Dan is a 2006 graduate of Duke University.
Through the internet, humanity is engaged in a global conversation unlike any before in history -- about who we are, why we are here, and how we should live -- and these individuals have an important perspective to share.
Stereotypical Mormons are known for their impeccable manners and devotion to traditional Church values. Jon Adams possesses much of the former and very little of the latter. His dedication to principle is matched by his commitment to fairness and truth. After having his faith seemingly secured by religious experiences throughout his teenage years, his demand for evidence began his interest in science and a path toward secularism. He has an impressive knowledge of Mormon history -- the timeline of Joseph Smith’s life, the Church’s long-held view that blacks were spiritually inferior to whites, the belief in the war for heaven. His criticisms of his religion are much-contemplated and factually-based.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints doesn’t generally produce bisexual Democrats. His evolution into an atheist, as he explains, was a liberating experience, allowing him to forgo years of cognitive dissonance. The pain he feels for his worldview shift is not for himself, but for his parents, who have been told by their church community that his atheism is a result of failed parental guidance. While he condemns the ignorance aimed at his family, he wouldn’t want his perspective to change: he finds his atheism to be enriching and empowering.
Jessica Ahlquist has always been a sensitive person. She cried in class when learning about slavery in the antebellum South. She cried in class when she learned about how the Third Reich massacred Jews. One might think that with what she’s experienced in the past two years, a river of tears would now stretch from Cranston to Providence. But that’s not the case; she says she feels more confident than ever.
An atheist since age 10, she is currently a student at the public secondary school Cranston High School West in Cranston, Rhode Island. She came across a prayer banner in the auditorium of her school her freshman year. She learned that the prayer, addressed to a God in heaven, was already an issue: the ACLU had been contacted by a parent within the school system, and a subcommittee had been formed to decide what to do about it. At its final meeting, the subcommittee, which included the school’s superintendent, voted 4-3 to keep the prayer.
Despite threats and harassment, Jessica partnered with the ACLU and filed a lawsuit against the school. She found support online during her activism. According to her, her involvement in the secular movement showed that “there are so many people who care -- and that’s the best part of all of it.”
At age 19, Michael Amini was standing on a highway overpass, seconds away from suicide. He thought about jumping onto an oncoming semi, planning to be splattered on its windshield like a nighttime summer bug. And why not? As a teenager, he had just lost his faith, his girlfriend, his community, and the trust of his family. He was an ex-Mormon with no rudder. Then, B.B. King and Ray Charles’s “Sinner’s Prayer” played on his iPod. He listened to its lyrics and mustered the courage to carry on.
Michael’s story, the original inspiration for this book, is a fascinating tale of a very detailed and very personal religious journey. In the end, it was his insatiable curiosity to find the truth that led him out of his faith and toward a life without religion. His new worldview, perhaps most importantly, has enhanced his empathy, allowing him to both better understand religion and view the status of his relationship with his family without bitterness. This is Michael’s story.
There are surely fewer greater cultural contrasts in the English-speaking world than that between Melbourne, Australia and rural Kansas. Jason Ball ventured from his relaxed hometown to the American heartland at age 17. What he experienced there would change the direction of his life.
Kansas was full of surprises. The Midwestern hospitality was very real and incredibly endearing. The religious lessons were also noteworthy and seemingly omnipresent. At the local youth group, he was taught that the Earth is 6,000 years old, that evolution is a myth, and that gay marriage should be opposed with strident intensity. He observed a society dominated by religion for the first time in his life.
Jason then began an intellectual journey unmatched in his life after returning home from Kansas. Influenced by science books, Jason found his passion and his community, subsequently deciding to become an advocate for secularism.
Irish Catholics tend to be both gregarious and feisty, like Ed Beck. Ed’s journey to atheism and secular activism was a gradual one. An Iraq war veteran, he was never particularly religious -- Ed identifies himself as a former cultural Catholic. His life experience changed him from viewing religion first as harmless, then as an intellectual and cultural barrier to progress, and finally as downright dangerous and destructive.
After returning from Iraq and enrolling in college, Ed became impressed by the accomplishments of the historical Greeks. Their flourishing society, he found, had progressed philosophically and scientifically, only to be undermined and destroyed by dogma and superstition. The transformation that began to take place within him was, above all, invigorating: he found freedom of thought and commitment to objectivity both more fun and more honest. Everything in his life became a bit brighter.
