Atheists: What drew you to CAF?

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DaddyGirl said:
No, I wasn’t shocked about anything regarding diversity among Catholics. Not sure how you got that impresson.
Yes…Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, Islam, and more…they will be around for quite a while, I imagine.
But my worry isn’t about the religions not being here…it’s about the difficulties I see many Catholics having that they post about on this site.

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Such as???
mlz
 
DaddyGirl said:
When I first stumbled onto the site, I wasn’t an Atheist.
Both my parents had been brought up Eastern Orthodox and I was baptized, etc. We didn’t go to church every Sunday, tho…it was more an Easter, Xmas thing. I do remember going to Sunday school as a kid and thinking: What they are saying makes no sense!!
But until a few years ago, I always in general believed there was a “God”.

A lot of what I read here led me to becoming an Atheist.
I began exploring the origins and evolution of Christianity with historical books, college courses, and lectures on my ipod as I walked in Central Park. I tried to learn as much as possible about Catholicism (and other religions, too) here on this forum, listening to members and apologists and making notes, keeping files, doing follow-up research.

The more I read, the more I listened…the stronger and clearer my disbelief got.
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Yes, this is my experience also. I carefully studied the bible, the history of late antiquity, the writings of the “early church fathers,” Augustine, the medieval theologians, the mystic saints of the Renaissance, the melodramatic saints of the 17-20th century, the councils of Trent, Vatican 1, and Vatican 2 as well as Ott’s Fundamentals of Dogma. I have not read nor studied the entire Summa Theologiae but I’ve taken Peter Kreeft’s course about it, and I’ve studied large portions of it. I’ve spent years and years researching Catholicism deeply. I’ve taken courses and read countless books. I’ve examined primary and secondary sources. I’ve researched the miracles, visited shrines, talked to priests, bishops, theologians, and Catholic philosophers. I’ve studied multiple catechisms front to back and over again; it used to be my daily practice to study a few pages of the newest Catechism each morning. I’ve also spent some significant time on this website and reading the works of contemporary American apologists. I’ve personally met and talked to a few of the well-known (in this particular spiritual and intellectual ghetto) apologists associated with the various groups started as a response to the “New Evangelization™.”

Why all this study? I was born a Catholic and while attending college, some campus ministry group agitated me to start “evangelizing” others. They use a kind of peer-based-marketing scheme for Catholicism. Anyway, I figured I had better be prepared and knowledgeable if I was going to be an effective salesman!

Based on all of this research, my conclusion is that Catholicism can best be explained with a narrative other than “it’s the One True Faith® handed down whole and entire from the time of the apostles, never changing, always developing, and 100% true.” I won’t supply my alternative narrative here, because this is neither the time nor place.

However, through all of this, I still believe in God. I agree with many atheists that the supposed “proofs” for God are intellectually bankrupt, and there is no sufficient reason to believe in any of the various Christian versions of God, but does this wipe out any possibility of God?

I don’t proselytize so I won’t say any more than this: if you’re curious, try reading Maimonides’ Guide For The Perplexed while suspending all the Christian notions of God’s attributes.
 
PumpkinCookie.
Your story is fascinating. You have undertaken a herculean effort of reading and studying the gospel, the history of the church and many foundational documents. You reject all Christian claims and hint at having developed or discovered an alternative view. Does this alternative have anything in common with what the church calls the heresies (Nestorian, etc.) so common in the early days of Christianity?
 
DaddyGirl said:
Hi Christine…

I guess that other thread we were on inspired this one, yes?
I appreciate that you are curious about this and that you ask.

I accidentally stumbled onto CAF a few years ago when I was doing research for a book I was working on. One of my subjects was Catholic and I was trying to fact-check some teachings and doctrine via google. Each time I did, the CAF site was the top listing to come up. I had no idea what it was.

At first, I was reading to try and find the answers to my questions.
Then, I stayed because…after reading just a few of the questions, comments, and debates on the forum, I was…well, I was in SHOCK.
I was shocked by what some people were thinking, feeling, and saying here…I was stunned to learn what the Catholic teachings and doctrine were…and I had to stay to try and figure out why people believed it.
I’ve always been interested in psychology and I wanted to understand the psychology of faith and belief and why someone picked one religion, one set of beliefs, over others.

When I first stumbled onto the site, I wasn’t an Atheist.
Both my parents had been brought up Eastern Orthodox and I was baptized, etc. We didn’t go to church every Sunday, tho…it was more an Easter, Xmas thing. I do remember going to Sunday school as a kid and thinking: What they are saying makes no sense!!
But until a few years ago, I always in general believed there was a “God”.

