List of converts to Christianity from nontheism

This is a list of notable converts to Christianity who were not theists before their conversion.[lower-alpha 1] All names should be sourced and the source should indicate they had not been a theist, not merely non-churchgoing, before conversion.

Converted to Anglicanism or Episcopalianism

Converted to Catholicism

Converted to Eastern Orthodox Christianity

Converted to Protestantism

Converts to the Quaker faith

  • Whittaker Chambers – former Communist turned conservative writer[110][111]
  • Gerald Priestland – news correspondent who discusses having once been the "school atheist" in Something Understood: An Autobiography; became a Quaker after an emotional breakdown[112]

Unspecified or other

Notes

  1. See "Nontheism" for specifics of what encompasses nontheism.

References

  1. San Francisco Chronicle: At 8, she read H. G. Wells' "The Outline of History" and pronounced herself an atheist
  2. Interview with Tamsin Greig in The Guardian
  3. Interview at the Guardian
  4. Near Christianity: "Hitchens describes his tumultuous journey from atheist to Christian and the moral reasoning that caused his conversion," book description
  5. I couldn't paint golden angels by Albert Meltzer, pg 319
  6. The Return of Christian Humanism by Lee Oser, pg 46
  7. Humanist Heritage
  8. "Lewis lapsed into atheism in his teens but experienced a reconversion to Christianity in 1931." Lewis, C.S.. (2007). In Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 28 June 2007, from Encyclopædia Britannica Online
  9. biography on official website Archived 5 December 2006 at the Wayback Machine
  10. The Guardian's obituary of Powell
  11. The Guardian
  12. Article from the University of Wollongong
  13. The Guardian Quote: Even though she was raised an atheist, in the past three or four years she has been going to church. In her eighth decade, she has even submitted to being baptised.
  14. Grand Forks Herald
  15. Free Inquiry
  16. Voices Online Edition Archived 24 July 2015 at the Wayback Machine "Elizabeth voraciously read books concerning religious faith. ... She finally announced, at 15, that she wanted to become a Catholic."
  17. Obituary in the Chicago Tribune
  18. Profile in "The Core: The College Magazine of the University of Chicago": "I was gradually convinced by my own reflections that Aquinas had provided a better case for theism than Marx or Darwin had provided against it,"
  19. Crisis Magazine
  20. "My Failed Atheism" in "First Things"
  21. "Atheism to Catholicism: a faith journey" – Dr. Mark Bauerlein at Eastern Mennonite University
  22. Medieval Roles for Modern Times by Helen Solterer, pg 85
  23. Tim Stanley's blog at The Telegraph
  24. Career stories: Belle Epoque novels of professional development by Juliette M. Rogers, pg 55
  25. Alexis Carrel, The Voyage to Lourdes (New York, Harper & Row, 1939).
  26. Obituary at the Guardian
  27. Newsweek obituary
  28. Telegraph "She reacted strongly against her parents' beliefs and became a Catholic at 19, because she 'no longer found it possible to disbelieve in God.'" (pg 2)
  29. "American Enterprise Institute". Archived from the original on 26 October 2014. Retrieved 4 July 2013.
  30. Page for "The Last Superstition"
  31. Obituary at the Independent
  32. I have met Him: God exists by André Frossard "We were what could be called perfect atheists, the kind that no longer ever question their atheism." (not in link itself)
  33. "The making of gay marriage’s top foe" by Mark Oppenheimer; Salon: "I was an atheist from the youngest age. When I was 16, I became a Randian. Becoming a Catholic began as an intellectual thing."
  34. Interview in the National Review: FMG:You've mentioned that you now believe in God. How recent is that? Eugene Genovese: It's in the last two years. You know, in The Southern Front I still spoke as an atheist; one reviewer said that I protest too much. When the book came off the press and I had to reread it, I started wrestling with the problem philosophically, and I lost.
  35. St. Petersburg Times
  36. MSNBC
  37. Australian Humanists of the Year
  38. "Former atheist and political leader Bill Hayden baptised at age 85 at St Mary's Church, Ipswich". The Catholic Leader. 18 September 2018. Retrieved 18 September 2018. See also Kristian Silva, 'Bill Hayden, former Labor leader, turns to God despite atheist past', ABC News, 19 September 2018.
  39. UC Berkeley article
  40. PBS
