BDSM and religion... how it's mixed in my life....

So first let me give you a summary of my religious journey. Raised RLDS (NOT Mormon, lmao, yes, I grew up saying that :D), converted to Wicca at 14, wandered into "A Course in Miracles" and various New Age stuff in my 20s when I reconnected with first girlfriend, finally got to a Unitarian Universalist fellowship in my late 20s, spent time as UU-ACIM, UU-pagan, UU-Norse pagan, finally have settled into UU-atheist/agnostic.

Now having said all that, let me comment on a "Christmas" a few years ago. Yes, we were calling it Christmas and we even had a Christmas tree. However, among my Master, our roommate at the time, and myself, we had not one adult with Christianity as part of his/hir/her religious make up. And my then-pre-teen had been raised in religious plurality and no care for Christian religious belief.

In my current household, Master (who was pagan when I met Him) considers Himself agnostic, I'm a UU-atheist/agnostic with Norse pagan leanings (I'm a UU but I have a problem accepting any sort of supernatural deity, although I do feel a connection still with my Germanic religious heritage), and my now-teen, who's a UU-atheist. I'm not sure we'll have a "Christmas tree" this year, although I'm hoping to celebrate the recently created UU holiday Chalica. So I'll have 7 days of holiday from the first Monday in December; my Master will possibly be amused.

So now you know where I'm coming from- or at least somewhat; I'll answer in more specifics if anyone wants to ask things in the comments. Do you notice that my Master and I don't have the same religion? I'm an active UU; He has disdain for quite a few things about UU-ism. I was at one UU fellowship for quite a few years, but a quite a few issues led me to the decision to leave that fellowship, taking my son as well; after the fact, my Master said "I'd hoped you would leave it way sooner than you did."

In "Vala's Story," The Queen in quite a few different situations, to different slaves of his, talks about the notion that he believes no dominant, even in a Master/slave situation, should try to force a submissive to a certain religious belief. And my Master would agree. Indeed, The Queen doesn't like it's really possible to do that; consider what the white slave owners did during the time in US history where chattel slavery of people of African descent was legal- the slaves were forced to give up their African religious beliefs, but they didn't always and further they created their own secret churches where their understanding of Christianity was different than what the slave owners preached.

I don't know if it would have been different if religion was a less of a fluid thing to me; one of the UU principles speaks of "a free and responsible search for truth and meaning"- we UUs don't believe that someone gives us what to believe (a creed), we have to search for what we believe. It's been interesting working with my Nanowrimo WIP where two of the main characters share the back story of having been ex-communicated from the LDS church, but religion hasn't figured into the story at all, beyond giving a third character some information.