Hey There, Wondering if you could help

andy5
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Hey There, Wondering if you could help

Hello all, I posted here a long time ago but it's been quite awhile.  Anyway, I wasn't sure where else to post this but I have been in a real bad place for a few years so I thought I would turn to you.  Now I consider myself an agnostic/atheist or something like that, but my family is major Christian, hardcore conservative Church of Christ, anti-evolution and as literal as can be.  Now, I am not an argumentative person, and they push buttons in me that cause me to want to fight fights they refuse to let me win, due to a combination of emotional appeal and bullying.  So, the fact is, they want their little perfect world where all their kids believe what they do forever, and in order to have personal peace I have continually been lying to them that, that one time I tried to make a case for that being wrong, I was misguided and have been faithfully attending church somewhere, etc.

 

Ok, so, bottom line, it's been a few years of this and I don't know what will ever happen-I'm resigned they are so hard nosed and stubborn things will never change.  I mean I pointed out contradictions and they said  it didn't matter, pointed out the Matthew prophecies all being out of context and ridiculous, etc, even though they're literalists, and and they said that the most important thing was to believe in something.   And of course their beliefs involve forcing it on others-so I mean, ya know, you know how it is, I can't begin to get through to them, you've heard it all, there must be a higher power, I will pray for you, how can you do this to me, yeah.  So anyway, what I'm trying to say is, and maybe some of you have been in this situation-since they still alternately cling to their precious sources, books like The Case for Christ, their true Christian scientists who know evolution is a hoax, and so on, and the burden of proof has to be on me totally of course-is there any rock solid case or argument or set of evidence or anything at all that you think could potentially be shown to them or thrown their way or anything to somehow debunk everything and convince them solidly 100 percent that whatever the truth is, it isn't the Bible?  I mean, I have tried to just settle for that-I doubt there is any way to persuade them of any other viewpoint.

One other thing-I also realize that their fear of Hell from childhood plays into this, and I have thought of trying to use the argument that if you interpret the old and new testament just so, it's actually telling you to ignore everything it says.  But I very much doubt that will work.  So, basically, if anyone has any advice, encouragement, ideas, or stories of experience to help me, I would appreciate it.


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To be honest

That sounds a whole lot like the Catholic background that I was forced to grow up in as a child and for part of my teenage years (teenage years was hell in that home). The only way that I actually was able to solve the problem was to move away from my family.

 

It took a long time before they stopped trying to use that same emotional appeal and bullying tactics that you are speaking of. They used to try and even guilt trip me over the phone with that.

For a long time, due to the fact that my whole life was surrounded by them and people just like them, I struggled with the fact that I must be inherently bad, inherently flawed, and inherently evil for refusing to give up and surrender to their ways. But I just could not accept that thinking with any part of my soul.

Today, I have a fairly good relation with some of my family ( I broke their habits of preaching and emotional appeal and browbeating the first few visits by immediately leaving when they would start it up). Today, it is a subject that we have silently agreed to not discuss. There are some family members that I have not talked to since leaving home and that will not talk to me to this day as a result of it. The few pathetic attempts at phone conversation were so angry and hate-filled that I found them to be a waste of time.

Sorry that I had no true solutions to your situation at hand. I can only empathize and say that I understand what it is like to be surrounded by a bunch of hard core theists and to feel like they are driving you insane. Hope you can find some way out or some way to vent your frustration until the situation changes.

“It is proof of a base and low mind for one to wish to think with the masses or majority, merely because the majority is the majority. Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people.”
― Giordano Bruno


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We cant really decide what

We cant really decide what is best for you. Only you know your family as well as you do. If you can enjoy them outside the issue of religion, then I would say the best advice is not to try to debate it with them. But you certainly don't have to put up with any pressure from anyone to make you do things you don't want to do.

I don't know how old you are but if you need to discuss these things you do have this website. I don't know where you live, but you can also look up local atheist meet up groups. They may be under labels like "humanist" or "freethinker" as well as "atheist".

It is important to not feel isolated. You can come here and vent. And you can seek out other atheists to talk to face to face. There are plenty of places on the web and this is not the only atheist website.

But you also don't get to chose your family. My mom is still a believer, but only time got her to accept that I don't believe. I never forced it on her and only discussed it when she seemed open to it.

