How to Deal With a Religious Family

Step 1: Pretend you're religious by smiling and nodding when your family mentions God.

I truly don't have any advice for dealing with family members who insist that your way is wrong and their way is right. Mr. Atheist suggests coming out to someone in your family who feels the same way that you do, and perhaps speaking with the host ahead of time. If you don't feel comfortable hanging out with your family who tends to shove religiosity down your throat, you can bow out and leave.

For the most part, my younger sister and I are in the same boat. We're not all that religious and find life to be satisfying without following the church's doctrine, but we have different ways of confronting the issue. My younger sister prefers to cut off contact and not show up to family gatherings. I show up and just play along. Sure, I'll hold hands and say grace to keep the peace. I'll even pretend to listen and keep my thoughts to myself when my aunts and uncles talk about the ways God has blessed them by not giving them a job promotion. I'll even respond with "okay" when my mom tells me to say my prayers. On the other hand, my younger sister only talks to my mom when she needs something and otherwise avoids contact with her: no phone calls, no visits.

I've never told my family explicitly that I'm an atheist even though I'm pretty sure my mom knows that I don't believe anymore. She told me she's not sure why I think and believe differently from her when she's the one who raised me. It's disappointing to hear something like that coming from your own mom. I know religion is important to my mom, so I keep my opinions to myself. But somehow I feel like I've still disappointed her. I've learned to live with that disappointment, and I think at this point, my mom has too, or perhaps I'm deluding myself.

I keep telling myself I'll come out after my grandparents pass away because after that, it doesn't matter anymore. For the longest time, I was afraid I would be kicked out of the family because I don't believe. I have avoided phone calls and letters from my grandparents out of guilt that I don't think the same way as they do. Out of guilt or perhaps fear that they'll discover a wolf in sheep's clothes and be very disappointment in me. I feel anxious around my family, especially my grandparents, and I hope they never discover my secret (that I am blatantly putting on the Internet, the least secret place in the entire universe). Last year I had a panic attack in my sleep because I was so worried about going to my grandparents' house in my dreams.

It might be easier to deal with if they shared the same values as me, but we don't share the same values and we seem to be on the opposite side of the spectrum. For now, I'll bide my time and keep my opinions to myself. I'm lucky in the fact that I don't have to live near them anymore so I don't have to hide my true self as much. It feels weird when they say things like, "Oh, we miss you since you're so far away." It feels like they're just saying it to say it and that it couldn't possibly be true since they don't even know the real me.

Family is difficult, and I'm afraid I don't have any answers. I've chosen the route with the least conflict but also with the least satisfying outcome for the relationships with my family. I don't hate my family, and I don't think they're terrible people whom I should cut off. I just wish they would talk less about religion so I didn't have to dread going to their houses for holidays.

Mourning Easter

I've read somewhere that once you've been a part of a religious community and then decide to leave the church, you're more likely to mourn the loss of your religion. I like to think that you're not just losing your community, but your faith, belief, and rituals.

I stopped going to church in my first or second year of college. The breaking point was the day the priest decided to preach about loving the sinner, but hating the sin, and he literally said that we should not be tolerate of gay lifestyles. And I could not understand how he reconciled those two points. We had to hate the lifestyle and be intolerant of their actions, but we had to love the person? Someone's actions are a part of who they are. To me, it also seems that someone's lifestyle is a part of who they are, so rejecting their actions and lifestyle is essentially rejecting that person. I refuse to reject someone just because they like the same-sex instead of the opposite-sex. It was that day when I walked out of the church and never looked back. I don't regret it either, and I find myself much happier without church and religion. I am much happier without the cognitive dissonance between what the church tells us to value and the church's actual actions.

I recently read a piece about Mary Magdalene, which led to subsequent Wikipedia searches about the Gospel and Mary Magdalene's background. Honestly, the stories that I read about Christ's resurrection and the Gospels just seem like nonsense. Ever since I was a kid, I had an extremely hard time believing in Christ, and once I finally believed, I constantly questioned why he died for our sins when he was such a good person. Why wasn't it me, the lowly sinner, who was punished? The answer to that question now seems irrelevant since I no longer believe. Jesus just seems like some crazy guy, and maybe he was made up in the first place by people who wanted the obedience of others. I don't know. Nothing can be proven.

Easter doesn't seem to be as big a deal up North than it is down South. I always knew when Easter was coming when I lived in Louisiana because Spring Break for schools aligned with Easter. We were always either off on Good Friday and through the next week or we were off the week of Holy Week and went back to school the Monday after Easter. Here in Pennsylvania, they don't even get Good Friday off. Easter just seemed a blip on my radar, and I sometimes forgot Easter was coming up this Sunday.

I don't miss going to church for Easter, and I had a particularly large disdain for Easter Mass since the incense they used made it difficult for me to breathe. But I do miss the feast. I bought a small slice of ham, some potatoes, and green beans. I'm going to make the usual potato salad and green bean casserole, but I wonder if I even deserve it since I no longer believe. Do I have the right to celebrate with food even though I'm celebrating something that doesn't matter to me? Holidays feel empty now, and they also feel like a drag. Spending time with family used to be fun, but now I can't wait to get away. Spending time with family isn't so bad when they don't focus on religion, but avoiding religion is nearly impossible when on one side, my grandpaw was a deacon, and on the other side, my grandmaw is always volunteering with the church in one way or another.

I guess I wish that holidays had some significance to me, but now most holidays feel empty. Perhaps it's because I no longer have faith or maybe it's because I no longer share the same beliefs as my family. I'm longing for the ritual of feast (but not the rituals of church), but it's hard to feel into it, like I was when I was a kid.