I was raised in a Seventh Day Baptist minister's home, with four siblings, all older than myself. I was encouraged to participate in church life, but not pushed to any belief. Our parents were all about building good relationships, being good friends, and helping people when they needed help but not presuming to know what they needed. Our parents and those closest to them believed that the natural world is God's creation and is something we should be curious about, and be in harmony with. I was baptized and sang in the choir in our parents' church (and at school), but also attended nearby S.D.B. churches, a Friends (Quaker) meeting. It was in Friends meeting that I felt the greatest profundity, because there everyone sat quietly and waited for it to come to them, before anyone spoke. Most times, no-one spoke, and that was wonderful. Occasionally someone said something, and most times, it was really worth hearing. In both settings, there was little dogma and much humanity and little or no persuasion. We were encouraged to think for ourselves. I never deeply believed in God, but liked the Quaker idea that God is within all of us and we should seek that inner light. As the years have gone by, I have increasingly observed that moral living is not limited to the religious, and is often forsaken by them. I also observed that religious dogma often does not explain the true workings of the world, so I reject it, in favor of scientific understandings, and critical analysis of philosophical constructs.

I have never not been an atheist. Both my parents were, too, as far as I am aware. I never saw them ever doing or saying anything religious ever, anyway.

It was for the first year or so... The realization that I had been living a lie that was told to and pushed unto me by the people I loved and trusted most in the world was a huge upheaval. Shock turned to anger, which turned to disdain, which turned to pity, which turned to grief, which turned to acceptance... eventually. I'm still rather bitter about wasting so much time and energy and emotion forcing myself to believe such utter nonsense for so very long. I have no way of knowing this, but I feel I'd be much farther along in life if I had never been taught to believe in magic invisible creatures instead of being taught they were just fun (and some not so fun) ideas and nothing more.

After many years of "not really believing", then holding out hope, and going to church, then "not really believing"....I finally opened my eyes to the incredibly unbelievable nonsense and decided that "I'm an Atheist".

While growing up my family "always" went to church on Sunday, there wasn't a lot of religious pressure in the house, or during the week. It was just kind of "assumed" that prayer worked. God is alive. Jesus was resurrected, blah, blah, blah. We weren't active members of the congregation.

So yeah there were those admonishments, but not much else.

When I married and we had babies, we went down the christian road. I mean, we have to save their little souls, right? My wife claimed to be a believer..... But she was little more than indoctrinated if you ask me. She picked our church. Went through all of the rituals to join......then she was the 1st to quit. After all of that we went to several other churches , to find the one that "fit us" ......MADNESS!

One day after we had not went to church for a while, she says: " I want to try the catholic church. It looks like a beautiful religion"
I replied: " You just go ahead and go for it" I knew I was done forever at that point.

I have had many fears and hardships involving this mythical being in the sky and by 2012 I finally realized it was all bullshit. Gods are imaginary.
as far as I've been able to figure, its a combination of wish thinking, tradition, lack of consideration, or fear of death.
Those are your words above and they sum it up nicely. Most believers are going with tradition but everyone has a fear of death. Believers can tell you where we came from, where we are going, and what is going to happen in the future. I reject those claims and I once studied for the ministry.

The most difficult task was to rely on evidence instead of indoctrination. "What if the evangelists are correct, and I am doomed to suffer in Hell for eternity?"

Naah.. Learnt to speak and my words allegedly were, "I don't believe in all this God crap." Big disappointment to my family, fortunately. Some of us are just born not believing in all this God crap and that's just how it is. I truly feel sorry for people who have a weakness or predisposition towards religion. Who needs that monkey on your back? Life's hard enough as it is without religion's layer of nonsense and guilt wrapped around you.

Do you know the joke about Why Jesus was Irish. I'll let this go until you want a reply.

Brought up as atheist. It’s nothing to be atheist in the UK but now I live in the Midwest, I just shut my mouth and avoid god topics. The other day at work I was sick and got touched by a woman’s hand who then started praying over me. Ugh. It feels creepy to me.

I’m not sure you “become” an Atheist so much as you just kind of wake up to the lies floating around you that are built on what at best is a really bad history book. I am not sure I ever swallowed the whole praying and thanking malarkey, since it was obviously kind of a useless pastime (people still died, food was bought at the store by money earned by working, Santa didn’t bring toys). I tend to question everything and search for logic, and there was none to be found in any religious practice I could find.

I was brought up Seventh Day Adventist, which is some no-joke, hardcore, Revelations-based BS. My one Aunt even pulled strings to get me and my sisters a scholarship to a private SDA school although we were poor. So, even though I was always inquisitive and picked up on the flaws in logic and the inconsistencies, it was a long process to admit to myself that it was all a lie. "Coming out" to family and friends has not been easy, either. But the freedom and healing I've experienced is well worth it.

I do think growing up in NYC was helpful for me with this. Most of my friends were Catholic or Jewish but not really religious. It was a non issue. Now when I moved away, that's a different story.

For me it was a natural part of growing up. I was too busy agonising about girls to waste much energy worrying about my loss of religion.

Breaking away from childhood religious training is a very admirable thing, requiring intelligence, awareness, and courage.

The fact that many Christian Churches set forth a set of ridiculous and unbelievable lies and invoke fear and guilt to make you believe those lies—that in no way is proof one way or the other of the God question. There are some very deep and overwhelming mysteries concerning existence and the nature of reality.

In the face of these staggering mysteries, my response is total bewilderment. I do not presume to label myself.

I was brought up Catholic but I never really fell for the fairytale. Went through all the motions; catholic school, alter boy, confirmation, etc.. all without belief. My family was very accepting when I told them I was a non-believer.

I'm agnostic, but no. Tho stepping off into not belonging to my community since forever was weird. but i had a few A friends.

Not hard at All, I’m not from a religious family, we are all atheists.

Not at all. I was lucky though. The most attempted doctornation that I went through was at school. Every Wednesday we had to walk to church and do a bible school type situation. It was/is bullshit, but I made it through it. My family only went to church for weddings and funerals (and my baptism, fuckers), so it wasn't a transformation for me, it was a realization.

No, as a matter of fact the conversion was quite easy. No getting dressed up to go listen to some hypocrite drone on for an hour. No dunking involved. I get to sleep in every Sunday. (To be honest I was never all that much of a believer to begin with. I quit going to church at 16.)

Was easy for me. I was twelve and didn’t give a shit what others thought

I quit attending church decades ago out of disgust for their hypocrisy.

But the 2016 election woke me to knowing I'm agnostic..and I felt foolish and angry for being so unaware before after seeing how my rabid alt-right Christian friends post hate memes attacking minorities.

I defriended the lot of the Trumpites. Including relatives.

No, I'd been an atheist long before I ever spoke it out loud. It is not something that comes up all that often.

No. I'm very outspoken about it

It was easy when I became an atheist after being a very devout Christian. I’ve always been doubting. I was raised as a Catholic all my life and left Catholicism at 13 and became non denominational. I questioned and became angry at an invisible entity many times when I still had faith in a sky daddy and I lost so many loved ones. The last straw was when my favorite cat ended up getting hit by a car and I found him at 5 am on my way to work. I renounced any god and have been super anti theist since.

It was easy when I became an atheist after being a very devout Christian. I’ve always been doubting. I was raised as a Catholic all my life and left Catholicism at 13 and became non denominational. I questioned and became angry at an invisible entity many times when I still had faith in a sky daddy and I lost so many loved ones. The last straw was when my favorite cat ended up getting hit by a car and I found him at 5 am on my way to work. I renounced any god and have been super anti theist since.