Peer pressure is a powerful force. In the ninth grade, in Warren, Michigan, it was Joe Bochinski’s turn to give himself to Jesus. A self-identified band geek, he, like many young teens, was searching for community. He was taken out of the crowd at a Baptist retreat and gave himself to the Lord.
His doubts grew as he began to learn about the differences between religions. Experiencing a fundamentalist megachurch for the first time -- and watching his girlfriend’s father use Scripture to justify subjugating female family members -- led to a crisis of faith. His education, particularly in science, led to what he describes as a liberating separation from religion. Knowledge fostered a growing self-confidence and a decreasing sense of fear. He began to consider that perhaps there is no judgmental, disapproving God watching over him.
Oregon megachurch minister Mary Manin Morrissey is credited with the following quote: “You block your dream when you allow your fear to grow bigger than your faith.” Rachael-Dawn Craig has had plenty of experiences with both fear and faith and, as her story reveals, the two often merged. Raised with censored television, she saw what she believed to be faith healings, holy laughter, and an exorcism at Rock Church in Nova Scotia, Canada. Rachael recalls her childhood as one dominated by guilt and terror. She was scared of demons, taught to view any sexual impulse as a sign of impurity, and feared that, by displaying a lack of religious devotion, she would allow her non-evangelical friends to burn in hell.
While she was quick to criticize science and defend her Christian faith during her early teens, Rachael’s curiosity eventually led her toward open religious skepticism. Because of her changes, her mother kicked her and her brother out of their home when Rachael was 18, believing that they had become Satanic. She now, despite her upbringing, considers herself free from the fear of her childhood. According to her, “It’s nice not to be afraid all the time.”
Shy youth from Arkansas don’t generally jumpstart their professional careers by attacking religion in the Bible Belt. But that’s just what JT Eberhard did, and he’s damn happy he did so. After a proselytizing high school teacher convinced him to commit himself to evangelical Christianity, in his mid-teens, JT finally read the Bible. He was an atheist by the time he was finished. Shortly thereafter, he read Sam Harris’s The End of Faith, which convinced him of the dangers of religion and that activism against its influence was necessary to create the kind of world in which he wants to live.
What began as joke -- drawing Flying Spaghetti Monster emblems on the sidewalks of Missouri State University -- has progressed into a purpose-driven life. He has helped organize multiple Skepticons, the largest annual secular convention in the Midwest, is a frequent religious debater, and currently works at the Secular Student Alliance as America’s only organizer of secular high school groups.
Given the location of his upbringing, Damon Fowler wasn’t a likely candidate to be featured in this book. Damon grew up in a poor, rural section of Louisiana. He always had plenty of questions about Christianity and no one around him to talk to about his skepticism. In high school, he defied his family when he protested a long-standing graduation prayer at his public high school. He worked with the Freedom From Religion Foundation, and his school was persuaded to remove the prayer from the ceremony.
The day after graduation, Damon came home to find that his parents had thrown all of his possessions out on the lawn. He moved in with his brother in Texas, trying to restart a life that he had hoped would include college and a career in animation. Hearing about his story, “The Friendly Atheist,” Hemant Mehta, another subject in this book, set up a scholarship drive for Damon on his website. It raised over $30,000. Despite his hardships, Damon doesn’t regret his activism and appreciates the incredible generosity he has received from the secular community.
Martin Luther wrote his 95 Theses in 1517, posting them to a door at Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany. His document is widely recognized for fueling the Protestant Reformation. In it, Luther criticized the practices of the Catholic Church for, among other things, his perception of Church abuses, particularly regarding the sale of indulgences. Nearly 500 years later, a Lutheran, who wished to be identified through his initials, J.A.G., began to criticize his own Lutheran faith after experiencing panic attacks brought on by religious fear. He didn’t eat enough, didn’t sleep enough, and was terrified by the possibility of going to hell.
J.A.G. spent his high school years in Colorado Springs, CO, one of the most religiously conservative sections of America. The more he understood science, particularly evolutionary biology, the more he was able to quiet his noisy mind. He began to view all life as a natural process, free from deistic observance or intervention. Empowered by knowledge and assisted by mild antidepressants, J.A.G. has overcome his childhood fears.
