Discussion Religion gets in the way of my lifestyle

[maggineko]

Please feel free to share your experience or advice if you're someone agnostic/atheist but still intertwined with religion. I love to talk to people and listening to other perspectives!

I wouldn't say my mom is a diehard Christian/Catholic, but she's definitely a Christian. Baptised, confirmed, and sent her two baptised children to Sunday school every Sunday morning. I was confirmed 2 years ago. Now, I'm an altar server of about 4 years with a secret love affair with cigarettes, piercings and tattoos.

Anyway, I don't really get a day to myself thanks to being Christian/Catholic. Monday to Friday, I'm plagued with college 7am to 4m. Saturday, I'm burdened with my duty as an altar server as I serve on Saturdays, and I don't get to put on makeup or dress up or anything. Sunday, I spend it mentally preparing for and dreading Monday. I virtually have no day of rest for myself, no days where I can rest and feel better, it's just dreading the next day and finding small relief at night.

Even if I skip out on Saturday and take the day to myself with rare permission from my mother, I have to make up for it on Sunday morning, meaning I'd have to get up at 8am just to go for 11am mass. Most of the time, I can't attend shows and concerts I want to go to because they're on Saturdays, and I can't attend on Sundays because school night, basically. My fomo is sooooo bad.

I want to tell my mother, but she's a somewhat judgy person and I don't want to be interrogated for 5 hours the reasons for my agnosticism. Plus, I wear crosses in my outfit sometimes when I bother to dress up; I don't want them taken away or be told I can't wear them if I don't want to be Christian. I don't exactly wear my black rhinestoned chunky cross ring to remind me of Jesus Christ and the great sacrifice he made so I can go to hell for smoking.

"It's not a phase, mawm!!!! "

By the way, outfit check? Is this allowed? ️

 

[whywere]

I have been for decades NOT believing in ANY FORM of ORGANIZED religion ever.

I could care less what form of organized religion it is, pick one or all, they ALL ARE ABOUT MONEY AND POWER and nothing else ever.

At the age of 70, I could pick so VERY many times where I ran into organized religion and where it was always about money and one "had" to believe in whatever they were selling in their style of religion, NO!

Everything from a pastor telling me that being one "sure did not pay well" to more than one where one HAD to give like 2% of ALL the money, before taxes, that one made in a year to them to be able to "join", REALLY!!!???

I could go on and on, but the genesis of it always stays the same, money and power.

I 100% believe in a GOD, but if my daily life is not good enough to get into heaven, then trying to pay my way there is so VERY wrong.

Walter

 

[maggineko]

I have been for decades NOT believing in ANY FORM of ORGANIZED religion ever.

I could care less what form of organized religion it is, pick one or all, they ALL ARE ABOUT MONEY AND POWER and nothing else ever.

At the age of 70, I could pick so VERY many times where I ran into organized religion and where it was always about money and one "had" to believe in whatever they were selling in their style of religion, NO!

Everything from a pastor telling me that being one "sure did not pay well" to more than one where one HAD to give like 2% of ALL the money, before taxes, that one made in a year to them to be able to "join", REALLY!!!???

I could go on and on, but the genesis of it always stays the same, money and power.

I 100% believe in a GOD, but if my daily life is not good enough to get into heaven, then trying to pay my way there is so VERY wrong.

Walter

Wow! I've never experienced that before! Donations in my church are optional, though many people freely give. Needing money to maintain a building is one thing, but having to pay to join is crazy! I'm sorry you experienced that.

Don't think I can support organised religion either. Seems hivemind-y. "Believe in God but only in the way everyone else does and is socially acceptable!"