Selective reasoning on what is fantasy (by anon)

The most shocking realization I had in my conversion experience out of Christianity was seeing how deeply rooted the Christian mythology was in me.  Basically, Christianity says that we are all sick, some guy came down out of nowhere and had to die this horrible death, he miraculously comes back to life after a brutal murder, but we have to wash ourselves in his blood, and only then are we made healthy and can go to heaven.  This seems so natural to believe as a Christian, especially when one grows up in the church.  Those are beliefs that feel like home.  BUT when I take a step back and look at them more objectively, they just seem crazy.  I can’t be clean until some guy dies for me – and he died over 2000 years ago?  I have to be cleansed in this guy’s blood?  How can this story ring anything but fantasy?  If someone said that the spaghetti monster requires that I eat some of his noodles and sauce for me to be allowed in his heaven, I’d say he’s nuts.  I thought that Mormonism was nuts for saying that Mohammed and his horse were raised to heaven at the Dome of the Rock.  Who’s ever seen anyone rise up to the clouds without mechanical aid?  So if I think these kinds of stories are fictions, how can I think any differently about the whole “Jesus’ body and blood will save me” theory?  If an alien species came down to Earth and learned about this, they would surely perceive Christians as no different than how we view ancient Greek mythology.

The moral of this is the age-old notion that if one is too close to something, one may not see it clearly.  I allowed myself to take a step back and it was quite eye-opening for me.  I was selectively choosing what was fantasy and what was not fantasy, when it was clear that it was all fantasy.