Childhood can be a confusing time. For a literally-minded child like Eric Gold (a pseudonym), the concept of God, as taught in his Jewish community, was rather vague. The Almighty, as best he could understand, was similar to a superhero, like Superman. When Eric would play with action figures as kid, both Batman and Moses were literally Godlike, possessing superhuman powers.
Eric drifted from Judaism as time passed. Despite not going to synagogue in years, he’s viewed as no less Jewish by the Jewish community than anyone who fully dedicates himself or herself to the religion. He doesn’t like such unchosen affiliations, though, and asks people not to call him Jewish. First and foremost, he considers himself a human being.
If a prize were awarded to the happiest atheist on the planet, Lucy Gubbins would be a frontrunner. Raised in Tennessee, Lucy had a childhood fascination with Japanese culture and all things religious. She drifted from Christianity to Wicca before advice from her brother began to lead her down a more secular life route. In college, she co-founded the Alliance of Happy Atheists (AHA!) at the University of Oregon. The group became one of the most widely-known organizations on campus within its first few years.
When she was a child, she believed that the bliss that she felt while walking through beautiful forests could only be explained through the awesomeness of a higher power. She certainly hasn’t lost her appreciation for nature or her faith in people, even though she no longer believes that God exists. She hopes, more than anything, that her efforts in organizing have helped to provide a safe and meaningful secular community in which young atheists can participate and flourish.
Roughly 94% of Howard University’s undergraduates and 85% of its graduate students are African American. While statistics are not available, it’s reasonable to believe that a similar number are theists. It’s surprising, given his childhood inclinations, that the school’s most visible atheist, Ph.D. candidate Mark Hatcher, has become a public advocate for secularism. He was quiet, reserved, and unsure of himself as a kid, and his family thought that he would become a pastor -- a prestigious role in the black community -- because of his propensity to lead his family in prayer. He believed that in order to be a good person, he needed to be an active member of his church.
Mark’s education has always shaped his perspective of the world. A high school class on the world’s religions taught him about faiths other than Christianity, and his first evolutionary biology class his freshman year at the University of Maryland described the natural creation of life on Earth. While he admits that it can be quite lonely to be a black atheist, he’s happy to have his worldview, for its accuracy and the loving secular community he has found.
Harrison Hopkins has never been particularly religious. In his junior year at Laurens District 55 High in Laurens, SC, a public school, he learned that the graduating class was required to vote at an annual senior class meeting on whether a prayer should be read at graduation. After doing some research, he contacted the South Carolina ACLU and the Freedom From Religion Foundation to inform them about the vote and the history of prayer at graduation. Laurens High responded, after receiving a letter from FFRF, stating that the prayer would not take place.
Once the prayer issue hit the local news, attention grew. He was told that Jesus loved him by some and that he would be jumped by others. On graduation night, the student body president, one of the speakers at the ceremony, stated that the controversy had strengthened his faith. He decided to read a prayer, which was greeted with a round of applause. Harrison isn’t particularly surprised that his desire to remove the school prayer has been treated with such hostility, as he understands that many within his South Carolina community have never had their religious faith challenged. He says he wants basic fairness and for religious people to understand that their religion is one of many, that no religion deserves special privilege within a public school or a public government.
Countless books have presented this journey through the eyes of people who concluded their search with devotion to God, salvation by Jesus, or commitment to religion.
But there's a changing zeitgeist in America and the world: a growing number of people are finding truth and meaning from the opposite perspective.
Through 25 personal narratives, Generation Atheist tells their stories.
If one wanted a youthful perspective on the relationship between Islam and the West, striking up a conversation with Moiz Malik Khan would be a good starting point. Born in Pakistan, Moiz moved with his family to the United States when he was two years old. Moiz, a devout Muslim growing up, first fasted during Ramadan at age eight, consistently prayed five time a day, and, with his relatives, went to Koranic study classes throughout his teenage years. A YouTube video of Richard Dawkins began an investigation into his faith that would eventually lead him away from Islam.
