I want to preface this by saying this is my personal experience; I do not hold any contempt for anyone who may not agree with what I’ve come to believe, and I’m aware that not every church conducts itself as mine did.
That being said:
Born and Raised
I was raised Catholic.Â
My parents were Catholic, their parents were Catholic, and like them, we inherited that legacy without a second thought. Every Saturday, we went to Mass, and I sat in catechism as a little girl just trying to absorb what I was told would result in my eternal bliss. But even then, something felt off.
I didn’t know it yet, but the biggest sin I would commit in church wasn’t doubt, it was curiosity.
As a young child, I learned to read, but by third or fourth grade, I was reading to learn, and so naturally, I started asking questions. Yet they were questions no one seemed to have answers for, and I was told over and over not to even venture toward such sacrilegious curiosities; questions about why I doubted or what I felt inside.
At that age, seeing such closed-off adults, the people I was supposed to trust, left me feeling isolated.
This culture of blind faith kept me on autopilot for years, even as I kept leveling up in my catechism lessons. I continued the path, admittedly, simply to reach the milestone of having a quinceañera mass; something I did almost entirely for my grandmothers, who were ultra devout. I loved them so deeply, but even then, I knew I was performing.
Where Did The Feeling Go?
Somewhere around 14, right before my quinceañera, I realized I no longer had a connection to God, despite wanting it so desperately. But the even scarier thought was that maybe I never had in the first place. I remember sitting there in the quiet after Mass, staring up at the ceiling of the church, trying to feel something, anything, like divinity inside of me.…but nothing came. What came was a craving for a reason beyond mere belief. But instead, I was told I had to confess every week to “prove” myself. Imagine young, impressionable children being forced to dig deep and manufacture guilt on a weekly basis just so that we could be deemed “worthy” of the daily bread at Mass. The thin communion wafer would dissolve almost instantly on my tongue, and I always wondered how something so small was supposed to carry so much meaning. I wasn’t forced to confess, but if I didn’t, the rejection was quiet; the burn of the glares from those who were in line while I remained in the pews said enough. Every time I knelt, trying to earn that grace, it felt like I was shrinking. My worth was tied to a weekly performance, not a natural belonging. Worse yet, I started to see how many of these stories I was taught to revere were used to justify racism, homophobia or any other prejudice one could think of.
I was a brown Mexican girl, a deeply insecure one at that. Even as a child, I saw how some used scripture, like the curse of Ham in Genesis, to say the darker-skinned were cursed….and that was a weight I just couldn’t shake.
I now know that not all believers twist the Bible’s teachings this way. But I am aware I was disillusioned with religion as a whole for a period of time because of it.
I Didn’t Know That Was An OptionÂ
Towards my adolescence, my grand act came to a halt when my parents “came out” as atheists. It turns out that, throughout their 20+ year marriage, they, too, kept up the façade of false faith for one another. While that is a beautiful sentiment in its own way, after the walls came down, so too did the stigma around conversations between us as a family that our religion used to suppress, and it bonded us in a way we’ve never felt before. It led to even longer, deeper, thought-provoking conversations that only pushed me further down this path. When my parents broke this news, it was the first time I realized I could choose for myself. No fear of rejection, shunning, pity, or judgment.
But that freedom came with its own fear:
If there’s no God, then what happens when we die?
Who do I look to now?
What was this all for?
And it wasn’t just that; it was the loss of the community, my friendships the rituals I’d grown so accustomed to.
Letting go was like shattering the last thin wall of security I had. And for a while, I didn’t know who I was without it.
As I left those pews, particularly when I developed a fascination with science, the nervous system and the idea that my “soul” is simply the electricity firing in my brain, I realized the universe was random, and so was my sense of self. Science didn’t erase wonder; it gave me a new way to see it. Suddenly, everything clicked: we are all just patterns of energy, fleeting and temporary. And in that vast randomness, I realized something else: there are countless stories—Christianity, Islam, Judaism, and so many others—and every culture tries to say something about being human. It’s only natural that we attempt to untangle the complexities of the human condition, and I think that effort is beautiful. Seeing all of that at once made every version feel fragile, yet somehow that fragility gave me a kind of freedom.As I sit here now, still uncertain, I love that I can talk openly with my religious friends, not to argue, but to continue wondering. I don’t have all the answers, I don’t know if there’s something out there, but I know I’m allowed to keep asking questions. And after everything I went through growing up in church, that freedom feels like its own kind of faith.