I am an Atheist Dad

I am an Atheist Dad, and I'm coming out of the closet.

Actually, I was never really in the closet. I parted ways with religion when I was roughly 16. The provability of Christianity's claims was a sticking point.

Growing up in Northern Ireland was a large part of it. I grew up in the midst of a conflict that I was never sure was about religion or politics. Certainly, the notion that Ian Paisley was some kind of spiritual leader of the 'Unionist' people always raised a question mark with me. I think around that time, I was witness to a bomb in a car park near where I worked that killed an off-duty policeman.

I think that galled me - how mixed up religion and politics were, and how entire groups of people could divide on the basis of religion. Honestly, what sort of God allows his identity to become mixed up in a vile little war where two sets of Christians were fighting it out for the right to call themselves either British or Irish?

Oh, the religious will tell me it's all about being tested and about the strength of your faith. But I require evidence, and God was never in evidence in Northern Ireland.

Anyhow, God eventually slipped away. He never really made any attempt to restore my faith anyway. Either way, there's no doubt in my mind that there's no grand God watching us from the sky...

I'm not one of those fundamentalist atheists. It's mostly live and let live with me.

However, I don't agree with hiding the fact I'm an atheist from the children. But when our kids are taught about religion in school, they're only taught to be Catholics. That's indoctrination. We don't teach them about other religions at the start because they might ask the awkward question: how do we know which religion is the right one?

Our oldest child caught on quickly about my atheism. I don't know how. She may have got suspicious when I'd dodge her questions about religion instead of lying to her. She'd definitely picked up that I never went along on the rare occassions Lisa took the kids to mass.

I wanted to start an Atheist Parenting group on Familytastic to discuss raising children in a non-Christian/non-religious environment. Or even in a mixed religious/atheist environment. If you're interested, join the group and start discussing with me.