The Bible offers a very good explanation for why I am atheist:

1 Corinthians 13:11 (NASB)  “When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things.”

If a man believes at 50 or 60 what he believed at 20 or 30, he has not investigated his beliefs very well and has wasted 30 or 40 years.

I “got saved” when I was 16, when I was in 11th grade (26 February 1971).  It had a profound effect on my life, not entirely for the good.  But considering my home life and early years, it was a better escape for me than turning to drugs or other less helpful escapes that other kids were using.

As a young adult I had doubts and questions, periods of “rebellion” and not attending church.  But I still wanted to believe.

After my divorce and learning the Church was flat-out wrong about being gay and some other things, I realized none of what I believed had been true at all.  Ever.  I’d believed a lie, and encouraged others to believe such garbage as well.

As I got older and continued reading and thinking it became clear just how preposterous were the claims of evangelical Christianity.

There is nothing in the Bible that wasn’t found in the myths and legends of earlier cultures.  It has no unique authority, and should not be trusted as anything more than a mythic storybook of fables.

Just like kids believe the stories about the Tooth Fairy, Santa Claus, and other childhood fantasy tales, people believe in Jesus. But eventually people grow up and realize all their infantile hero characters are just stories.  But because religious characters are still socially acceptable, even for grown-ups, most grown-ups do not question their beliefs.  They just believe whatever the preachers tell them.  For that, I totally regret having ever been a preacher.  I also regret exposing my children to the lies and bullshit, because they still believe it is real.  That is very sad.   But they are still young and may one day stop and question how any of it makes any real sort of sense.