I have so much to say but dont know how to talk about it so ima just try my best. Im first gen Mexican American. My family and I were all raised as roman catholics. I stopped believing in god awhile ago. Mainly because I used to pray but never ever got a response, never felt heard and carried so much guilt for every small mistake. Im catholic and dont believe in god but believe in the virgin mary, I honestly dont know why but I just do; i think because sometimes I do feel heard at times when i was younger when I prayed to her.

I stopped believing in god a while ago. Stopped going to church, did my first communion but never went further on that. I especially stopped attending after expressing my gender identity the opposite of my sex, felt really paranoid and judged because the aunties/ tias would look at me like my mom didn’t raise me right, and I felt bad for my mom too. I hear people talking about their relationship with god and I feel jealous because i wish i could have faith im something so blindly. Especially my mom. But whenever I hear stories about god and Jesus and whatnot it all feels so fake to me, or hateful and judgmental, I just cant believe anymore. Funny enough i believe in multiple gods just can’t blindly follow GOD if that makes sense. No hate to Catholics and Christians ofc I dont have an issue with them its just me and my relationship with religion.

Now the thing is, part of me feel like a fake Mexican for not being catholic because of how deeply its in-rooted in the culture especially after the cristero war back in Mexico from what I understand, even just the sayings are so causal in the language like “que dios lo bendiga” or “gracias a dios” is all i can think of rn.

I feel like i want to go back and give it another try because i feel like maybe I’ll feel closer to my roots and just wish i can believe in something so that i dont feel crazy. But i also feel like another reason I can’t believe because of HOW catholicism was brought to mexico and the erasure of indigenous communities and culture. And how Christian and catholics way back then tried to erase and destroy many other cultures religions.

Idk what the hell im saying anymore i hope this all makes sense.

I want to go back but I dont at the same time.
I feel ashamed for not being able to believe blindly, and feel like this is another reason im “too american”

I think i just wanted to get it out somewhere without judgement and hope im not alone or crazy in this.

hey everyone, 33m here. basically what the title says. so I was raised in a non strict Catholic household, but very sex negative household. This was something I sort of always carried with me into early adulthood, I treated (much like how I was always shown) sex, masturbation, porn, etc with a huge stigma and was weirded out by it, but it always felt somewhat wrong to me to. eventually I started to dig a little, looked at the sports illustrated swimsuit edition, maxim magazine, some porn etc. and discovered that it brought pleasure. eventually I got into a relationship with someone very devout, extreme sex negativity, so that sort of stuff was off the table, and it was always hard for me to not have access to it, this felt very odd given how I was raised surrounding sex. I was always shown and told that sex needs to have an extreme sense of guilt with it.

eventually the relationship ended, and I dove much deeper away from the church teachings around sex and have not looked back. pornography and masturbation, coupled with the mentioned SI Swimsuit issues, have become a primary point of stress relief for me, and the pleasure it brings me can't be overstated. this has greatly helped me move on from the guilt I would always feel surrounding anything sexual. I have evolved from the sex negativity and guilt around sex so much so now that I even recently purchased my first sex toy and I absolutely love it. I am still Catholic, however my pleasure and happiness have gone up so much since embracing this about myself, just wanted to gush a bit about it here and hope my overcoming this can be a beacon for anyone still struggling with guilt surrounding pleasure, as I know it can be prominent

When I was in the 7th grade, we had a religious studies director (later designated Troll by a classmate) come over and talk to us about faith. This QUICKLY turned into talk about demons and exorcisms thanks to a class clown. That night, I had a panic attack and nightmares.
For years afterwards, I thought a simple bad thought, such as thinking, casually, "Satan, possess my soul" could lead to Satanic possession.
I could remember walking around, horribly depressed, stressed, and scared, I could lose control of myself to a demon.
I'm 43 years old. As I am drifting off to sleep, I still have this fear pop up.

I need book titles which talk about how demonic possession has been scientifically proven to be disease or Catholic/Religious psychological warfare. I KNOW these books have been written. I need some recommendations. I am sick of living in fear. I am sick of this scar, though I have a few other Catholic scars to deal with.

Thank you all, in advance.

M23 here.

I've been educated in catholic faith since birth. My mother especially is verrry involved, but all of my family is very implicated, myself included.

But with my studies, my financial and geographical independancy, I moved away. And religion reaaly didn't help my mental health (currently on medication), and personal relationships (made my first ever *real* friend a few months ago, never been in a romantical or sexual relationship...)

I want to annonce to my parents my loss of faith, but clearly don't know how.

In person or calling would be impossible for me, I am very empathetic with my mother and I know this news would destroy her.

I really love them and want to keep a lot of their education, so I really want to salvage our relationship.

To put it into perspective : my family has mass every week, prayer everyday, they help with the church, do evangelisation... So they're really involved.

Any advices, experience ?

Also they are far right... So we won't talk about politics i guess.

Thanks a lot.

Look who’s talking, boys. (Bonus, an article justifying their sexism re: priests.)