It can seem very lonely when you don't have someone to talk to. I am quite sure your family loves you and it is a pity that they  are that deep into it. But time and age and independence will help you deal with it without destroying all contact with them.

If they were to disown you for being open, I would more blame society and the churches that warped their minds. I would feel sorry for them more than I would be angry at them. I hope they wouldn't do that to you.

In any case, like I said, you don't need to disown them, but only bring it up if you feel they are open to it. It may be that you may not be able to have those discussions with them, but that doesn't mean you have to feel alone in the world, we are here and we do hear many stories of people in similar situations.

If you can get your hand on a copy of "Infidel" by Ayaan Hersi Ali, it is about her escape from Islam and the fundamentalist  Muslim societies in the Middle East and Africa that she escaped from. She is now an atheist. She too when she was a kid had plenty of doubt growing up. I consider her one of my heros.

 

"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog


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Hi Andy, welcome back.

I had the same sort of fundy upbringing with evangelical preacher father, missionary mother and the whole nine yards of bible study every morning, missionaries home from the sudan doing slide nights about demons and satan a living presence in the world from the age I could comprehend - oh - and the whole hell threat thrown in for good measure. It kept me up at night well into my late 20s and 30s, believe me.

My entire family are believers tho some have gone their own way a bit. They argue from complexity (it's all so mysterious we can never know so it must be supernatural), or they argue from force (god is perfect - he can't look at our evil it's too awful, eternal torment is just cause he's soooooo perfect, you deserve to die), or from adverse consequences (there must be a god because there is morality/knowledge and with no god there could be neither because man evolved from rocks and can do no good because eve spoke parsel tongue to lord voldemort the serpent), or silence (there is no proof of no god so there's got to be a god), and it goes on an on through assertion and assumption to assertion.

Mate, what works for me is strengthening my own arguments, following discoveries in neurobiology that explain self and consciousness, improving my comprehension of knowledge and what philosophy makes sense from the perspective of what we can know. Try reading Science Daily for the latest cool emperical evidence that does not come from the bible.

This is an argument you must have and win with yourself. Your family have too much invested and they also have different sorts of brains from yours. You will probably not break down their cognitive biases and blind spots and unravel their tendency to generalise and weave god into every gap they find in the world.

This is a big question you face. I think it's better not to argue but I constantly fight with my folks about this and challenge the morality of their belief in eternal hell and mock Noah's ship, HMS Improbable, and all the rest. I just can't help it. Whether or not this has caused any change in their thinking is debatable. I think it's best to agree to disagree with them but I understand how hard it is when your flesh and blood betray you by worshipping a mythical contrivance that they truly believe is your future torturer.

The most comforting thing I can say is that you are not alone. The best advice I can give is to hang around here with like minds and learn more and beat up (mildly) on christians here who are not your family. I find it relieves the stress in a big way to talk to other people who are in exactly the same place you are.

With the lying - ummmmm. Bugger it. Tell the fam they are full of crap and insist that when they show positive proof of an objective supernatural event you will go to church and worship god's flawless intergalactic lamb chop.

Good luck, Andy.

 

"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck


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Well, I'm 25, this is a

Well, I'm 25, this is a decision I came to at college a few years ago when I was 22.  Mainly, the problem is I feel very very trapped.  I get angry at them being how they are, it upsets me, I am not a cool customer, and they will not budge.  One of the biggest problems, if not the biggest, would be their intrusion on children I may have in the future.  Essentially, if I have them, my choices would be-A-raise my children the way my parents want me to so there will be no problems, which of course would drive me crazy, and B-openly rebel and do what I want, leading to the nonstop harassment which I can't deal with, or C-don't have kids so I can continue to avoid the problems.  I am pretty much resigned to C, but it kind of bugs the hell out of me since I'd really like to have them some day and I'll be an old man when my parents are gone and it'll be too late to enjoy them.  So they kinda win and that kinda really sucks and just makes me angrier.  Anyway, I knew you guys couldn't give me a magic solution , I guess I just get so sad about it some times I don't know what else to do.


