Well, welcome to you. I'm glad we could help you embrace reason.

But don't thank us, thank yourself. You're the one who examined the arguments and evidence, and you're the one who ultimately made up your own mind.

We simply provided some resources and counter-points.

Welcome to the community.

Ditto above, and welcome! Hope you get more from this site as you reply and post, we really thrive on community here, so make yourself at home!

Welcome. You have just stepped in a new and wonderful world. A place where you can express your thoughts and contribute to the expansion of the human mind.
Most of us have had a prior religious delusion, and have waded through the sea of doubt, and overcame our initial fear of living a life without a god/religion.
We would be extremely interested in hearing the story of your enlightenment.
If you have any questions, there are plenty of intelligent and caring people here that would be more than willing to help you out.
See ya' in the forums.

Thank for the support guys!

I will type some of my story here and then repost it all in the other thread.

I "accepted Jesus christ" into my heart as my personal savior at a church camp in 3rd grade. I lived in a house hold that didnt go to church but i had friends that invited me. I attended this all through middle school and attended a local youth group. When i started highschool i actualy became a counseler at the youth camp.

I would say that was my highest point in my religious life, during my first three years of highschool i was a full time youth group attendee, and a christian camp counseler for three weeks every summer.
I knew chrisianity well and it wasnt uncommon to see me debating my mormon friends. I live in an idaho small town were religion is extreamly promenant.

My real connection was in worship, i loved christian rock and i associated the emotions that came with worship with a connection to god. I believed the bands, how could these people make this music and not know god.
Air1.radio was a major part of my life and them along with other pastors in my life i believed they truely what they were talking about. I figured someday i would understand what they understud.

My world got rocked by a Challenge posted on myspace in august one month after the summer camp, it was a godisimaginary video about prayer. I immediatly fired up an email to the original poster tearing the email apart. I then follwed the link to this webpage. I ended up listening to a few of the radio shows and writtting down all the questions they asked christians figuring i would just do research on all the questions online and by asking my pastors and then come back and give all the answers.

i didnt find any. I just found more athiest info. conincedentaly during this time at school we were starting a section about ISLAM in my western civ class. Even though it was purly on a historical basis you could how fake it was when you learned about it. Then i saw a godisimaginary.com video about the christian delusion bubble, it asked me why i believed in christianity if i thought muslims were crazy.

That was the turning point. I went from christian to Athiest in about 3 months. Literaly, i can see clearly now. I hear christians talk about their religion and all i can think about are the fallacys in it. I understand all the points made on the RRS.

Currently i am preparing to "come out of the closet" at school.....i dont really know how to tell anyone at school because athiesm is almost unheard of. I do have one friend who has been athiest all along but has never told anyone.....he has refrained from saying i told you so.

just a slight note on the summer camp that i attended/counseled at. Its nothing like Jesus camp, no crazy gods army stuff. just your basic jesus loves you kinda thing. I am really torn here, as much as i disagree with indoctrination i think that camp might have been the best thing that ever happend to me. the reason being i still ended up seeing the light, but christianity gave me the personality i have today and im not sure if i would be the same with out it.

thanks for letting me share, please forgive the typos.

Heh, wow. I happen to live in Idaho as well. It's not totally unheard of.

Hey! What's wrong with Massachusetts!?

I've lived in MA for my whole life (outside 4 years of college in Indiana). People out here are definately less religious.

And to you ChAnMaN: Congrats on opening your eyes and seeing the world how it really is. I wish I could offer you advice on "comming out" but my dad and brother are both atheists, so it wasn't really a big deal for me.

I too credit my upbringing with the person I am today, and there are parts of it I still hold near and dear to me. Some of the most loving people I know are Christian, and I PROMISED myself I would not be blinded by the anger I felt towards my indoctrination and forget the good that I had learned. People here are generally angry towards religion, don't let that turn you off. There ARE nice atheists!

Thanks, the video didn't really prove much, I will have to read the "Proofs that prayer doesn't work" post when I get more time.

It takes a lot of courage to admit it. I hope you can avoid the 'anger pitfalls' of deconversion. It can really grate on your nerves for a while after you realize that religion has 'duped' you. I know that I was mad. After 'mad', it turned to pity for others still in the faith, and now I'm at the 'incredulous' phase.

I agree with darth_josh, as I said in my "I Am Every Atheist" essay, The hardest thing you'll ever have to deal with is not the life you live after you've lost your belief, but coming to terms with the life you wasted before you got up the courage. Reading Richard Dawkins books is not only a good way to put these things in perspective, but it's also quite educational, as he covers quite a few subjects. Living in an area with a high concentration of religious people can sometimes drive you into spending all your time online. (Hence the massive online atheist population) but you have to force yourself to still keep real friends, and maybe even use the internet to find freethinking individuals nearby that you can meet with in real life.