My Faith Journey ##Lemon8Diary

I'm relatively new to religion. I've never been heavily involved, I haven't stepped foot in a church since I was 16, and I was going to confirmation classes on Sunday evenings. It’s been 13/14 years since my confirmation, and my journey with religion has been very complicated. I guess the only place for me to start from is the beginning.

I was born into a Catholic family, but as I stated in the beginning, we weren't heavily involved. In my 29 years of life, I've only ever stepped foot in a church less than 20 times. Which, if you're devout in your religion, that's practically nothing. My mom sent myself, my brother, and my sister to Sunday school. If you don't know, Sunday school is exactly as it sounds. You go to school on Sunday and learn about your religion. 10 commandments, the point of Lent, the Advent calendar, all of it. and it's the length of a normal school year in the US. I can't speak for other countries. and I'm not going to lie. As I got older, my interest in Sunday school went downhill real quick. I did get bored in all honesty. But my mom would take us to McDonald's after, so that was the only reason I even kept going. Until I got to 7th grade and had a crush on my Sunday school teacher, then I had two reasons to go. That's part of a different story for a different time, though.

Confirmation and the years after

I got confirmed at 16 and tried to wipe the oil off of my forehead because I hated the feeling of oil on my face. I still do, if I can be honest. After that is where my relationship with religion gets complicated. I didn't have anything to do with religion very much after. But I still considered myself a Catholic, even though I was more agnostic at the time. I did question A LOT how everything was made. Why do trees exist? Where did bugs come from? Stuff like that. I didn't believe that Jesus was the reason people even existed.

I got through a lot of my 20s as a religion hating atheist. Everything about religion pissed me off. The religion itself, the people within it, the music, seeing it online and on tv. EVERYTHING about it got on my nerves to no end.

Until this past March. I saw a short on YouTube of Brittany Dawn, yes the born-again grifter, but I didn't know that about her at the time. Of course, it was a homophobic one, and I got curious. Luckily, days later, I found out that she's an awful person. So, I installed the YouVersion app and began my religious journey there. Eventually, I ordered a Bible and began trying to read a little each day, even if it was just for five minutes, I read a little. The Lord has saved me from myself, at least for the most part. I do have days where my mind takes over, and I'd rather not be on Earth anymore if y'all catch my drift. I can not thank Jesus enough for allowing me to walk with Him.