Religion bothers me.
It's bothered me for decades, to varying degrees. Today, it's not just bothering me - it's pissing me off. So what do I do? I create a blog where I can write about it. I have been considering doing this for months and delayed while I tried to figure out why I would bother to write about it. It came to me today that this feels like the journal writing I did as an adolescent: writing to sort through things I find distressing and/or confusing. Maybe no one will ever read it, and there is no point in having it online, but perhaps someone will say something that makes sense to me.
Anonymity is important because attaching my name to posts that will certainly sometimes be more rantings or ragings than mere musings will inevitably hurt my therapy practice. It would also make gatherings of my extended family more irritating than they already are. See...just now, I self-censored (changed "irritating" to "uncomfortable," and then changed it back again), imagining what it would be like if my mother read this post and felt hurt because I find family events "irritating." Well, I do, and she's never going to read this, so "irritating" stays. Yes, anonymity is good.
I've been thinking about whether there is a point to this blog. Do I need to convince anyone? Maybe, but I doubt I can. "Sides" are pretty much chosen. Other atheists might cheer, but theists won't budge. At least, in my experience, they don't, unless they are ready to do that on their own. I was once, after all, a Good Little Catholic Girl, and now I think religious belief is a culturally specific delusion that meets certain human psychological needs. My shift was primarily a result of...um. Well, I am not certain. Maybe that is how I get rolling with this: the history of my evolution from Catholicism to atheism.