  41. Time Magazine from 19 July 1963 "Lepp has the credentials to explain the mind of the atheist: he was one himself for 27 years."
  42. Unequally Yoked (blog at Patheos.com)
  43. Popular Atheist Blogger, Leah Libresco, Converts to Christianity by James Bishop, 6 January 2017
  44. Catholic Converts: British and American Intellectuals Turn to Rome by Patrick Allitt, pg 199-201
  45. Phenomenological approaches to moral philosophy By John J. Drummond, Lester E. Embree; pg 269
  46. A Fierce Hatred of Injustice By Winston James, Claude McKay: "Prior to his conversion to Catholicism in 1944, his atheism was one of the most powerful and enduring threads of continuity in his outlook on life."
  47. Claude McKay: rebel sojourner in the Harlem Renaissance : a biography, pgs 357-359
  48. "From Rome to the World: The Global Offensive of the Catholic Media" 20 August 2004 Archived 22 April 2005 at the Wayback Machine
  49. Who's who in hell by Warren Allen Smith, pg 57
  50. First Things Archived 10 April 2013 at the Wayback Machine
  51. Haven, Cynthia L., "'A Sacred Vision': An Interview with Czesław Miłosz", in Haven, Cynthia L. (ed.), Czesław Miłosz: Conversations. University Press of Mississippi, 2006, p. 145.
  52. Malcolm Muggeridge: A Life by Ian Hunter
  53. Chicago Sun-Times obituary
  54. Nathanson, Bernand Aborting America (1981 Pinnacle Books)
  55. The Miami News - 9 April 1965: "His conversion to Catholicism ended 50 years of questioning doubt as an agnostic."
  56. Rome News-Tribune - 29 May 1952
  57. Cassell dictionary of Italian literature, pg 423: "Although a confirmed atheist in his youth, Papini experienced a religious conversion in later life..."
  58. Notre Dame Center for Ethics and Culture Archived 12 June 2010 at the Wayback Machine
  59. The American Spectator Archived 9 May 2013 at the Wayback Machine
  60. Political ecumenism: Catholics, Jews and Protestants in de Gaulle's Free ... by Geoffrey Adams, pg 85
  61. Australian Broadcasting Corporation
  62. Sustaining the earth by John Young, pgs 96-112
  63. New Scientist 26 July 1984. pg 38
  64. Decibel Magazine Archived 17 March 2007 at the Wayback Machine
  65. University of Chicago "made a spiritual journey from atheism to agnosticism before eventually converting to Catholicism"
  66. Race: the history of an idea in America by Thomas F. Gossett, pg 390
  67. The American Conservative
  68. "...he was an atheist arguing for religious values, a man writing an essay on religion 'in a spirit of irreligion.'... He would not convert to Catholicism for two decades, but his need for religious authority was acute even in 1930." Allen Tate: Orphan of the South, p. 167, biographer Thomas A. Underwood, Princeton University Press, 2000, ISBN 0-691-06950-6
  69. Bjørn Thomassen (6 May 2016). Liminality and the Modern: Living Through the In-Between. Routledge. pp. 78–80. ISBN 978-1-317-10504-6.
  70. Norwegian Women's Writing 1850-1990 by Janet Garton, Page 125
  71. Interview in the American Conservative: I also went through an angry atheist phase. As someone who spent a lot of his life buying into the lie that you had to be stupid to be a Christian, Augustine really demonstrated in a moving way that that’s not true.
  72. Six Modern British Novelists by George Stade, pgs 53-55
  73. Interview with John C. Wright at "Mostly Fiction": "For many years I had been an atheist, and a vehement, argumentative, proselytizing atheist at that. I saw no other possible option for belief for a logical thinker. My recent conversion to Christianity was a miracle, prompted by a supernatural revelation, which has satisfied my skepticism in this area, and saved my life."
  74. Amazon page for "Atheist to Catholic"
  75. The Guardian
  76. "Atlantic Times". Archived from the original on 4 May 2013. Retrieved 10 February 2013.
  77. Nihilism by Eugene Rose from Columbia University Archived 2 March 2013 at the Wayback Machine
  78. Pomona College Archived 14 April 2012 at the Wayback Machine
  79. "The Australian". Archived from the original on 19 September 2009. Retrieved 8 April 2012.
  80. Seattle Times "In 1975, he threw off his atheism and became a Christian."
  81. Bashir, Martin (7 May 2007), "Does God Exist? The Nightline Faceoff", ABC News, retrieved 4 April 2009
  82. "Back of Book Segment". The O'Reilly Factor Flash. 12 April 2006. Retrieved 8 December 2008.
  83. Cameron, Kirk; Ray Comfort (2004). The Way of the Master. Tyndale House Publishers, Inc. p. Foreword. ISBN 1-4143-0061-1.
