When I told my family I stopped believing in religion, my little sister actually asked me what will happen to me during Christmastime. Will I join the merriment? Will it be offensive for me to give/receive gifts?

I sat her down and talked to her.

Of course I would join in the merriment. It was the holiday season, the perfect time to spend with family, balikbayans and friends.

A belief on whether or not a savior was born more than 2000 years ago will not change the sentiments I have for the people I value and love.

Why would I be offended in giving or receiving gifts? The reason I give gifts is because I want the person I’m giving gifts to feel thought-about and cared for. I’d like to think people who give me presents have this mindset, too.

She was quite contented with my answer.

During our noche buena, we gathered around the table and held hands. While my mother was saying a beautiful prayer, I looked around and felt like seeing things this clearly for the first time. The people around me, my family—we were never bounded by religion. It has always been by love.

And this is what “Christmas” or the holidays is all about, anyway. More than the beliefs, traditions and massive consumerism, it all boils down to love, appreciation and gratitude.

I have spent my holidays the way I wanted to, with the people I wanted to be with. For that, I am grateful.

PS. Let’s help out the victims of Sendong in this season of happiness and love. Dakila is having the Ride and Rock Relief today, December 29 at Yadu & B-Side at The Collective Malugay St., Makati City. You can send your relief goods and donations there. Contact Ayeen at 0917 505 7055 for more info.

My family already knows I am an atheist. My mother was not to keen about this idea. She asked me, "Paano na ang moralidad mo?" (What about your morals?) I told her, "I believe in the goodness of man." She said, "Ano namang klaseng paniniwala yan? Ano yun?" (What kind of a belief is that? What's that?)

I wasn't able to elaborate on this to her because I was already crying at that time. The confrontation between me and my mother was, simply said, intense and emotional. And while I had a rebuttal in my mind for this, I did not answer back.

I love my mother. I truly am grateful for all the things she has sacrificed and done for our family.

I guess people like her, and what I mean by that is people who are religiously active, assume that being an atheist means living without morals. Religion gives that illusion. They think that without their beliefs, morality cannot exist and be defined.

I think that's so egotistical. Religions actually complicate and twist morality around in such a way that killing people who aren't of the same faith as them is justifiable in the eyes of God. This isn't just an extremist perspective.  And the died-down version of this is the belief that people who don't believe in the same god as them will go to hell. These are actually explicitly written in religious texts. Explicitly written.

Morality far exceeds the existence of religions.

Nature has ethical principles far more fascinating, universal and humbling than all of the religious texts combined.

Let's take parenthood as an example.

In the case of mammals (we are part of this family), the animal mothers always take care of their young. Some fathers participate in this, too. They teach them how to hunt and survive until they are ready to be on their own. In the families of foxes and wolves, the fathers share the task of the mothers in hunting, feeding their young, cleaning up and protecting their cubs.

The basic notions on parenthood,  on nurturing families and on taking care of offsprings are actually innate in us as animals. That instinctively, we understand that in order to survive, we have to take care  of our young and teach them what we know about the ways of the world. The other animals do not need a god to understand this. Neither do we.

I know that not all animals function this way. Some have families and take care of their young. Some do not. It's amazing how evolution provided different ways and standards on our survival. And ethics does not stop or even begin in families for some animals, a thought I will further discuss in my next posts.

My point is that basic morality came from our need to survive as a species. That we should not commit incest because it produces weak and challenged offsprings. That we should not steal from others because we are territorial (possessive) ourselves. And that we should not kill the same species as ours because it will lessen our chance of survival as a kin.

Our definition of morality simply became more complex alongside evolution, the growth of our population, the permanence of our structures and the foundations of philosophy.

So to assume, no--to impose that morality is dependent on religion is a deluded notion.

Browsing my diary when I was in Grade 4, my journal entries during Sundays were always filled with comments like, "I hate going to mass!" "Why do we have to go to mass? Last year's wasn't different from this year's anyway" and "Mass is so boring zzz" (Yes, there were really doodles of the zzz).

Such great yet simple doubts and insights of my childhood were pushed away by the strong influence of my Catholic school and upbringing. My Christian Doctrine teachers would say that doubting faith and getting bored or distracted during mass were the devil's way of luring us not to listen to the word of the Lord. I remember my mom always telling me, "We just sacrifice one hour a week to glorify God. He gave us everything. Don't be selfish."

Looking back, if I just knew about the insane and morbid history of Christianity or the scientific data and theories on evolution and the origins of the Universe, my eleven-year old self would probably have been an atheist right then and there.

It's funny how I only came to terms with my atheism ten years later.

I don't deny drinking the Kool-Aid. I was a believer once. Of God and Christianity. I nagged my friends to come to mass with me and family. I prayed the novena. I confessed my sins. It's hilarious how a vast number of religious people treat atheists as if we don't get it. Trust us, we do. That's why we've stopped believing.

My boyfriend and I were watching the first episode of Curiosity by the Discovery Channel last September 20, 2011. Stephen Hawking explained the origins of the universe in such a magnificently rational way. To have reason explain how the universe came to be without necessarily a god is so logical and profound.

I'm currently reading Richard Dawkin's The Greatest Show On Earth and I've watched other documentaries and shows featuring Christopher Hitchens, Bill Maher and Sam Harris to name a few. I owe it to them for helping me discover full critical thinking. I also learned that morality existed way before religion did which was fascinating.

Perfectly stated by Richard Dawkins, “We are all atheists about most of the gods that societies have ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further.”

I did not create this blog to offend, at least not intentionally. I still believe that the different religious texts have historical value and a handful of principles worth living by.

I fully accept that science has its limits. I admit that I don't know everything. But I want to share what I do know and what I am discovering everyday.

I want to share my one epic lifetime walking this Earth and witnessing the infinite majesty of the universe.

I want to share what it feels like to be an atheist.  How I've never felt more enlightened and liberated in my entire life. How deeply humbling it is to find out and somehow grasp the magnanimity of the universe, the laws of nature and how we came to be.

Contrary to popular belief, science and atheism are breathtakingly awesome.