There is no word for “atheist” in Arabic, only one for “nonbeliever,” one who knows that God exists but will not admit so openly. Moiz became exposed to the idea of atheism through his study of philosophy and history, as well as through the scientific theories that challenged the fundamental tenets of his religion. As he lost his faith, he began to tell his family. He found, surprisingly, that many of his Muslim relatives were receptive to his ideas. While he recognizes that secularizing the Muslim world will take time, he’s optimistic that modern technology can play a crucial role in speeding up that process.
A dad’s influence over his son is incalculable. When the father of Yerret J. Maclovich (a pseudonym) was growing up, he was dedicated to Zen Buddhism. Later in life, when diagnosed with a rare autoimmune disorder, Yerret’s father, terrified of his illness, decided to give his life over to Jesus. Yerret watched as his dad, confronting possible death, begged and cried for his life. This had a profound influence on Yerret, and he decided that he never wanted to face life’s end with desperation.
Although he was afraid of falling out of favor with both God and his father while he was considering atheism, Yerret was inspired by his former boss, an entrepreneurial atheist who attempted to link his fate to his own will. Yerret’s secular worldview has motivated him to change his priorities. A poor student in his youth -- who often thought that perhaps Jesus would come and fix his life for him -- he’s now motivated by the idea that our lives are in our own hands.
A seventh-grade Jennifer McCreight answered with a nonchalant “no” when asked whether she believed in God. This was just the beginning of her involvement in all things Godless. Once she became aware of the social stigma associated with being an atheist, she frequently withheld her true beliefs until she entered college. As a founder of the only secular group at Purdue University, a public, conservative, predominately Christian college in Indiana, she was surprised by the amount of support that the group received from the student body and its professors. The group had 400 people on its mailing list by the time of her graduation, more than most of the Christian groups on campus.
Jennifer feels as though she went through two phases of atheism: the first, as a young teenager, when she wished religion was true, and the second, as a college and graduate student, when she no longer did. She began to feel incredibly lucky for this one life. Through her college group, numerous speaking engagements, and a popular blog, Jennifer has become a recognizable figure in secular activism. She looks forward to the day when the movement makes itself obsolete.
Fitting in as an atheist in Iowa can be a challenge. During her upbringing in a mostly white, Christian state, Stef McGraw knew many young people who discussed how God was influencing their lives. Most of her peers were involved in youth group. Raised in the Unitarian Universalist Church, which, more than anything, emphasizes respect for people and the environment, she had the freedom to educate herself and decide which religious -- or nonreligious -- perspective would work best for her.
The group that she joined as a freshman in college, the University of Northern Iowa Freethinkers and Inquirers, provided a supportive community that grew her confidence and comfort in her identity. Stef, like many involved in the secular movement, recognizes the lack of women within it. The characteristics that are generally associated with those who do not believe in God -- coldness, lack of emotion, etc. -- are, according to her, both intimidating and untrue, encouraging women to distance themselves from the possibility of atheism.
Rarely are the words “friendly” and “atheist” juxtaposed in American culture. But, on the internet today, one U.S. citizen is linked with that identify more than any other: Hemant Mehta. Hemant was born to Indian parents of the Jain religion. Like many others in this book, his worldview was profoundly shaped by the internet and the arguments for atheism that can be found within it. In college, largely because of the resources he found online, he became more comfortable with his worldview and began a group to socialize with his nonreligious peers.
Following a brief stint in medical school, Hemant began writing a book, I Sold My Soul on Ebay, which was eventually published by WaterBrook Press. During his research for the book he found, to his surprise, most religious people, Christians specifically, to be friendly and, in many instances, open-minded. Although his public atheism has been challenging at times -- the Illinois Family Institute contacted the administrators of the high school at which he teaches to inform them of his heresy -- Hemant continues to be both an optimist about the secular movement and an open and eager communicator with the religious community at large.
It is indeed possible for religious indoctrination to fade away. Lydia Murphy (a pseudonym) left her faith quite suddenly, just a year after leaving her private Baptist school that used Christian history books, chastised students for committing thought crimes, and encouraged its pupils to attend Bob Jones University. Once she left, she realized that the Baptists had encouraged stereotypes: not all non-Baptists, she found, were evil and, to her surprise, recreational drug users could be quite pleasant people. She drifted away from her religion, an experience she describes as “like coming out of a fog or coming out of a dream.”
