chansen
Coming out to parents as an atheist
Posted on: 09/19/2013 22:48
This topic has fascinated me recently. I was browsing reddit just now, and came across another story where a 16-year-old announced he was an atheist to his family, and his mother has since refused to feed him under her roof.
I don't go to r/atheism all that much. It used to be such a circle jerk, but to their credit they cleaned the place up of a lot of the crappy meme attempts. The infighting, of course, continues. I still have no interest in posting to atheist communities, it's pointless.
But still, it seems like every week there is a kid coming from a deeply religious family who announces or confesses that he or she is an atheist, and the parents either kick them out or severely restrict their privledges or refuse to pay tuition until they profess belief again.
The r/atheism FAQ even lists the preferred way to come out as an atheist. Essentially, they recommend the kids lie:
Should I come out to my parents as being an atheist?
The short answer is "No."
The slightly longer answer is that if you are not in a position where that is likely to end well for you, you should probably wait until you're more self-sufficient. However, you know your own parents better than we do. You could try breaking the ice on the subject of atheism to get a feel for their reaction to it in general, if you're not sure. Always keep in mind that for many people religion is a highly emotive subject, and for many parents who have been raised to believe in the "moral superiority" of religious belief, a child who comes out as an atheist can be interpreted as a betrayal of them or as a failure of their own.
In some religions, it can actually be dangerous to "out" yourself. If you're coming from one of those, keep that in mind as well.
r/atheism will almost invariably respond that you should wait. A common proverb here is "The best place to come out to your parents is at a home you own, over a dinner that you paid for yourself".
If you do decide to "come out," then consider that "atheist" has many evil, hateful connotations to religious people. It's right up there with "Satanist." You might be able to reduce the amount of flak you get by choosing a label for yourself that has a similar meaning but is less controversial. Please consider using an alternative such as "agnostic" or "humanist", which does not carry quite as much baggage.
There's also another approach: You could say "I've lost my belief" or "I don't know what to believe any more" or even "God doesn't speak to me any more." Asked if you are an atheist, you could say "I don't know."
This makes you look less like a monster and more like a victim. You'll be subject to sympathy rather than anger. You won't be kicked out. But you run the risk of having folks work really hard to bring you back to God. Expect (more) frequent church visits, and maybe a talk with the priest/pastor/counsellor.
Now, I absolutely hate lying, but I can not think of a better response. In many cases it seems these are loving parents. Normal parents. Who then flip out when their child does not believe in the correct way. I thought the FAQ explained it well, that in some cases, the parent will consider it their own failing when their child loses faith.
I understand that the majority of UCCan parents would not act in this way. I understand a lot of your own kids are probably atheists or agnostics, as the terms are commonly used.
So, what advice would a UCCan member give to a neighbour kid who's family belongs to a strict evangelical church, and wants to tell his parents that he just doesn't believe? Is there a better way to go about it?
For reference, here are some stories I dug up. There is just a steady stream of these cases at r/atheism:
http://www.reddit.com/r/atheism/comments/1mqjep/told_my_parents_didnt_end_well/
http://www.reddit.com/r/atheism/comments/1m5cy9/atheist_among_strict_christian_parents/
http://www.reddit.com/r/atheism/comments/1lb6jh/i_need_help_coming_out_to_my_parents_about_being/
http://www.reddit.com/r/atheism/comments/1lwtft/mildly_terrified/
http://www.reddit.com/r/atheism/comments/1lw8t7/you_can_never_leave_mormonism_as_a_teenager/
http://www.reddit.com/r/atheism/comments/zs415/my_english_teacher_told_my_parents_i_am_an/
http://www.reddit.com/r/atheism/comments/emt6r/to_all_ratheisms_younger_readers_dont_come_out_to/
And, in case you feel like being angry today:
http://www.reddit.com/r/atheism/comments/q6is0/in_september_2009_after_admitting_to_my_parents/
Comments
airclean33
Posted on: 09/20/2013 11:45
Hi Chansen-- So do you believe it is easy for Christain parents? Not in this world Chansen. I became a christian when I was 33. I had my children a few years befor that. My daughter an son . Chose not to follow . Both went the way of the world. I never stoped loving them . Or praying for them. Today one has chose to become a Minister for GOD. He has a much more Displinted walk with GOD than I do. My Daughter just took vows with her secound husband as she divorced the first. She tells me now she has also vowed to come back to her walk with GOD. But heres the kicker. Her new husband who didn't know GOD or seem to want to . Has also vowed to walk with Christ. An has taken to read the word out loud for both of them , Really all I can say is thank GOD , a prayer answered. My children grew up knowing Gods way. The world was kind enough to teach them there way. All I could do or believed I should was to try and teach Christ though my life and pray alot. The rest was up to them an GOD. --airclean33 PS-- I am so happy to know we will spend much more time together and my grand children and there children now have a open door. All Glory To GOD..