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Well, mate.

andy5 wrote:

Well, I'm 25, this is a decision I came to at college a few years ago when I was 22.  Mainly, the problem is I feel very very trapped.  I get angry at them being how they are, it upsets me, I am not a cool customer, and they will not budge.  One of the biggest problems, if not the biggest, would be their intrusion on children I may have in the future.  Essentially, if I have them, my choices would be-A-raise my children the way my parents want me to so there will be no problems, which of course would drive me crazy, and B-openly rebel and do what I want, leading to the nonstop harassment which I can't deal with, or C-don't have kids so I can continue to avoid the problems.  I am pretty much resigned to C, but it kind of bugs the hell out of me since I'd really like to have them some day and I'll be an old man when my parents are gone and it'll be too late to enjoy them.  So they kinda win and that kinda really sucks and just makes me angrier.  Anyway, I knew you guys couldn't give me a magic solution , I guess I just get so sad about it some times I don't know what else to do.

 

You are not full grown yet. I was about 28 before I directly defied my father. Bear in mind your parents do love you more than they self love jesus - they just don't realise it yet. And bear in mind too, that when they are older it won't be jesus who flies in and helps them in their frail dotage it will be you. Your parents will work this out sooner or later.

Just get stronger in your honest beliefs and grow into yourself and go ahead and live your life. Don't put yourself into this negative place. You don't deserve it no matter what torturous horseshit you were told growing up. That stuff is a hateful lie that can only be sold by threat.

"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck


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andy5 wrote: Well, I'm 25,

andy5 wrote:

Well, I'm 25, this is a decision I came to at college a few years ago when I was 22.  Mainly, the problem is I feel very very trapped.  I get angry at them being how they are, it upsets me, I am not a cool customer, and they will not budge.  One of the biggest problems, if not the biggest, would be their intrusion on children I may have in the future.  Essentially, if I have them, my choices would be-A-raise my children the way my parents want me to so there will be no problems, which of course would drive me crazy, and B-openly rebel and do what I want, leading to the nonstop harassment which I can't deal with, or C-don't have kids so I can continue to avoid the problems.  I am pretty much resigned to C, but it kind of bugs the hell out of me since I'd really like to have them some day and I'll be an old man when my parents are gone and it'll be too late to enjoy them.  So they kinda win and that kinda really sucks and just makes me angrier.  Anyway, I knew you guys couldn't give me a magic solution , I guess I just get so sad about it some times I don't know what else to do.

 

Choices, grasshopper. 

My family is not particularly religious and less so when I was growing up.  But my sister became a Jehovah Witness at age 16 and still is now that she is 57.  (My how time flies.)  Anyway, they have a big deal about being reunited with your family in the earthly paradise to come - or some nonsense like that.  And she wanted to convert all of her family to be with her in that paradise.  Why, I don't know since our family is constantly fighting.  We never got along as children and we don't as adults.

She bugged me for months.  We wrote back and forth arguing various points (written letters at the time - not email - not twitter - ancient history).  And I finally got through to her.  She is arrogant and prideful.  All the evangelical christians are.  Their way is the right way for them, therefore, it has to be right for everyone. 

dictionary.com wrote:

Proud

–adjective

1. feeling pleasure or satisfaction over something regarded as highly honorable or creditable to oneself (often fol. by of, an infinitive, or a clause). 2. having, proceeding from, or showing a high opinion of one's own dignity, importance, or superiority. 3. having or showing self-respect or self-esteem. 4. highly gratifying to the feelings or self-esteem: It was a proud day for him when his son entered college. 5. highly honorable or creditable: a proud achievement. 6. stately, majestic, or magnificent: proud cities. 7. of lofty dignity or distinction: a proud name; proud nobles. 8. Chiefly South Midland and Southern U.S. pleased; happy: I'm proud to meet you. 9. full of vigor and spirit: a proud young stallion.

10. Obsolete. brave.

 

11. do one proud, a. to be a source of pride or credit to a person: His conduct in such a difficult situation did him proud. b. to treat someone or oneself generously or lavishly: You really did us proud with this supper.

 


Origin:
bef. 1000; ME; late OE prūd, prūt arrogant (c. ON prūthr stately, fine), appar. < VL; cf. OF prud, prod gallant, LL prōde useful, L prōdesse to be of worth


proudly, adverb proudness, noun quasi-proud, adjective quasi-proudly, adverb un·proud, adjective un·proud·ly, adverb



1. contented, self-satisfied. 2. overbearing, self-important, disdainful, imperious, presumptuous. Proud, arrogant, haughty imply a consciousness of, or a belief in, one's superiority in some respect. Proud implies sensitiveness, lofty self-respect, or jealous preservation of one's dignity, station, and the like. It may refer to an affectionate admiration of or a justifiable pride concerning someone else: proud of his son. Arrogant applies to insolent or overbearing behavior, arising from an exaggerated belief in one's importance: arrogant rudeness. Haughty implies lofty reserve and confident, often disdainful assumption of superiority over others: the haughty manner of the butler in the play. 6. noble, imposing, splendid.

