What I Believe… – Life In Random Order

A Secular Statement

I get asked a lot these days what I believe if I don’t believe in the supernatural… so I thought it might be helpful to put this out there for those with curious minds.

If these kinds of discussions are not your thing, then by all means please click-on, no worries… I am okay with the possibility that you may see thing differently. For me I figure that if I don’t share, then I run the risk of missing out on the thoughts of a friend and I am always up for learning more about others and myself, so here it goes…

Below is a concise statement of my worldview as a Secular and following that paragraph are some of the common questions I get about this statement. The statement is concise the rest is rather lengthy, but hopefully interesting and to the point.

My secular life is a life committed to protecting one’s personal freedoms and the freedoms and diversity of our communities, our world, and our environment. I embrace the passion that comes with the realization that I shall only live once and that the value of a life well lived is beyond measure. I awake each morning knowing that it is only the love and kindness I show, the knowledge I impart, and the help I render that shall live beyond me. As a Secular I find less to hate and more to love. In times of disaster I look for a better tomorrow rather than pretending there is purpose in meaningless tragedies. I find awe and inspiration in the complexity and the simplicity of the world and people I share it with. When I approach the limit of knowledge, rather than fill the gaps with wishes or fears formalized as an unquestionable faith, I rather stand in awe and then turn to the effort of advancing my understanding beyond it’s current horizon. I find comfort in the knowledge that secular societies are moral without the inducement of any reward, other than the knowledge that treating others as we would be treated brings security to all. I find security in the knowledge that secular punishment is based on reason and fairness rather than a view that demands infinite punishment for finite crimes of conscience. As a Secular I know each day is my “eternity” and as such it is not to be wasted, not to be forgotten. I count it my privilege to to accept the world as it is today while working with love and charity to insure that tomorrow we find the world as it could be.

RESPONSES TO A SECULAR WORLDVIEW

Question: Thaddeus, you speak of only living once… life after death is something many people believe in and have for as long as we can tell. How can you know for certain that there is no afterlife?

My Response: I do not know for “certain”… rather, what I am stating here are my realizations based on the facts available to me, and the conclusions those facts and probabilities force upon the subject. There is no evidence to suggest there is an afterlife, so in the absence of evidence for an afterlife I have come to the realization that there is little reason to build a worldview based on such a notion. So, technically I am Agnostic on the question of the afterlife which is in contrast to believers who profess to KNOW FOR CERTAIN what happens after death.

However, admitting Agnosticism on any subject does not preclude someone from having a practical day-to-day “modus operandi” that is more concrete, and it is this day-to-day position that I am stating here after basing it on a reasonable assessment of the probabilities involved… thus, this is why I state that with a lack of evidence for any afterlife my modus operandi is “realization that I shall live only once”.

By analogy… there is no evidence for fairies or unicorns… I CAN NOT say for CERTAIN that they do not exist but there appears to be no evidence for them, thus the sober and reasonable thing to do is to not incorporate such notions into my worldview.

I also find that the notion of an afterlife is not only without any evidence but that commitment and belief in such a notion can prove very dangerous to oneself as well as others.

There are of course varying degrees of this danger. For some the notion of an afterlife is only a “hope” and not something they have full faith or belief in, and for these there seems to be little real danger.

Then there are those that do fully believe in the afterlife and as such see this life as less important and a kind of prelude to the “real deal”… this perspective at the very least effects in small ways the importance they put on the here and now.

Finally we have a multitude of instances where belief in the notion of an afterlife has caused great pain, suffering, and atrocities in the present and throughout history as people strap bombs to their backs or ride off to slaughter the infidels whether they be Christians or Muslims or others… not to mention the more mundane day-to-day harm done by the self-righteous who are so sure that everyone else is wrong and going to hell.

So unlike the rather benign indulgence of believing in fairies or unicorns, there is a world of evidence that belief in an afterlife is not only without evidence, it is dangerous to the believer and society.

