Autism and Atheism? What's the connection?

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Now you are changing what you say, and now that you have altered what you have said I can agres with you!
My personal observation is that those on the spectrum go far deeper into whatever they believe in.

Out of interest, have you ever had any spiritual experiences? I am wondering if this is the deciding factor between those who believe in God and those who don't.

I think you nailed it.

Out of atheists I've known, there's been a handful who had an experience that broke their ability to believe, but the bulk seem like they've literally never been able to "get it".

I'm definitely one of the latter.

I was given the spiritual gift of faith 6 years ago so I believe strongly. It was a sudden thing that just happened.

I have seen supernatural things happen, they are very subtle so can be dismissed by a determined atheist.

The action might not be dismissed, but the supernatural explanation can always be dismissed.

Well you can't explain it so it must be magic just means more investigation needs to be done, not that the supernatural was actually involved.

I call myself an agnostic rather than an atheist (since I don't actually know). Though I did attend church for some years, I never felt anything spiritual or divine, which is one of the reasons I stopped attending. So yeah, I never "got it".

I wouldn't even say my church experience was bad. In a lot of ways I'm glad I went, since it helped me better understand something that's important to many people. But it isn't something I could connect with more than superficially.

(Apologize to the origional poster for going slightly off track in this but I will answer this as it is interesting).

My Dad was like that through most of his life. He could not deny the existance of God, but there was nothing that drew him in. (If that is the right term to use).
Then without any help from us, late in his life he gave his heart to the Lord and became a Christian. (After he died a few years later we happened to locate one of his teenage friends who was amazed of my Dad that he decided to become a Christian and in his words said "He is the last person that I would have thought would become a Chridtian!").
Now my Dad was one where when we were seing demons and entering into battle, he just could not see it! He would walk right in the middle of the demons and not know!
Yet, when the spiritual experiences manifested into the physical, he had some amazing experiences! He had the Holy Spirit come to him in a wirlwind that was only where he was standing and he started speaking in tongues, which was another thing he had never done and did not in the past know what was going on when others spoke in tongues.
All he could say when he had that experience was "Ysprid Glân" which is Welsh for "Holy Spirit" though its literal translation in Welsh is "Clean spirit".
We also never expected any of this with my Dad! It was a miracle as he was one who we never expected to have accepted Christ!

I do not knkw why some can see things that others can't. It is puzzling. Also amusing!

Anyway. Apologize for straying away from atheism, but I am curious as to the spiritual side or the non-experience of it that may be a deciding factor.. Though like my Dad, I would never say that things may not change as one progresses through life. All I can say is that it is interesting.

Changing what I say?
That was in my OP, at no point did I ever "change" what I was saying.

As for if I have had a spiritual experience, no, at no time did I ever experience anything I'd call "spiritual".

This thread is interesting to me, because one of the first things that struck me when joining this forum was just how religious it was in terms of userbase. At least, based on the threads and posts I saw back then.

I know some religious people, but most people I hang out with are either agnostic, atheist or spiritual in a way outside of organised religion.

My school was religious but my parents definitely weren't, so there was a conflict of interest. I was taught that if you don't believe then you're a terrible person. Yet I near always had doubts about the stories I was being told.

I also found it pretty daunting. This idea of a God constantly watching over you, one you're supposed to apologise to all the time and that you have to keep making up for the fact that you're alive. Personally it led to a whole bunch of intrusive thoughts.

The idea of putting water on a child to save them from punishment seemed bizarre. What kind of God would follow such an arbitrary rule?

I was hesitant to question. Because in my mind, that meant I was a bad kid. I didn't want to be a bad kid, so I pushed my doubts to the back of my mind.

How would a single boat fit so many animals? What exists within a soul that makes it possible to feel pain? How can we know that one religion is true and the others false? Especially since it's common for Mythology to take elements of former religions and adapt them to fit within their culture. Could they all be telling the same story, but from different angles? Perhaps.

I finally allowed myself to freely question when I was around twelve and came to the conclusion that I don't believe in a God, or Gods for that matter.

Churches have always felt bizarrely empty to me. Cold even. As if lacking something. With fixtures in gold and detailed windows. They should be beautiful, but none of it ever sat right. A sort of beauty that lacks in character. It also bugged me just how white everyone was in the illustrations. Given the setting, it makes no sense. I know this is just Western influence, and I have heard it said that the white version of Jesus was based on a male lover of the artist. Which makes a lot of sense. Still, it seems bizarre that we stick to this depiction.

The idea of a non sentient God seems baffling. Can you consider it a God if it has no awareness? I certainly know that there are concepts in Quantum Physics that have yet to be understood. However, I certainly don't believe in a God in the traditional sense. An overarching set of principles that govern the world, yes, but not an overseer. Unless this is a simulation, but then that leads to even more questions.

This is one of the reasons I am grateful that I never really bought into that, I can only imagine how horrible having such a belief would be. I always see jokes about god watching people masturbate, and just how creepy that would be.

I don’t see a “connection,” really.

I’m an agnostic atheist who has never had a “spiritual” experience.

I will often insert this into “Is there a God?” discussions:

“If my mother would call me from Heaven, then I might start believing in some sort of religion.”

I don’t argue religion because religion is not logically-based. It’s (mostly) a purely subjective experience. It’s not the same as arguing ethics.

Every individual has his/her own theology (or non-theological theology).

I know I started getting kind of skeptical when I learned other fantasy things like santa and leprechauns aren't real because my mom finally admitted it. So kind of hard to ignore thoughts of well if they aren't real is this other being I've also never actually seen also not real.

Shedding christian beliefs was probably one of the better choices I've made, as I think that stuff was bad for my mental health. It took longer to become full atheist however.

I grew up in a home with a mother who had a religious attitude towards Christianity where she would talk, talk, talk about the Bible. I was almost turned off as a teenager and went through a rebellious phase. However, I ended up meeting a wonderful Christian bus driver who became my best friend. However, when I moved out on my own for the first time, I decided to discover what God and the bible were like. Therefore, I have been born again for over 20 years and I don't want to go back to that rebellious phase.

However, while I went through the rebellious phase, I was interested in Judaism as well. However, I kept hearing about the Messianic Jewish movement, where Jews and Gentile believe that Jesus is the Messiah together. About 9 years after I got born again, I joined a Messianic Jewish congregation and I have been pretty happy.

Whatever floats your boat

There’s another guy here who is also a Messianic Jew.

I became an atheist at the age of 12 or so, because I was forced to listen to religious classes at school. I found it extremely annoying. So I was the only kid in class who got bad marks in religious class, as the teacher sensed that I don't like his religion. The only thing I found interesting in religious class was the geography of Israel.

Today I'm more of a syncretic pantheist though, after several psychedelic experiences (with LSD, Psilocybe mushrooms, etc.). But it doesn't affect my daily life.

Syncretic as in my personal "religion" contains similarities with several other religions and philosophies. E.g. Stoicism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Native American religion, etc.

"The universe itself is God and the universal outpouring of its soul"
~Chrysippus