 

Sorry to post the whole definition.  What I want to point out is the very last bit about synonyms, especially #2.  "One's superiority in some respect."  Well, their (and my sister's ) superiority is their religion.  They are so much better than everyone else because they believe in a sky fairy.  Whoopie-fucking-do.  And so I told my sister.  I also told her that if she wanted me to be with her in that earthly paradise of the JW's, she wasn't going to have the real me.  She may have a person that god/s/dess created who looks and sounds like me, but it wouldn't be me because I would never believe in her dippy religion.  She could either love me as the sister I am, or she could stop communicating with me.  And she hasn't harassed me since.  We don't talk about religion any more.  Ever.

Now, we were adults, not living at home, when we had this conversation.  And that made a difference.

Cutting family ties has been easy for me.  I don't communicate with my dad who is an alcoholic.  I haven't talked to my brother in almost 20 years.  If my sister stopped talking to me, I probably wouldn't notice.  It may not be easy for you to do that.  But I can tell you, getting away from the various nutcases in my family was wonderful.  A real relief. 

What you do, how you handle it, is your own choice.  Not theirs.  That includes having a family.  Grandma can learn to live with the way you raise your children, or she can not see them.  Tough, but this has worked for some people I know.

 

-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.

"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken

"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.


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Welcome to the forum,

Welcome to the forum, andy5.

andy5 wrote:
is there any rock solid case or argument or set of evidence or anything at all that you think could potentially be shown to them or thrown their way or anything to somehow debunk everything and convince them solidly 100 percent that whatever the truth is, it isn't the Bible?  I mean, I have tried to just settle for that-I doubt there is any way to persuade them of any other viewpoint.

In many cases, it is essentially impossible to convince them with only reason and evidence.

http://www.secularhumanism.org/library/fi/dawkins_21_4.html

Dawkins wrote:
All the more interesting, then, to read his personal testimony in In Six Days. It is actually quite moving, in a pathetic kind of way. He begins with his childhood ambition. Where other boys wanted to be astronauts or firemen, the young Kurt touchingly dreamed of getting a Ph.D. from Harvard and teaching science at a major university. He achieved the first part of his goal, but became increasingly uneasy as his scientific learning conflicted with his religious faith. When he could bear the strain no longer, he clinched the matter with a Bible and a pair of scissors. He went right through from Genesis 1 to Revelations 22, literally cutting out every verse that would have to go if the scientific worldview were true. At the end of this exercise, there was so little left of his Bible that

. . . try as I might, and even with the benefit of intact margins throughout the pages of Scripture, I found it impossible to pick up the Bible without it being rent in two. I had to make a decision between evolution and Scripture. Either the Scripture was true and evolution was wrong or evolution was true and I must toss out the Bible. . . . It was there that night that I accepted the Word of God and rejected all that would ever counter it, including evolution. With that, in great sorrow, I tossed into the fire all my dreams and hopes in science.

See what I mean about pathetic? Most revealing of all is Wise’s concluding paragraph:

Although there are scientific reasons for accepting a young earth, I am a young-age creationist because that is my understanding of the Scripture. As I shared with my professors years ago when I was in college, if all the evidence in the universe turns against creationism, I would be the first to admit it, but I would still be a creationist because that is what the Word of God seems to indicate. Here I must stand.

 

Our revels now are ended. These our actors, | As I foretold you, were all spirits, and | Are melted into air, into thin air; | And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, | The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, | The solemn temples, the great globe itself, - Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, | And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, | Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff | As dreams are made on, and our little life | Is rounded with a sleep. - Shakespeare


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Situations change

andy5 wrote:

Well, I'm 25, this is a decision I came to at college a few years ago when I was 22.  Mainly, the problem is I feel very very trapped.  I get angry at them being how they are, it upsets me, I am not a cool customer, and they will not budge.  One of the biggest problems, if not the biggest, would be their intrusion on children I may have in the future.  Essentially, if I have them, my choices would be-A-raise my children the way my parents want me to so there will be no problems, which of course would drive me crazy, and B-openly rebel and do what I want, leading to the nonstop harassment which I can't deal with, or C-don't have kids so I can continue to avoid the problems.  I am pretty much resigned to C, but it kind of bugs the hell out of me since I'd really like to have them some day and I'll be an old man when my parents are gone and it'll be too late to enjoy them.  So they kinda win and that kinda really sucks and just makes me angrier.  Anyway, I knew you guys couldn't give me a magic solution , I guess I just get so sad about it some times I don't know what else to do.