Question: The “good life” or a “life well lived” is defined for the believer by the teachings of the Bible… what does a “life well lived” mean to you without the Bible as a guide or measuring stick?

My Response: I do not think a “good life” or a “life well lived” is a concept that is as subjective or elusive as many try to make it. I think we as a species share a very common and basic agreement about what this concept or phrase means. Sure there are exceptions… there are people who are mentally ill or have psychiatric issues but these are a small statistical subset… on the whole, regardless of religion (or lack thereof), race, or geographical location I think you will find an overwhelming number will respond the same way… a life well lived is one in which you have meaningful relationships and improve and insure our life and the life of our loved ones by treating others as we would be treated. The concept of the golden rule is not unique to the scriptures and altruism is something that is very rational from both the perspective of personal security and preservation as well as a larger societal view.

Question: If you do not believe in the scriptures or a God then where does your love and kindness come from?

My Response: Love and kindness comes from the same place it does in all people regardless of their religious belief or disbelief… again their are exceptions, but love and kindness for your children and by extension those around you who make up your environment, your children’s environment, and thus the larger society. We even see some degree of altruism in other species.

There are of course other possible candidates for a solution to this question and it is only fair that we consider them as well…

One solution to the question of “Where does love and kindness come from?” is to answer that “All goodness comes from God”. This answer must be considered and weighed as a candidate among all other explanations.

In the case of the believing Christian the explanation offered is even more precise. They are confident that all goodness comes from the God of the Bible and yet this answer comes with it’s own baggage… one must then also ask the next question of “where evil comes from?” The scriptures are clear on this too and it is again God who is sovereign and in control, he is the creator of all including good and evil… even the creation of the “tree of good and evil”.

The Christian’s answer has to consistently explain how the source of ultimate good can at the same time be the source of ultimate evil… for example, how can we square such circles as a “Good God” condoning and commanding genocide…

1 Sam 15:3’Now go and strike Amalek and utterly destroy all that he has, and do not spare him; but put to death both man and WOMAN, CHILD and INFANT, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.’ “

Stating that they were to kill the children evidently was not enough… God evidently felt he needed to make sure his blood thirst was clear, and for good measure he added INFANT… just in case some sympathetic soldier might be smitten with the cute and innocent eyes of a pagan new born.

I often hear such verses defended by suggesting that God’s foreknowledge of the kind of pagans these infants would grow to be justifies his actions. This explanation falls short on several levels; however, if for argument sake we allow this defense to explain the fates of the pagans, it still does not explain the fates of the faithful in this situation. How can one characterize as “good” or as “fatherly” a God or a Heavenly Father that commands his faithful, his very own “children”, to witness and commit such atrocities. What scars must this leave on someone’s psyche to witness, much less be commanded to commit the butchering of infants in their beds, and children in their play yards? We see the ravages of war in the minds of our young soldiers today, how much more would that mental pain be if they were commanded to commit such full scale genocide and atrocities. If God wanted to annihilate the pagans, why not do the dirty work himself as he does daily around the world? Why not wipe out the pagans with a natural disaster or a mysterious disease? If God wanted to be through with the pagans why not “close up their wombs” and let the generation die out on its own leaving no babies that must be slaughtered at a later date by God’s “chosen” people? Is it really better to ask your chosen people to personally decapitate children and babies or to run pregnant women through with a sword? I am sorry but a this sounds like a “God” who was dependent on the bloody sword of man, an invented God created by men to justify a genocide.

If one cannot muster any empathy for the pagan’s innocent children, their innocent infants, or their innocent livestock then surely the believer must have some empathy for the evil this commandment must been to the faithful soldier of God.

Would you ask your children to butcher babies for you?

I have also heard it argued that the age of accountability covers these children and infants. I have even heard this line of argument pressed to the extreme limit of saying that such genocides are actually a testimony of God’s grace to these infants because the slaughter of their lives before they became “accountable” ushers them immediately into heaven as opposed to hell, where they were likely destined had they been allowed to live and grow up in a pagan household.

