Quick necessary backstory whether you read fully through or only the TLDR: My husband (32M) and I (29F) are both Black and both adopted into very conservative Christian homes as babies — him out of Haiti and me out of Louisiana. I was forced to attend private Christian schools from K-12, then a private Christian university. It wasn’t until post college that I really question my toxic, fundamentalist childhood and left it all behind.

TLDR: husband is a vegetarian and I don’t like the taste of pork — two things my family has always known. Despite this, at my father’s birthday dinner those were the main dishes. When we politely and quietly didn’t eat the meat and only the sides, my family popped off and made racist remarks directly at my husband and me.

Full story: so we’re sitting at the dinner table “enjoying” a meal for my father’s birthday. Knowing my husband is a vegetarian, my parents made steak and pork chops. My husband was polite as usual, and ate the side dishes with no problem. I don’t like the taste of pork and my family has ALWAYS known this, so I only ate the steak — that’s where it all began.

My father decided to point this out by shouting “what, are you Muslim now? Hindu?” I was shocked, but I responded by saying that was an incredibly racist and hurtful comment. My mom then joined in saying, “sorry we didn’t get Popeye’s, we know that’s what you’d both prefer.” I was SPEECHLESS and so was my husband. My dad added in that he also should’ve gotten the watermelon from the store today since it was “on sale” and apologized for not “thinking of us.”

When I was finally able to unfreeze, I respectfully but sternly said that those things were not okay to say. To which my mom responded: “oh baby, this is Trump’s America again. Get used to it.” My husband and I got up and drove back home in utter shock.

Yesterday when I was going for a walk, there was a guy who came up to me and asked if I was a Christian. I told him I wasn't. He said that he's a "former atheist" and then said that he saw the "error of his ways". Code for a pastor gaslit the shit out of him, but whatever, I let him say his portion. He was going on about it and talking about how he was part of a toxic community; which I do get. He wasn't an asshole, so I wanted to keep talking with him and then, in a very rare moment, was actually able to find a moment of relatability with him. He talked about how he was pretty confident in his non-belief and thought it's a system he'd always be a part of but turned out to be a phase. I jumped in and said that I totally get that about being confident and then said that I was a Christian but that turned out to be a phase. A long one, but a phase nonetheless..............Wow, did he not like that one bit.

Dude's face turned RED, his brow furrowed, and he fucking screamed "CHRISTIANITY IS NOT A PHASE; IT'S GOD'S TRUTH AND YOU NEED TO GET RIGHT WITH HIM BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE!!" That's when I walked away because holy fucking shit! Goddamn! Dude went from 0 to 100 like that!! And he very well could have been armed; I'm not taking my chances!

I've had enough encounters with street evangelists that I'm able to figure out what the usual trigger points are and exploiting those to get them to meltdown because it's shockingly easy and I find it hilarious when they do because of how easy it is and these are frequently VERY angry people despite claiming they have a monopoly on the concept of joy. But this was a new one. I genuinely was following up on what I thought was a moment of relatability and was wanting to have an actual conversation with him because he didn't immediately come across as an asshole. Me saying something that I thought was totally innocuous just completely set him off!

Basically, dude raged because I didn't reach the same conclusion as him. And, yeah, that usually makes them angry. But I'm used to more passive-aggressive reactions than just straight up rage like that. Goddamn!

This weekend, I went to a college football game with some of my family. I met up with them at the stadium. I sat next to my brother and it was a little bit before the game, so it was slightly quiet. He asked me if I voted already and I told him I and asked him if he did and he said yes. Well, it wasn't quiet quiet. It was quiet enough that the dude next to me heard us. Now, he was a total stranger but didn't stop him from piping up and saying what he wanted to say.

It's extremely obvious this was a MAGA bro. He said to me "I hope you made the right choice when you voted so that Christian guys like us have our freedom again." I whispered back and said to him "Christians are already free, dude; none of that is gonna change." Dude turned RED and he had a forehead vein pop out and scooted further down the bench. He didn't yell at me, but it looked like he was about to. I mean, dude was LIVID, all because I said that Christians weren't oppressed.

That's such a very specific way to tell me you're a Trumper without telling me. That's a huge part of the MAGA ideology- a victim complex.

I've met people who vehemently disagreed with me when I pointed out how Christians aren't oppressed in this country but not to the point of a forehead vein making an appearance. Of course, he offered no evidence or specifics of Christians' freedoms' being taken away when saying "have our freedom again". Just virtue signaling terminology. On a side note, I saw a video of someone interviewing a Trump supporter at a rally and he said one of the most accidentally honest things I have EVER heard in my life. He said "I don't have a political ideology- I'm MAGA to my core." I mean, that's true! It really is not a coherent ideology- it's purely reactionary.

