From the atheist questions that were recently posted, I get the impression that a lot of Exmormons turn atheist rather than turn to another religion... For me, not believing in a God makes since given the evidence... But I wonder how many people actually turn to atheist ways or another religion

I wonder if there's a thought after leaving the cult of Mormon of "fool me once..." so they don't want to get fooled by another religion so they retreat from it.

I don't want to make an assumption, so I thought I'd ask what people here think...

The same standards of evidence we apply to debunk kolobianism work equally well with every other religion on the planet.

Bingo. That's exactly what happened me. Once I realized what a crock mo'ism is I knew that I couldn't in all honestly continue to believe in any form of religion if I applied the same intellectual standards to it. Kind of like you can't give up on the Easter Bunny and still believe in Santa Claus...

I'm not sure what "atheist ways" are. I'm still just me. My ways never changed. I think that everything considered to be good in humans is a product of the evolution of life.

I did conclude that all organized religions are false. Any person or any organization that claims to have answers from beyond this world are not something I wish to follow.

I don't see that any supreme being communicates with humans. Too many people who insist so end up getting led into fraud by illusionists.

I do think many good people belong to religions and I try to see the good in humans beyond the teachings of their faiths. I don't give religion credit for what makes people good.

To clarify... by "atheist ways" I don't mean that an action or personal change, other than once a person no longer believes in the LDS church, do they choose atheism, or another religion... I understand that there isn't a set "doctrine" for atheism.... I hope that's clearer?

... but nobody chooses atheism. You must choose theism. Atheism is the default position.

Not trying to argue back... Just explaining my thoughts.

I do understand your point, I've just finished reading (listening too actually) "The God Delusion" by Richard Dawkins and I understand the default position...

I would argue however that once a person has become a member of the church and was either moved away from the "default" position either by choice (convert) or by force (born in the church and raised that way by parents, I would say that the child indoctrinated did not choose this, it was unintentionally forced on them)... But, when they leave the church a person is faced with a decision, a choice... Do I go back to the default position (even if they aren't aware that it was the default) or to continue with another.

Take a light switch with a dimmer, the default position of a such a switch may be considered to be off. If I or someone else turns it on to a various level of light, I have to make a decision or choice to turn it off (back to default), or if it's a dimmer or three way switch turn it to a different setting.

There is a choice involved after leaving the church. Starting from birth, a person is an atheist by default until they choose to believe in God or someone indoctrinates them, but it is a choice to leave that and a choice of what to do after that.

I hope that makes sense?

... one of the (dare I say) blessings? of kolobianism was the opportunity it gave me to realize just how ridiculous the mainstream x-ian version of god really is.

A schizophrenic alpha male who knows his own future creates sentient beings whose ultimate purpose is to worship him, places them in the bodies of higher primates with instincts that run contrary to the arbitrary laws he made up knowing full well before he created the laws that they wouldn't be obeyed, then creates a torture chamber where he can send those disobedient creatures once they've died, then as a loophole he sacrfices himself to himself to appease himself and then requires those monkeys to make-believe that he exists even though he deliberately witholds any meaningful evidence of his existence...

At least elohim had an excuse for being an a$$hole. He was just doing what his daddy did.

I really like your description of god and his plan for us... I hope you don't mind if I quote it from time to time (giving you credit)... I've often tried to come up with a way of summarizing the whole thing like that.

Check it out:

http://youtu.be/dkyZCby7akg

Its a tough job, but somebody's got to do it!

Timothy

Thanks for clarifying it. I had a flashback of years ago when the term "godless atheists" was popular and not a good characterization. I did not think you meant it that way.

I don't choose anything, never have, even as a mo. I study and investigate, and my beliefs follow suit. I don't know about others, but for me the "belief" part is totally involuntary.

Only thing that kept me as a mo so long was lack of exposure to evidence.

Like the poster above, I'm not looking to argue, just looking for clarification... I haven't thought of it this way and I find it fascinating...

Are you saying that your beliefs are "informed" by the evidence in front of you? That your beliefs are built by said evidence?

Couldn't it be said that you choose to "accept" one set of evidence over another, there by choosing, in essence, what to believe?

I ask because there is ample evidence of people being shown perfectly good evidence that go against their belief system and they refuse to accept it. Granted you might be stating that you aren't like that... But even with that allowance, don't you choose what evidence you deem "good enough" to accept and help build your belief system?

I guess to me, belief, choice and "proof" all work together, weighing each against the other... Some people place more value or weight on belief, or their choices or "proofs" than another...

Stated another way, for me, I choose what evidence to accept as true, and that in essence builds my believe. I can just as easily state, I choose my beliefs based on the evidence that I accept.