  84. "He converted from atheism to Christianity in his twenties after seeing how radically his patients' faith transformed their experience of suffering, and after reading several works by C. S. Lewis." The Question of God: Interview with Francis Collins, WGBH Educational Foundation, 2004 (Accessed 14 June 2007)
  85. [Bo Giertz, The Hammer of God,revised edition, XIII, Augsburg Fortress, Minneapolis, 2005.
  86. "Testimony of the Evangelists by Simon Greenleaf". law2.umkc.edu. Retrieved 29 November 2015.
  87. M. Maisel, John. "Jesus God". Meekness and Truth. Retrieved 28 November 2015.
  88. Men who made Labour: the PLP of 1906, pg 75
  89. Spartacus Schoolnet Archived 20 May 2012 at the Wayback Machine "Although raised as an atheist, Hardie was converted to Christianity in 1897."
  90. Stockport Express 17 May 2006
  91. Cotswold Journal 14 October 2010
  92. "The Killer and the Pastor" article from Time.com
  93. Beryhill, Mary. "Akiane Kramarik: Dream Child". Christianity Today. Archived from the original on 24 January 2007. Retrieved 23 February 2013.
  94. Centi, Lori Rose. "Interview: Akiane speaks of heaven and paintings". The Washington Post. Retrieved 23 February 2013.
  95. Archived 15 July 2014 at the Wayback Machine "I knew it was Jesus immediately from the moment I started shaking. It was like he just came up and introduced himself to me. I remember him saying, "You don’t have to have this if you don’t want it". And I said, "No, I want it"."
  96. The Post and Courier
  97. USA Today
  98. statement of William J. Murray
  99. Marxism and Me by Marvin Olasky Archived 29 February 2012 at the Wayback Machine: My communism was based on atheism, and when I could no longer be an atheist, I resigned from the party.
  100. Creators Syndicate Profile
  101. University of Bielefeld
  102. Chronicle of Higher Education article obituary (Copied by Gametheory.net) has the following "Because George was a fire-spitting atheist and Julia a devout Christian, their relationship was contentious from the beginning. After eight years, the marriage ended in acrimony." "On June 7 [1970] I gave in and admitted that God existed", he explained to friends.
  103. American Humanist's "Top Ten Sexiest Female Celebrity Atheists" Archived 6 March 2015 at the Wayback Machine
  104. Article by Mira Sorvino in "Guideposts", via Huffington Post, where she mentions her Christian faith
  105. Barry, JD (2009). "Investigative Bible Study: Lee Strobel on Engaging a Pluralistic World". Bible Study Magazine: 10–14.
  106. Lee Strobel Books and Ministry Archived 6 August 2011 at the Wayback Machine. Christnotes.org. Retrieved on 2011-11-14.
  107. Interview for Christianity Today: I was so outspoken about not believing in God. I had real problems with Christians.]
  108. Dearborn Free Press: "Amazing Grace Amid Profound Controversy" by Jonathan Light August 31, 2010
  109. Heritage Foundation
  110. TruTV: "He had been an atheist and had been kicked out of Columbia University for writing a play considered blasphemous."
  111. Antiqbook
  112. TheTrueSeven. Peter Baltes of Accept Heavy metal band from Germany. 23 September 2011. Retrieved on 13 October 2014.
  113. http://www.cbn.com/700club/features/amazing/Peter_Baltes082609.aspx
  114. Wall Street Journal
  115. The Guardian "I grew up, and stopped being an atheist, in my 20s, in the 1980s."
  116. Christianity Today
  117. Slate blogs
  118. "Dahmer found religion, played pranks in prison". The Beaver County Times. Associated Press. 28 November 1994. Retrieved 5 December 2013.
  119. "I was brought up as an agnostic... and when I first became a Christian in the Seventies I didn't really know what it was I'd adopted." Faith in Practice: Holding on to the Mystery of Love, by Bruce Cockburn as told to Cole Morton, Third Way, September 1994, page 15. (Accessed 13 June 2007)
  120. Becky Barnicoat, Weekender: Karl Dallas, writer, 82, The Guardian, 27 April 2013. Retrieved 2 July 2013
  121. Ohio Atheists Archived 20 August 2008 at the Wayback Machine
  122. Statement disavowing Atheism
  123. Hicks, Jesse (25 November 2014). "God's Lonely Programmer". VICE Motherboard. Retrieved 21 April 2015.
  124. Forbes
  125. Christian Post
  126. "Norge IDAG - Monsen med bok om sin tro". Archived from the original on 18 July 2011. Retrieved 15 March 2012.
  127. Interview at Inspire Magazine
  128. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/science-obituaries/8150004/Allan-Sandage.html
  129. CESNUR interview
  130. New Statesman
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