While I can’t identify exactly when I became an atheist, I can remember when I started speaking out about it. I remember writing an essay in my African American studies class about the relationship between Christianity and slavery. My instructor, perhaps because she was Muslim, liked it and suggested that class members read it as an example of good writing. I suspect her bias because, looking back, it wasn’t a very good paper. It referenced maybe five or six sources, none of which were scripture. My case was actually pretty weak. For years after writing that paper, I remained unaware that there were any passages in the Bible that endorsed slavery, a fact that is practically part of Atheism 101 now. I look back and wonder how I missed the mark so badly on a term paper that I felt so passionately about writing.

This was a theme for about a decade for me. Transitioning from Christianity to atheism was like a type of existential puberty. I was awkward, clumsy, and naïve. I had no sense of my intellectual identity. For a while I tried looking into other religions, not even clear what I was looking for. I wasn’t sure if I was looking for the truth, something that comforted me, or just something that looked good on me. Much like one’s behavior during puberty, my decisions were based more on tribalism than rationality. While there’s no doubt that I questioned Christianity for years on philosophical grounds, I was much less likely to reject God based on reasoning by Nietzsche than on lyrics by Cornell, Jourgensen, or Graffin.

Like a high school freshman I was insecure. I was worried that I would not fit in with a new group. People in Christian youth groups at least had to pretend to like me, and I was not sure I would get the same reception from another tribe. I was also really afraid of Christian apologetic arguments, so I dismissed them before engaging them with any honesty. Even into my early thirties, I still caught myself being inarticulate about simple religious ideas. I even vividly recall calling a friend stupid for his belief in God.

Like a frustrated kid going through changes he didn’t fully understand, I was angry. It’s not that I didn’t have reason to be angry. I was angry about years of fearing hell, I was angry about praying to God and being convinced that the voice I heard in response was, in fact, his. I was angry about insufficient responses to honest questions. I was angry about sex. Not that anyone had to that point been willing to have sex with me, but I was angry that an unnecessary layer of confusion had been piled on an already nebulous and nerve wracking act, making the nearly unattainable also forbidden. But this anger made me irrational at times and was easily triggered. While some anger was justified, I let it get out of hand for a few years.

Most importantly, though, I remember the excitement. The sensations of growth and freedom that I gained by breaking free from religion were empowering and invigorating. I wanted to tell everybody what I had found. I wanted to convert the world and let them know that the universe and all its wonders had just become a lot more interesting… and a little bit less confusing. I no longer had to bounce all of my decisions off of an imaginary omniscient being or cherry pick sermons to convince myself that God agreed with me. I became accountable to myself and the real people around me, as I should be. My decisions became clearer, the consequences of my mistakes were easier to understand, and the world generally made more sense.

So for the most part the transition was wonderful and I would never wish to trade it away. The anger grew into a controlled passion, the awkwardness became a little more articulate, and knowledge led to a bit more tolerance. None of these were possible without that fumbling five to ten years.

And there are some things I hope I still retain from that time. I feel sort of as if I had it right intellectually from the start. I dismissed religion on some of the simplest philosophical grounds: God seemed absent, people suffered a lot, the universe was big and old and seemed like a strange thing for a God to make, there were practically as many religions as there were people, and there simply wasn’t much good evidence for God. Any advanced counterapologetics  that I’ve learned in the past five years has been for the purpose of responding to arguments that are more complex and convoluted, but not really any better than those I encountered in the 90s. The apologists have just buried their mistakes deeper in their arguments. Sometimes I have to remember to revert back to some of those simple objections to religious claims.

I’m glad that my positions are based more on rationality now, that I’m less dismissive of religious positions, and that I’m even willing and prepared to be proven wrong on this topic so central to my identity. But I hope I can hang on to the best aspects of my transition to atheism. I hope I never lose the excitement, the desire for knowledge, and to some extent, I hope I never forget the reasons for – and motivating power of – my anger. Atheism has made my life better. I can’t say for sure that I’m happier than I would have been as a Christian. I know a lot of extremely happy Christians and bitter atheists, and I know that sometimes the world is dark and cold, and once in a while even lonely. But I believe that I am more fulfilled. I’m fulfilled knowing that I will experience the world for what it is, and that I can grasp the significance of this one crack I have at life and all the pleasures and disappointments that come with it. I find a sense of urgency and deeper meaning when I watch a moving play, visit a beautiful new place, hear a stirring poem, hug my friends, and when I kiss my wife. As far as I know, these things are all I’ll ever have, and that’s nothing to sneeze at.