Note, as explanation of choosing evidence: I might not fully understand the principal shown as proof, but I trust the source enough to accept it. Take, for example, the DNA evidence that refutes the BoM, no Native American tested so far shows any Jewish ancestry, I'm not a geneticist, but I trust the source enough to accept it as true, I could easily disagree with it, saying the results have been falsified or we don't understand the genetics or the genes have changed enough, etc. It's just one example. As another example, it's possible to prove that 1=0 using simple math concepts, in such a way that if you don't fully understand the underlying math, it makes perfect sense. It doesn't make it really true, but it can be used to make people believe it's true.

Thanks for all the comments so far... It has turned out to be a more interesting question than I thought and some of the answers have made me think about things in a new light.

Oh, I know I'm a rare case when it comes to my beliefs on belief (no pun intended). But for me, there never was a choice. If I find two contradictory pieces of evidence, and after investigation find that they have near-equal reliability, I don't choose one or the other to believe. My belief is just that - either one could be true. If one starts to emerge as being more likely than the other for whatever reason, then I'd say that that's the one that I believe, but the possbility of the other never goes away with my declaration of that belief.

I could "choose" what to believe, by saying it out loud, but it's not going to necessarily make it true. It's not in my nature to be partial without reason. My reasoning changes, and with that my analysis of evidence. Then if the scale tips the other way, my belief will change. For instance, according to my reason, I used to think that the spirit was the most reliable source of religious truth. I had reasons for this, and the result of applying that reason to my evidence was that mormonism was most likely true. Then, after learning facts about church history, I re-analyzed the spirit and found it to be highly unreliable, so the scale tipped the other way, and with it my beliefs.

Faith is another matter altogether. I can choose what I decide to exercise my faith in. But I don't see much point in exercising faith in things that have a small likelihood of being true. There's just not enough time in life to cover my bases, and I have better things to do.

Thanks, you make some good points and have given me a lot to think about...

...is that exMos frequently choose either "atheist" or "Bible-believing Christian". The thinkers go one way and the feelers go the other.

religions and decide they were all false. It took another 10 to give up on the idea of a god.

It's a complicated, life long process. Apparently, the eternal progression of man is the only Mormon concept I still agree with.

I would add choice and accountability, that's my favorite, although I probably interpret it a bit differently than The Brethren.

Particularly if you grow in the Church, you have been told all your life that all other churches are abominations. There is only one true church.
We are told, in short, either the LDS church is true, or no church is true. When you discover that the LDS church is not what it claims, the default position is that no church is true.
Mormonism or nothing.
Not mormonism.
Therefore nothing.

Very interesting point. I remember my mother saying those very words to me. "If the church isn't true, then none of them are... Its the best thing we have going for us."

Perhaps the church's doctrines are affecting us even after we leave... I sure hope not, I'd like to think I did research and decided for myself.

the first time I heard that argument was from Ed Decker. I don't agree with him on pretty well anything, ever, but I thought he made a good point that time.

I thought about other religions and looked into some of them. But I really don't know. It all seems like a lot of hooey. I want there to be god, I want a life after death. I'v got some dogs and a cat I'd like to see again, and one dog that's likely to go there soon.
Iris Dement has a song called "Let the Mystery Be"--I've posted the lyrics here before. It's how I see things. I'm content with letting the mystery be.

Susan

After studying my way out of Mormonism, I looked into other religions and very quickly realized that all other religions have the same basic problem as Mormonism does - no reliable evidence that would stand up to equal scrutiny.

I still perfer to refer to myself as agnostic because atheism is often thought to hold an affirmative statement that God does not exist. IMO, that is also a statement that could not be supported any more than the claims of God could be. Since posting and reading here, I have come to understand that atheism simply means "without God(s)" which would include a position more like mine - that no evidence for God exists to satisfy me. Pantheism is the closest theist thought that I like, but I have no more evidence that this version of God exists any more than Christians or other religionists have that their version of God(s) exists.

... the whole religious thing fell apart in my eyes.

After I climbed out of the box, the whole "Christ died for us.." business didn't even make sense.

I was amazed at how little "sense" there is in any religion humanity has to offer. Now I see them all for what they are -- yet another way for humans to group themselves in an "us-vs-them" mentality. No-thanks.

I cannot agree that atheism is the default position when one has been conditioned by a cult and also to the society at large, which claims a "Christian-Judeo heritage" from which we derive our values.

We live in a society which has these gems ingrained in us:

"He came from a god-fearing family"

"In God We Trust" (on our money!)

