I was just wondering how some of you told your friends/family that you were Atheist and their reactions to it.
I don't talk about it a lot. It's funny, because I so enjoy being active on here, but in my real life, my lack of religion doesn't come up that often, and I don't really feel the need to "announce" myself unless it comes up.
With my parents, (who are Evangelical Christians) it first came up when I was marrying my husband. My parents wanted me to have a church wedding, and I said that I wasn't getting married in a church. I think that is the first time I ever said the words "But I'm not a Christian" when my dad asked me if I would feel weird about not having a "Christian marriage." From there the conversation kind of devolved into "what are you?" "nothing."
My husband's family is Jewish, and they know that I am not. I'll never forget one time his cousin (who is fairly religious) asked me what religion I am, or if I go to church. I said "I go to the church of let's just try to love one another and be nice to one another. That's hard enough most of the time." He said "Yep, that's true." Although honestly, being Jewish, he was probably just relieved to hear that I'm not a big bible thumping Christian!
Most of my friends are atheist, so there wasn't really a huge "coming out" scene with them.
Other than that, like I said, I typically don't talk about it unless directly asked. My coworkers know that I don't celebrate Christmas, but I think most of them assume I'm Jewish (by marriage, I have a very Jewish last name.) If asked, I will tell people because I'm certainly not ashamed of who I am or what I believe, but I don't really feel the need to bring it up to people if they don't ask.
I've never told my family. All my friends know.
Quote from: Ali on January 31, 2012, 05:29:32 AM
I don't talk about it a lot. It's funny, because I so enjoy being active on here, but in my real life, my lack of religion doesn't come up that often, and I don't really feel the need to "announce" myself unless it comes up.
That's pretty much how it was for me as well. My Dad and the oldest of my brothers knew right away because the three of us always had a close relationship and talked to each other a lot so you could say they had ringside seats to the on-going process. With everyone else tho, when it came up I mentioned it but otherwise I didn't bother.
My parents didn't believe either, so no coming out required. My close friends all know too, and I can't remember how or why it ever might have come up. I just take it in stride and mention in casually to friends. Now, if I'm meeting people I don't know well, and religion comes up, I ease into it. I might say I'm a non-believer or secular humanist, and then when they ask for clarification I add to it. As a younger person I didn't talk religion with people I didn't know well. Now that I'm older (I'm in my 50s) I'm not generally afraid to be very open about who I am.
There are exceptions. Distant relatives who are bible-literalist, young earth creationist, bible-thumping ... I'm pretty quiet around them. Partly I'm afraid of what they'll say/think. And partly I'm afraid of what I'll say/think. I think, but am not sure, that if they lived closer than a 2-day drive away, I'd bring up the conversation. I stayed with one of them for several days a few years ago when I was traveling through the bible belt. I didn't say their grace at table. I didn't say amen. I didn't go to church. So they probably got some kind of clue.
I think if my parents had been believers it would come up around going to church. Sorry, Mom, I don't want to go to church. Why? I don't believe. And then go from there.
By the way, even the most religious of potential friends with whom I've had the conversation with have been very accepting (at least to my face), probably because I'm pretty diplomatic about it. I'll say stuff about how there are many paths up the mountain, and I figure if we're all good people it shouldn't matter what we believe. Stuff like that.
99% of my friends are also atheist or something close to it.
With family I just don't worry about it unless it comes up in conversation; and it rarely does. Those that would care have kinda blocked out finding out; especially the longer time goes by (classic denial)...my mom has a tendency to forward me some of those junk god text messages...whatever. I just don't see a point in causing turmoil around the family unless they express a belief that I find abhorrent; and my family tends to be fairly liberal in their views so it's not a common problem. I definitely corrected the whole "atheists are evil" talk when it came out of my mom's mouth a few years back...she hasn't said anything similar since then. It says freethinker on my facebook so any family I'm friends with on there can see it and look it up...wouldn't surprise me if they have since facebook might as well be called stalk-book.