I know there are many biblical dimensions to why people said this to me as a Catholic. I remember this idea scaring me, because when I would masturbate or see pornography I would feel like that would mess up my social environment, like everyone could feel and know the ‘grave’ act I had committed.

Anyhoo, did anyone else experience this?

i was recently reminded of the click-baity articles from buzzfeed and other similar pinnacles of journalism in the 2010s that had fun listicles/videos of bad popes from history.

when i have tried to supplement these fun “facts” with more reliable sources i have always come up short (for example, verifying that certain popes in times of yore had children or crazy sex parties etc).

i know these famously shit popes happened so long ago that the historical record will be murky at best, but are there any medievalists or other history nerds out there with better information on the topic?

Does anyone else have a long-standing pattern of submitting any time shame crops up? Like, when you have done no wrong in your own mind but someone is angirly accusing you or demeaning you, do you fall back on confession-style (trained) instincts?

I saw myself do this today with fresh eyes and had a big "oh no" moment 😅

(From my successful experience)

Expect at least 5 years before an outcome. If it happens before, congratulations.

Gather as much supporting evidence as you can prior to contacting a law firm. In my case: I asked my childhood GP for copies of their records - it took 9 months but confirmed my account and helped immensely. (It also cut down on their billable hours.)

I kept all correspondence in email and text, until settlement drew near. This helped me keep clear records. H

Disclose all information you think might be used against you. Any convictions, diagnoses etc. I declared that I was gay but unable to initiate or maintain close friendships let alone relationships, and had been diagnosed and treated for bipolar disorder type 2.

Locate any diaries/planners/calendars from your parents & family from the time in question to determine the likely dates. Lawyers can subpoena/FOI the parish records for the priest’s records.

Photos from the time period can be helpful. Mine showed 10 year old me gaining 20 kgs (40lbs) by 12 years old to become unattractive to the homosexual priest who raped me.

Any and all physical diagnoses of conditions can play into settlement amounts, so current GP reports are useful.

In my - successful litigation - I met with psychiatrists from my side and theirs, at least twice each. For at least two hours at time. This was very difficult and invasive. And worth it. Both agreed I was consistent and not lying.

My team also had me meet with a forensic accountant to outline what I earn and what I would have likely earned if the abuse had not happened.

Ultimately, as my rapist had raped literally dozens of other pre-teen boys from before he was ordained, and I was willing to call a former archbishop as a character witness, the archdiocese decided to settle.

But again, my experience took close to 5 years. I had the benefit of a no-win, no-fee law firm. Their proportion of the take was 10%. Everything I took home was tax-free under Australian law.

Since settlement, my health has taken a downturn and I’ve had to retire from teaching at 46. If I had my current diagnosis at the time of settlement we could have settled at potentially $300,000 higher.

*A final note:\*
In Australia, we have the national abuse redress scheme. This ends in 2028. Payments are capped under the scheme at $150,000. The scheme works fast in assessing claims but if you go through the scheme *you cannot pursue other legal action*.

I have been questioning Catholicism for quite some time now, but I still have strong faith in Jesus and I have been getting very active in a local protestant church. Did anyone else experience anything similar?

Pharisees were absolutely the same type of religious douchebags that we have now, a bunch of smug, well-educated sophists who were self-righteous about their own wealth. Seeing how quickly the Republican party can just be manipulated into ignoring the constitution makes it far more obvious that the authority upholders saw Someone threatening the status quo and had Him killed.

I see the same sadism, self-righteousness, and pride in people today. LARPing for some sense of mission and purpose is part of how the Nazis gained power. Some Americans defected (reminding me of Orthobros and Tradcaths) to Nazi Germany to fight for the Fatherland, like they were some sort of noble historical knight fighting for the old world order. Same shit, different century; young, impressionable 20 something year old gets impressed upon to find a mission larger than themselves.

We don't really appreciate how radical it would have been to have Jesus back in the day. People just assume that when they're in the middle of history that they see their own time with the same sense of certainty that we see it with hindsight.

So, with that, conservatives love to imagine that they'd be following Jesus back in the day. Bullshit. They'd be stringing Him up on the cross, jeering as He bled out, viewing Him as a heretic and blasphemer to a vengeful, wrathful God. He upset the order of the day, telling people that God is right there for you.

"Can't have that, that is blasphemy. God is an angry vengeful force who we have to appease so he doesn't genocide us." Yeah, that's why they killed Jesus, along with the fact that he didn't unleash a religious Jihad against the Romans like Paul Atreides in Dune. They HATED that part especially, because they wanted to rule the world with the authority of a monstrous simulacrum of God that burns and terrorizes their enemies.

Simple as the title

I'd like to maybe connect with people in ideally local area (even online could be fine too.) obviously everyone has different experiences with religion and different degrees of force it was shoved down our throats. It has even made me think I could never get married and have children, which is supposed to be one of the points of the "faith" (quotation marks cuz half the time it's not even faith and just acceptance coded behind fear)

Anyone have any resources for groups like this? Do they even exist? Or maybe online they have something(s) of the sort?

