No, not at all. I felt same and self doubt while being a believer over being a "sinner" just by being normal. I have never hated all religious people, but just detest people who try to impose their religious beliefs on me, and duplicitous demagogic charlatan preachers and leaders.

No it started very young and was complete by age eight.

WOW!!! Get out of my head!!!!

For me it started as a child wondering why if god was so great was misery and torment was so common, that lead me to reading the bible and other religious texts (voted most boring :The Book Of Mormon). Never made it to the despising stage, although the Evangelicals continue to make that hard to avoid. The last one I totally agree with, religions has done epic damage to mankind, but for some it works and works well.

I guess I kinda had a similar experience.
I grew up in the Catholic Church, I had to go to Sunday school (CCD), did the whole first communion whole nine yards. But I never truly believed, just did most of it to appease my Mom.
I did go through a stage in my early twenties that I explored other religions, mostly paganism and Buddhism. But now I am at your stage 3, I'm always reminded of the movie The Matrix in the scene where Morpheus tells Neo some people are not ready to be removed from the Matrix.

Stage 1:Raised Catholic, was into the pantomime of the guy in the dress up on the stage and wanted a bit-part as altar-boy, carrying the candles etc. Loved the hymns and my elaborately gilded catechism.
Stages 2 - infinity: Then, aged 7, suddenly realised that none of it made sense, stopped attending church and Sunday school (wasn't forced to). Have never needed to modify opinion since.

I don't remember ever being in Stage 1; I guess, I skipped that one.

I know several atheists stuck in Stage 2; feel like they are full of hate about anything religious

I never went through a Stage 1, as I've never felt shame about not believing in a god. When I was younger, in college, I admit that I was stuck in Stage 2, having plenty of derision toward all things religious and a condescending attitude toward people who fell for any of it. As far as Stage 3, although I tried to be mature and open-minded to everyone, I don't think that I truly experienced gracious acceptance of others' religious choices and beliefs until I went through a difficult and humbling period that included grieving close family deaths and other personal losses. I now feel that my embracing the "realness" of others' beliefs (realness for them, of course) has solidified and crystallized my personal atheism.

I kind of bypassed stage two and most of stage 1 other than some worry about my place among my peers and extended family.

My Stage 1 equivalent was my Agnostic phase, which lasted many years, In the later years of stage 1, I was afraid of the societal backlash in declaring myself a full blown atheist.

In my Stage 2 equivalent, certainly derision since most of my arguments/debates involved me ridiculing religions, but mostly due to frustration rather than hate.

Because of a lot of experience in stage 2, I'm in an acceptance stage. I didn't become an atheist overnight and i realized people's minds won't change after a mere conversation with me. But acceptance to me doesn't mean keeping quiet when it comes to lawmaking or any high-impacting societal changes influenced by religion.

I think I hopped over 1 then spent a lot of time in 2 then stage 3

Went straight from devout Catholic to Athiesm overnight. Now I am spiritual. But I believe in darkness.

I don't know about stages, I questioned things as a kid, but didn't press the issue. My early adulthood was mostly secular, but not caring enough to decide either way. I guess maybe around 30 or so, I concluded that I cannot call myself a Christian, I didn't believe in the tenants. I didn't actually come out as atheist until around 40, at which point, yeah, I was kinda angry and rejected anything having to do with religion. I'm 54 now, I've calmed down; I recognize that some people need religion, and respect their right to believe as they wish, that is until they use it to suppress other's rights, then I have a serious problem with it.

also the stage of denial. i believed jesus did not exist. that the bible was just fiction

I agree that there are / were stages. Mine and most likely others in this group have a different perspective of what these stages are. The one thing that is similar (hopefully) is that we do have different phases of non-theism because that shows a willing to evolve and learn and not set into a benign way of thinking. Do I think my perspective will be different in 10-15 years?? God I hope so, or... non-god I hope so. That would mean that I wanted to keep evolving.

I was too young to have stages... but easy on the covfefe baptist, not everyone will act like you... Hallucinating on stages already.

It has pretty much always been stage 3 for me . Even as a young boy training as an Altar boy, I wasn't a believer . These days I wish I could believe, there would be many advantages and much support from a religious belief.

nope. it didn't happen to me at all. my stages: 1. wow, i'm jewish and i have never gone to services. i should go and study and find out what this is about. 2. okay a year of that is enough. i'm still jewish and the talmud is way interesting but i am not making friends and i guess i'll just go back to being a jew without going to services, even though i kind of miss the studying part. 3. wow my folks told me long-haired boys are dirty and rebellious and i see that's just not the case. what else did i believe that wasn't true? let's see. god. yeah, that's not gonna fly. still a jew, but there's no god. yup, okay, got it. 4. what's for dinner?

g

Never made it out of 2. I try to, but end up viewing religion as the root of all evil. I start looking at cause and effect of a variety of issues and end up recondemning it very quickly. Narrow minded, bigoted, racist, entitled, arrogant pricks. Yup, still in stage 2 ?

I'm pretty much in the stage 2 area. I've never had any of stage 1 at all, and I am dubious about stage 3. Benefits of religion are greatly overdone. People say they can't get through a single day without their Jesus. WTF? What did they ever do before?

No - I have acceptance in the sense of "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink" regarding discussions with some religious people, but I have never believed "plenty of good also comes from religion". Good, kind, caring people are that way regardless of religion. Hateful, malicious, selfish people are the same. Religion is just the clothes worn over the person, and most often twists people into doing evil things in the name of good.

The process, in my experience, is much like the stages of grief, which probably shouldn't be labeled as 'stages' since they can occur in varying sequences and simultaneously. I went through the shock and denial, the anger, the bargaining, the depression and finally the acceptance. And even after the acceptance stage, for the longest time I felt much like the writer, Julian Barnes, who famously admitted, "I don't believe in God, but I miss him." But now I don't miss him at all, and am, after many years, breathing freely.

Skipped step 2. I have never hated anyone. I have only disagreed with people and their beliefs. I only believe in the language of love and unselfish acts. I was raised religious, fell upon the best of the best "sinners" and held the shame and guilt for most of my life. I recently changed my life completely and accepted the things ive done wrong, corrected them, and I do everything in my power to not let it happen again. I love christians and religious people. And I love non believers. As long as they are doing good things in life, then they are doing the right thing. The issues with christians these days is that they have become the MOST judgemental people around. They frown at people who are good and honest people but have a different belief system. And that is actually against their religion! They don't even follow it! I do believe in the messages of the bible, but its just a story with a message. A moral. Just like any good book or movie that has a positive life lesson. Doesnt mean its true, just good morals to follow.