A Testimony on Belief and Non-Belief.

[Casstranquility]

I thought it would be interesting to post my own testimony. But, it is not a testimony on how I became a Christian. I was a Christian. Here's a nice little deconversion story for you, and it's still in progress.

If I start this: I was raised a Christian, some people will think that is typical of deconversion stories, and, of course it is! You can't deconvert if you were never one.

So, without further ado: I was raised a Christian. I went to church on Saturdays and celebrated Holy Days. I didn't celebrate Christmas or Easter, but The Feast of Tabernacles and the Feast of Trumpets.
I learned that the Bible was the truth and anything outside of the Bible was suspect. I was taught that God had all kinds of rules that if one disobeyed, they would be punished in some manner.
Most people in my family have experienced the power of God through healing or other miracles.

At about 13 years of age, the church I went to disbanded and people started believing different things which seemed to me to be unbiblical. I was taught to trust my own understanding of the Bible. (Which in hindsight, I'm grateful for.) I liked studying the Bible. And it wasn't the kind of studying I run into these days-oh, here, answer these questions, but don't really take out your concordance or read different verses on the matter. Well, that was the end of church for me. I didn't become a part of another church until I was 21.

Life was what it was till at 15 my sister moved away, which was a traumatic experience for me, maybe because I blamed myself for her leaving. For this trauma I received depression, anxiety, and OCD.. or perhaps they just took hold where they had already been resting peacefully.

For one year, it seemed I was in hell. I was prone to suggestability. Many times I found my mind betraying me, and I understood why Paul said he did things he didn't want to do. I was worried about everything. I said things in my head like "Holy crap" and asked God to strike me down if I was going to hell for that. God hasn't struck me down, thank goodness. Things were all out of place.

I took a year off from high school, away from the stress of having to perform and be someone I couldn't be with my mental difficulties. During this year, I got some control over my mind. I relearned things that had been lost during my struggle. I began to learn how to let go. I still haven't got a good handle on that, but it was a beginning. Besides, it was easier then, I had faith in the God I was turning my difficulties over to.

At one point I believed my mother might be going to hell, which is not a pleasant thought. I didn't think much about hell other than that, because to me, it was never a place for people who weren't Christians, but for evil people, people who turned away from Christianity (since Christianity was the truth) and for people who met God on that last day and chose not to be with Him. I didn't think that would be many-who could see the proof of God's existence and say "No, I don't want to be with you, creator of me"?

When I was 19 or 20, I met a man on Beliefnet who was discussing with people that hell didn't exist, and that no one would go there. I was disagreeing with him, debating that no one would go there. I was very sure that there would at least be a few. He gently led me to believe that there was indeed no hell, and from there, I was able to grow past where I had been throughout my entire life. I was opened. Around that time I read a book called Love, by Leo Buscaglia, and that book reached out to me and I cried and felt love all the way through the book. I couldn't put it down. This was not a Christian book, it was written by a wonderful man who believed in love-who studied love and shared love. After this book, I, too was a learner of love. I knew when I read it what was true about love, for in my family I had discovered first hand what wasn't love. Jealousy wasn't love, anger wasn't love, punishment wasn't love, judgment wasn't love. This was a catylist, the changing of my beliefs. Surely God could not be what I had thought He was. Clearly God loved everyone and God spoke to everyone through love. Then I learned of Zen from a dear friend, and I found peace, peace I hadn't known in a long time. Peace that was available at all moments with just the stilling of thoughts and the end of labels and judgment. Through Zen I found my way to church (Jan. 2004)-I finally found the courage that I had been lacking.

At the church I went to, I met lovely beautiful people who just happened to believe in hell. I didn't know this at the time I began going. I was only wanting one thing: Fellowship with other God lovers! I found that. I joined study groups... only to find that they were not really studying. But, I kept going for a time. I learned that they believed that everyone who wasn't a Christian would be going to a place of eternal torment, and that made me sick. God, who is Love, could do no such thing!! I learned that God had such wrath that the only way He could forgive us was to sacrifice His Son: the blood would satisfy His need for punishment. Again, my spirit cried out, no, this wasn't so. Love forgave without conditions, and Love could never know wrath. At this time I still believed in sin, so I still felt as though we had something in common. I was happy for a few weeks during the first year I was with this church. (I still have depression, being happy for a few weeks is a long time to me.) Being part of the church gave me a life I had always wanted. It gave me friends, it gave me strength, it gave me life.

In the second year of my journey with that church, I started to read books about Hinduism, and I began to read self-help books, and religious books and spiritual books-which I never would have had access to if I hadn't began going to a really cheap book store. (Anyone who knows me knows I love books). This was the year, 2005, that I finally took into my being everything I had been learning about love and life. Practising non-judgment had allowed me to see the truth in other religions. I rejected completely any notion of a vengeful God, any hint of Angry Monster God. I let in God being One with Everything, God being a part of me and the trees and the rocks and the mountains. In March of 2005 I had an experience in the lobby of the church. They were taking Holy Communion and I could never identify with that method of communion. I was talking to God, thinking about communion and a fly landed on me. I must have thought "Is that you, God?" And I knew it was. I mean I could feel the essence of the fly in me, and the whole world around me became a part of me and I a part of them and it was the most wonderful thing I have ever experienced. I didn't know at the time that this was Pantheism, but I did know it wasn't Christian. Although the strangest thing was that this non-Christian event opened a path to Christ that I had never had. I hadn't known Jesus as a part of God. I had only known Him as a man pointing the way to God. When I realized that Everything was God, then Jesus became God, and I could have a relationship with Him.

