Even though Christianity was a big part of these famous people’s early lives, they later decided to switch to another religion or quit believing in a higher power altogether.
Questions that started early
Brad Pitt’s childhood in Missouri was quite church-heavy, as his family was Southern Baptist. But Pitt has said that he began questioning the religion when he was quite young. His decision to leave home meant that his Christianity gradually went with it, too.
He described himself as being agnostic and then an atheist. The last label hasn’t stuck around, though. Pitt has said that he doesn’t follow a formal religion, but does believe that all humans are connected in a spiritual way.
A gradual exit
Comedian Bill Maher’s decision to leave Christianity didn’t come at a single moment. His father raised him Catholic, and Maher went through religious instruction. He even prepared for First Communion like plenty of Catholic kids.Â
But Maher said his doubts grew over time, and it got to the point where he was openly an atheist as an adult. He does talk about religion constantly in his comedy and TV work. He’s said in recent interviews that he’s an atheist raised Roman Catholic.
Bible study changed everything
The funny thing about comedian Julia Sweeney’s decision to leave Christianity is that she became more serious about Catholicism right before she left it. She began taking Bible classes at age 40 and started studying Catholic teaching more closely. It didn’t have the effect you might expect.
The more she read, the less convinced she became of what she was reading, and she eventually concluded that she didn’t believe in God at all. Sweeney turned this experience into her one-woman show Letting Go of God.
The youth group surprise
Magician Penn Jillette’s exit from Christianity started when he was young. He reached an agreement with his parents when he was 16, where they’d let him skip Sunday morning church as long as he kept going to the Congregationalist youth group. He agreed.
Except, Jillette started reading the Bible closely and asked question after question. He later said the minister told his parents that Penn was encouraging so many other kids to question Christianity that it’d be better if he stopped coming. It didn’t take long for Jillette to decide he was an atheist.Â
No label required
George Carlin grew up Catholic and went to Catholic schools. The comedian spent a huge amount of his career making jokes about religion, but he was still quite careful about what to call himself. He said he rejected traditional Christian belief. Yet he didn’t love atheism either.
He said during a 2001 interview with Larry King that the label sounded too certain for him, and ‘agnostic’ didn’t interest him. Carlin didn’t believe in the Christian God nor in boxing himself into another category. He was a free spirit.
It happened in high school
Comedian Kathy Griffin decided to leave Catholicism when she was quite young. Yes, she grew up in a strongly Irish Catholic family, but by high school, she was already drifting away from it. She’s even joked about calling herself a ‘fallen Catholic’ and has looked into becoming a Unitarian.
Her parents weren’t exactly thrilled about that. Griffin says she is now nonreligious and a nonbeliever, although she hasn’t always directly said she’s an atheist. Her mother stayed a practicing Catholic until she died.
A newspaper made an impression
Muhammad Ali’s birth name was Cassius Clay, and he grew up as a Baptist in Louisville. He didn’t leave Christianity until much later, and it came after he saw a cartoon in a Nation of Islam newspaper. It showed enslaved Black people being beaten while being told to pray to Jesus.Â
Ali said he never forgot it, and it actually encouraged him to look into Islam. He began spending time around the Nation of Islam, and officially became a Muslim after beating Sonny Liston in February 1964. That was when he took the name Muhammad Ali.
Faith was gone by adulthood
Writer Seth MacFarlane’s Catholic upbringing in New England didn’t really survive into his adult life. He was already talking about being an atheist by the time Family Guy had made him famous. Interestingly enough, though, he isn’t completely committed to his non-belief.
He has referred to himself as being ‘99% atheist,’ so there’s a little room left there for uncertainty. But even so, it seems that the 1% of doubt left isn’t for Christianity.
His father’s death changed things
Religion became a lot harder for actor Javier Bardem to accept when his father died. He was raised Roman Catholic in Spain, although he did later say he was never devoted to it. His father’s death made him question why people believe in religion in the first place.Â
That led him to the conclusion that, actually, faith could be a way of making frightening or confusing things feel easier to explain. He began calling himself an atheist as an adult. Still, he has spoken about there being a possibility that humans simply don’t understand everything. Fair enough, really.
