I'll put a TLDR at the bottom. Wanted to add my original "conversion to Christianity" story to provide context on how I got where I am now.

So, the title is a bit misleading. I became a Christian in college, back in 2003. though for various reasons haven't regularly attended church since 2019. If I had to be honest, I would probably say I still am Christian at least to the bare minimum requirements.. it's a bit hard for me to fully disbelieve based on my experiences.

I grew up in a family that had left the Catholic church before I was born. We had crosses on our walls, but I never really understood them. My mother was going to be a nun but was excommunicated after my father got her pregnant. I fully believe my mother believed in Catholicism, and my dad, well, I have no idea. For me, mentioning Jesus would just go in one ear and out the other. I didn't believe, I didn't disbelieve, I just didn't really know any information, and the topic honestly never came up.

Fast forward to college, and I start dating a girl, who says she's Christian. Again, I didn't know what "Christian" meant. It was a foreign word to me. All I knew was, "cute girl, and she likes me." I know, real mature. She dates me anyway, and breaks up rather quickly. That's where it gets weird.

I was rather confused by the breakup, and one night we had a storm, knocked the power out. I had something to the effect of "God why am I so confused?" Not a prayer, more like in vain. Anyways, at that moment, at 2AM, the TV comes back on, but only one channel works: PBS, airing a show about religion--specifically, the difference between Catholicism and Christianity. I still didn't understand much, but told my ex, who was still a friend at this point, and she was thrilled. We went back and forth about me going to a Catholic church, as per my family's wishes, or her non denom charismatic church. Seeing as how my family hadn't been to church in 20 years, I went to hers. She broke off our friendship by the 2nd week, saying i was using religion to manipulate her. (I wasn't. I was asking a ton of questions that didn't make sense, as one would and should). The thing is, though, I had that "miraculous" experience, so I really felt like there was something here. So I continued on in my Christian journey.

The remainder of my journey is quite what you would expect. Some charismatic, some hellfire and brimstone, some Calvinism, and everything in between.

I noticed a few things: The most glaring issue I had was the whole anti homosexual thing. I never agreed with that part. I could not understand why God would want to forbid a certain act that in and of itself didnt hurt anyone. Then there was the whole creation vs. Evolution thing. I found myself defending creation because science is hypotheses (aka educated guesses) and thus disregarding science (maybe cuz I was bad at science in school and this at least made sense? Idk). I actually highly enjoy the William Lane Craig - Chris Hitchens debates, probably for that reason.

But it wasn't just Christians treatment of tree the LGBTQ community. They treated each other horribly too, and then just say "forgive!"

They espouse very loudly certain aspects, like forgiveness, or anti homosexuality, yet completely ignore topics like reconciliation.

But I also noticed something else as well. All it took was me posting "Christian" on Facebook to get unfriended and such by any non Christian. I noticed that once any homosexual discovered I was a Christian, it was an automatic disqualification to their friendliness, despite i actually defended them on many occasions. I understand why, there's probably a vast history of hurt from those I corroborate with, but it did seem unfair to be ousted solely based on religion and not my character.

That said it's been 4 years or so, and I want to stop supporting Christian belief systems, but what's hard for me is that it was the only viable source for community for me. I would love to have a community of non religious people.

TLDR:

I became a Christian in 2003 due to a "miraculous/paranormal" experience.

I could never agree with the Bibles anti homosexual message.

I found Christians to not only be mean and disrespectful to LGBTQ but just to everyone in general.

Christians espouse certain things Jesus said, but completely disregard/negate others even if in the same passage (i.e. demanding tithing and forgiveness but ignoring reconciliation).

While a lot can be said of Christian behavior, it is also true I experienced a lot of rejection from homosexuals and LGBTQ themselves, based solely on the word Christian, rather than character or a conversation of what I actually believed.

The church was good for community, but I want a community where I can be honest about my values for love and support.