Tag Archive | God

Genesis Chapter 2

Chapter: 2  has 24 verses

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Genesis Chapter 1

Chapter: 1  has 28 verses

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Exposure and Response Prevention

I’ve completed my ERP therapy. Thanks to both medication and ERP I’m in a “complete” remission of symptoms. I can truly tell you I hope to never go through that again, but I do not regret doing so [ERP] (and would do it again if needed to). I feel peace and am relatively anxiety free. Results may vary from individual to individual, but for the most part a significant decrease in symptoms is expected should one complete therapy.

So, what is ERP and how/why it works. The basic idea is actually deceptively simple. That doesn’t mean it is easy. Let’s take the example of someone who is afraid of heights. This fear of heights triggers an uncomfortable amount of anxiety at a certain level. We start with a scale from 1 to 10 (or 1 to 100). This scale is known as subjective units of distress (aka SUDS). This person who is afraid of heights would  back away from the balcony (avoidance/escape response) if on say, the tenth floor. By Read More…

So, why do I consider myself an atheist (part 3)

Part 2

It’s now difficult for me to believe in the God of the bible. The monumental failure of prayer in my life is the least of my reasons I do not believe. I don’t understand how a God can claim to be all loving, all powerful, all knowing and send people to hell for an eternity or allow the amount of suffering in the world that He supposedly does (problem of evil). How can this Read More…

So, why do I consider myself an atheist (part 2)

Part 1

It is very difficult to convey all of the emotions and thoughts which went along that period of my life. I think that was the closest I’ve ever been to being “insane.” I still couldn’t tell the entire story to my parents. How would they understand how ultimately “evil” their child was, or so I thought. To a degree, the abuse made a sort-of twisted logic and fed into the idea that I deserved it. It made sense in terms of the abuse I received, and it made sense “theologically” too. I started to search for answers among my fellow Christians (at that time). I prayed the sinner’s prayer with other born-again Christians a few times (I meant it with all the faith I could muster). I remember calling Silent Unity to pray on a regular basis. I thought if I would be born-again, then God would love me again. I was anointed with oil, a sacrament for the sick. It is a Christian truism that if God doesn’t answer your prayer than he would make you strong enough to endure whatever trial befell you. To an extent, I agreed, but my trials were getting harder and harder. Read More…

So, why do I consider myself an atheist (part 1)

The reasons I’m going to give are not necessarily philosophical although I’ve encountered the “problem of evil” “the problem of hell” essentially on my own. Rather, my OCD latched on to these problems and caused a great deal of pain in trying to resolve them. Let’s start at the beginning.

I was raised Roman Catholic (RCC) on my mother’s side. I have been baptized, and confirmed. I used to go to church and confession. I used to enjoy reading the homilies on my own as I did find them interesting as stories and narratives of some type of truth. I looked to these stories as how is God trying to help me understand them. I used to pray quite a bit. I would even venture a guess that it may have been a compulsion, but I didn’t always pray out of guilt or anxiety. For the most part, I thought of God as Read More…

It’s time for a page one rewrite for the Roman Catholic Church

Before I begin I want to let Catholics know that I’m not trying to “come down” on Catholicism. I was raised Catholic and I to a certain degree understand what it means, or meant I suppose, to be Catholic. I write this in the spirit of constructive criticism. I don’t want to see the Catholic church disappear. Despite my disbelief I think the Roman Catholic church isn’t all bad. Catholicism is still one of the Read More…