John Wilson
Posted on: 09/20/2013 12:10
Consider that John Wilson couln't believe what I was taught
That is not true. I merely do not understand your posts.
gecko46
Posted on: 09/20/2013 12:13
Adding a little levity....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=lFWA1A9XFi8#t=11
Rev. Steven Davis
Posted on: 09/20/2013 12:26
Consider that John Wilson couln't believe what I was taught
That is not true. I merely do not understand your posts.
LOL!!!
SG
Posted on: 09/20/2013 12:40
I went to school in the US. My elementary school years were in Michigan in the 1970's. There was no longer a BIble verse read or The Lord's Prayer recited, but there was a lot of time spent out in the hall or at the principal's office because I was Jewish. The Jehovah Witness family would go to the hall every day when the Pledge of Allegiance was said. (In Pa, it was a sign of being Amish, Mennonite or Quaker) For me, I was in the hall during the Easter party and the Christmas party. I am not sure I can make anyone understand what it feels like to be sitting outside listening to all your freinds laughing, singing, gettingtreats. It did nothing to make me want to be a Christian or to not like being a Jew. It made me wonder how stupid it was that I could not sing songs or play games about a fictional rabbit that laid eggs or a fat old B&E artist or have chocolate eggs and balls or jelly beans and marshmallow peeps because it went against someone's "religion". I was "different", so out to the hall. Why weren't they in the hall for Jewish holidays? It was the office for Christmas pageant rehearsals and the event. This is before Holiday and Winter pageants. Mary and Jospeh were there in those days. Everyone got a nice white shirt and got their picture taken. They got fussed over and received applause and love. I sat in the principal's office feeling what any kid would. I was always told to write during the time, stories instead of sentences, but it still always felt like I had done something wrong.
kaythecurler
Posted on: 09/20/2013 15:00
Adzgari - in response to your question above - my friend (and I) decided it was just easier to keep our mouths shut about things that would cause our parents to freak out. In my case it wasn't the religion thing. By the time one is a teen they know their parents fairly well - my older sister chose to argue and push their buttons over and over. Eventually she rushed into a marriage to get away from home.
Kimmio
Posted on: 09/20/2013 23:06
I went to school in the US. My elementary school years were in Michigan in the 1970's. There was no longer a BIble verse read or The Lord's Prayer recited, but there was a lot of time spent out in the hall or at the principal's office because I was Jewish. The Jehovah Witness family would go to the hall every day when the Pledge of Allegiance was said. (In Pa, it was a sign of being Amish, Mennonite or Quaker) For me, I was in the hall during the Easter party and the Christmas party. I am not sure I can make anyone understand what it feels like to be sitting outside listening to all your freinds laughing, singing, gettingtreats. It did nothing to make me want to be a Christian or to not like being a Jew. It made me wonder how stupid it was that I could not sing songs or play games about a fictional rabbit that laid eggs or a fat old B&E artist or have chocolate eggs and balls or jelly beans and marshmallow peeps because it went against someone's "religion". I was "different", so out to the hall. Why weren't they in the hall for Jewish holidays? It was the office for Christmas pageant rehearsals and the event. This is before Holiday and Winter pageants. Mary and Jospeh were there in those days. Everyone got a nice white shirt and got their picture taken. They got fussed over and received applause and love. I sat in the principal's office feeling what any kid would. I was always told to write during the time, stories instead of sentences, but it still always felt like I had done something wrong.