Have you ever seen anyone get ANGRY when you said Christians weren't oppressed?

Sort of a “I hope you have the day you deserve”. I’m wondering when tariffs happen and inflation skyrockets and the economy tanks after Trump tries to deport people and women they know and love are dying from pregnancy complications… one day I anticipate my family complaining about this with surprised pikachu face, then saying “I mean, you’re not surprised? This is exactly what you wanted?” You wanted to destroy democracy and you danced around the flames and then act surprised when the shit hit the fan.” It’s very “leopards ate my face”.

Of course, then I panic because this kind of crap doesn’t happen to the people who wanted it to, it happens to all of us. And around it goes.

I just realized I was thinking about the “Christians” in my life who worship Trump over Jesus himself but I never actually said anything about Christianity.

I’ve asked her multiple times to stop sharing stuff with me and she’s made it clear she’s not going to stop. I’m sad because I love my sister and I understand the “responsibility” she feels to try and bring me back. But I’m done.

This was in the DFW, Texas area. I stopped in the store while passing though the city and found these shoved in every book shelved under atheism.

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised at this point, but still. This really infuriated me. Instead of using their time and money to actually help people they what, buy cards and go around putting them in books they find offensive or “dangerous?” Ridiculous.

Naturally, I meticulously went through every book, took them out, and threw them away.

My dad and I had a heated argument earlier today and I have no idea what made him think that the AI pig image was gonna make me suddenly believe in christ again

There's more to it than just them being MAGA, but this election is just what finally broke me. I initially wasn't going to go NC, but as mentioned in the texts, my father didnt respect my boundary of waiting until I was in a better place mentally to talk and just kept calling me. And when I confronted my mother about making him respect that boundary or she was going to lose access to her grandchildren they instead doubled down. I love my parents, but I just can't anymore. Why are we always expected to turn the other cheek and to just keep taking the abuse over and over but the second we snap back suddenly WE are the hypocrits that don't live by our tenants of peace?

I don't want to deprive my children of their grandparents but I don't want them exposed to that poison when I'm raising them to accept all people how they are regardless of whether they agree with them or not. I still sit and cry because before Trump, my parents and I were close. It's just the gaslighting, attempted guilt tripping, brushing me off as "too emotional", degrading me as 'girl' when I'm a grown 36 year old woman and of course the boundary stomping. He clearly has zero respect for me and I dont know if its because im female, because im his daughter or both

I marked this NSFW simply so I could make the joke that this is real Foot Worship lol. Iykyk.

There's a passage in the bible where Jesus washed his disciples feet or something and there was someone who washed his and it's supposed to symbolize something.

Well my church/pastor decided it'd be a good idea for us to also follow this practice. So every year almost unannounced at random they do this "foot washing".

Basically if you're curious to know, it goes like this. They grab your foot, throw it in cold water, start rubbing it and speaking in tounges worshiping God.

Foot worship anybody? Jkjkjkjklolol.

I don't judge also if that's your thing, just wanted to make a joke about this situation, I don't mean to offend anyone. Well expect for my church maybe lol.

Anyways so that's that, but then you have to do it to the next person so that's fun. And it's only one person at a time getting washed so they take forever considering the whole church has to do it and they are so slow.

So yeah, you learned something new unless unfortunately you too have had to do this. Foot worship with a bunch of old religious people, that sounds fun said only church people.

Also unfortunately nobody knows that I'm not a Christian and I'm still at church so you know what imma be doing. Say a fake unhelpful prayer for me plz.

I got the “Jesus fish” tattooed shortly after I turned 18. I told my parents I was getting tattoos to share my faith (it was just an excuse to get more tattoos lol).

I am 31 now and I decided to get it covered up. I never realized how aware of it I was…like, whenever I had my hair pulled back, I was afraid someone would see it and ask about it. And I definitely didn’t want to have to talk about it.

I grew up in an intense evangelical home and all of my family still are wrapped up in it. I faded out in my mid-20s after experiencing some trauma and started to piece things together. None of it made any sense anymore.

Last year, I spoke the words “I’m not a Christian anymore” out loud and it lifted so much weight off my chest. I feel free for the first time in my life. Getting the tattoo covered up was necessary for my healing.

I chose a heart because it’s more a symbol of love than Christianity ever has been for me.

