Christianity is a Lifestyle
It's More Than the Bible and a Church Visit
from 
JoeUser Forums
JoeUser Forums
Fore-Warning: As you read this, keep in mind that this is coming from a former Catholic/Christian who has now turned to Atheism.
Over the past 7 months, I've been living with a roommate at the University of Michigan who the school paired me with. And for the most part, we've been great friends the whole time. I've always been supportive of him, giving advice, etc., in fact, I occassionally felt like an older brother to him. From the get-go, he has claimed to be heavily religious, listening to religious music, talking about friends he's met at Church, ranted on and on [a lot] about "good morals" and how "God always has a plan."
About 2 months into school, I noticed a change in him: he became much more irritable, frustrated, swore a lot and condemned his faith and his God. At one point during his "evil period," he went too far saying things like "Fuck God!" and "Where the hell has God ever been for me?" and, at that point, I just lost it, and grabbed him, slammed him against a wall, and told him that even though I don't believe in God, I knew he did, so I told him that part of being a good Christian is staying true to your faith during the good times, to be sure, but also to stay true during the worst of times. I let go of him, and he stormed out in a storm of swearing and damn'ing me to the worst parts of the world, etc. Soon after that, though, I think he came around and saw truth in what I was saying, and eventually got back to "normal." Since that point, however, I believe he felt that I still could "be saved" by God, and had made it his personal mission to "convert me."
Granted his goal of attempting to "convert" me would never happen, as I was born and raised Catholic and lived in a rather religious household. Growing up I was required me to attend pre-church "school" and the occasional youth-group meetings, along with reading the Bible on a daily basis. My reasons to turn Agnostic, and later Atheistic were very well-justified in my mind, and pretty set-in-stone, at least for my foreseeable future, and I have remained that way for a couple years now. I've occasionally thought about maybe attempting to go back to Christianity (though I will never return to Catholicism), simply because it makes certain aspects of life easier to deal with, however those were fleeting thoughts, and I still remain strong in my current beliefs.
The previous paragraph was just some background information on myself though, to indicate that although I am NOT religious in any way, shape or form, I still do know a decent amount of information about Christianity, and especially the Catholic set of beliefs. So, even if I don't believe in God (or most of the other things the Bible preaches about), I was able to answer a lot of questions about Christianity that my roommate may have had. Now, I had just mentioned about one of his "evil periods;" however, little was I to know, that these "evil periods" were going to happen much more frequently: about once or twice a month. I've learned to deal with him when he gets like that, but being that I felt he and I were still good friends, I also did my best ot help. And, to support the main point of this article (which will be discussed in the paragraphs to follow), let it be known that he has NEVER ONCE thanked me for helping him, or apologized for his "evil periods", which he writes off as "part of who he is."
To me, part of being a good Christian is more than just beleiving in God, showing up every now and then at Church and reading the Bible. I was always raised on the belief that part of being a good Christian is more like a lifestyle: you follow/trust in God, you treat others like you would like to be treated, you live a self-sacrificing life, and always put other's feelings over your own (which falls under the self-sacrificing part). My roommate and I got in a major argument over this, he believes that in order to get into heaven, you just have to believe in God and show up to Church. I told him that if he was to follow the Christian way of thinking, then there is a whole lot more work that needs to be done if you wants to get into his Heaven. So I preceded to say that if someone was only mildly religious, but was a total asshole to everyone he/she met, never doing a good thing for anyone other than him/herself, then they could get into heaven. He said "Yes," and I just scoffed at him, and gave up the discussion.
If he was right, then I've definately been right about my views on religion all along, however, 15 years of getting raised in and around the Catholic church tells me otherwise. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to make a religious come-back, but religion is an interesting topic of research for me. Any thoughts?
Over the past 7 months, I've been living with a roommate at the University of Michigan who the school paired me with. And for the most part, we've been great friends the whole time. I've always been supportive of him, giving advice, etc., in fact, I occassionally felt like an older brother to him. From the get-go, he has claimed to be heavily religious, listening to religious music, talking about friends he's met at Church, ranted on and on [a lot] about "good morals" and how "God always has a plan."
About 2 months into school, I noticed a change in him: he became much more irritable, frustrated, swore a lot and condemned his faith and his God. At one point during his "evil period," he went too far saying things like "Fuck God!" and "Where the hell has God ever been for me?" and, at that point, I just lost it, and grabbed him, slammed him against a wall, and told him that even though I don't believe in God, I knew he did, so I told him that part of being a good Christian is staying true to your faith during the good times, to be sure, but also to stay true during the worst of times. I let go of him, and he stormed out in a storm of swearing and damn'ing me to the worst parts of the world, etc. Soon after that, though, I think he came around and saw truth in what I was saying, and eventually got back to "normal." Since that point, however, I believe he felt that I still could "be saved" by God, and had made it his personal mission to "convert me."
Granted his goal of attempting to "convert" me would never happen, as I was born and raised Catholic and lived in a rather religious household. Growing up I was required me to attend pre-church "school" and the occasional youth-group meetings, along with reading the Bible on a daily basis. My reasons to turn Agnostic, and later Atheistic were very well-justified in my mind, and pretty set-in-stone, at least for my foreseeable future, and I have remained that way for a couple years now. I've occasionally thought about maybe attempting to go back to Christianity (though I will never return to Catholicism), simply because it makes certain aspects of life easier to deal with, however those were fleeting thoughts, and I still remain strong in my current beliefs.
The previous paragraph was just some background information on myself though, to indicate that although I am NOT religious in any way, shape or form, I still do know a decent amount of information about Christianity, and especially the Catholic set of beliefs. So, even if I don't believe in God (or most of the other things the Bible preaches about), I was able to answer a lot of questions about Christianity that my roommate may have had. Now, I had just mentioned about one of his "evil periods;" however, little was I to know, that these "evil periods" were going to happen much more frequently: about once or twice a month. I've learned to deal with him when he gets like that, but being that I felt he and I were still good friends, I also did my best ot help. And, to support the main point of this article (which will be discussed in the paragraphs to follow), let it be known that he has NEVER ONCE thanked me for helping him, or apologized for his "evil periods", which he writes off as "part of who he is."
To me, part of being a good Christian is more than just beleiving in God, showing up every now and then at Church and reading the Bible. I was always raised on the belief that part of being a good Christian is more like a lifestyle: you follow/trust in God, you treat others like you would like to be treated, you live a self-sacrificing life, and always put other's feelings over your own (which falls under the self-sacrificing part). My roommate and I got in a major argument over this, he believes that in order to get into heaven, you just have to believe in God and show up to Church. I told him that if he was to follow the Christian way of thinking, then there is a whole lot more work that needs to be done if you wants to get into his Heaven. So I preceded to say that if someone was only mildly religious, but was a total asshole to everyone he/she met, never doing a good thing for anyone other than him/herself, then they could get into heaven. He said "Yes," and I just scoffed at him, and gave up the discussion.
If he was right, then I've definately been right about my views on religion all along, however, 15 years of getting raised in and around the Catholic church tells me otherwise. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to make a religious come-back, but religion is an interesting topic of research for me. Any thoughts?