If this “age of accountability argument” is true then why doesn’t God love all of us enough to slaughter us before we reach the age of accountability? This also raises the issue that the doctrine of “age of accountability” is not directly or even indirectly supported by ANY scriptures, and in fact violates several scriptures and clear doctrines of the bible. For instance, many believers are very committed to the doctrine of “Free Will”, a doctrine that says it is up to us to decide for ourselves in this life whether to follow Christ or not and that from the beginning God had to give us a Free Will if he expected genuine love in return, because without Free Will we would be nothing but fancy “robots”. The problem is… if the Age of Accountability is held to be true then the doctrine of Free Will must be false because these infants were not given a chance to make a choice in this life… they were not given a free will, the decision was made for them… they were slaughtered and thus ushered straight to heaven without a choice. So like many doctrines of the religious, they conflict.

To suggest that goodness comes from a biblical God that could wreak such evil on infants and mentally scar his own chosen people with commanding them to commit and witness such atrocities seems a bit irrational if not perverse. And of course this is only the tip of the iceberg. One of my favorites notorious scriptures is the condoning of taking young virgin war trophies and raping them so long as the troops wait 30 days and give them a nice hair cut and nail trimming…

Deut 21… “When you go out to battle against your enemies, and the LORD your God delivers them into your hands and you take them away captive, and see among the captives a beautiful woman, and have a desire for her and would take her as a wife for yourself, then you shall bring her home to your house, and she shall shave her head and trim her nails. “She shall also remove the clothes of her captivity and shall remain in your house, and mourn her father and mother a full month; and after that you may go in to her and be her husband and she shall be your wife.”

So, goodness comes from a biblical God that states that as long as you give these young girls a nice short haircut, give them a manicure, and 30 days to cry it out… THEN you are allowed to have sex with them (even if they do not want to… RAPE) and that it is somehow not considered RAPE… rather it is a testimony of God’s goodness and justice to let them continue breathing in a living hell while they service God’s chosen soldiers. How pleasant.

Well, I am not a woman and I do not have any daughters but I can not see how a haircut, a nail clipping and a 30 day delay equals anything but DELAYED RAPE and SLAVERY. The OT of course says you can not sell the virgin war trophies as you can other slaves (slavery is okay though) but it is okay for you to claim them like property and hold them against their will as your “beloved” wife. The point is, that such twisted views of justice and goodness are not unusual in the scriptures even among its most core doctrines. In the words of Robert Ingersoll…

“The absurdity of the doctrine known as “The Fall of Man” gave birth to that other absurdity known as “The Atonement.” So that now it is insisted that, as we are rightfully charged with the sin of somebody else, we can rightfully be credited with the virtues of another.

So while the answer… “Goodness comes from our Biblical God” is one candidate among other explanations, I would suggest that given the contradictions of the scriptures and the direct evidence of evil in this same God I would hope you could see why I find this a less than convincing candidate for an answer.

Another alternative candidate for an answer to the question of the origins of “goodness” is one that states that goodness comes from our desire to preserve ourselves and our loved ones… admittedly this desire can also result in evil if one does not carefully consider the effects of ones actions… in other words, if some one acts shortsightedly.

This natural explanation is evidenced not only across various cultures, beliefs and disbelief’s but is also seen in varying degrees in other species. This natural explanation thus has the benefit of being free from self contradiction while offering an explanation for both goodness (well reasoned desire for self preservation) and evil (short sighted actions based on self preservation).

This is however a scientific view and thus I do not hold it with FAITH or unwavering commitment… it is simply the best candidate, the best theory, the best answer I have seen at this time… if a better answer comes along then you would find me suggesting such a discovery be awarded a nobel prize as opposed to being burnt at the stake, called heresy, or resigned to hell to suffer forever.

Question: You mentioned in your statement that you hate less now that you are no longer a Christian?