A lot of what I read here led me to becoming an Atheist.
I began exploring the origins and evolution of Christianity with historical books, college courses, and lectures on my ipod as I walked in Central Park. I tried to learn as much as possible about Catholicism (and other religions, too) here on this forum, listening to members and apologists and making notes, keeping files, doing follow-up research.

The more I read, the more I listened…the stronger and clearer my disbelief got.

Another reason I stay is to hear people’s reactions along the way to the changing world–like the laws on same-sex marriage or the words of the new pope.
That so many here get so angry or fearful or confused when the pope speaks a tad more inclusively than other popes have in the past…compels me to stay and see what happens here, see if some specific people’s thoughts and feelings here will…soften, widen, lift.

Often, it’s frustrating. The people who complain here that many people–including the media-- have the wrong view of what a Catholic believes…are often the same people who make gross assumptions and have erroneous ideas about what an Atheist believes.

I have no specific desire to make anyone here an Atheist…even though many here have the opposing wish, wanting to evangelize and help steer people toward Catholicism.
But I do hope to encourage people–here and elsewhere–to think for themselves and research and ask questions.

The world is changing and the “nones” are rising and how people see religion is changing–quickly and drastically. The internet is speeding up the regular, organic process.

What people are talking about here is a good barometer of what’s to come in the near future.

I worry about many of you here.

And so…I stay.

.
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Do you stay as a spectator (one of the crowd), a participant (a disciple), an accuser (Pharisee) or judge (Pontius Pilate)?
 
PumpkinCookie said:
I don’t proselytize so I won’t say any more than this: if you’re curious, try reading Maimonides’ Guide For The Perplexed while suspending all the Christian notions of God’s attributes.
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Here is what one reviewer wrote about Maimonides:
He points out, what many readers of Maimonides fail to grasp, that Maimonides did not express his true views openly. Like most ancient philosophers, including Plato who called this the “noble lie,” he wrote for two audiences. He felt that the general public would see their own false notions in his writing, while the more intellectual readers would be able to mine the surface of his writings and discover his true views. He didn’t do this to hide these secrets from his fellow Jews, nor out of fear of reprisals. But exposing the general population to these truths could only lead to perplexity in the best of circumstances or to falling away from observance in the worst of circumstances, neither of which Maimonides had any interest in promoting.
 
Ontheway said:
PumpkinCookie.
Your story is fascinating. You have undertaken a herculean effort of reading and studying the gospel, the history of the church and many foundational documents. You reject all Christian claims and hint at having developed or discovered an alternative view. Does this alternative have anything in common with what the church calls the heresies (Nestorian, etc.) so common in the early days of Christianity?
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I don’t reject all Christian claims, just some of them, and I respect rabbi Jesus. I can’t go into detail here about the narrative that currently makes the most sense to me because it borders on proselytizing and I don’t care to engage in that! I’m not an exclusivist, so I really have no desire for anyone to believe differently, unless their beliefs lead them to harm or hate themselves/others or God.
 
Ontheway said:
Here is what one reviewer wrote about Maimonides:
He points out, what many readers of Maimonides fail to grasp, that Maimonides did not express his true views openly. Like most ancient philosophers, including Plato who called this the “noble lie,” he wrote for two audiences. He felt that the general public would see their own false notions in his writing, while the more intellectual readers would be able to mine the surface of his writings and discover his true views. He didn’t do this to hide these secrets from his fellow Jews, nor out of fear of reprisals. But exposing the general population to these truths could only lead to perplexity in the best of circumstances or to falling away from observance in the worst of circumstances, neither of which Maimonides had any interest in promoting.
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Yes, this is the “esoteric hypothesis.” Leo Strauss was a big proponent of this school of interpretation. I did some work with a philosopher who worked closely with Strauss, and am familiar with this mode of reading.

That’s not why I suggested this particular book though. Everybody is always talking about what God is. Aquinas’ famous question: “What is God?” I like how Maimonides goes at this backwards by asking “What is not God?”

So many atheists (in my view) reject God because they understand his attributes to contradictory. What if he doesn’t actually have any attributes? I don’t know…it can move the discussion out of a rut I think.
 
I first came here during the final days of John Paul II. At the time I was attempting to strengthen my Catholic faith through study and reason. Obviously, that had quite another result. Now, I stop in occasionally to read the posts and hopefully learn something new.
I also have no interest in conversion…only logic and fact.

John
 
DaddyGirl said:
Hi Christine…

I guess that other thread we were on inspired this one, yes?
I appreciate that you are curious about this and that you ask.

I accidentally stumbled onto CAF a few years ago when I was doing research for a book I was working on. One of my subjects was Catholic and I was trying to fact-check some teachings and doctrine via google. Each time I did, the CAF site was the top listing to come up. I had no idea what it was.

