you and yours must deny that the Bible is the Word of God.
I think you have a mistaken view of what happens when some people deconvert from Christianity. Let me tell you my story. It isn't as simple as "denying".
I spent most of my early life as a Christian. Not a fundamentalist, just a middle of the road United Methodist. Throughout most of that time I attempted to "feel" the way I understood people felt when they "knew" God. I wanted to feel like God was present in my life. Unfortunately I never really "felt" his presence. In my best times I felt good and maybe "happiness" is what some people call God. In my darkest hours it wasn't God that got me through but rather the fear that if I made a bad choice God might punish me for it. Now, of course, you can easily say God is nothing but Love. However I felt so little of that in any real way that I started to question: what am I worshipping? Am I worshiping something that I am in a relationship with?
The fact of the matter was that it was a one-way relationship. I prayed to God and tried to feel his love and presence. I didn't feel it. So I started looking closer at what the faith offered me. Unfortunately I also suffered from a form of
scrupulosity which put a lot more of my mental focus on trying to do right by God. Some people like Martin Luther who suffered from scrupulosity found a way through and still maintained his faith. I was not so lucky.
I read the Bible. I looked as critically at the "evidences" for God's existence. I studied philosophy and theology but at the end of the day I simply realized that I no longer saw compelling evidence for God's reality.
Maybe God is there. As they say "God answers all prayers, sometimes the answer is 'no'." Well, I never felt like anyone was on the other end of the line when I was praying.
If you are an honest broker with regards to faith then you know that these "dark nights of the soul" are nothing unique. Mother Theresa writes extensively about the occasional sense of abandonment.
So it's not as simple as simply decreeing that an atheist wants to deny god.
the Message is more important than what you have left of it.......
See, that's the thing. As an atheist I realize there's a lot of trash in the Bible, but there's also a LOT of BEAUTY and GREAT LIFE ADVICE. There's a lot of value I get from my time as a Christian. In fact most of my friends are still Christians and I honor their beliefs.
I think in many ways the New Testament carries some great stuff that still holds up even if you strip away the magical undead part. Even if Christ never existed the concept of salvation through grace can still have value to an atheist! Grace is something we can grant to each other! If we all understand that we are all inherently flawed imperfect creatures prone to messing up and hurting each other, maybe we can be more forebearant towards our fellow people and grant them the 'grace' that we ourselves will be in need of some time.
So, you see, atheists aren't simply denying all the good stuff you value. In fact if you ask an atheist what they think about this and how they came to their atheism you might be surprised to learn that many atheists have a much deeper link to spiritual thought than you ever imagined.
