An Old Friend

MattShizzle
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An Old Friend

I just got off the phone with a friend I haven't heard from in almost 7 years. We were friends since we were 9. Unfortunately he had problems with drugs and mental illness and wound up in several hospitals - well he called about an hours ago. He's Catholic - I knew that since then, and he knew from before I was agnostic - and I told him npw I'm an atheist (I know, I was then, but most people don't understand the difference.) He has been clean from drugs more than 6 months now. He is also gay - I suspected this as far back as Jr High - he came out in HS. Unfortunately, for his therapy he's going to a "Christian Therapist" - which includes the "gay conversion" thing. One good thing is he said "Well, I know I won't be able to change what you believe." I did answer that it didn't bother me his being Catholic. He did say maybe one day I'd be in Heaven - I told him if the Bible was true I wouldn't - then explained about the Blasphemy Challenge. He didn't even know that passage from the Bible.

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HisWillness
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 Oh man. I hope he gets a

 Oh man. I hope eventually he gets a secular therapist. He's going to feel so much better when he lets go. I've seen a few guys after they finally come out of the closet, and they just go nuts with joy. Well, that and gay sex. It's a bit annoying hearing about the new sex life.

But the relief that I felt just saying I'm an atheist was great, and it can't compare to someone letting go of a much more problematic stigma.

Anyway, it would be great to hear that the punchline of the story was that he got a secular therapist. I'll be over here hoping that happens.

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fabulae! nil satis firmi video quam ob rem accipere hunc mi expediat metum. - Terence


darth_josh
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Do you think it will be an

Do you think it will be an on-going conversation now?

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MattShizzle
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I'm sure. I didn't attack

I'm sure. I didn't attack Christianity at all, let alone the way I do on here. Since he knows I'm not about to convert he's not likely to bring it up. I only mentioned denying the holy spirit, not the "fuck the holy spirit" "or "The Holy Spirit fucks Jesus up the ass" or any of the other things I said on here that have a 100% guarantee on offending Christians.

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MattShizzle
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I am also fairly certain

I am also fairly certain he's unhappy as he has been celibate - he is not attracted to women and has sadly bought into the dogma that homosexuality is "a sin" and "wrong."

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Loc
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That's some really rough

That's some really rough stuff. Was he raised very religiously? I find people who are very religious in their earlier years either become vehement christians for the rest of their lives or completly derail and end up in rehab or something.

I found an old friend from my christian school the other day, he's also gay now. I was a bit surprised, but kudos to him for having the guts to come out

Psalm 14:1 "the fool hath said in his heart there is a God"-From a 1763 misprinted edition of the bible

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This is getting redudnant. My patience with the unteachable[atheists] is limited.

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MattShizzle
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We talked tonight. He's

We talked tonight. He's kinda become a fundie though still Catholic. He kept saying I should believe. I got tired of it and started pointing out the lack of evidence, the fact that if everything needs a creator so does god, errors and evil in the Bible (he didn't know these passages) that Jesus probably never existed and was copied from earlier pagan gods, etc. He obviously never talked to atheists before or debated and it was extreme pwnage - everything he brought up I heard many times before and knew how to counter immediately. He answered "wow. You really did your research." I'd like to hope I planted some seeds of doubt, but probably not.

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