Christians often accuse atheists of living for self, as if that is a bad thing. But deep down, it *is* what I want. It is what everybody wants, whether they admit it or not. Of course I am not talking about a hedonistic lifestyle; that is absurd. I am talking about, paraphrasing Ecclesiastes, ‘eating drinking being merry, for tomorrow we die’. I want to make the best of this life while I can, because I am convinced this is it. I have fulfilled so many of my dreams and ambitions, and I want to now live to help RoseMary fulfill hers. In Christian’s eyes, this is wrong. No. This is the life we are stuck with. Facing that is bracing. It is sobering. It is exhilerating. It is liberating.

It is freedom.

Well said - I released myself from the lies at the age of 45 and my only regrets are for the first 44 years I wasted.

I couldnt agree more! You all have expressed exatctly the sentiment I was going for. Many existentialist thinkers have taught that it is precisely the confrontation with what they call “death” — mortality, finitude — that saves us. It makes us aware of both the indescribable preciousness of life, now. It makes us aware that life is to be lived and tasted, *now.* We cannot defer it forever. Lost opportunities are forever lost. No one is going to make it up to us. It is, as HIS said, sobering.

That is why it seemed so important to me to make up for lost time, so to speak, for all those years spent writhing in fundamentalist neuroticism. Luckily, I was only in my twenties when I “saw the light” (har!) streaming through the cracks of my own cardboard box. It still felt like many wasted years of misery, though. I supposed writing these essays, getting informaiton and ideas and resources out there for others to use, as they start to peek out of the fundamentalist box, is my way of giving back.

Don Cupitt has one of my favorite phrases — Life is a Gift without a Giver. I think it is no less precious for not having one. In fact, it is more.

NO WAY! Not you too? My old pastor’s wife works with my wife (RoseMary), so of course I am often the topic of discussion. Pastor’s wife wondered if my loss of faith was due to a ‘mid-life’ crisis? This gave RoseMary a good chuckle.

But seriously though, this made me think. I am 44 now, at the age where the inevitable end of my life is visible before me. It is a reality that I think I must come to grips with. I can either be depressed, or as Richard says, say ‘Yes’ to life. I think I have successfully chosen to live my life with the later mindset. My life is truly great and RoseMary and I have a great life together. But did my age help lead to my de-conversion? I think it is possible. As I get older, I guess I have to decide what I want with the rest of my ever-shortening life. And I suppose deep down inside of me, without my even being aware, age leads to wisdom and that lead to shedding the old baggage of religion and facing what I perceive as reality.

Christians often accuse atheists of living for self, as if that is a bad thing. But deep down, it *is* what I want. It is what everybody wants, whether they admit it or not. Of course I am not talking about a hedonistic lifestyle; that is absurd. I am talking about, paraphrasing Ecclesiastes, ‘eating drinking being merry, for tomorrow we die’. I want to make the best of this life while I can, because I am convinced this is it. I have fulfilled so many of my dreams and ambitions, and I want to now live to help RoseMary fulfill hers. In Christian’s eyes, this is wrong. No. This is the life we are stuck with. Facing that is bracing. It is sobering. It is exhilerating. It is liberating.

It is freedom.

If that mindset is due to a midlife crisis - hey, I will accept that.

Now, I feel like Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz, who stepped out of her house from Kansas and into a brilliantly colorful world.

My therapist gave me a similar thought picture and it continues to resonate with me. I picture living for years inside a small cardboard shack, perfectly happy and cozy, but never realizing that there was a whole beautiful world outside. Then one day, who knows how, a tiny crack developed in a wall and the sun came streaming in. From then on, it was only a matter of my having the courage to gradually enlarge the hole, then poke my head out, then take that first step outside and the rest was history.

I didn’t have a mid life crisis. I had a mid life epiphany…and thank goodness I did!

That’s great! I’m going to have to use that one.

Karen - AMEN! Since my de-conversion, I have been accused of suffering from a mid life crisis–among other things, but I kept thinking, why is it that when women begin to think and act in a way that goes against the status quo, our hormones are always to blame? I didn’t have a mid life crisis. I had a mid life epiphany…and thank goodness I did!

And an accurate one, at that!

To add a bit more here, it’s interesting to think about some of these early intuitions we deconverts may have had about ourselves, long before deconversion - which of course would’ve been the last thing on all of our minds!

Yet, I’ve realized that for much of my life I used to joke about having a “mother of all midlife crises” one day. I was halfway being funny and halfway articulating my uneasy realization that I had used fundamentalism to avoid doing the work of personal discovery that most people do in their adolescent and young adult years. It’s weird to me how the thing I joked about actually happened, and weirder to think that I somehow deep down knew it would.

I’m not claiming the prompting of the holy spirit, or prophecy, or anything supernatural - just that possibly I knew myself better on an intuitive level than I realized way back when.

I also recall thinking that if I had to pick another religion, it would be Taoism. Y’all notice where my avatar icon derives from?

Gee, I’m a prophet after all.

For many who have been exposed to the various abuses of “fundamentalism,” existentialism offers a refreshing respite. Fundamentalism, especially legalistic forms are so stifling and censorious that once a person breaks free from its grasp it is very easy for them to become hostile toward those former religious institutions. Been there, done that, got a t-shirt.