I was 12. Mom was sick so she stayed home that night and the pastor came to get me to take me to church. I was the only non-adult there and I had to sit in on the adult class.
The pastor told me if there were other children there that we could have our own class. Somewhere along the way, I excused myself to go to the restroom, and when I came out I spotted 2 young boys about 9 and 10 out the window playing outside.
I had always been taught that it was our duty to bring others in, so thinking that I was doing a good thing, I went out to unsuccessfully convince them to come inside.
The pastor came looking for me and brought me back in. He said nothing to me, but the 1st thing that happened when I walked in the door was that my mom slapped my face.
Convinced that a pastor would never tell her a lie, it would seem that the pastor had told her that I left the church and was 'outside talking to boys'. I was punished without ever getting the opportunity to explain my side.

In UK never had one, however I was literally groomed by a couple who were ostensibly selling us a house. They invited us round for dinner, offered us gifts, offered to let our kids go round to play in the pool and 'get used to the house'. Then they offered us to join their church. Basically when we said no, they withdrew from the sale. I felt violated.

I can tell you the day I walked away from religion was a few days after my best friend committed suicide. At the funeral, someone whispered behind me, "you know, suicides go to hell. He committed suicide because his family is pagan and didn't have jesus in his life."

My family is very religious and that was six years ago. Every day, I get a guilt complex that drives religion fostered upon me for "walking away from god." That is my worst experience with religious people. It's every day.

I decided to turn my back in religion when i figured out that people can spend billions building churches but can't spend thousand to feed the poor in the same church and the homeless.. Instead of building Mega Million Cathedrals why not build Mega Million Homes for the Homeless.

My brother-in-law was one of the 16 Marines killed in the c-130 that crashed over Mississippi on July 10. Almost every day after the names of the victims were officially announced, my sister started getting "sympathy cards" from Christians telling her that she needed to repent so that she could see her husband in Heave (ironically, he also was agnostic so that ship would have already sailed). Some included tracts, pamphlets, steps to avoid hell, and the conversion prayer. These were people that didn't know my sister or her husband, Brendan (or any of us for that matter). We have no idea how they got our address since we never announced that, but it was just freaky, and a disgusting violation of a human being's grief.

My trauma is this. My worst experience with religious people was when I was 17 and I had a group of three elders (older appointed men) assigned to assess my case of immorality. They are called a judicial community. Anyway they suspected I was lying to them about the exact events that took place being my boyfriend and I. They wanted to know details about how far we had gone sexually with each other. Supposedly they needed the information to discern whether or not to kick me out. But next they invited me to meet them at another kingdom hall (church). I thought it was just going to be us. They failed to mention there were going to be three other Elders and my boyfriend there.
So here I was, 17, the only girl there with 6 old geezers and my teenage boyfriend all sitting in a circle going into detail about our sex life. They asked us questions like, "Did you masturbate at all? How much clothes did you have on? Where was it? How many times?" Etc. Etc. VERY DISTURBING. I don't know how I didn't realize how wrong it was and why I didn't run out of there. The brain washing was strong with this one. (AKA: me.)

My best friend had AIDS and, when he didn't have much time left, he asked his older brother (who lived in another state) if he could see him one last time. His brother sent him a bible and told him he still had time to save himself from hell if he hurried. Oh, and he'd be praying for his soul. I can't fathom anything that hurt's another human being that intensely as being good.

My mother told me not to have children because i'm an Atheist. It sounds really rough but I'm actually not really mad at her. I used to be very religious too and she's told me directly she simply believes that if I raised a child atheist then they'd go to hell in the afterlife. We still love eachother, but its been a Dificult split in the family.

Listening to the stories of kids who heard some religious people praying for the death and destruction of non-believers, and those who don't practice their same religion.

I came back from a Toys for Tots run to pick my son up from my aunt at her church one evening. One of the church ladies rushed over to tell me that if I was a good Christian that I wouldn't dress like that. I responded, "I'm not but if you were a good Christian, you wouldn't have said that. Maybe you should read your book about judging others."

