Let me explain...I thought it was a joke.

I'm an atheist (if you haven't figured it out yet). It took me a while to actually come out and say I was an atheist, but I've been skeptical ever since I was a kid. Ever since I saw my aunts and uncles putting gifts under the tree when our families would stay at my grandparents' farm for christmas. They, then, persisted for years to tell me that it was Santa Claus. It made me feel grown up, knowing the truth. I'd go along with it and tell the other kids it was Santa Claus, even though I knew it wasn't. For years I assumed the Jesus story was of the same stock. It made me feel good to know the truth. That everyone else was out of the loop. I found even the adults were believing these stories. It took me a while to realize this. My mother would always be so excited when I came home to tell her I learned something new. She and my Grandparents always taught me that knowledge was very important. So I learned. I learned about theories and laws; Facts and Fictions. I kept learning and found that with the more I learned there was even less and less room for those stories all the adults believed. I soon had no reason for believing them myself. When I started to realize how devoted everyone else was, I thought I'd just play along too. Maybe it wasn't such a good idea to talk about my beliefs at the risk of being shunned and stoned (and not in the good way). I'm still pretty sure not a single relative know of this little secret of mine. I drop hints here and there, you know, to test the waters; But, alas, not single fellow atheist in my bloodline. It gets kinda lonely. Back to my mom-wanting-me-to-know-stuff thing. It gets a little confusing here, in that She's one of the most religious people I know; yet it seems like she set me up to be an atheist from the start. She even cried when I stopped going to sunday school. From outside that little box called religion, you can see that the pursuit of knowledge doesn't get Jesus very excited. Ignorance is bliss in many ways, I guess. What I'm getting at is this: How can completely logical, rational people believe in a god? I've got an opinion. I think it's because we've had this idea shoved in our face for so long (centuries, maybe even millenia), that it's just accepted without question; Also, most people are way too stubborn and proud to believe that they're gullible enough to be lied to on that scale. And I know most religous people who see this will shake their heads and not even consider any of these ideas. But if you disagree go ahead and leave a comment telling me how wrong I am about everything. Perhaps you'll even get me to repent. But as I understand it, heretics and bastards have no place in heaven, anyway. So Fuck You!