"Does he believe in God?" (instead of "Is he a moral person")

I believe poster Holy Ghost hit the nail on the head in recognizing the cult conditioning designed to elevate Mormonism by pit-digging other Christian denominations has the effect of positioning the member who leaves to find it very difficult to embrace religions which they have specifically been taught to view as "abominations." (and the whisperings of public relations in the last decade do not superceded the voice of GOd--unless they consider God a less recent source than the PR department of the Mormon Church)

I left the Mormon Church because I read the New Testament and realized that the TSCC was actually more like the Jewish establishment that Jesus hated. Jesus did not want a heirarchical, abusive church. That's what he came to stop! Mormons restored the Old Testament church and put Jesus Christ's name on it.

What sent me to the Bible to pretend I had never heard Christ's message before was the behavior of the Mormons (cruel) and the obvious contradictions present in the convenient change of mind God had regarding the Negro. These upset me enough to trigger what remained of my critical thinking ability: "Hey, that can't be right."

However, I really believed all good people were Christians (hope she marries a good Christian man). We were conditioned to believe atheists wanted to sin without consequences, so they just chose not to believe.

Over the years as I rejoined the Catholic Church and various Christian denominations, I began to realize they were all exploiting something they called "the God-shaped hole in people's hearts." I began a study of religion around the world wondering how the beliefs of Hindus, Buddhist, Taoists, and the millions of members of Islaam filled this "need."

Along the way, I started questioning my assumptions. Was there really a "need?" So I studied atheism and branched out some to Scientology, Rosacrucianism and even had Jehovah Witnesses visit me in my home (like Amway Mormons with a heavy dose of fear).

During my explorations I suddenly discovered that I was a good, moral person without having a defined religion. God seemed to bless me (actually I was much MORE successful). More importantly, I was growing inside, developing ideas of my own, a personal spirituality that didn't make me dependent on an imaginary friend who had the power to punish me and make me feel guilty. I righted my wrongs directly with people I had hurt instead of going to confession or promising God I'd do better.

Now here's the kicker: my relationships began to improve. It turns out all my life I've been the Amway representative of religion, trying to peddle some denomination or another. I thought I was just talking, but I sounded enough like a salesman to turn people off--people I loved.

My open, more exploratory position created actual respect for the truth. The truth actually is (wait for it...)

NO ONE KNOWS.

We are all guessing based on our own paradigm, which is the country, culture and family we were raised in. Just think of it, some people tonight are going to sleep guilt-ridden because they used electricity. Or can't sleep because they feel like they are full of demons. Or that they wore certain clothes or didn't wear certain clothes...and some are sleeping well because they did not harm the earth or any living thing that day.

Good luck on your personal journey where there's no real correct answer except one: don't ever be exploited again.
Make sure your choice is your choice, freely without fear.

Anagrammy

Many realized that the evidence really does not match the concept of an all knowing all powerful god.

The human body does not show evidence of being created by an intelligent designer. There are glaring design flaws with the human eye, blind spots, for example.

Also, many theists believe that the wonders and complexities of life requires creation by a more wondrous and more complex God, but fail to realize that, if complexity requires a creator, then a complex creator would need to be created by a complex creator, which in turn would need to be created by yet another complex creator...

No, on reasonable analysis, the evidence does not fit the concept of a God.

Is a great way of looking at the question. The idea that getting fooled once SHOULD put anyone on guard for getting fooled by the same sort of SCAM.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/18/2011 01:16PM by MJ.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/18/2011 01:16PM by MJ.

I tried to post this to the main thread, but for some reason it ended up on one of the sub-lines... Anyway...

Thanks for all the comments so far... It has turned out to be a more interesting question than I thought and some of the answers have made me think about things in a new light.

Some ex-muslims also turn atheist.

See http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2011/07/i_get_email_87.php for an example.

There seems to be some correlation between the extent to which a religion controls the lives of its members, and the strength of mind it takes for most people to leave such religions.

Once they've made their way out of a hyper-controlling religion, other bull$h*t cultural systems tend to also fall to the scythe of reason. This is not, by any means, a universal result, but it is frequent enough to deserve study.

Another interesting question... I'll have to see if there's ever been a study on people leaving a religion and what they choose after that and if there's a correlation between the originating belief (or non-belief as the case may be) and the direction taken after leaving a belief system...

My gut says you're right that there is probably a correlation between the control and/or "cultish" behavior of the original religion and movement towards atheism.

I realized that there probably is no god(s) when I was about seven years old. I gave Mormonism a chance for 26 years after that. Then I went back to the position that makes the most sense to me. My son is the same way. He is as baffled by religious belief as I was at his age.