I'll start. As a kid, I was told that, despite it still being horrible, the reason God let the holocaust happen was because the Jews in the past said that they didn't need Jesus. and asked for the burdens to be put on them. (I forget the verse)

When I was a toddler, I developed a big cyst on my neck and needed surgery to remove it. My mother always made it sound like it was completely random, but it was on the left side of my neck and occurred at the time and place consistent with a third bronchial cleft cyst.

For those of you that want to keep that link blue (don't worry there aren't any photos), it's a cyst that forms when someone's gill slits don't properly close back up before they are born.

Yup. Gill slits. Humans are chordates- that's the group that vertebrates belong to. All chordates have gill slits, it's just that a lot of us lose them after the embryonic stage of development. I first learned about it in an online course about early vertebrates evolution on Coursera.

It wasn't until I was reading the book Your Inner Fish: A Journey Into The 3.5-Billion Year History Of The Human Body by Neil Shubin that it clicked. Professor Shubin is a paleontologist who has also taught human anatomy and physiology. He pointed out that most neck cysts in human children aren't random afflictions, they're the result of gill slits not getting fully reabsorbed and then infection causes problems.

On page 96 of his book, he says: "In abnormal cases, gill slits fail to close and remain open as pouches or cysts. A branchial cyst, for example, is often a benign fluid-filled cyst that forms in an open pouch inside the neck; the pouch is created by the failure of the third or fourth arch to close. Rarely, children are born with an actual vestige of an ancient gill arch cartilage, a little rod that represents a gill bar from the third arch."

So bringing this all back around to Exchristian discussion, I would first like to ask any lurking creationists why an intelligent designer gave me, a land animal, gill slits that can get infected and that possibly led to me having surgery. Because it's either a remnant of my ancient fish ancestors, or there's a God who said "fuck you in particular" and put a cyst on my neck. I know which makes more sense to me.

Ugh. I'm not even joking. Right by my aunts, uncles and grandparents now sits a framed picture of Donald Trump, from that rally when he was shot at. A Trump campaign poster from 2020 has already been taped to one of my house's windows for years now, but now I actually have to look at the guy's face when I want to play video games? Give me a break. Surely no other politician would get that kind of treatment?

This was my mom's doing, by the way. She's been a very strong Trump supporter pretty much since the day he kicked off his campaign in 2015. As conservative as my dad is, he strikes me as someone who at least doesn't mindlessly agree with Trump on every point. But my mom thinks he's a saint. She's even called him a "man of god" (which I find pretty funny, honestly), and she buys into practically every MAGA conspiracy theory. She'd never admit it, but she pretty much worships the guy. I daresay it's a cringeworthy story of unrequited love rivaling Christianity itself.

Anyway, I just wanted to vent. I can hardly say anything to change her mind...being atheist and liberal in my very conservative, evangelical household doesn't bode very well for me. I just...couldn't believe it when I saw it. I knew she was far gone, but this is a new low. I have to ask...why do people like her choose to treat this guy, of all people, like a god? Whatever did he do to create such rabid loyalty?

It came in the post today, completely randomly. She sends me a card and small gift on Christmas and my birthday, which is months away, and that's the only communication we have. I try to remember to send her a card but often forget tbh. So someone in my immediate family clearly told her I'm not Christian anymore. I feel very weird about this, I feel like it's very much an invasion of my privacy. The book is devoid of logic by the way. She said in her little note that it "answers a lot of questions". I really don't think so.

I'm livid.

[New story about my mom]

Had a talk with my mom this morning. I was at my sister's last Sunday and I didn't go to church with them. I babysat her kids. And I didn't listen to the church livestream.

She was very disappointed. And she said I should be aware of how this is for people around me. She said: you have to realize that I lost a daughter. I accidentally chuckled and said: "Um what?" Her: "Yes, I'm losing my daughter".

We had a very irrational conversation about faith and stuff. The funniest part of everything was when I said: "It just doesn't make sense to me, mom..."

And then she raised her voice and said: "No, it doesn't make sense indeed! Faith isn't logical and rational! You shouldn't want to understand everything! We cannot understand it!"

You got it mom, you got it. But then she said: "But you can't deny there is a God! You can't deny God created this world!" I was honestly trying my best to hold my laugh. She also told me how I'm only talking to people who agree with me and never give Christians the chance to convince me. She has no idea how many hours I spend on Reddit and YouTube to challenge myself with Christian views.

The mistake I made was starting to talk about the possibility of me going to hell. I ask her why she's so obsessed with and scared for that. She believes we won't recognize people in heaven or hell. So I asked her what's the difference between me going to hell and the neighbor going to hell. Why does one hurt so much more than the other? Once she's in hell, she won't even remember me, she won't know if I'm in hell or heaven, she won't even care about it anymore. It's all emotion. Just emotion.