My Response: I am simply saying that I find less to hate as a secular than I did as a Christian. As a Christian we are told we are to hate homosexuality, that we are at war with the world, and that our savior came not to bring peace but to bring a sword that will set family members against family members (Mat 10:34), and on and on… so yes, I find less to hate, less to be in opposition to for no good reason other than because a scripture tells me to… in other words, it is God’s word, don’t ask! Do I mean to say that the scriptures are wrong on all ethical issues? No, but there are certainly many it is wrong on… slavery, sexism, genocide, bigotry, etc. So yes, the exchange of “blind faith” for “reason” has left me with less to hate and more to love.

Question: Do you really find any comfort in such a view? Who do you pray to, who answers your prayers and comforts you?

My Response: Okay, there are really two separate questions here… one is “Do I find comfort in my views?”… and the second is a question about prayer which would also beg the question of the efficacy of prayer. I’ll take one at a time.

As to “comfort”… Yes, there is MUCH comfort to be had my views, but first let me say that even if it did not provide comfort but was still a reality then I would prefer the reality to false comfort. In the same way, if I had an incurable fatal disease I would prefer the doctors give me the truth as opposed to a comfortable fiction. Give me the facts, the probabilities… I prefer the real to the fictional.

But to the question of “is there comfort in a secular worldview?”. Yes, there is more comfort in this than the alternative view, but again please know that my objective is not to find “comfort” but to find what is most probable.

For example, I find it much more comforting having no one to blame for my father’s Parkinson Disease. My father has been the best father one could hope for… he has lived a life much more deserving than many his age, many who were complete losers and yet are still 100% healthy. What comfort is there in believing in a sadistic God that would allow such an injustice?

In the midst of my faith crisis years ago my oldest son German (then 16 months old) fell from a second story window onto concrete. While there where no exterior signs of damage (other than a mild abrasion) his skull had been cracked. As we rushed to the hospital we called everyone we could in our church group. We prayed over him. They prayed over him. We pleaded for him to our God in heaven, failing to ask the obvious question of why God did not stop him from falling in the first place.

At the end of that horrible day I slowly walked down the halls of the Vanderbilt Children’s Hospital with my son in my arms. As he gazed up at me, I gazed back with the joy of knowing that the doctors had just told me that he was perfectly fine and could go home… he had survived a fall from a second story window, missed construction debris, been spared the nails and splintered boards, had landed just perfect, had split his skull internally but was fine… he would go home with us that night. Eventually I had to look up, and inevitably my eyes fell upon room after room, parent after parent, child after child receiving news that was the opposite of mine.

My son’s outcome would be characterized by many as a “miracle”… you would think I would be overjoyed and full of faith. I was of course overjoyed with the outcome but the overriding emotion as I walked down that hall was not one of comfort. My son was a great kid and I have tried to be a great father, but I am under no delusions that either he or I were more deserving than these other little ones we were leaving behind.

So although “comfort” was never my objective (and still is not) I can say that admitting that many of life’s tragedies are simply meaningless is much healthier and comforting than pretending their is a sadistic God in the sky who more often than not turns a deaf ear and in fact actively wreaks havoc on the most defenseless of this world. Again if there was evidence for such a Biblical God… despite my distaste for his blood thirst… I would believe in him… but there is not, so fortunately I am not in that uncomfortable position.

Before I leave this topic I feel compelled to comment on a common defense I hear for the atrocities that the Biblical God reeks on our planet daily. It is often said that these tragedies and sufferings serve a higher purpose, one that is beyond our understanding and that such tragedies are required to shape the lives of God’s children, to produce growth and change our hearts. I hear this defense from the same people who tell me that God is all powerful and without limitations… and yet it seems he is limited in his ability to effect change without violence. How can it be that an all-powerful God must resort to something as base and blunt as violence, death, and suffering to accomplish his goals. Is this Biblical God’s power of persuasion so weak or his creativity so inept that he can utilize no other tool but violence, disease, death and suffering to accomplish his goals. This seems patently absurd and at contradiction with itself, especially when the very same scriptures tell us that he is capable of creating a pain free world and that he will one day do just that in a heaven… a place that is to be incapable of producing even a single tear. If he is capable of such a paradise why would he first create a living hell on earth for so many to begin with? Surely the Biblical God could effect his will without stooping to such primitive tools as violence and disease.