Lydia became heavily involved in her university’s secular group once she enrolled in college, creating some of her fondest memories with its members. While she’s adamant that she would not raise her children in a religious institution, she has lost much of her hostility toward religion in general. She recognizes that many people have had horrendous experiences in life, and religion often provides both comfort and a community for them. It may, she thinks, simply be better for some people to be religious. She’s come to believe that being right isn’t everything. Still, she’s happy that she’s left her faith -- and its dogma -- behind her.
The Left Behind series has influenced and entertained countless young people throughout America and the world. It is not difficult to understand why Jon Nelson, who grew up in Kansas as a shy, nervous, protection-seeking child, gravitated toward such literature. In his own life, he was yearning to find his own powerful, ever-present deity. As he aged -- and after he read The God Delusion -- both Jon’s desire for and his belief in such a God began to wane.
Like many children in isolated religious environments, during his youth, he was never exposed to the possibility of a secular worldview. His journey begins as one filled with anxiety. It concludes with a feeling of liberation that changed his life, one that increased his faith, not in Christ, but in people.
A.N. didn’t taste beef until he was 21 years old. When he did, he had just arrived in America following a childhood spent in his native India. Millions of Hindus abstain from eating their sacred cows. America, he quickly found, was different from his home country. The world’s most technologically advanced nation not only subsisted on Big Macs, it also had Christian evangelicals who asked strangers in college cafeterias if they had been saved by Christ.
Because he stopped believing in God at an early age, A.N. was not severely impacted by his conclusion that the universe is neither created nor governed by a celestial guider. To A.N., critical reasoning, the ability to use one��s own mind to discover facts about the world, is perhaps the most valuable personal skill. He’s grateful that he’s been able to foster that ability in himself.
For much of his life, Jimmy Pianka stayed with Greek Orthodoxy. Raised in Lancaster, PA, he went to church camp through age 18 and admired his religion's emphasis on artistic beauty. His slow break from his faith began as his curiosity grew. He wondered how he could believe in and love both God and Jesus even though he felt like he did not know them.
Jimmy feels lucky that his sister paved the way for his departure from religion: she had angrily left the Church years before he did because of Greek Orthodoxy’s position on gay rights. When he admitted his atheism, his parents seemed concerned not that he had lost his belief in the divine but rather that he would be unable to raise a successful family of his own. His father openly wondered how he would be able to raise moral children outside of the Church. While losing his belief in God has brought its own difficulties, Jimmy feels grateful that his life is free from superstition and a fear of hell.
Raised in group homes, Greydon Square, born Eddie Collins, has lived a unique and often difficult life. Fascinated by religious concepts, particularly that of Armageddon, he became increasingly devout in his teenage years. He recognizes, looking back, that most of his life, from his youth to his time in the military, has been decided for him -- when to eat and sleep, what to do, and what to think.
In his 20s, he fell in love. His girlfriend, a fervent Christian, encouraged his musical career, which was becoming, ironically, increasingly anti-religious. As Greydon began distancing himself from his faith, she suddenly died.
Using music as a release, he has released multiple full-length albums, including The Compton Effect, The C.P.T. Theorem, and, most recently, The Kardashev Scale. Learning, he found, gave him a jolt of dopamine. According to him, as long as he got his fix, then he “lived a great life.”
At the age of 11, Chris Stedman accepted Christ into his heart at an evangelical church in Minnesota. Raised into a poor and often unstable family, through his church he found both a strong and a caring community. Over time, however, Chris realized a fact about himself that he knew he could not share with his religious community. How could he? According to what he had been taught, people like him not only got the AIDS virus, they were also punished by God in hell.
Viewing his homosexuality as a spiritual test, he fasted and prayed, hoping to change his nature. He became reclusive as his internal struggle became increasingly difficult. Then, one night, he turned on the fan in his father’s bathroom, locked the door, sat down in the bathtub, and, with a knife in his hand, nearly ended his life. Shortly thereafter, his mother found out about what Chris had been dealing with and arranged for him to meet an LGBT-friendly Lutheran minister. This interaction would change his life.
Later, after studying religion at Augsburg College in Minneapolis, Chris lost his faith in God. Despite his atheism, his experiences continued to reinforce the importance of interfaith dialogue. After college, he worked for the Humanist Chaplaincy at Harvard and has written his own memoir, Faitheist.
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