VioletVortex
Well-Known Member
As a spinnoff of the thread created by @syncretic, I decided to create this one. For those who are currently theists, were you previously an atheist? If so, how did you make your journey from atheism to theism.
I was an atheist, pretty much from birth. My mom had tried to teach me some Christian stuff when I was a baby, albeit out of a cartoonist childrens' book that made me view it as a fairy tale like any other. I asked her questions about the clothes god wears and whatnot, but after that I developed and fairly strongly internalized the notion that religion is inferior to science. I thought of myself as a "normal, secular person". I did not learn the term "atheism" until I was 13, and it wasn't until then that I actively called myself an atheist. Through the heavy metal band Black Sabbath, I discovered Satanism, and it's two main braches-atheistic and theistic. I vaguely remember telling my friend that I was an "Aesthetic Satanist", meaning "one who is fond of the religion's dark aesthetics" after misreading "atheistic" as "aesthetic".
The next year, I discovered the Church of Satan website. After doing some reading, I noticed that the doctrine of the organization was in accordance with my own personal beliefs, and because I was drawn to the aesthetics as well, I became a serious LaVeyan Satanist, reading about it almost every day and educating my friends on it, some of who were actually quite interested. This interest gradually became more theistic, and a year later, I became a hardcore Theistic Satanist. That is how I became a theist.
I currently identify more with Paganism, however I frequently experience a desire to revisit Satanism.
I was an atheist, pretty much from birth. My mom had tried to teach me some Christian stuff when I was a baby, albeit out of a cartoonist childrens' book that made me view it as a fairy tale like any other. I asked her questions about the clothes god wears and whatnot, but after that I developed and fairly strongly internalized the notion that religion is inferior to science. I thought of myself as a "normal, secular person". I did not learn the term "atheism" until I was 13, and it wasn't until then that I actively called myself an atheist. Through the heavy metal band Black Sabbath, I discovered Satanism, and it's two main braches-atheistic and theistic. I vaguely remember telling my friend that I was an "Aesthetic Satanist", meaning "one who is fond of the religion's dark aesthetics" after misreading "atheistic" as "aesthetic".
The next year, I discovered the Church of Satan website. After doing some reading, I noticed that the doctrine of the organization was in accordance with my own personal beliefs, and because I was drawn to the aesthetics as well, I became a serious LaVeyan Satanist, reading about it almost every day and educating my friends on it, some of who were actually quite interested. This interest gradually became more theistic, and a year later, I became a hardcore Theistic Satanist. That is how I became a theist.
I currently identify more with Paganism, however I frequently experience a desire to revisit Satanism.