UW Atheists Featured in the Daily
By Lael Telles
November 3, 2009
Chris Busby, a UW junior, was raised in a Southern Baptist community in Alabama but now identifies himself as an atheist.
When Michael Amini walked out of a Mormon endowment ceremony in May 2006, his parents asked him if it was the most amazing experience of his life. The UW senior was about to embark on his mission trip to Singapore, but he emerged from the temple questioning the entire foundation of his faith.
“I found the ceremony disturbing,” Amini said. “I was immediately convinced the whole church was false.”
But instead of turning his back on the first 18 years of his life, Amini opted to leave for mission training in Utah. After several days, he phoned his parents to explain that he had confessed a sin to the bishop and he would not be permitted to continue on the mission.
When Amini then started to explore non-Mormon texts, he came to identify himself as an atheist, which he defined as “the lack of a belief that there is a god.”
Like Amini, other UW students raised in very religious families or communities started to identify as atheists after a great deal of thought and exploration once arriving in college.
Most religions center on a single doctrine like the Bible or the Quran, but because atheism doesn’t have a guiding text, it is up to individuals to define their beliefs for themselves or form groups to discuss philosophy and religion — or, more precisely, the absence of it.
“The word ‘atheist’ doesn’t say anything about you,” Amini said, “just what you are not.”
For Amini, identifying as an atheist meant losing most of his friends and a full scholarship to Brigham Young University. It divided his family, and their relationship is still strained today.
Similarly, UW sophomore Kevin Constantin was raised in a Christian household and attended the same church until he left for college.
“I was always asking why and questioning everything in church, and they didn’t like that,” Constantin recalled. “[It felt] like they were hiding the truth from me or they were embarrassed to answer.”
Constantin found himself feeling angry toward the church and everyone who attended, especially when they “spouted off hatred toward homosexuals,” he said.
“I didn’t want to be a part of a religion that justified that kind of disrespect,” Constantin said.
The move away from home to college also had a profound affect on Abraham Smith*.
Smith, a UW junior and biology major, grew up in a Muslim family, but gradually realized his beliefs lay outside Islam.
“As I became more educated, I couldn’t reasonably believe everything my parents were teaching me,” Smith said. “I think I’ve always had that skepticism, and, combined with my studies, especially evolutionary study, I could not keep religion and science compatible for myself.”
Smith and Constantin have yet to come out of the “religious closet” and tell their families about their atheist beliefs, something others who have “outed” themselves struggled with. Smith said his family would likely disown him and cut him off financially, so he will continue to live a dual life until he has a foundation of his own.
Chris Busby, an out-of-state student from Birmingham, Ala., who was raised in a Southern Baptist community, shared one such outing experience with his family. He found his parents’ reactions were largely dependent on geography.
“My mother took it all right; she was raised in Denver,” Busby explained. “My father wasn’t too happy about it; he had never really left the state.”
Busby thinks his father’s negative response was due to his limited experiences with religious diversity. Busby’s parents continue to fund his education, but once he graduates from college, he does not intend to continue his relationship with them.
Because morals are often associated with religion, atheists are frequently asked where they get their morals without a god to guide them.
When Busby was younger, he gave a primitive and simple answer to those who asked why he didn’t steal and murder: “I don’t want to go to jail.”
But, after leaving his faith, Amini struggled with this issue.
“Mormonism affects everything: how to vote, what is right and wrong,” Amini said.
Soon after he left the church, Amini wrote down a list of moral questions in an attempt to define his beliefs, but he realized he was unable to answer them. When Amini arrived at the UW, he discovered a theological and philosophical forum in the Secular Student Union (SSU), where he was able to discuss these matters with other UW students.
Through the SSU, Amini came to more specifically identify himself as a humanist, which he defined as the “embodiment of philosophy that puts the welfare and betterment of humanity above all.”
Even so, Amini and other atheists continue to participate in discussions with people from different belief backgrounds, persisting on his path of questioning — a perpetual process.
“If I had to say the single most important reason I became an atheist,” Constantin said, “it would be that religion told me not to question, and that is all I really want to do.”
*Name has been changed to preserve anonymity.
Reach reporter Lael Telles at lifestyles@dailyuw.com.
(daily link here: http://dailyuw.com/2009/11/3/what-they-are-not/)