Cherie Anderson

10/10/2021

Eng 308

How to Make an Atheist

Making an Atheist is like a souffle. It is a precarious recipe that needs special care to

cultivate. Making an atheist involves minimal ingredients (less than 10) just like a souffle. It is a

delicate and complicated recipe. If you are gentle and you nurture your souffle it will come out

perfect, like a close family, like creating an atheist. That term, atheist, seems too harsh, too

opposite of Christianity but that is how my family sees me, not necessarily how I see myself.

My family, my souffle does not turn out like I envision it will. It tastes burnt and bitter;

it’s caved in and appears as unappetizing as it tastes. My family echoes this souffle. Religion

played a key role in the ruined dessert. It has led to the end of a family, a souffle in the garbage,

discarded, unwanted. I will present you the perfect recipe to bake the most delicious atheist, in

conjunction with the most disgusting souffle, whose taste at the end will out weight any guilt.

Ingredients:

Religion (the flour)

A strict, conservative church (butter)

A broken family dynamic (salt and pepper)

Cycles of Abuse (milk)

A love of history (eggs)

Healing (cream of tartar)

Let’s introduce the ingredient and how they contributed to the making the perfect Atheist and a

ruined souffle.

Religion/ (Step 1):

I grew up with very conservative, religious Christian parents. They were kids church

pastors in a small, conservative church. Cherracon and Daniel, my stepmom and dad, tried their

hardest to raise perfect chaste Christians. We went to many bible studies. Many studies geared at

keeping us pure for our husbands, because as women, that is all we have to offer our husbands. I

remember one specific class more than the rest. In this class my stepmother, presented a sermon

to me and my fellow peers on the importance of purity and saving your virginity for your

husband, "this is the most precious gift you can give your husband". We sat in a circle on the

floor of my friend Sara-Beth's mom's house. Cherracon held up a snickers bar, instructed us to

hold and squish/squeeze the bar then when we have had our fill of playing with bar, to pass it to

the person next to us. Cherracon went into the sermon, but my attention was zoned in on the

candy bar in each girl’s hand, being passed around. It didn't matter that I wasn't paying attention,

I have heard it all before. I was seated in the middle of the circle but by the time the chocolate

bar got to me, it was a disgusting mushy mess already. I held the lumpy mass in my hands and

stared at my vagina. The faint smell of chocolate reaching my nose; the wrapper was no longer

sealed. The chocolate was warm in my hands. I passed it to the next girl and observed the

chocolaty brown spots on my hands left behind by the manhandled candy bar. Once the bar

reached Cherracon, she held it up and proclaimed how disgusting and mutilated the bar is, "This

is what happens to you when you sleep with multiple partners, who wants to eat this chocolate
bar?" she asked. Every girl made a face and rejected the lumpy mess. What I took from that

sermon was that if we had sex no one would want us like no one wanted the candy.

A strict, conservative church/ (Step 2):

This church was small and lived up to the stereotypes of conservative churches not

protecting their young members. This would lead to me not trusting “the church” but I still

believed in God; I was still cooking, still hoping for a loving family, still living up to my parents

hopes.

One of the last years of my attendance at my church youth group was embroiled with

scandal. I was 16 at the time. Our youth group was run by the pastor's son and his wife, with

some designated helpers who taught sermons and chaperoned us. One of the helpers is named

Calvin. He is 27,28 when this all happens, never married, and a virgin, saving himself for

marriage. Then, there is my friend Sara-Beth, she is a year and a half older than me, slightly

pudgy, and obsessed with being a wife and mother, but she has an edge to her. She stays out late

and parties, and I would later learn that she even has sex, which at the this point in my life is

taboo. I start to notice Sara-Beth is getting skinnier and skinnier, she is newfound vegetarian and

hardly eats anything. She eventually is hospitalized with an eating disorder but returns to the

church in less than a month. Her return signalizes Calvin's leave to Africa to participate in

missionary work. It felt sudden, there had been no mention of said missionary work before he

left. One day, at a girls meeting where our virginity is compared to an over handled chocolate bar

that is now melted and mushy by the end of class, Sara confides in me that she and Calvin are

dating. She is beaming, cheeks pink and flushed with love and excitement. I was happy for her

because she was happy. Her dreams were coming true. Calvin remained in Africa until Sara
turned 18, and then he magically returned, and they were swiftly wed. They had a child in less

than a year. The church was very hush-hush about the circumstances surrounding their dating.

Eventually, my stepmom told me that Calvin was sent away because him and Sara had started

dating before she was 18 and had engaged in some sort of sexual behavior but not sex. The

church had covered up the whole inappropriate affair. The gilded romance began to fade, and I

saw her for what she was, a child, a victim. I saw the church that did not protect her, wouldn’t

protect me.

A broken family dynamic/ (Step 3):

This contributed more to the ending of the relationship with my parents, and less to me

leaving my faith. However, it adds a key ingredient, it adds the bitterness to the recipe that I

ended up with. I was born to teen parents, met my dad when I was 8. I spent a couple summers

and a Christmas break with him prior to moving in with him and Cherracon at the age of 13. I

barley knew him, and he barley knew me. We tried to create this whole family. He used

Christianity to bond our family. Maybe if he had used love and understanding the end result

would have been a little more sweet.

Cycles of Abuse/(Step 4):

Daniel tried to heal himself by turning to the church and not through healing and therapy.

This led to Christian therapist who turned to God as the way to mend all things, to make us a

close family. God didn’t break the cycles, didn’t heal. I often heard “my childhood was worse; I

could be worse”. He was right he could be worse, but he could have been better. I often believed

if God was real why would he give me a father like the one I had, quick to anger, very strict,
controlling. Religion, God, never helped a thing in my family; it did however help with ruining

it.

Love of History/ (Step 5):

History is my favorite subject, and when I left for college, I took many history classes

that interested me. My favorite periods to study are ancient history, and anything before the

1900’s. My studies showed me how religion changed as time changed and how religion changed

to fit the people’s need at the time. This would influence how I viewed religion. This led to me

finally acknowledging that I did not believe in God. When I informed my parent’s; they were not

happy. It led to lots of contention. An inability to talk about certain topics. I had to walk on

eggshells around my parents as not to incite arguments and debates.

Healing/ (Step 6):

Eventually I would decide that I could no longer walk on eggshells. I chucked

them into my bowl and mixed them in with all the other ingredients and I baked it. I accepted

what came out of the oven. I accepted the burnt smell and the bitter taste. Then I threw it away. I

didn’t need this burnt dessert, this sad, broken family. I let my parents see me however they

wanted to, and I just became me without them. It has been better than trying to make it right,

make it good. I am okay being the Atheist black sheep of my family; that left a sweet taste in my

mouth.
 References

“Basic Soufflé Recipe.” Eggs.ca, https://www.eggs.ca/recipes/basic-souffle.

“In U.S., Decline of Christianity Continues at Rapid Pace.” Pew Research Center's Religion &
Public Life Project, 9 June 2020, https://www.pewforum.org/2019/10/17/in-u-s-decline-of-
christianity-continues-at-rapid-pace/.