I began to let Him in. We laughed at people's misconceptions of Him. I took a class on Jesus and found a Jesus I could relate to, because He was human and laughed and cried and wasn't a snobby mystery dude. Then I took another study class which was about love. It taught us to read God's words as though they were meant for us. So that we could experience God loving us. (I always heard that the Bible was God's love letter to us.) I experienced God's love through that class, until about the 5th or 6th chapter, where it began to say that jealousy was loving, and because of my experience, I knew that wasn't so. It also said that we could never measure up. It was positive in the breaking of the measure stick that binds us to trying to be good enough, but it was negative in telling us that we could never be. I reject that. I think we are good enough the way we are. I think we are perfectly imperfect.
So, I found myself separating from them.
And, I had a traumatic experience when I shared my beliefs with another Christian woman and she spat (not literally) at them. She called them bull and told me I was blind and immature and that Jesus would tell me He never knew me. This reaction hurt more than anything I have ever felt. I pulled away from sharing. I pulled away because I didn't want to be rejected or thrown away because I was different. I felt like an outcast. I felt betrayed.

I stopped believing in sin during all this. I realized that if God was Love, God didn't see sin, and sin had nothing to do with anything. It wasn't something to focus on. I saw that every mistake we make is a growing tool, and how can that be a 'sin', something that God hates? I also stopped believing in evil. Letting go of judgment let's you really see everything as it IS rather than labelling it as good or bad or evil or wrong or right. Not that I stay in that place long, that would be impossible for someone like me, who has always had a critical mind and used reason to judge everything. Ah, it was nice to not feel any evil presence around me-which I used to feel all the time. I know some of you have seen demons, and I respect your views and acknowledge that they could exist. I just don't believe they are to be feared or detested. Not that I wouldn't freak out if I saw one!

My relationship with the church began to decline as I felt more and more separate from what they believed and felt pain when I listened to sermons instead of joy. At times I almost wanted to kill myself when I listened to certain sermons. You may wonder why they got to me so badly, but it is because, even with all of my new beliefs, that I still felt that I was nothing, that I was a failure, that I wasn't worth anything, that I should suffer for my sins. These were conditioned beliefs, and hearing them over and over again made me crawl into a hole and build giant walls. "You will not tell me that I am not worth anything nor that I deserve eternal torment!" "You will not teach me that even God doesn't love me until I meet His demands or until He has a blood sacrifice!" "NO!" It is a hard path when one part of you thinks you are unique and wonderful and loved by God, and another part is in torment feeling worthless and guilt ridden. I know which one I want to be true. I know which one is from Love and which one is from the darkness. I will tell you though that I believe all this pain in me is there for a reason-it has taught me empathy. I has allowed me to love, because I know the pain other people are in.

This pain though has also lead to my deconversion. I had decided that I was still a Christian and that no one had the right to tell me I wasn't because I loved Christ and I loved God. I argued with people over this and constantly met rejection. I was not a Christian, I was going to hell, or to destruction, and I wasn't on the narrow path. This hurt. This angered me. This made me begin to detest Christianity.

Then one of my cats died. I knew he was going to die because he was acting like death was chasing him. I didn't want to believe it though. I prayed for his healing and survival. He didn't make it. He died, and I lost my faith in God. I have OCD and because of this, if I don't pray hard enough or I don't pray at all, or if I even have a thought about someone dying, my mind tells me that it will be so. I have formed a prayer to deal with it, but discovered though my cat's death that this prayer doesn't make much difference either. I discovered that prayer failed me. What point is there in praying if whatever is going to happen will happen regardless of my prayer? You see, if I really believed that prayer worked, then I would have to blame myself, and if I blamed myself, then nothing is right. The whole universe is out of whack, God Himself is to be hated.
Yes, my mind is a mess, but it's mine.

I kept praying, though, my OCD wouldn't let me stop. It is the only thing that quiets it even though I no longer put much faith in prayer. I looked to Zen to get me through my pain, and it did. Letting go and not judging works miracles. In my fear of death I began to feel the presence of evil again, knowing that it was only my fear of the unknown manifesting itself in darkness. I couldn't sleep at night-in every shadow there was the possibility that an evil spirit, an apparition of my cat could appear and attack me. Oh, what things the mind will think! I finally realized that I hadn't been following my own beliefs, I had let love slip away in my pain. I began to kiss the evil spirits goodnight (a sign of love), and even though I continue to feel the darkness moving around me, it is nothing compared to what it was. It probably won't go away until I am no longer afraid of the unknown. I fear death. I don't believe in heaven or hell. I don't know what happens after death. For now, I believe in reincarnation, but that isn't a firm belief. Mostly I believe that we will all return to the one, and the I will be lost, even though the spirit of me will continue to burst forth from the beyond, it won't be as I.

