A reminder from a courageous man that some of us really do have it easy.

A couple of weeks ago I met a man on Twitter who is an ex-Muslim atheist living in Saudi Arabia.  He and I have talked a little, and at the end of last week I asked him if he'd be willing to write about his experiences for this blog; he very kindly obliged.

I am not going to give my new friend's name, because atheists in Saudi Arabia can find themselves in genuine, mortal danger if they are discovered to be apostates.  I find parts of his account heartbreaking, and others hopeful and inspiring; as with Bethany's story from the other week, though, I was struck by the similarity between my friend's experiences and those of so many others I've spoken to.  It's a strange and in some ways a very moving reflection that however different our cultures and backgrounds may be, we atheists are often so similar in how we think and how we came to reject our indoctrination.

My scepticism and outspokenness are so much parts of me that I struggle even to imagine what it must be like to be required to suppress them for my own safety.  I am glad to have met my new friend, and honoured that he consented to write this for me.  It's a reminder to us in Europe and other places of just how lucky we are to live where we do, and of some of the reasons the fight against religion really is important despite what many of our detractors try to tell us.  But this also fills me with tremendous hope for the future; through modern technology, we are able to speak to people, share experiences and support each other from distances of thousands of miles.  I believe this new ability may in time bring about the start of an enlightenment in parts of the world where religion currently dominates.

My friend submits this with apologies for his English; I will say, though, that those apologies are entirely unnecessary as his own words needed only the most minor of tweaks from me.  I would like to thank him most sincerely for sharing this with me, and for allowing me to share it with you.

"The story of how I became an atheist.

Before you read this I have to say there will be a lot of grammatical mistakes. I am sorry for that; I will try my best.

I am a guy who was born 16 years ago to a Muslim family in Palestine  Like every child who was born in a Muslim family I was raised to think that Islam is the one true religion and every other one is false.  My parents wanted me to become a Hafiz (a person who has memorized the whole of the Quran), so I became one at the age of 12 and got the second place in a competition in my city.

As a child I always had questions about Islam, like why Christians are going to hell even though they believe in God and pray; the answer was that they are just wrong and Islam is right because the Quran says so. When I got a little older I became interested in science (physics and biology mostly); I was still memorizing the Quran so this created huge conflict in me, but I stilled believed in God and thought it was a test to my faith.

When I turned 14 my father died and my family and I moved to Saudi Arabia (my mom works here as a XXXXX).  I joined the school and found that we have 5 subjects about religion (they are mandatory); we have to pray in school; and my sisters have to go to school wearing burqa, even though none of them are over 13.  I also have a little brother.

I started criticizing Saudi Arabia (in my mind of course, not in public) because they are extremists even though that I knew my religion promotes that, so I became an agnostic for quite a while.  Then I got to a point where I said to myself that this religion doesn’t make any sense and neither does any other; the idea of God, heaven, hell… etc. are absurd, and all the fairy tales that were put into my mind when I was child also don’t make any sense to me.  That was the point when I became an atheist.

A few months ago I decided to tell my 4 best friends in Palestine about this. We talked on Skype. The first one took it well and said you have the right to believe whatever you want; we didn’t argue about it. The second and third friends are brothers; when I told them they were a little bit shocked but also said you can believe whatever you want and that my atheism wasn’t  so big a deal as to end a friendship. The fourth friend was my best best friend; we were friends for more than 11 years.  When I told him he argued with me about a lot of things and got really angry; we argued for about 2 hours on Skype, and in the end he told me “man I can’t talk to you anymore. It’s nothing personal, but my religion says so”. Just like that an 11 year friendship was ended; I got a little emotional and maybe cried a little, but I got over it.

A few days after that I decided to tell my mother since I felt such a release when I told my friends.  I told her in private about my honest opinions; she was very shocked (as I had expected). She told me that I am wrong and Islam is the one true religion and all that stuff; I didn’t want to argue because I felt her pain in thinking that her son will be tortured in hell or could get killed in this country.  In the end I told her that I was not really an atheist but that I had a lot of questions about a lot of things. She said that’s OK, that it was just a phase and that God wanted to test my faith. We’ve barely spoken on the subject again; just a few times she’s told me to watch some lectures by “Muslim scholars”, and to pray. Now I pretend to pray and to believe in Islam, as a lot of ex-Muslims do.

So now I never open a conversation about religion. I don’t want any of my Saudi friends to know that I am an atheist, because if the government heard about it I would be killed for apostasy. 

That was the story of how I became an atheist, and some of my experiences. Thank you for reading."

Update: On the advice of a few people, I have edited out a couple of personal details from the above account. Their loss does not affect the point or the tone of what is being said.