Your describing a situation that sounds very similiar to what  mine once was. However, there are no children of my own involved so I can not help you there.

But I can tell you that situations change. The people in my immediate family that were totally impossible to talk to, started to treat me a whole lot better, once I would either leave or hang up the phone every time that it got brought up.

Everytime I was at their  house and they started in on me, out the door I went. I said nothing in response. Every time that they started in on me on the phone, the phone got hung up.

It took a long time before they dropped it. It took a long time before they realized that preaching to me was an automatic cut-off and would result in no returned phone calls or visits for months at a time. I think they finally understood because the ones that were semi-close to me communicate with me today. The ones that have cut me off permanently are the types of people that have standards no one can live up to and hate everyone anyway. These are the types of people that if I walked on water, healed the sick, raised the dead and parted the red sea, they would still have some reason to dislike. Those people, I have found, are people that I am more better off without.

“It is proof of a base and low mind for one to wish to think with the masses or majority, merely because the majority is the majority. Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people.”
― Giordano Bruno


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andy5 wrote:Well, I'm 25,

andy5 wrote:

Well, I'm 25, this is a decision I came to at college a few years ago when I was 22.  Mainly, the problem is I feel very very trapped.  I get angry at them being how they are, it upsets me, I am not a cool customer, and they will not budge.  One of the biggest problems, if not the biggest, would be their intrusion on children I may have in the future.  Essentially, if I have them, my choices would be-A-raise my children the way my parents want me to so there will be no problems, which of course would drive me crazy, and B-openly rebel and do what I want, leading to the nonstop harassment which I can't deal with, or C-don't have kids so I can continue to avoid the problems.  I am pretty much resigned to C, but it kind of bugs the hell out of me since I'd really like to have them some day and I'll be an old man when my parents are gone and it'll be too late to enjoy them.  So they kinda win and that kinda really sucks and just makes me angrier.  Anyway, I knew you guys couldn't give me a magic solution , I guess I just get so sad about it some times I don't know what else to do.

or D- move away, have kids and refuse to have anything to do with them until they agree to be reasonable.   

 

Not that I'm recommending it. I don't like giving advice on relationships because they can always get fucked up no matter what you do and I don't want any part of the blame. I just lead my life the way I want and people can either love me or hate me, that is their problem not mine. Whatever you choose to do they might or might not learn to accept it. You have to decide for yourself if you are willing to risk alienating them. 

 

If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X


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Well, thanks for all the

Well, thanks for all the input so far.  I could definitely use some good Bible-bashing, as one of you suggested earlier, any recommendations for the best threads on the forum or other places to suck all the wind out of somebody's religious sails?


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try this.

andy5 wrote:

Well, thanks for all the input so far.  I could definitely use some good Bible-bashing, as one of you suggested earlier, any recommendations for the best threads on the forum or other places to suck all the wind out of somebody's religious sails?

 

 

               www.skepticsannotatedbible

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Just check out

andy5 wrote:

Well, thanks for all the input so far.  I could definitely use some good Bible-bashing, as one of you suggested earlier, any recommendations for the best threads on the forum or other places to suck all the wind out of somebody's religious sails?

 

Just check out all the threads started by our new "Rational Christian of Rare Intelligence". Those are quite entertaining.

“It is proof of a base and low mind for one to wish to think with the masses or majority, merely because the majority is the majority. Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people.”
― Giordano Bruno


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See, I think that the only

See, I think that the only way I could make it would be a complete break from them.  But then there are other problems if I try to do that.  For example, what if I get laid off one day and need financial help, backing, something?  I'd have to come crawling back to them if I didn't want to be homeless.  Also, the woman I'm in love with has a lot of problems, can't work, and her family is very poor.  Again, what if something happens to me or her, I'd end up having to go and pretend to make amends, listen to their crap, come forward and repent, etc.  So, I'm torn between wanting to be free of it, and worrying about losing their valuable resources.  Not to mention, I do love some of them, and emotionally I think it would be very hard.  But I am pretty darn sure they will never, ever change their minds.  So, basically, I think I'm screwed, or at least hypothetically could be and I'm not sure I can take the chance.

