I was atheist and now I’m agnostic
I (26M) have grown up catholic in Italy, in a family that was deeply religious and I was deeply religious as well as child. At 11 I discovered I was attracted to the same-sex, you can imagine how painful it was to come to terms with what the main exegesis of the Scriptures is at such an early age. To me it was like hell, believing I was wrong, believing I deserved to die. Long story short, I accept fully my homosexuality now but the structure of self-loathing I developed when I was a child is still running: I’ve depression and ocd.
I moved away from religion at 16 years old because of the way some priests handled the introduction of same-sex unions in Italy. I became agnostic.
Then, almost two years ago, I witnessed an homicide. My reaction was the complete rejection of the idea of God mixed with death salience, OCD and depression episodes.
This year I attended Philosophical Anthropology classes at university, taught by a deeply catholic professor, on Pascal’s *Thoughts.* Well, what a journey it has been.
My ocd exploded on the question of the existence of God and Pascal’s Wager. The fun part? After the panic attacks I had about death last year, I ask God to make me see him through rationality, in some ways I interpreted the classes I attended as signs. One night I wrote a prayer to God to help me with my OCD, then I opened my copy of *Thoughts* and I read some passages that I think responded to the prayer. I had to go the day after to my psychiatrist and now I take antipsychotics.
My days now are calmer than before, and I still am questioning everything. I am agnostic again and I’m reading a lot about LGBT Catholics, the contexts of the period Scriptures were written and about progressive catholics.
It’s a mess.