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I was born into a practising Roman Catholic family. Although I went to state schools I attended church and catechism regularly, even hoping at one time that god might call me to the priesthood. It never happened so after an accident I had during my probationary apprenticeship I joined the Royal Navy at the age of 16 and served until my compassionate discharge after my wife died in a road accident.
I remained a practising Catholic during some eventful years as I tried to cope with the death of my wife and work out how to bring up my eighteen month old daughter. I married again but this time it ended in divorce.
I worked in a variety of jobs, finally settling as an electrician in industry and construction. I married again, very happily, and worked abroad on and off for some twenty two years in the petro chemical construction industry Most of my work was in the Middle East including ten years in Saudi Arabia. During these years I tried to be a Catholic, but having re-married after being divorced, going to church very rarely and never to confession, I guess a throw-away comment by a friend of mine in Saudi that "religion is a crutch for those who could not face the real world" made me examine my life and how god had fitted into it, and I realised that he never had. The times when I had sought help and guidance from the trinity resulted in nothing, so when I decided that god did not exist, and I had not been struck down by a bolt of lightning, I knew that there was nothing there. I became an atheist.
I retired in 2003 and moved from our home of twenty years on the North Yorks Moors to Coton in the Elms to be closer to our daughters. Having settled down I then searched for others like me who were atheists but wanted to live ethical lives whilst being involved in the community. That was when I found The British Humanist Association and Derbyshire Secularists and Humanists.
Having been told as a child by priests, nuns and parents that Catholicism was the only true religion and only Catholics would ever go to heaven, there was a sense of emotional detachment from other people, but also a sense of puzzlement as to why god and Jesus never answered my prayers when I needed help and guidance.
For the above reasons I now believe that all school pupils should have an unbiased education, completely free of religious pressure, and that Religious Education should be part of Philosophy and Ethics so that, having understood both sides of the argument, pupils can make up their own minds as to what they want to think.
I am quite happy to talk to pupils and adults of my own experiences and how I think of my life now.
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