Easter is Why I'm an Atheist.

I've was a very inquisitive child. I wasn't afraid to ask questions. If something didn't make sense it bothered me and I just had to try to make it make sense.

My grandmother regular church goer. Every Sunday she would go to the 8 a.m. service. My mother never really made me go and I would go occasionally. Holidays, however, were mandatory.

Christmas was my favorite and I could make sense of it. Presents, Jesus's birthday, I could accept that. Easter, however, made no sense to me whatsoever.

The church we attended would perform the Stations of the Cross. Our minister went around the church told the story of the crucifixion of Jesus. When he would get to the moment when Jesus was nailed to the cross he would take a piece of wood and bang on it with a hammer. The sound would echo through the church and freeze my blood cold.

It made me physically ill, literally, and I hated it. I had a very vivid imagination as a child and and I visualize the horror that this man had endured. I was about seven years old when I realized that Easter make no sense whatsoever.

What did the murder of this man have to do with chocolate and bunnies and chickens? It made no sense and it bothered me. When I asked about no one would give me an answer. That was the first time I ever doubted my faith.

The older I got and the more I studied our history, the more I realised that all religions have the same ideologies and stories and they are all man made. Religion is fluid and changing and adaptable. This, I discovered, was why easter made no sense.

Like Christmas, easter is an adapted pegan holiday. This is why we have baby chicks and bunnies, presents and Christmas trees.

Now, it all makes sense to me. I'm going to go have some chocolate.