Next was your mention of prayer. I would ask that you consider the fact that prayer and the promises made about prayer should be one of the areas were we could see demonstrable evidence for a promise kept. If God kept his promises then I might see how faith could bring some comfort. So lets look at the promises. There are many, many verses I could list but we only need one to establish the promise so lets take…

James 5:13-15 Is anyone among you suffering? Then he must pray. Is anyone cheerful? He is to sing praises. Is anyone among you sick? Then he must call for the elders of the church and they are to pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord; and the prayer offered in faith will restore the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up.

The promise made in this verse is very straightforward… no grey areas here. The most common prayer request in the world is one for recovery from an illness. Here we have a promise about what will happen when we pray. Although it would be fair to take it on its face and expect recovery every time, we could be more lenient and only expect recovery the majority of the time… and yet, Christian segments of society show no greater tendency to recover than any other segment. If this promise was kept only 10% of the time that would be short of the promise but would still be something… but there is no statistical difference in Christian and Pagans recovery. This demands an explanation.

I have many believers who are family and friends and yet they have not asked to take my father to their church elders for an assured healing… why not? Is it because they don’t care? Surely not. Maybe it is because they know deep down that the promises do not work. That religions makes claims it can’t back up. Maybe it is a bit like the child who finally realizes that Santa could not possibly make it to every house in the world in one night… and yet they decide to keep on “believing” because it is the easier path to take when the majority of the other kids believe and it is just cool to imagine there might really be elves in a workshop.

If I told you that Poseidon was my God and that he has promised me that if I prayed to him he would deliver all the fish I asked for then you would expect for me to be able to show that I was catching more fish than “Poseidon Atheists”… at the very least you would expect to see that on average “Poseidon” fisherman did marginally better in fish quantities that “Non-Poseidon” fisherman. If the stats did not show this then you would say “Hey, you have a problem here… if your God says one thing and does not deliver then that necessarily says something about your God and the validity of your belief in him.” If it is fair to make this criticism of Poseidon’s broken promises, why is it not equally fair to demand an explanation for the broken promises of a “Biblical God”?

I hope you can appreciate why I see your comfort misplaced in a promise that is clearly not kept.

Question: Earlier in you original statement you said… “When I approach the limit of knowledge, rather than fill the gaps wishes or fears formalized into an unquestionable faith, I rather stand in awe and then turn to the effort of advancing my understanding beyond it’s current horizon”… Thaddeus, that statement sounds to me like you think you are smarter than God… surely you can appreciate that insinuating you are smarter than God sounds arrogant?

My Response: I am not sure how “turning to the effort of advancing my understanding” is arrogant. I am only stating my commitment to the task… I am hardly claiming to have succeeded or to have completed the effort and thus POSSESS ALL the answers.

My statement simply says that I am humble enough to admit when there is a gap in my understanding and that I will do all I can to try to advance my understanding in order to span that gap if possible. I no where state that all gaps can be spanned… I happen to think there are gaps in our understanding that we are incapable of filling.

The real hubris is the believer who when faced with the unknowable does not state their gap in knowledge but rather CLAIMS TO KNOW BEYOND A DOUBT and with all FAITH what the answers are. It is the religious who claim to know what happens after death, who claim to know God’s mind, his wishes, his likes and dislikes, the meaning of life, even the particular materials used for pavement in heaven. Believers are the ones who demonstrate the real hubris, and they not only claim to KNOW all these things but they also KNOW that they are the ONLY correct ones, in exclusion to all others, and that everyone else is going to hell where they will get what they deserve… a never ending eternal torture for finite crimes… crimes as simple as thinking the wrong thought about a god who never showed up and never evidenced himself.

