Congratulations! It sounds like it was a very civil and thoughtful discussion. These are not always possible, even with family. It seems you may have breached a barrier to understanding. Now all you need to do is show her how to fill that void of faith with an acceptance of reality and why that isn’t a bad thing. Little steps at a time.

Sounds to me like your mother has been crumbling her own faith, probably for quite some time, and that she's a very intelligent woman who, like many others, never felt free to express her intelligence and free-thinking. I hope she's about to start doing so!

I couldn't imagine having that conversation with my fundamentalist mother. I hope yours turns out good for both of you. I don't know why some people have such a hard time letting go of false beliefs.

I am so happy for you, for both of you. Such an emotional thing.

When I point obviously discrepancies to my mother she is I never thought of it that way. I can't even count how many people I know that are nieve with the religious insanity.

Nice. I never had such talks. My family was never big on god.

Hopefully she will find her way to be free of the guilt of sin and the fear of Hell.

It's really impressive that you were able to get past the usual knee-jerk defensiveness. You must really have great communication skills. You may have reinforced the cracks in her belief. Maybe she'll come to her senses. Brava!

How heartwarming. ? I’m happy that you and she had that breakthrough.

Ask her this question, "Faith is what let you believe Santa Claus was real. Should adults use the same method (faith) to believe god is real? Or anything?"

This doesn't happen often so well done to you and your mom!

SO happy for you!

Wow! I wish more people would see the light...

That is simply awesome! =]

What an awesome day for your relationship with your mother!

Wow !!! People can change sometimes.

That's fantastic!!

That’s awesome!! The door is open for further conversations!

I'm glad something you feel is positive happened between you and your mother. Cherish that.

How wonderful is that!!

Happy day for you, the fact that she has opened her mind to the possibility that everything in the bible is not true is just the first step for her. It must be hard for her to face the fact that everything she has always believed in is not infallible after all. She is able to rationalise in her head that is due to manmade mistakes in the writing of it rather than the message itself being wrong. Doubt has crept in and that is the first step towards considering that the whole thing might just be wrong, Take things slowly, and hopefully after more discussions with her she may see more of your point of view. I am sure it must have been a wonderful change to hear your mother say these lovely words in your praise. I feel like giving you a hug too.

It takes time but appears that you are finally making progress. My stepdad told me once that if I am right it means he has no future. Go figure.

Excellent! My Christian mother once made an odd remark, long after I was an adult, regarding religion. That remark (don't remember what it was) caused me to ask her outright if she believed that Jesus Christ was her lord and savior. She said "no" and when I said something about her not being a Christian she was quick to tell me "Of course I'm a Christian". No wonder I'm a non-believer.

Congratulations! I somewhat know the feeling as I have seen a few people crumble as a result of similar discussions with me. This reminds me of a long series of discussions I had with a hard core Catholic who asserted (among other things) "All gays should be placed on a small island so god can kill them." After dozens of hours over many weeks, the day after I changed tactics and decided to complement him on every one of his positive attributes; the conclusion of that session he left assuring me he would carefully examine my points. The next day I found him in a corner of the stairway going down to the men's health center (higher priced luxury locker room) at the YMCA (my theist hunting ground). He was curled in the fetal position and supported by the two concrete walls. I decided not to debate him that day.

I once had a boss I could converse with easily. He was a Roman Catholic. He said he went to mass regularly "because of his mother." I had to tell him that he was really a humanist!!