Hey y'all!
First of all thanks for sharing your stories! I was pleasantly surprised to find so many people with experiences similar to mine, and for the first time in years I don't feel truly alone!
I'm in my 20s and was born and raised in Canada, in a religious muslim family of South Asian origin. Everything in my life was pretty much dandy until I realized I was gay and I couldn't bring myself to tell my loving yet extremely homophobic parents the truth. Since I knew all about Lot's story in both the Quran and the Bible and I was brought up to believe in the Quran literally, I was convinced that I'd have to live my life like some kind of chaste monk in order to get to heaven. On top of this, my dad frequently chanted the well-known "gays are cursed" spiel (and still does) which, even though I've given up religion, makes me almost as uncomfortable today as it did back then.
As I got older, this and many other Islamic concepts began to nag me, but particularly the one about who goes to heaven/hell. I was bullied by Muslim boys who went to my secondary school, and was verbally taunted and even physically beaten by them on a few occasions (nothing to with my homosexuality, and no-one suspected it at the time). This led me to question why all believing Muslims, even the most evil ones would end up in heaven, while the majority of non-Muslims, even the kindest ones (people like my dear friends, teachers, friendly neighbors, other inspirational figures) would end up burning in hell. It disgusted me that my bullies would be my co-habitants in heaven while my friends would be burning in hell as enemies of God.
To cut a long story short, I had my "eureka moment" a few months ago, where I realized that Islam is the problem and not me. I've never felt so liberated!
For years I felt like I was wrong for questioning Islam, and for being gay, and for believing that my life's entire purpose was to serve God and my family and live by their rules and values, no matter how much those rules and values contradicted what I felt. Now I feel confident in my values, and I don't have to compare my sense of morality to the standard Islamic spiel. At the moment, for the sake of my parents' love and sanity (or insanity rather), I'm living a double-closeted life, but at the same time I'm relishing my newly-found atheism!
Topic: Hi, newbie from canada here!