At first, I was reading to try and find the answers to my questions.
Then, I stayed because…after reading just a few of the questions, comments, and debates on the forum, I was…well, I was in SHOCK.
I was shocked by what some people were thinking, feeling, and saying here…I was stunned to learn what the Catholic teachings and doctrine were…and I had to stay to try and figure out why people believed it.
I’ve always been interested in psychology and I wanted to understand the psychology of faith and belief and why someone picked one religion, one set of beliefs, over others.

When I first stumbled onto the site, I wasn’t an Atheist.
Both my parents had been brought up Eastern Orthodox and I was baptized, etc. We didn’t go to church every Sunday, tho…it was more an Easter, Xmas thing. I do remember going to Sunday school as a kid and thinking: What they are saying makes no sense!!
But until a few years ago, I always in general believed there was a “God”.

A lot of what I read here led me to becoming an Atheist.
I began exploring the origins and evolution of Christianity with historical books, college courses, and lectures on my ipod as I walked in Central Park. I tried to learn as much as possible about Catholicism (and other religions, too) here on this forum, listening to members and apologists and making notes, keeping files, doing follow-up research.

The more I read, the more I listened…the stronger and clearer my disbelief got.

Another reason I stay is to hear people’s reactions along the way to the changing world–like the laws on same-sex marriage or the words of the new pope.
That so many here get so angry or fearful or confused when the pope speaks a tad more inclusively than other popes have in the past…compels me to stay and see what happens here, see if some specific people’s thoughts and feelings here will…soften, widen, lift.

Often, it’s frustrating. The people who complain here that many people–including the media-- have the wrong view of what a Catholic believes…are often the same people who make gross assumptions and have erroneous ideas about what an Atheist believes.

I have no specific desire to make anyone here an Atheist…even though many here have the opposing wish, wanting to evangelize and help steer people toward Catholicism.
But I do hope to encourage people–here and elsewhere–to think for themselves and research and ask questions.

The world is changing and the “nones” are rising and how people see religion is changing–quickly and drastically. The internet is speeding up the regular, organic process.

What people are talking about here is a good barometer of what’s to come in the near future.

I worry about many of you here.

And so…I stay.

.
Click to expand...
I must say I enjoyed reading this, DG. One statement made me laugh, that is, when you say that reading comments here made your disbelief grow to the point of becoming an atheist. I don’t think that is the intention of CAF!

BTW, what am I, a Jew, doing here? That might be the topic of another thread and a few people on CAF have already asked me this. But I digress…
 
Charlemagne_III said:
And you know this for a certainty?

I’d love to know how. 😉
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I don’t know anything with certainty. That might be the biggest difference between us, Charles. I’m bemused by such certainty. Even science, which deals in empirical facts is based on the assumption that ‘X is true…as far as we can tell’.

But the harder I look behind that curtain, the less uncertain I am that there’s nothing there.
 
Bradski said:
I don’t know anything with certainty. That might be the biggest difference between us, Charles. I’m bemused by such certainty. Even science, which deals in empirical facts is based on the assumption that ‘X is true…as far as we can tell’.

But the harder I look behind that curtain, the less uncertain I am that there’s nothing there.
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👍
 
I forget what first brought me here, but this forum at least claims to welcome other viewpoints, even if some posters seem to disagree, and it discusses a number of topics I am interested in.

What more needs to be said? Maybe the following helps:

You learn more by talking to people who disagree with you, both listening to and critiquing their opinions and trying to explain and defend your own to them, than by sitting around agreeing with those who share your views.
Reasonable, yes?
 
DrTaffy said:
I forget what first brought me here, but this forum at least claims to welcome other viewpoints, even if some posters seem to disagree, and it discusses a number of topics I am interested in.

What more needs to be said? Maybe the following helps:

You learn more by talking to people who disagree with you, both listening to and critiquing their opinions and trying to explain and defend your own to them, than by sitting around agreeing with those who share your views.
Reasonable, yes?
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Reasonable, yes!

Catholic tradition allows open discussion from a variety of view points. It doesn’t mean that I will agree with you, simply because you are here. (and vice versa) But, the forum is open to all comers who are willing to discuss.
 
I was initially drawn by the authoritative information about Church law. I first looked at CAF to understand if the RCC still considered me to be a Catholic. I was intrigued about what the Church’s rules on apostasy were.

What kept me dipping in and out of the forum was the fascinating and sometimes extraordinary views expressed by so many contributors. I’ve been trying to make sense of what I recall from my religious education in a Catholic primary school. Having drifted away from the Church at 12 or 13 years of age, I’ve gradually discovered that I was never taught many of the core beliefs about the nature of God. The more I’ve read on CAF, the more I’ve learned of what it means to be Catholic, and the more convinced I’ve become that I’m an agnostic atheist.
 
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