I cannot continue living this life a lie. I need to tell my parents that I am an atheist. But how? They will probably freak out and treat me like an alien or something.
They try to force me to go to synagogue and religious school, which I do. I'm in the youth group, but not active. I only stay in it so I can stay in touch with friends from the rest of the country...away from the dump of a town i live in. And the only reason I want to have friends from around the country is because most of the people here are either not very nice or not accepting of others. But I think my parents think I'm in it for other reasons.

All I know to do is ask you guys for advice.

This post was last modified: 03-03-2007 02:56 PM by overcaffein8d.

Hell I haven't even told my parents yet.
I don't really know what to tell you. It really depends on how strongly you feel that you have to tell them. When your 18 you can tell them anything you want and suffer much fewer consequences. It's a sad predicament.

Stand up straight, it is nothing to be ashamed of, it is a strength not a weakness. Remind them that you still keep your Jewish heritage, you simply don't share they're delusion of a god.
If you are they're son then they should accept you for what you are, not what they think you should be. Tell them that you've been an atheist for a while now (I'm assuming this is true) and that they still liked you then so why should this be any different.
Whatever you do, do NOT apologize, I have a twitch reflex where I say "sorry" at the slightest action and it makes me appear really unsure.

Just be prepared to stand your ground. Although I am not an atheist, I went through something very similar when I told my extremely Catholic mother that I was becoming a Buddhist. This follower of a supposedly loving god told me she believed I (and my unbaptized children) would probably go to hell.

Fortunately I had long gotten used to the guilt trips and said, "Great! At least I'll be with my friends."

We get along and talk all the time now - although there was a period of about half a year when we did not speak at all after my conversion - but never about religion (or politics, for that matter). She has made it abundantly clear that she is not interested in my religion.

Good luck. You need to be honest with yourself and the people around you, even if (maybe especially) they do not understand.

thanks a lot guys, i think i'm going to wait awhile.. my mood has changed. but i do plan to tell them.

Just do what I do for the time being.

Maintain your god fearing image to the family that you don't want to have heated arguements about religion with, and at any instance where dribble of praising of holy entities arises from them, pretend to agree and when they turn thier backs make rapid stabbing motions in thier direction.

that's what i do. it works too.