One of the most profound moments in my spiritual journey was the moment I realized I no longer believe in the concept of sin. About seven years ago, I was lying in bed, trying unsuccessfully to find my way to sleep because I was wrestling with guilt over some trivial something or another. Somewhere in the middle of all that wallowing, this moment of perfect clarity slapped me across the face. It was like a lightning bolt aimed directly at my soul, and I experienced what was, at that time, the greatest sense of relief, of peace, that I’ve ever felt in my life. It was like a deep, calming breath after having been in severe pain. I’d never even felt that kind of peace and contentment as a Christian, which should tell you something about what it’s like to be an evangelical.
Mind you, I already considered myself an atheist at this point, but I had never quite freed myself from the chains of righteous versus sinful actions. Yes, I didn’t believe in God anymore, but there were clearly still some things I needed to work out in my own mind.
So much of the Christian life is predicated on guilt, built on the concept that humans are inherently sinful because daddy Adam failed an arbitrary test millennia ago, not to mention they are so fallen and evil that they need the power of an Almighty God to redeem them from their sinful nature (a God who, incidentally, set this whole plan up in the first place). Even after having accepted my atheism at this point, I still sometimes wrestled with the notion of sin and judgment, that a God I no longer believed in might still strike me down for something I had or hadn’t done that might have offended him. It took me years to shake loose that feeling of impending doom.
Because religious trauma is a real thing, and it takes years to release oneself of those bonds. (Gee, I wonder why I have chronic anxiety now. The curious mind wonders…)
But that night, I felt one of those old, rusty chains fall away, and it was a breath of fresh air. Of course, I still believe in right and wrong, good and evil. I just don’t frame those concepts in terms of sin versus righteousness anymore, God versus Satan. I no longer believe humans are inherently evil or going to hell without God. That’s an antiquated notion that should have been disposed of a long, long time ago.
“So where do you get your moral compass from then?” you might ask.
Simple — from myself and, to a lesser extent, from the collective consciousness of mankind. I trust myself to know right from wrong, based on what is to the benefit of my fellow Man. And in the cases where I misjudge something, I trust myself to course-correct and learn something new because that is the kind of person I want to be. That’s what it means to me to be progressive. Because here’s the thing — if you need a higher power to tell you what’s right and what’s not, then you’re actually not a very good person.
Over the course of time since this incident, I’ve learned more and come to terms with the fact that religion’s true intention, its actual purpose, is to control people according to the whims of those who hold the power, most notably church leadership. Sin itself is a key fabrication in a whole system of lies designed to make people feel inferior and morally destitute and spiritually vulnerable. What better way to accomplish this than to brainwash people into believing they’re evil, right from birth, and need to do certain things within the church (things which just so conveniently benefit the church) in order to demonstrate their faith in a god who is ultimately objectively not all that good himself. It’s an abusive system that perpetuates itself generation after generation, much as abusive systems do.
It’s been years since this revelation occurred to me, and it has changed the way I see both the world and the people in it. I’m more open to truth, more accepting of people where I find them, and non-judgmental of those who are making a genuine effort to be a good and better person. I’m far happier now in my growing spirituality than I ever was in Christian evangelicalism.