Question: You seem to speak of morals and ethics, but without the word of God to establish the standard upon which peoples actions should be measured where do you get your morals?

My Response I have already addressed this at length above… it comes from altruism and a desire for preservation of ones self, loved ones and the environment/society one must continue to exist in. Treat others as you would want others to treat you and those you love.

Question: You said in your original statement that you “find security in the knowledge that secular punishment is based on reason and fairness”… I am not sure what you are referring to here. Are you talking about the justice system we have here in the United States?

My Response: I am simply stating the fact that our justice system (a mere mortal system) requires that the punishment equal the crime, and that this position is morally superior to the “justice” found in the biblical system which supports INFINITE punishment for finite crimes, without the possibility for parole or rehabilitation.

I of course do not believe any of this biblical system to be a reality, but for argument sake… if we were to assume it to be a reality then it has always troubled me that apparently God/Jesus is unable to convince a mere human to become rehabilitated. I guess men are capable of waging convincing arguments that can change the hearts and minds of other men, but God somehow is unable to rehabilitate even one soul in hell… seems he needs to attend some communication and soul winning seminars. It also could be that his message of “love me or else I will burn you forever and ever” is not the most appealing message of love.

Question: A worldview that does not include an afterlife seems very sad to me, but what continually strikes me is your continual statement of “KNOWING”… how can you possibly know what you say you know for certain?

My Response: To explain what I mean by “know” let me share my “Scale of Certainty”. I think it will help avoid some confusion in terms and is something I should have led off with. The following offers a definition for “Hope”, “Belief”, “Knowing”, “Certainty”, and “Faith”. Admittedly I have no ownership of these terms… others may choose to define these terms differently… I only offer the following in order for others to appreciate how I understand these words when I use them.

HOPE

To WISH or HOPE is a very “open-handed” position… one simply states what they desire, what they WILL in a particular situation to be true. The very nature of Hoping often creates a mental environment that is positive and nurturing… it is with hope (in part) that scientists approach their next experiment, it is with hope that we join our life with one another, it is with hope that we struggle politically and socially to make the world a better place. However it is vitally important to note that HOPE does not in any way affirm a certainty about anything other than the emotional stance of the person doing the HOPING… it does not make a statement with any degree of certitude (or even arguably, speculation) about the external, real world.

Example of a hope: I hope the world will find everlasting peace… not stating fact just a mental stance, something I would “will” to be a reality if I could.

BELIEF

With BELIEF we move up the “Scale of Certainty”. We are no longer merely “hoping” we are now saying that we believe with a certain degree of probability that the subject of our belief is true. While we are basing our position on probabilities, this word is often used to describe our “working theory or position”, our current “modus operandi”, our “proto-theory”. Belief is that point where the probability of a subject has reached a critical mass, so as to tip the scales of Reason one way or the other. Admittedly there are those that often use this word indiscriminately and use it to state what they feel is a certainty rather than a high probability.. in these cases the word FAITH would be a better fit. Because BELIEF is used so widely in our common vernacular to describe positions on politics, science, relationships, etc… and because so many of these things are demonstratively real things for which we are making real probabilistic statements, I would suggest that we limit this word to describe probable things rather than opening this word up to confusion by also using it to describe positions on things for which there is no demonstrable or probabilistic evidence… this only confuses matters, especially when there is a word that is a custom fit for just such indemonstrable/improbable positions… as mentioned before, the better word for such things is FAITH, and we will get to that in a moment.

Example of a belief: I believe my wife loves me… she evidences this to me every day in little ways and based on these demonstrable acts of love I believe she loves me.

KNOWING

What do we mean when we say we know something? I would suggest that when we say we “Know” we are saying that we have come to a point where the probability of a particular position has not only reached a critical mass that tips the scales of Reason but that the probabilities are so one sided that one can assume with comfort that the subject is known with as much certainty as can be afforded a finite mind. It is important to note that KNOWING is not certainty in the absolute sense but rather a point at which probability overwhelms the alternatives.