Well, things got kind of complicated for me. When I was an Atheist for the first time I was pretty open to people that weren't my parents and grandparents. However, when I say "open", I don't mean I went around calling myself an Atheist. I stayed more safe by mostly calling myself an Agnostic. I had my religion on Facebook set to Agnostic, for example. However, some were aware of my Atheism. My exact ways of telling them I don't remember.
Now after supposedly going back to Christianity for four years, I kind of have to do it all over again. Three of my IRL friends I have already let know I was an Atheist. Not in the way that I was like "I need to tell you something - I'm an Atheist." The first one is one who I mostly have contact through with LiveJournal these days. I commonly make LJ updates about my feelings on society, religion, etc. So I just made one that I had decided to stop lying to myself and go back to being an Atheist. The second friend is one who is very outspoken about being an Atheist, so with them I just told them since it's something they talk about a lot anyway. The third one I just told after we were talking about religion for some reason and he told me he was an Atheist, so I just said I was one as well.
I'm not going there with my family. There's no need to. They don't make me go to church, but they are still pretty strong in belief.
It was a really gradual process due mostly to my Dad's large Irish Catholic family. I actually went through all 7 sacraments despite having doubts from an early age. I tried to believe for the sake of my Dad so I eventually called myself Agnostic when he asked for me to give it more time. Once I came to college and started reading books and hearing conflicting opinions I got a chance to think for myself for once and I just started telling people I was atheist when I met them, all my friends know and most agree. I havent really gotten around to formally telling my family, but since they are all friends of mine on FaceBook they see I am a REALLY active atheist
Dude. You are not an atheist. I'm sorry to break this to you, but you're a theist. It's okay. No one's perfect.
Quote from: Mocha Chief on January 31, 2012, 02:29:19 AM
I was just wondering how some of you told your friends/family that you were Atheist and their reactions to it.
To answer the question more directly, my maternal grandmother kept writing to me about god wanting me to do this and that and, being young and impatient then, I eventually wrote back that I was an atheist so it was moot. She blamed my mother for my "goathood" and thought it looked bad that somebody in her family was going to hell. My mother found it difficult to talk about my going to hell when I visited because my youngest brothers were usually following me around and she thought it would have been confusing to explain to them why I was hellbound. All my brothers are relatively religious but if any thinks I am going to hell they haven't mentioned it to me.
I don't know how much of that side of my family knows I'm an atheist, but considering what a gossip my grandmother was I wouldn't be surprised if it got around. Fortunately, it doesn't matter since, other than my brothers, I've never been close with my maternal relatives.
My best friend is Agnostic. So was my mom. My gf is pretty much atheist too. The ONLY person who seems to have an issue is my super christian dad.
He won't out right put me down about, but he's a snarky fuck who says things like "you'll find your way back to god" and "i was a non believer around your age."
I want to kick him in his face.
He really doesn't matter much to me anyway. Only my mom did...
Well for me, I told my closest friends right away. They all accepted me and didn't look at me too differently. Which is all I really care about. But when I told my Mother (who I live with) and stepfather, they looked at me and told me I wasn't Atheist... Which pissed me off. They said I was just going through a stage in my life and that it wouldn't last long. My stepdad continually told me I could not be Atheist because I had been Baptized. He said that because of that, I would always be a Baptist, and therefore it was impossible for me to be Atheist. I never agreed with him and knew they wouldn't take me seriously right away. So after a few months they finally got around to believing me, but they still don't accept it, so I don't bring it up unless it's necessary. My Dad has always been Atheist, so when I told him he didn't really disagree much, but instead he thought it was pretty cool. When i go to his place we have a good bit of discussions, our last one being Evolution. I do go to church every now and then with my friends cuz they bug me about it so much, but that hasn't really driven me into believing. They know this, so here recently i just stopped going with them. Other than that, I don't bring up religion unless someone asks me about it. And even then I don't really say the word Atheist unless I have to. I have only 4 or so friends that are also Atheist, the rest of them being Christians. So none of us talk bout religion much.
I ordered The God Delusion on our family Amazon account, which sent my mom the e-mail that her order had been shipped. Let's just say that was an awkward confrontation. Kinda ruined fall break.