Date: 2007-11-05 23:15 Subject: Coming out as an atheist Security: Public

I have thought for most of my adult life that declaring myself an atheist would be just as silly as saying that I believed without a doubt in the existence of an omnipotent God. The fact is that we just don't know, and so agnosticism really is the only intellectually consistent and rational stance for me or any other hard-core skeptic to take. For all I know, we're Sims-like automatons in some great cosmic video game, or unwitting players in a morality play being performed for some alien intelligence, or maybe we're characters in someone's book, as in the classic YA survey of Western philosophy, Sophie's World.

But I have also written and talked before about the fact that I have never felt what other people describe as the "God-shaped hole" within myself. Simply put, I am not inclined in any way to be a religious believer; it's far easier for me not to believe than it is to believe. I'm frankly not interested in the notion that there may be a purpose or an existence beyond the one we have right in front of us, mainly because the world we live in is so rich with opportunities to live purposefully, and the question of what it means to live well in one's day-to-day life is a never-ending conundrum. I'm always disappointed when I see a title of a book like The Purpose-Driven Life, which seems like it might speak directly to someone like me who has a deep and abiding interest in finding ways to live more purposefully, and then discover it's really all about figuring out what "God's purpose" is (as if such a thing could possibly be comprehended by our puny brains). I should note that I admire many (although certainly not all) of the key philosophical, moral and ethical principles of the three Abrahamic religions, Buddhism, and Hinduism. But it's always been very easy for me to separate those moral precepts from their religious context. When Jesus says, "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone," I'm fully capable of taking away the intended lesson without first believing that Jesus was anything more than an unusually smart and thoughtful guy.

We are living in a cultural moment when there's a great deal of pressure to come down on one side or the other of the most basic religious questions. Surely one of the more unexpected consequences of 9/11 has been the way that voices of secularism, humanism and atheism have been so emboldened in their rejection of not only "Islamist fascism" but also the surge of religiosity in early 21st-century America. Of course, for many people, especially on the right, reaffirming America's identity as a Judeo-Christian nation has become a matter of paramount importance. But for many others, most notably the Four Horsemen of Atheism--Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens--the attacks of 9/11 highlighted what they see as the dangerous and barbaric superstitions of the Abrahamic tradition. The success of the Four Horsemen's books has been astonishing; the large media retailer I work for was even emboldened to put up an atheism endcap featuring their books.

So it seems to me that declaring myself an atheist is a little bit like declaring myself a Democrat. I don't agree with many things the Four Horsemen say, just as I don't agree with some of the positions of the leading Democrats; I am reluctant to say that these cultural customs and codes, which have bound societies together for thousands of years, should be summarily tossed out, just as I am reluctant to dismiss all Republican ideas as stupid or evil simply because they were concocted by Republicans. But if I had a choice in the voting booth between the Atheist party and the "Believers" party, I'd go with the Atheists.

Admittedly, it's a big leap from saying, "I don't believe one way or the other," to saying, "I disbelieve," and I guess I'm still not ready (nor may ever be, inasmuch as I do strive for some degree of intellectual honesty) to embrace Atheism with a capital A, at least not without some qualifications. Here is what I definitively do not believe: I do not believe in a personal God; I do not believe in a God who has any regard for what happens on our little blue speck of dust; I do not believe in a God who listens to prayers or grants miracles; I do not believe there is a moral structure to the Universe; I do not believe in a soul distinct from the physical body; I do not believe in life or consciousness after death; I do not believe all the wrongs are righted, the wicked punished, the faithful forgiven; and I do not believe I will ever find anything comforting in a belief system that requires me to put my faith in any of these scurrilous notions.

On the other hand, I do not believe all religions are inherently or equally reprehensible; I do not believe religious teachings should be dismissed out of hand; I do not believe children should be insulated from religious ideas; I do not believe religion is a primary cause of violence in most cases; and I do not believe most human beings would be comfortable in a world without religion. I do believe we may be coming to the end of the latest so-called Great Awakening, which bodes well for the proponents of secular humanism in the next couple of decades. But I also believe that people of all backgrounds and philosophical outlooks will continue to find comfort in religious faith, and that's all right with me, just as long as they don't expect me to join them in the pews.