Example of knowing: I know gravity to be real and thus I need not test it by jumping from every window I encounter.

CERTAINTY

Certainty is an absolute 100% statement that is true anywhere in the universe at any time, past, present and future… such a statement by its very nature is well beyond the finite mind… it is impossible for us to test something everywhere at all times and be certain.

FAITH

Since faith is typically a religious term and I am discussing it in a society that is predominantly Christian I will use the definition of faith given in the Bible…

Hebrews 11:1 Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

In other words… Faith is something hoped for, something believe as certain without any evidence.

Hmmm… So , Hope as we know “wills” or “wishes” something to be true and then we marry our “Wishes” to the absolute character of “Certainty”… the child of this joining is one for which the world has labored under for nearly all of human history… the child of this unholy union is FAITH. Faith is the bastard child of HOPE and CERTAINTY.

Faith, though born in illegitimately sets itself up as the most desirable of all traits… to have Faith is noble, yes? Nope, I am afraid it is not. Faith is being certain without evidence, which is just another way of saying to everyone else that you have the exclusive right to claim as fact (and thus a fact for everyone) something for which you have no evidence.

That is not to say that positions without Reason are necessarily harmful, I encourage Hope and Inspiration which are often without direct basis in reason; however, when Hope wishes to merge with Certainty and thus claim to be fact without proof then this new entity called Faith becomes that which has incited so many to such hatred, and this hatred burns hot against the stark backdrop of absolutes. The very DNA of “Faith” is a double helix of fantasy and unjustified certainty.

Question: In your original statement you said… “As a Secular I know each day is my “eternity” and as such it is not to be wasted…” Wasted? It seems you are saying that a Christians life is wasted. Thaddeus, I would suggest you are not only wasting your life here but you are wasting your eternity as well. After all, if as a believer I am wrong then I have not lost anything but have simply lived a better life for having believed what turned out to be a fantasy. Thaddeus, if you are wrong then you will have lost everything and I will have gained eternity in paradise.

My Response: My intention was not to claim that believers are “wasting” their life… that is for you to decide. If you took this meaning then it is of your own making. I was simply saying that I am committed to doing all I can to make sure that I utilize my time in a way that improves my life and the lives of others… period… no accusation intended.

Believe it or not, my world view does not have as a foundation an “Us versus Them” mentality. I understand this is the mentality of the scriptures with it’s “chosen people”, “remnants”, and “predestined elites” and then all the “OTHERS”, but my world view is not based on that kind of division. I was simply stating my goals as a fellow human being with the responsibility I owe to myself and thus by extension to others.

As to your “what have you got to lose ” statement… this type of argument is classically known as Pascal’s Wager and it is a flawed defense for believing.

Instinctively we all already know the answer to this question… what is at stake when we contemplate believing a lie is the very thing that prevents us from signing on to every crazy idea and belief that comes our way. What is at stake is what lets lets even the believer dismiss the crazy beliefs of all those OTHER religions. How many Christians lie in bed awake wondering whether their better gamble would be to bet on Islam or Hinduism… or vice versa. What is at stake is the same thing that prevents us from buying the midnight infomercial sales pitch of… “Try our program, what have you got to lose! Even if you do not lose 20 pounds in a week you will be better off than you would have been otherwise!”

We know what is at risk here, and in every other area of our life we guard it carefully… what is at risk is what makes us human, what makes us unique, it is our REASON, our RESPECT for REALITY, our respect for others, our self respect and a respect for not wasting our time pursuing a fiction as fact, especially when that pursuit involves criticizing, shunning, and demonizing others.

The price for believing a fantasy is high, it is paid by the believer whose life suffers from the delusion, it is paid by their family who are forced to deal with the effects, and paid by the community that suffers from the cancer of the delusion.

I have heard it said that you can not make a right step in the wrong direction. We should do good for good reasons, not bad reasons. A life of believing in a belief system that is contradictory and false is bad. Period.

All the good that a believer wants to attribute to the ethics of their religion can be had without a deluded view of a god or a commitment to bronze age bigotry, sexism, slavery and hate.