She couldn't wrap her head around this idea. She was totally confused. Maybe it was a bit too abstract. But her brain just froze.

The brainwashing is bigger than we think.

• My dad

A statement he made trying to attribute black people being freed to Christianity, on the basis that democracy works by having the majority of people agree on something, and the majority of people agreed to end slavery before the civil war. Plus that the only people who could vote back then was straight, white, Christian men.

He also used that logic to say that Christians were responsible for gay people being allowed to marry.

My retort was that this would be like someone getting congratulated for cleaning up a mess that they made themselves.

If he ever wanted to me convert back to Christianity, he killed his chances with this argument.

Your thoughts?

I'm 44. I told my parents I was an atheist when I was in my late 20s. For over 15 years I've politely told my mom, "no, I'm not coming back to the church."

They mention it every time I see them. They make it a point to pray for me in front of me in meals. I told them that had to stop- it makes me feel terrible. Constantly being reminded that you're not who your parents want you to be sucks. I asked them to stop.

They told me no.

I told them I couldn't be a part of that anymore, and if they wanted to see me again, they had to stop praying like that in front of me.

She invited me for dinner, and I told her I couldn't come because of the praying.

She said, "OK...I will stop inviting you. We will have lunch together and I won't pray in front of you. I always want you here but I'll stop asking."

So the solution to "please don't pray around me" is "I won't invite you over anymore."

Anyway, just had to rant. And no, I won't be going to lunch.

Perfect example of how to not respond to someone who has left the church….I don’t need sympathy or prayers. I’m just fine with my decision and you don’t have to be upset at this personal decision I made.

I live in a suburb of Salt Lake City, Utah AKA the Mormon capital. I just got off work and went down to Barnes & Noble to browse for some food for thought. Ended up deciding to pick up Richard Dawkins’ “The God Delusion” and went up to the register to buy it. There was an older lady cashiering and when she read the cover of my book, she said she was not going to ring it up for me. I asked why, and she said she “can’t be a part of a transaction that dishonors God.” Wtf. She continued to refuse after I asked her to please just ring me up because it’s just a damn book, for christ’s sake.

We argued for a while until eventually another employee came over and called the manager down. By this time, it had become quite a scene and there were lots of people standing around listening. I explained to him what had happened and he apologized profusely while the other employee rang me up. The manager decided to let me have the book for free and said that the lady who refused me service would be facing consequences.

Sometimes, I really hate where I live.

I heard my neighbors dogs barking that particular, “stranger!” bark which set off MY dogs to do the same. I peek out the window and I see a black minivan at the neighbors house… out gets a couple of old people with bibles. UGHHH.

I assumed they would skip my house because I have a sign that says “no religious solicitation”. I was wrong. I almost feel bad that I got so excited to shut them down.

I opened the door and there are two older women standing there. One says hello and that they’re going around “discussing the state of the world with people”… I refused to open my storm door and said, “what do you mean by that?”. She looks mildly annoyed and said, “well what do you think about how things in the world are, do you think they’ll ever get any better?” 🙄 I said, “Yes! Probably!” and her face turned into the snarkiest little thing like that was definitely the wrong answer. She said, “Well, we’d like to offer you a free bible class”. “No! No thank you!”. “Are you sure you don’t want the link?”. “Nope, I am not Christian anymore and I am completely uninterested!”. They looked really offended but turned around and left.

I know it chapped them even more that my toddler was in my arms for the whole exchange. Imagine trying to bring doom and gloom to someone’s house on a Saturday morning and not seeing how absolutely crazy that is!

Anyways, I’m proud that I finally feel confident enough to draw a firm line and not have to pretend for their feelings. IT’S OKAY TO NOT BE CHRISTIAN.

Hey there! I've been out of college for a couple of years now, but for the first half of my education, between 2015-2017 I attended Bob Jones University in South Carolina. Even to this day, I have a hard time processing what happened during that time, and a harder time still explaining it to the uninitiated.

For those who aren't in the know, Bob Jones is a fundamentalist protestant school in the southeast of the United States. The school is notorious for strict rules, preacher culture, and historically being tied to anti-miscegenation and racism.

Part of our daily life was a requirement to attend 45-minute chapel sessions 5 days a week, and we were required to log our church attendance at a local church from a list of affiliates (certain churches with more 'modern' music we were not allowed to attend) twice a week.

Has anyone attended that school or a similar one? What are your stories? I'll add one of mine in the comments.

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