I created this account ages ago, but haven't had much time to read the forums and such.  I am an unemployed IT geek in Portland, OR.  It's almost 10 months since I was laid off and I'm REALLY REALLY bored.  Retirement fund?  What retirement?  Ah, well. 

I finally officially became an atheist about 30 years ago.  My husband has been an atheist all his life.  I kept trying to fit in with friends and neighbors.  Religion never really worked for me - something about giving up control of my life to Jesus.  And punishing a child for a wrong doing for their entire life - and their children, and grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, and..... What kind of sadist is this god???  Or the impossibility of a being who is all-knowing, all-powerful, all-benevolent and yet just look at the world around you!  Are you blind?

And the inconsistencies - take this part from the old testament, this part from the new, but ignore everything that doesn't fit with your religion's philosophies.  And so what if it is all out of context-believe what the preacher says to believe.  Check you brain at the door just doesn't work for me.

It was just icing on the cake to discover that the Bible was largely made up by a bunch of goat herders.  Nice guys, I'm sure.  But how do you explain genetics to someone who doesn't understand cellular biology?  Or billions of years when they don't have zeros and count their years by the generations of their ancestors?

So, now I can say-

-- I feel so much better since I gave up trying to believe.