How many hospitals and schools could have been built with the money spent on fancy churches, temples, and ridiculous costumes and hats for priests and preachers? What problems could we solve in the here in now if we spent a little less time focusing on the “hereafter”?

Strong words? Yes, but maybe a little strength is called for these days. Have we not dwelt in the cave long enough? Can we not admit the images on the cave wall were but shadows? Is the beauty of the world outside the cave, the magic of a child’s smile, the taste of salty air not enough? Can each day not be our eternity, the beauty of the cosmos our cathedral? Are we really so self centered and greedy that this world is not enough, that we must have more, that we must have eternity and be willing to sacrifice what we KNOW and WHO we know for what we imagine? Can we only find self worth if we can pretend to be princes in the making, children of God, and instruments of some grandiose plan?

I for one am tired of lives wrecked on the shores of dogma. It is rather ironic that dogma spelled backwards is… “am-god”… after all, this is really what the religious seek… the know they are not gods so they imagine they are the next best thing… maybe they are the progeny, the children of God… they want eternal life like a god, they want to be princes in heaven ruling over angels like a god, they want their crowns of gold, their palace awaiting them, they want the respect of being the representatives and voice of God on earth… so they invent religion in order to make their fantasy true in their own minds and in the process they degrade all those who see it otherwise. Their focus turns to a fictional hereafter instead of the here and now. I suggest that the shores of dogma have wrecks enough… There is much to lose… but with reason much to gain.!

Question: Without God what is the point, why not do whatever makes you want… if we lived like this then society would crumble.

My Response: If you could only for a moment participate in a thought experiment and pretend that tomorrow you would awake convinced that the Biblical God does NOT exist. Do you think it would be very likely that under this new mind set you would suddenly desire to spend the rest of your day in wanton debauchery… raping children, killing small animals for fun, murdering, stealing, etc? I am guessing not. The point is that your assumption that your ethics come from your faith might deserve re-examination.

We too often “trade in fear” rather than in reason. Yes, if someone acts with little thought or contemplation of the far-reaching effect of their actions then they may act in a way that harms others. Acting thoughtfully and taking the time to consider and weigh the pro and cons of various rules, laws, or ethics is something that must be taught and requires effort… but if such an effort is made then I think we find that such contemplation can regulate our rash and short sighted actions. Gods need not apply.

The fear that drives us, drives us apart and is without any evidence in reality. The Bible is self-contradictory and yet many insist on ignoring the plain contradictions.

By way of analogy… I hold journalists to a pretty high standard, and when they fail to live up to this standard I disregard their reports… I expect journalists to get their facts straight, to make sure the narrative is consistent and representative of the facts, and I expect them to get little things like numbers, statistics, and sequence of events correct. I don’t think I am alone in justifiably holding journalist to this standard… I think most of us do (or should) and if the journalist fails we should discredit their stories and dismiss them as an authority. After all, this is what we do to a witness that is contradictory in a courtroom.

I also hold the authors I read to a high standard… I expect them to speak clearly and informatively on their subject. I expect the prose and content to be written so that the intended audience can make perfect sense of what is being said. I expect an author to be clear enough that her intent and “thesis” is not open to broad speculation or interpretation but is plain and obvious. I think most readers expect the same thing and when we find an author delinquent in one of these areas I think most of us count it against the author.

I (and I think most people) rightly expect all these things of journalists and authors… and yet these writers are mere human beings of which many are only of average intellect and skill.

If we are to expect this much from the words of a human being then how much more should we expect from the “greatest intellect in the universe”? Would it not be reasonable to expect that the words of God himself should greatly surpass any mere mortal attempts at communication?

I think this is a fair and reasonable expectation, and thus as a believer and now as a non-believer I continue to expect that out of any written document that purports to be the Word of God… and yet the Bible fails miserably on this account.

I will leave you with the words I began with and hopefully after reading the above they will be clearer and mean more the second time around…