The Quran came last
Sinéad O’Connor had a complicated relationship with Christianity before she ever became Muslim. The singer had previously been ordained by an independent Catholic group that Rome didn’t recognize, and years later, she decided to start studying different religions.
O’Connor said she saved Islam for last because she had strong negative ideas about it. But it changed once she opened the Quran. O’Connor said something clicked once she read the second chapter and formally converted in 2018. She adopted the name Shuhada.
A conversation in Bahrain
Jermaine Jackson was raised as a Jehovah’s Witness like the rest of his famous family. His decision to leave came during a 1989 trip to Bahrain. Local children asked him what religion he followed, so he said he was Christian, but then the kids started talking to him about Islam.
The conversation stuck with him. He went on to meet Muslim scholars and travel to Riyadh, capital of Saudi Arabia. He also went on a pilgrimage to Mecca. He officially converted to Islam in 1989 and took on the name Muhammad Abdul-Aziz Sharif.
Grief led her somewhere new
The main reason Elizabeth Taylor moved away from Christianity was a terrible personal loss. Her third husband, producer Mike Todd, died in a plane crash in 1958. Taylor said the incident devastated her, and she found herself needing a stronger religious foundation.
Christian Science, however, didn’t give her what she wanted, so she began studying Judaism with Rabbi Max Nussbaum at Temple Israel in Hollywood. She continued studying for around a year and converted in 1959, taking the name ‘Elisheba Rachel.’ Taylor also said, ‘I feel as if I have been a Jew all my life.’
An interest that began in school
Before the fame and the TV show, Dave Chappelle was interested in a different religion. The comedian began reading about Islam in high school, despite the fact that his mother was an ordained Unitarian Universalist minister.
He continued to learn about Islam as he got older and became a practicing Muslim around 1998. He tried to go on a pilgrimage to Mecca during a break from Chappelle’s Show, although visa problems prevented him from getting any further than Turkey.
The prison story isn’t quite right
There’s a story about Mike Tyson’s conversion that says he became Muslim in prison. That’s not quite right. Tyson was raised Catholic and has said that he’d already accepted Islam before beginning his Indiana prison sentence in 1992.Â
He studied Islam and attended Friday prayers while he was locked up, even though he hadn’t publicly made any statements yet. Tyson openly spoke about being Muslim in 1995 and about his belief in Allah.
A different path after Baptist church
Rapper Ice Cube grew up in South Los Angeles and went to a Baptist church with his family. He remained a Christian believer until he got older and made music. Around the time that his days in N.W.A. were ending, he began looking into the Nation of Islam and went to Chicago to hear Louis Farrakhan speak.
He never formally joined the group, though he did describe himself as a ‘natural Muslim.’ In other words, he doesn’t make regular trips to the mosque or follow every formal practice. He does still believe, however.
An accident started the search
Singer and actor Sammy Davis Jr. was having a difficult time in November 1954. He’d been in a serious car crash that cost him his left eye, and it was during his recovery that he started thinking about religion again. His religious background was a little mixed, as his mother was Catholic and his father was Baptist.
Davis later said he’d become ‘sort of nothing’ until he had conversations with rabbis and read books about Jewish history. He kept reading. Davis officially converted to Judaism by the early 1960s and never looked back.
More than a wedding formality
You might be surprised to learn that Marilyn Monroe actually converted to Judaism. This was shortly before marrying Arthur Miller in 1956, although it wasn’t a simple process of her signing a form and moving on. Monroe actually studied one-on-one with Rabbi Robert E. Goldburg before converting.
It wasn’t just because she married a Jewish person, either, as Monroe kept identifying as Jewish after her 1961 divorce from Miller. There’s even a surviving conversion certificate with her signature on it.
Sources: Please see here for a complete listing of all sources that were consulted in the preparation of this article.
11 misunderstandings about Christianity you should stop believing
Some ideas about Christianity have been repeated so much that people think they’re true, but the thing is, they’re not.
11 misunderstandings about Christianity you should stop believing