That's awful, SG. You know, my memories of school days always seemed pretty 'secular', but thinking back today I realized there was religion, and religious division/ exclusion even in the late 70s early 80s on the west coast of British Columbia Canada then too. I don't really know where my Jewish classmate went when we read the NT. I dread the thought, hopefully a false memory, that she waited in the hallway. I don't know if she stayed for assemblies when we read the LP, or made Christmas and Easter art or not. I am not sure if her parents would have objected to Santa and Easter Eggs, and St. Partick's Day (my parents never made mention of their religious significance, except Christmas, sort of because I was taught about it at home but it the religious focus wasn't the main focus; and maybe Easter to a lesser degree, none of those events had any religious significance in my house. They were just festive occassions). I just remember her leaving for the bible readings. The NT I assume. She was the only one I remember leaving the classroom. I am glad that they stopped reading the bible at school.
Azdgari
Posted on: 09/21/2013 00:20
Adzgari - in response to your question above - my friend (and I) decided it was just easier to keep our mouths shut about things that would cause our parents to freak out. In my case it wasn't the religion thing. By the time one is a teen they know their parents fairly well - my older sister chose to argue and push their buttons over and over. Eventually she rushed into a marriage to get away from home.
seeler
Posted on: 09/21/2013 09:26
I don't spend much time on the computer for a few days (except for playing Scrabble) and a new thread is two pages long before I stumble upon it.
.
My initial response to the OP before reading further: . Don't these families talk to each other?
and
Where is the love?
.
Talk - why is there any question about 'coming out'? Haven't these people talked to each other over the years? ask questions? made comments? My granddaughter was only about seven when she first asked me if I really believed in the physical resurrection, and I first detected some of her doubts. My grandson at nine is asking questions: why does God let Grammy's arm shake like that? Why doesn't he do something? I wouldn't be surprised if, at some point in their lives, one or both of them decides that atheism is a better description of where they are than theism does. It's not something they would have to announce.
.
Love - I can't imagine anything that my children could do or think or say that would stop me from loving them. Being hurt by them - yes. But stop loving them??? It seems to me that if I were the parent of a mass murderer I would still love him. So why would I turn away someone who wasn't spiritually at the same place as I am. Rather than refuse to have them eat at my table, I might welcome the opportunity for some interesting discussion.
.
But then - I'm UCC.
However I do have a Baptist neighbour - her four children were raised in a strict, and loving, Baptist home. They went to Sunday School, youth group, church. I am quite sure both her sons would consider themselves atheists - although the oldest's children are being raised in the RC church of his wife. One daughter attends her parents' church and is raising her children in that church. The other, I'm not sure about. But I don't think there is any conflict. She prays for her children. They lovingly laugh at her 'old fashion' beliefs. But they are all welcome to come home and join in family birthdays, anniversaries, graduations. I have no idea if the boys ever 'came out' to their parents. I also am quite sure that the parents know, or have a pretty good idea, that their sons do not believe as they do.
.
Now back to reading through the thread. Sorry if I've been repetitive of what others might have said.
WaterBuoy
Posted on: 09/21/2013 11:00
Consider that John Wilson couln't believe what I was taught
That is not true. I merely do not understand your posts.
LOL!!!
I found this funny too that in a world where "god as pure Love" results in so much hate and shunning of the other. Although this gets to be a sort of devilish thing if you think about it ... and still I hear some ministers preach monotheistically that emotions are all there is ... and you shouldn't intellectualize on this. Dumb emotions are bad to "someone" as compared to emotions connected to intelligence? How could this be? Is the "someone" who despises intellect of an alternate desire than what would be wise as a passion? Is this mental etude such alien process in which god as wisdom is excised? Causes some po'pagans to sink into thought ... a dark po'el eight ... that goes on and on as an infinte standup, ET'ic or vert-egos as it dizzies some ...
