You may know me from the YouTube Atheist Movement. Or not...

[Simone]

I have a complicated life, so I'll just copy paste from my introduction on the other forum. Pretty long I know, but please, bare with me....

Hello, my name is Simone. I've been going to private Catholic French Schools my whole life. French is my second language. I vaguely frequented the "Atheist Network" forums until it came time to create a thread, I later realized, that I did not know how to... But I do read posts daily. No, I am not a sped... At least my parents told me I wasn't... Anyways, I was raised in a very strict religious house hold, my mother, coming from the Buddhist side of things, and my father Catholic. Both their families, highly religious, my father having a priest as a brother, and my mother having a "Saint" as a brother he's a "Dalai Lama" like figure in their sect. Although I find it rather sad, they find it rather amazing. Anyways, even though my mother was of an extremely strong faith, my brother and I were brought up in Christianity. But at the tender age of seven drastic things were happening in my life, psychologically wise. my brother was having medical issues, and that would stress me and my parents . My brother being two years older than me. Me being seven at the time. So, as a normal religious follower every week on Sunday, when my brother, father and I would head off to church, I would pray for his health, every night, and morning, I would pray for his health. But years passed and not much happened, I honestly thought that God was angry with me. Maybe i was asking too much of him. Until he was later clinically diagnosed with a disorder called (tourettes). So, just weeks later I started seeing changes in him, and I (not knowing that he had started taking medications) thought that god had finally headed my prayers. So I naturally, started lashing out at myself for having doubted God's abilities, and having not believed in god. When I was later told that we was indeed on medications. So Later, at but the tender age of nine (for me) my brother jumped into a medical relapse, I not knowing what to do, started doubting god again because my prayers were being unanswered. And even when i would speak to my parents, they would tell me, "Maybe you are asking too much of him" or 'Well, you can't suddenly remember him when you need something". Then they started my brother on new medications. My parents called his new found health a miracle, and I, called it thanks to scientists and medication. So one night, I sat on my uncle's lap(the priest) and asked him, "why did the doctors help him, and God didn't" and I still remember his response, not in exact words of course, but please take into consideration that it's been years, "well, we're but humans, the doctors, and those fancy scientists wouldn't of been here in the first place hadn't God of created them." And me, being the little naive child that I was, I guess I believed him, but for a few months or so, i was getting tired of the same old responses, but seeing the family background that i come from, I could never tell them about me not believing in god. Until a few years ago. When my brother (the same one) told them that he did not believe in a or in plural forms of God. My parents were shocked, but they blamed his atheism on his state of mind. And the funny thing is that, my father is an educated man, MBA, engineer, and he's buying into all this, now I'm not trying to say that when you're religious you aren't smart, not at all, but really, I expected more from him. And to top off my beautiful and simple life, I was recently diagnosed with Bipolar disorder, and when my father (even though I prohibited him) he goes off to tell my grandmother of a Christian about it, she called me up and says "this too shall pass". And at that very moment, I could have killed her, she was so "lucky" that she was at the other side of the phone line, really. Then I told my father, okay, well, if your God is so powerful, I guess I won't be needing these meds anymore, and then he tells me "look, God is extremely powerful, but he works through us imperfect humans, so we have to take initiative to help him, help us."


Now out of the boring part. And into the more pass time part, I enjoy reading I guess, listening to music, diverse sorts such as:

Tarkan.

Maynard James Keenan!!!!!!!!!

Tool

A Perfect Circle

Rage Against The Machine

Placebo

System Of A Down

Acoustic Science

Mindless Self Indulgence

A.R Rehman

Disturbed

Nine Inch Nails

Arash

Rammstein

Skinny Puppy

Storm Large

Radiohead

Smashing Pumpkins

King Crimson

Deftones

Puscifer

Skillet

Static X




And, yeah....

[McQ]

Welcome, Simone. Thanks for the in-depth background information. That's not an easy thing to deal with, let alone share.

And congrats on figuring out how to post!  

[tacoma_kyle]

Whats up? Seen TOOL live? Their amazing.

But yeah that one hing that annoys the hell out of me.

Ok there are the 'sorta' religous people (people that dont think about it and just say 'yeah' cause its what everyone else thinks) that for the most part dont care much if your a atheist but may avoid you a little lol. Probably my mom.

[Squid]

Welcome Simone.  Glad to have you.

[Tom62]

It's nice to see here another Rammstein fan on this forum!
Welcome Simone.

[joeactor]

Hi Simone - pleased to meet you!

JoeActor

[SteveS]

Hi Simone!

[Will]

Welcome.

