I believed in God when I was a child.

I got caught up in some “God isn’t real” hype a few times but overall it remained.

Then as a teenager my world got rocked and the doubt really set in. Suffice it to say there was involuntary relations involved.

When I dropped out of college due to drinking more doubt came.

Broke my leg before deployment, more doubt.

Divorce and my child being taken across the country from me when I wasn’t able to follow, I knew there was no God.

It didn’t take much to reaffirm my faith, however. To realize I had been foolish.

The moment I walked out of the mental hospital at Loma Linda, California, wrists still bandaged, alive despite my best efforts I felt Him. I saw Him in everything. The day was brighter, the world was better.

But I had made many friends who I assumed didn’t believe in Him.

It turns out I was wrong. They claimed not to when in reality they hated the very idea of Him, they hated Him.

It was odd losing friends due to re-finding faith.

I wonder if the cognitive dissonance you saw and the utter contempt I saw have some relation. Perhaps I misunderstood what I was seeing.