Such Nexis can be seen to be an "exis; exodus" of something or other, leading to imbalance.
What happened to the god of wisdom? Roman tradition canned that one and it even was carried over in protest-ante-ism!
Then when you look at the mess the world is in due to Roman Based belief systems ...
Does this leave anybody that processes theology in a state of disbelief? Then one could accept it blindly, without process! Dogma's breakfast thus becomes ß'ichthy regurgitation.
I'yam just asking as I am told I am too confusing to understand. Perhaps some other raptured person's problem? Po'de um sol' ... doesn't understand strange words and tongues. Did the bible say something about understanding being positive? Perhaps just create-ism as addressed to satyr-ism ... or other form of danty'ole allegory? A danty-ism of intelligence, hated by brutes and bull-ism type as severed from the genteel sort of Eyre beast ... de voided mind? Funny? That's Eve' in rapturous abstract of the dark lil'ethe ... but if you don't understand ethe/eshe/ð your left in the dust ... sort of in a dervish? Ever see a collective of Ka Miles crossing the arid wilderness ... that's space that's volumous in an emotional mind needing a whet ... and thus to be sharpened to the detailings of creation.
Then the gods of the time (as lording it over the land) believed self-centred cognizance of their own personal acceptance (of love from the folk around them) was good ... after this they had little to give!
Such attitudes left later generations stupified in disbelief of what was done to the ancient infinite concept ... that conception being larger than a mortal can imagine without a spot for the infinitely humble; regressive jinns, or deportation of thought; di Pi's or DP's! Such is somewhat subtle for the KISS Principle ... and thus complexities and other rationales were subverted ... this still goes on parallel to monotheism as some bright star in the intelligent Middle East once said about singular things not looked at from outside as in uncertainty of Thomas Principle about doubting anything down here that the bible opened to question ... I Corinthians 12:29-31 simply defines greed without the Job of processing the gifts (a'Donii, or a grace in old tongues as a curio's idée) being that few really question the enigmatic book as demanded in I Thessalonions 5:21 and it's Nexis (Greek Hexis?) with contempt for not questioning. For those that have no wish to know ... leave eM in a fog as mystical clouds can be ...a' Haze I à or Ahaziah coming right after the beauty of the solar wind ... a ruagh stir of etheral parts?
It is said that neither Roman or Jew allowed for infinite or nothing ... so the Hebrew form must have been a priori means to Nexis ... that connection across an excessive hungry void? This alas could be a lie or a myth ... the differentiation thereof I'm not allowed to know as shunned paegan (just common fecundity or the other kind of taurus). So I have to think ... perhaps high flight or the odd fleize is beta as sprung ... leads to "lev' or survival of wadis left ... projected on the right mind as reversed in reflection though the dark warped mirror ... space as described by Einstein ... having unseen dimples! Could we all be contained in êrè joke by outside powers? This be deis-ism if you know the otherside to it as imbeded in the depth of theis hades form across the page ... literaried vice, or just literarie-de-vice as profound satyr for those who giggle remotely ... the afte blast ephe meis ... that's Ur ... vege tative eruption!
Do you authorities (on soul) know how many times people like me have been told about thinking complexly? It gets so it is irrational from my perspective ... sometime called mythically phun neigh to what you don't know that's ebin sayed before ... really, really sadeistic as laid on the unseeing, unhearing,and unspeaking mon'quis as they are not un-knowing what they learned in the process as considered kind awe Eyred ... the process of narð ... nerd or what the Hebrew lady called nada ... it is nothing that you can make of ...
WaterBuoy
Posted on: 09/21/2013 11:07
Is a god of pure love sort of ignorant about his wise side? Does excess passion sort of blind emon as in a crime of emotions?
Could explain the chit we'rein ... like a bump in the night as it falls on the upper portions of the fecund soul ... some fearful whet'n that needs time to mellow the whine ... to fading whisper of memesi ...