[Simone]

Hi, thanks. Many more responses here than I had on the YouTubeAtheistMovement forum. Heh, really glad to be here too. I haven't been able to see Tool live in concert yet, although I plan on going the next time they come around. I had heard that they were coming by Hamilton (Steel Town) and so I was about to go, but I forgot the date, so I'm not sure if it passed or not... Hmm... Maynard's voice is beautiful heard anywhere. But I heard that the all the tickets were sold out. Maybe next time around?

[Naked4Jesus]

I have a complicated life, so I'll just copy paste from my introduction on the other forum. Pretty long I know, but please, bare with me....

Hello, my name is Simone. I've been going to private Catholic French Schools my whole life. French is my second language. I vaguely frequented the "Atheist Network" forums until it came time to create a thread, I later realized, that I did not know how to... But I do read posts daily. No, I am not a sped... At least my parents told me I wasn't... Anyways, I was raised in a very strict religious house hold, my mother, coming from the Buddhist side of things, and my father Catholic. Both their families, highly religious, my father having a priest as a brother, and my mother having a "Saint" as a brother he's a "Dalai Lama" like figure in their sect. Although I find it rather sad, they find it rather amazing. Anyways, even though my mother was of an extremely strong faith, my brother and I were brought up in Christianity. But at the tender age of seven drastic things were happening in my life, psychologically wise. my brother was having medical issues, and that would stress me and my parents . My brother being two years older than me. Me being seven at the time. So, as a normal religious follower every week on Sunday, when my brother, father and I would head off to church, I would pray for his health, every night, and morning, I would pray for his health. But years passed and not much happened, I honestly thought that God was angry with me. Maybe i was asking too much of him. Until he was later clinically diagnosed with a disorder called (tourettes). So, just weeks later I started seeing changes in him, and I (not knowing that he had started taking medications) thought that god had finally headed my prayers. So I naturally, started lashing out at myself for having doubted God's abilities, and having not believed in god. When I was later told that we was indeed on medications. So Later, at but the tender age of nine (for me) my brother jumped into a medical relapse, I not knowing what to do, started doubting god again because my prayers were being unanswered. And even when i would speak to my parents, they would tell me, "Maybe you are asking too much of him" or 'Well, you can't suddenly remember him when you need something". Then they started my brother on new medications. My parents called his new found health a miracle, and I, called it thanks to scientists and medication. So one night, I sat on my uncle's lap(the priest) and asked him, "why did the doctors help him, and God didn't" and I still remember his response, not in exact words of course, but please take into consideration that it's been years, "well, we're but humans, the doctors, and those fancy scientists wouldn't of been here in the first place hadn't God of created them." And me, being the little naive child that I was, I guess I believed him, but for a few months or so, i was getting tired of the same old responses, but seeing the family background that i come from, I could never tell them about me not believing in god. Until a few years ago. When my brother (the same one) told them that he did not believe in a or in plural forms of God. My parents were shocked, but they blamed his atheism on his state of mind. And the funny thing is that, my father is an educated man, MBA, engineer, and he's buying into all this, now I'm not trying to say that when you're religious you aren't smart, not at all, but really, I expected more from him. And to top off my beautiful and simple life, I was recently diagnosed with Bipolar disorder, and when my father (even though I prohibited him) he goes off to tell my grandmother of a Christian about it, she called me up and says "this too shall pass". And at that very moment, I could have killed her, she was so "lucky" that she was at the other side of the phone line, really. Then I told my father, okay, well, if your God is so powerful, I guess I won't be needing these meds anymore, and then he tells me "look, God is extremely powerful, but he works through us imperfect humans, so we have to take initiative to help him, help us."


Now out of the boring part. And into the more pass time part, I enjoy reading I guess, listening to music, diverse sorts such as:

Tarkan.

Maynard James Keenan!!!!!!!!!

Tool

A Perfect Circle

Rage Against The Machine

Placebo

System Of A Down

Acoustic Science

Mindless Self Indulgence

A.R Rehman

Disturbed

Nine Inch Nails

Arash

Rammstein

Skinny Puppy

Storm Large

Radiohead

Smashing Pumpkins

King Crimson

Deftones

Puscifer

Skillet

Static X




And, yeah....

Very interesting and I'm sure a lot of us can share some of those specific experiences with you.  We've all been told god works in mysterious ways and that we're too stupid to analyze god. I never bought it because if god was so smart why would he even need us, why create us?  A god that is perfect is complete and needs nothing else isn't going to start creating imperfect beings out of boredom unless what we have on our hands is a really bored god and then we're all in trouble and better start dancing, singing and giving him something to laugh about.  Here's my contribution:

One  beautiful Sunday morning, a priest announced to his congregation:  "My good  people,  I have here in my hands three sermons...a $100 sermon that lasts five minutes, a $50 sermon that lasts fifteen minutes, and a $10 sermon that lasts a full hour.  "Now, we'll take the collection and see which one I'll deliver."