As a very young child*, at Sunday School I was told that prayer was supposed to be a conversation and not a monologue by just me. After a year or two with no one talking back and no other religious experiences to speak of, I began to wonder if there really was someone at the other end.
A year or two later still, I decided that if there was, I would have heard something by now, and became a full-blown atheist. (Although to avoid jeopardizing Christmas and Communion and Easter, and because it’d probably annoy my family, I told no one.)
Everything else—the labels like ‘atheist’ or ‘theist’, discovering science fiction, learning logic, reading tons of scriptures and theology and philosophy and occultism—everything else came later.
My story isn’t very interesting, sadly.
As a very young child*, at Sunday School I was told that prayer was supposed to be a conversation and not a monologue by just me. After a year or two with no one talking back and no other religious experiences to speak of, I began to wonder if there really was someone at the other end.
A year or two later still, I decided that if there was, I would have heard something by now, and became a full-blown atheist. (Although to avoid jeopardizing Christmas and Communion and Easter, and because it’d probably annoy my family, I told no one.)
Everything else—the labels like ‘atheist’ or ‘theist’, discovering science fiction, learning logic, reading tons of scriptures and theology and philosophy and occultism—everything else came later.
* I think around age 4 or 5. Surely not after 7.