I actually had someone defend the idea that you can rape children in the name of god. I told him that if he truly believed that then his morals were absolutely FUCKED. He became irate at the use of the word 'fuck' and declared that he could not tolerate such vulgarity. To sum up, he actually believed that child rape was acceptable but saying 'fuck' was unconscionable.

When I was a kid I went to a Catholic School and we had to go to church so yeah probably going to church

My family who are "born again" christians. All they talk about is jesus and try to convert me. They think I have to be "saved". The only thing I need saving from is them! They are judgemental hypocrites who are focused on materialistic things. They have no compassion!

My oldest sister. Blocked me on Facebook over challenging her faith. Well, let me just point out, she's the kind of Christian that places Jeebus First on everything in life. That would include disowning anyone in her family that doesn't join her bandwagon. Yeah, my own sister hasn't talked to me in years because of "religion". Pretty pathetic if you ask me, and gives me even more reason to deny religion as a whole.

I am a professional house painter. I'd spent a week painting the house of a lovely older couple. On the last day, I was cleaning up and they were chatting with my boss. He's a former pastor and a heckuva good guy. When I entered the room, my boss joked, "Don't ask him about any of this, he's an Atheist" (We have a very good relationship, and discuss and joke about this kind of stuff pretty regularly). It was the wife's reaction that got me.

She looked directly at me, and said, " oh, and you seemed like such a nice man".

I was actually pretty shocked at how much that hurt.

Since then, I painted for them again. I didn't mention it. My experience has taught me time and again that there is simply no changing the religious mind.

My few encounters with religious people have been a real hoot. Being human they also question their beliefs and I think at times are frankly unsure of them and questioning. Many can get pretty wound up if you let them know what you think. They will go far out of their way to let you know they are right. I have this sneaky feeling a big reason they don't like agnostics/atheists is because it makes them question their own beliefs and possibly have doubts and that can be very uncomfortable to them...LOL

Every time a religious person tells me that they'll pray for me, while they have such pity in their eyes. Like I'm just trash, lost and unloved, and only their prayers will fix my broken soul. It does hurt me like it used to, now it makes me angry. I don't like being angry...

I have met some religious people and groups that have the personality of destructive cults. I hesitate to go into too much detail about this though because a lot of people don't know about cults and how they work. But if anyone has experienced anything with cults, feel free to add to this.

Most of them are illiterate and they can't make any good logic. They are also very angry minded people ????

Every day with my wife and kids going to religious things at churches. It is clear they choose to be stupid and blind and have no respect for someone who has more experience, knowledge and understanding than they do.

I was and am being shunned by a church community I once belonged. Went from 100 so called friends to none. My sin? I dated a person outside my faith community. She was labeled a whore and me a fornicator! By the way, we were both virgins. At the time it was devastating but I now see it as the best thing that ever happened to me.

not much to be considered worst, no physical assault of any kind . . . except for the thought that most of religious folks I've known and have met don't practice what they preach

Every day. Because I live Ina religious family\community people are always undermining and trying to change my belief and calling it a phase.

A fundamentalist preacher who was street-preaching at my college last semester told me that when Judgement Day comes, he will personally dragging me screaming and throw me into the pits of Hell, laughing at me the whole time.

Granted, he also told me that he had 5 Ph.D.s, performed miracles, and had evidence that present-day whales existed in the Cambrian Period, so he might not be the most believable person in the world.

First experience with religious people was my worst. Southern Baptist family of kids comes walking down the sidewalk while I'm outside with my two sisters, we were all younger than 12. They were all dressed in their sunday's best. They walked right up to us and said, 'Do you believe in Jesus?' Not a one of us knew what they were talking about. Immediately they all started telling us how we would all burn in hell unless we believed. Their words just struck me as angry and hateful. It also sounded like they were trying to sell me something they couldn't actually give me. I went inside and told my parents and my dad got pretty mad and explained to us how wrong they were to say what they said. It made sense to me then and it still makes sense to me today. Keep your religion to yourself.