Unfortunate stories such as Nate Phelps' abound here in America's Bible Belt, though that does not make reading or hearing about any one of them any less heartbreaking. Unfortunate is even too delicate a word to describe such... Horrifying, disturbing... So many monikers, and all of them fit the bill.
Reading stories such as these, or hearing them, often gives me a moment's pause. My father was a religious man, and remains so to this day. He raised me to follow in his religious footsteps, so to speak. He was nowhere near as... vehement about it as Fred Phelps, not even a grain of similarity between the two of them, but Hell was still a part of the teachings. That's what gave me special pause during my reading of Nate's story... His description of his son's reaction to the idea of Hell.
I am left to wonder how I did not fall into the same trap as a child. I was not spared from the idea of Hell; it was always a part of the teachings. And yet, somehow, the idea of Hell never truly disturbed me. Nor did the knowledge that I would not be going to heaven.
Certainly, as an atheist, the idea is now laughable to me. But why did it not scare me to death as it did Nate's child? Why did my mind skip over that horror?
Is it an intelligence factor? I knew I didn't believe what my father believed in even from an early age. I questioned religion, privately, even back in Sunday School.
I just don't know what made me different. I wish I did.