 

I realize that there are other resources for unemployment, and so on, but the bottom line is I'm scared.  If the job I'm in now doesn't work out, I don't know what else I could do.  Whatever it is, I'm just picturing a million bad things that will go wrong as soon as I try to cut them off.


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That is apretty normal concern

andy5 wrote:

See, I think that the only way I could make it would be a complete break from them.  But then there are other problems if I try to do that.  For example, what if I get laid off one day and need financial help, backing, something?  I'd have to come crawling back to them if I didn't want to be homeless.  Also, the woman I'm in love with has a lot of problems, can't work, and her family is very poor.  Again, what if something happens to me or her, I'd end up having to go and pretend to make amends, listen to their crap, come forward and repent, etc.  So, I'm torn between wanting to be free of it, and worrying about losing their valuable resources.  Not to mention, I do love some of them, and emotionally I think it would be very hard.  But I am pretty darn sure they will never, ever change their minds.  So, basically, I think I'm screwed, or at least hypothetically could be and I'm not sure I can take the chance.

 

I realize that there are other resources for unemployment, and so on, but the bottom line is I'm scared.  If the job I'm in now doesn't work out, I don't know what else I could do.  Whatever it is, I'm just picturing a million bad things that will go wrong as soon as I try to cut them off.

I totally understand where your coming from. I felt the same way when I made that break with family. I was eat up with all sorts of fear about the future and what would possibly happen to me if this scenario were to happen and that scenario were to happen.

I think that I was at my most frightened in my first year. Seemed like everytime I was a little behind on rent or having difficulty with some of the people that I shared rooms with, there was this feeling of "Without family, if I end up on my own, what the hell am I gonna do ?,".

The first year involved alot of couch surfing, alot of bad apartments with cheap rent, and a few other unfortunate experiences along the way.

I guess you could say that I got lucky. I happened to find truly good friends that could stick by me through thick and thin (and vice versa). I found people that accepted me for who I was rather than who they THOUGHT I should be and in effect, I more or less started my own family. Once that happened, independence became a great thing rather than a thing to be feared and I came to a point where I could not picture myself needing to return to my family no matter how bad that the situation got.  In fact, returning to the hell of my family became, not an option.

Making a break is not easy. Alot of people used to tell me to just leave a situation if it was intolerable, but things are not always as cut and dried as that. A break away from all that I knew and all that I had known was probably one of the most difficult decisions that I ever made, but looking back on it, just for me, it was one of the best.

“It is proof of a base and low mind for one to wish to think with the masses or majority, merely because the majority is the majority. Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people.”
― Giordano Bruno


harleysportster
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One more thing

As the famous TV detective Colombo was always saying: "One More thing,".

The decision that I made to leave was not an overnight one. It had been in the back of my mind for a few years before I finally came to the conclusion that I had to do it.

Whatever that you decide to do, remember that you don't have to do it today. You don't have to make it in haste. You can always formulate a plan and work towards it (granted, that takes massive amounts of patience and putting up with them longer than you may like. There were days towards the end of my home life, when I would think : I JUST CAN NOT STAND THIS MUCH LONGER. ) or you don't have to decide to do anything right now.

I don't see any decision that you make as a "wrong" decision. Even if it is a decision to stay there for the security of uncertainty.

I think the idea of options was what set alot of my mind at ease. For a long time, I never felt like I had any options and that was what made the situation with my family so intolerable.

There is always options. Take care and good luck with the Irrational Theists, hehehehe.

 

“It is proof of a base and low mind for one to wish to think with the masses or majority, merely because the majority is the majority. Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people.”
― Giordano Bruno


rebecca.williamson
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Tell them to come to this

Tell them to come to this site and read how the majority of Christians on this site resort to name calling, degrading, and even exsposing others identities on here. I'll be the first to admit that I can grow fangs very quickly but it usually takes one of the things I just mentioned from a Christian. Tell them to read Jean Chauvin and just go through the first idk 30 pages of threads and they will run across one called meaning-of-life. He is a horrible person! He has some akas and I'll read through, find them and post them when I do.