In September of 2007 I decided that since there weren't many who agreed with me that I was a Christian-including me, that I didn't want the title anymore, so I am not a Christian.
I do not even hang out with Christ much because it became painful. I realized that everything that He and I have together is just in my imagination. Nothing about Him is solid. Only His words, and some of them are suspect, and if some of them are suspect, what about the rest? Why worship a man who didn't know Love perfectly? If I wanted to do that, I could worship a man who exists now, since everyone, including Jesus, is One with God.

I only want Love, and Christianity points to and from love depending on where you look, but it is definitely not my path anymore. I am tired of it. Tired of the rejection and the confusion. The trying to believe in what I can't anymore. Tired of people calling me immature, blind, stubborn, lost. Tired of people telling me that I don't know God in truth, even though the Truth of God is Love-that being the only truth. Love DOES bind everything in perfect unity. Love DOES heal all wounds. Love DOES forgive all trespasses. Love exists, and love isn't suspect. Tired of people telling me I'm depressed because I believe as I do. I am not. I have been happy in my beliefs. Actually, if I really, completely and truly believed what I believe without any doubts, I would not be depressed. I'm tired of the judgment.

Today I am a Pantheist who believes in Love, but not necessarily a personal God. The word God I use for the Whole, the Everything of Everything, the Isness. I believe in Jesus as a man who once existed and now lives on through his teachings. He may or may not still exist as a person.
I am where I am based on all of my life experiences, and that's the only place any of us can be.

If you read all of this, wow! :) Thanks! Have a wonderful day! And if you just skimmed to the bottom, have a wonderful day, too! :)

[Sarah]

Cassi,

I just wanted you to know your honestly and your spirit touched me.  Yes, you are loved...in fact I feel love for you right now and I don't even know you.  I'm not too concerned about your beliefs.  I desire your continued journey into truth lead you into peace and joy and happiness.

:HeartThrob: Sarah

[Casstranquility]

Thanks for saying that, Sarah!  :girlheart: You have brightened my day!

[captamajora]

Tired of people calling me immature, blind, stubborn, lost. Tired of people telling me that I don't know God in truth, even though the Truth of God is Love-that being the only truth. Love DOES bind everything in perfect unity. Love DOES heal all wounds. Love DOES forgive all trespasses. Love exists, and love isn't suspect.

Yes, exactly!  I feel the same way, Cass.

Speaking of love, I loved reading your testimony!

Religionists make God (however you define Him) so complicated.  The bottom line is that GOD IS LOVE. If you know love, then you know God, regardless of any of your specific beliefs.

I hate the spirit of separateness in Christianity as well.  I am not a Christian (in the religious sense).  I believe that Christ brought truth, but I also believe that many others have brought truth, even some of the same truth. Truth does not belong to anyone.  It belongs to everyone. Truth was not "started" by anyone.  It has always been.

Looking forward to hearing more from you. :thumbsup:

[Casstranquility]

Hi, captamajora! :)

Thanks for reading my testimony and I'm glad you enjoyed it.

Some people want to make the bottom line confusing as well-such as "What is Love?" and "God isn't just love. Love is mushy. Love is warm and fuzzy." Pfft.

I agree with you! Truth is not owned by one religion.

:) Thanks, but I don't know how much you will. I don't post much. If you want to discuss anything privately, feel free. I have strange ideas about things, according to some. :)

[Paul Hazelwood]

I didn't know at the time that this was Pantheism, but I did know it wasn't Christian. Although the strangest thing was that this non-Christian event opened a path to Christ that I had never had. I hadn't known Jesus as a part of God. I had only known Him as a man pointing the way to God. When I realized that Everything was God, then Jesus became God, and I could have a relationship with Him.

Great testamony...

I will say that what some may consider non-Christian can often be the means by which people are drawn to Christ.

Part of the path to my belief in God who will have all men saved, was fueled by an Athiest, even though my specific involvement in this was indirect.

In this case there was a debate in a discussion forum on the errors of the bible.  The athiest was making the point that translations of the bible could not be error free if they needed to be changed to correct errors.

The christian dude had no choice but to consider the documentation on the revisions of the King James bible alone and through his efforts to prove this atheist wrong he discovered the God of Love who will have all men to be saved.

As this Christian person started posting what he was finding in that regaurds thats where I come into the picture.  I rejected that idea right off the bat, and I rejected it like most people reject it,  by ignoring all the scriptures that prove it.


As I was trying to prove this Christian fella wrong, I came to the understanding that I would have to be willfully ignorant of a lot of scriptures to continue believing as I once had.

I read the threads that I mentioned previously to realize the path of all of this that could not be chalked up to coincidence.

But as I reflect upon that,  I realized why I rejected it so quickly to begin with.  I had been indoctrinated by religious instruction, not the instruction to search for truth.

I have also learned that God reveals himself to us at the time of his choosing and how its done can boggle the mind sometimes.