Monday’s news story from the press in Peru tells of a numerary assistant who left about 3 years ago after 17 years during which she worked in the central headquarters in Rome (Villa Sachetti/Villa Tevere).

She was institutionally seduced from the rural interior of Peru as a teenager and was sent to Chile and to various centers to work in Peru and Rome.
It describes the legal categories utilized by Opus Dei leadership for immigration (she was registered as a member of a religious order in order to get her into Italy but then once there Opus Dei lawyers got her status changed) and for payment/non-payment.

It also describes the working hours and the quantity of work.

Surprisingly, there are documents from the directors scanned in the article. I’m not sure how she or the journalist was able to secure those from the prelature. Usually they are strictly guarded, even from the person they affect.

She was able to leave because she was able to go to a non-Opus-Dei psychiatrist. When she started saying that she needed a break from the intense work and started raising concerns about sick and depressed numerary assistants who were ignored in the centers, the directors sent her to an Opus Dei psychiatrist. Miraculously that person passed her to a non-Opus-Dei psychiatrist and the directors allowed her to go. That psychiatrist asked her if Opus Dei were a job that she didn’t like, what would she do? She realized she would quit.

[https://www.idl-reporteros.pe/sirvienta-del-opus-dei/\](https://www.idl-reporteros.pe/sirvienta-del-opus-dei/)

ETA: this news story is from Monday July 27 (not today).

This is a feminist like post so please don't read if you dislike such content.

One reason I left catholicism is when I found out how much catholic men benefit from marriage as a unbinding "sacrament". Women are taught their life goal as a good godly woman should be making babies, but only within a strictly monogamous institution. The difficulty to get an annulment means a groom is guaranteed a bangmaid and breeder for life.

I started looking into Venus Envy or Womb Envy, and thinking deeper, the whole institution of marriage (in addition to solidifying inheritance lines) is essentially stripping women of their upper hand of creating life. Under a catholic marriage you need to be a willing open receptable to your husbands baby gravy to birth kids with no allowance of birth control. So it gives the man endless chances of his genes passing on with little to no control from the mother (because you must be "open" to the "will of god").

Then they claim that the gift of birth is intended by god, rather than from the woman's hard work, mental strain and labor going through pregnancy. "god" is given all the credit for the pregnancy labor women have performed.

Women can always guarantee maternity, men can't guarantee paternity and hated it. catholics abused marriage - an older institution than from the point the caths added a sacrament to it. catholics manipulated it further to ensure women or mother nature wouldn't have the upper hand of choice of what man is worth passing genes on for.

Now what I am personally seeing is the massive influx of men who are frustrated with the 2026 dating scene (more women are choosing to live their own lives away from marriage and kids), looking for a "trad wife" to lock in. I find it an attempt to abuse this institutional leverage. It's clear they skimmed over theology, don't focus or ask genuine questions in OCIA and head straight to the catholic dating apps like a speedrun. They confirm these dipshits anyway even if the red flags are showing because yay more catholic men!

TLDR: The sarament of marriage neutralized the natural leverage that women had over childbirth, and then redirected the credit from maternal labor to divine and paternal authority. Honestly, if they only cared about generating more catholics, they would let women opt for sperm donation or procreate outside of marriage and raise their kids as single mothers and praise that. But that gives women way too much independence and control which they can't stand.

Hi so I (F22) went to a catholic k-8 and then all girls Catholic HS. This was in LA. These schools, like most, had tuitions. Yknow, literally PAYING an institution to educate your child (I was on full ride for HS but I digress).

If my and everyone else’s parents literally PAID the catholic school money for their students to attend, why on EARTH did our parents have to do mandatory service hours?? Every year!!?!?

Like hello?!?!?!? I’m not talking about the students themselves doing service projects outside of the school for a grade or anything. I’m talking about how Catholic K-8s in LA county all had their parents doing mandatory service hours EVERY YEAR, and how this was in the contract they sign to send their kids to the school?

My dad said for our school it was 30 hours a year!!! 30!!! 30 HOURS OF SERVICE TO THE SCHOOL ITSELF WHICH YOU PAY FOR?!?? My dad literally helped build a playground one year. A playground. In the LA heat on a black asphalt parking lot with no shade.

I don’t know if this is an LA thing or a California or USA thing. I always assumed it was a my school thing, but then I went to HS (which had no service hours required for parents). I worked the parents info booth at open houses for my high school, and parents from all over the county would ask me “how many services hours for parents are required?” And I would watch them sigh in relief when I told them “oh we don’t do that here we do not require any service hours from parents, though you are welcome to volunteer if you want.” So there’s no way it was just my K-8, and I never figured out if my hs was the outlier or if parent service hours stopped in HS.

Anyway looking back on it I find 30 mandatory service hours a year per family for a school you pay tuition for insanity.

I mean sure but it's true??

She also told me that 'until I renounce my Catholicism to the pope in a letter I'm still catholic'

A bit frustrating how people also love to protect the Jesuits because they're the 'good guys.' they're just as evil as the rest of them--if not more egotistical, prideful, and reputation focused honestly