Also, if you want kids, have them. You'll have to stand your ground on how YOU are going to raise them and what you exspect them to not be exposed to behind your back. My only advice is if they won't comply, remove them from your life. It's hard to do and I know because I've done it. I don't speak to my mother and haven't seen her in over 2 years but I can't let her run my life.

If all the Christians who have called other Christians " not really a Christian " were to vanish, there'd be no Christians left.


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andy5 wrote:See, I think

andy5 wrote:

See, I think that the only way I could make it would be a complete break from them.  But then there are other problems if I try to do that.  For example, what if I get laid off one day and need financial help, backing, something?  I'd have to come crawling back to them if I didn't want to be homeless.  Also, the woman I'm in love with has a lot of problems, can't work, and her family is very poor.  Again, what if something happens to me or her, I'd end up having to go and pretend to make amends, listen to their crap, come forward and repent, etc.  So, I'm torn between wanting to be free of it, and worrying about losing their valuable resources.  Not to mention, I do love some of them, and emotionally I think it would be very hard.  But I am pretty darn sure they will never, ever change their minds.  So, basically, I think I'm screwed, or at least hypothetically could be and I'm not sure I can take the chance.

 

I realize that there are other resources for unemployment, and so on, but the bottom line is I'm scared.  If the job I'm in now doesn't work out, I don't know what else I could do.  Whatever it is, I'm just picturing a million bad things that will go wrong as soon as I try to cut them off.

If you think your material fears aren't really as founded as they seem maybe they are just another expression of your emotional attachment.

For most of us our family is the sole source of emotional security throughout our young lives and we're pretty dependent on it. I think it's possible that you've come to realise that if you depend on your family for emotional security you're only going to get capricious and superstitious drama. The thing that makes me think that is how you mention you don't want it for your own children - emotional security is the first thing we want for our kids, almost always.

If that rings true to you then I guess my advice would be that it is normal at a young age to see your family as the only emotional scaffold you'll ever have, and its also not necessarily true. It's not always obvious that the family you know didn't always exist the way they are. All your elders were once individuals who didn't know each other and the family structure that they have was built over time, not 'always there' as our childhood life perspective leads us to believe. To realise totally and remember that the emotional bonds we depend on were forged from nothing at some time is, I think, a comfort. It helps us to know that they are attainable beyond our childhood home, especially if we once thought it impossible.

I hope that is in some way helpful. Good luck in making your own way, your family will be alright and so will you. Smiling

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 Well, you certainly have

 

Well, you certainly have yourself in a pickle. Apparently, you have it down to a choice between burning your bridges and cutting them off or letting them have their way with you and your kids. Is that about right?

 

Perhaps you could find another way to deal with this. Get to the point of a truce between them and yourself. Let them know that when you have kids, it will be you who is in charge and not them. Past that, what to do is still going to be a problem.

 

For the time being, you are lying to them, which has to hurt. Perhaps you can let them down a bit softer by dealing with them on terms that you control. OK, so they are literalistic but there is plenty of stuff in the bible that just can't be taken that way and still make sense.

 

One example that I like to use is the part that talks about Solomon building the temple. Obviously he can't have done all the work by himself. If it even ever happened, what that must mean is the same thing as the king of England building Buckingham Palace. He told his people to build the damn thing and they did. In fact, part of that bit of the bible is fairly specific that he outsourced a good deal of the work to Huram of Tyre.

 

Now, you want some resources to help you out with this? Here is the folder from my bookmarks:

The Straight Dope: Who wrote the Bible? (Part 4)

BibleGateway.com: A searchable online Bible in over 100 versions and 50 languages.

Greek Bible

Foreignword.com - Dictionary Search Tool - DictSearch - Search in on-line dictionaries

Full Text Hebrew/Greek Bible Gematria Database

Skeptic&apos;s Annotated Bible / Quran / Book of Mormon

The Nag Hammadi Library

Nag Hammadi Library Alphabetical Index

CHRISTIAN BIBLICAL ERRANCY DEBATE - Biblical Errancy by Dennis McKinsey

Online Parallel Bible: Weaving God&apos;s Word into the Web

 

NoMoreCrazyPeople wrote:
Never ever did I say enything about free, I said "free."

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