Listed on Reality 101.
I suppose some wacko would consider any of these license to commit vandalism on my vehicle?
I really like "I Wouldn't Trust Your God Even If He Did Exist" and "I Forget - Which Day Did God Make All The Fossils?"
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Friday, November 12, 2010
Death is Difficult
It is remarkable how lonely it can feel as an atheist at a funeral in a religious setting. The sense of the Christian god as a comforting presence - even as a fellow griever - that seems to link the mourners together, and to allow them to feel the comfort of community, was absent for me today. I don't take comfort in knowing my friend is "an angel" now - that he is "with His Lord Jesus Christ." It could be seen as a lovely idea, if one divorces it from all the nasty things that attend that god. The idea that he was so wonderful God couldn't wait to have his company in Heaven is a silly one, but I can see how appealing it is to his family and friends who believe in that sort of thing, because it lends some semblance of structure or reason to horrible, tragic loss. It makes bearable the unbearable.
Grieving doesn't inspire sudden belief just because some kind of comfort feels so necessary, or make the ridiculous credible, so I felt alone in a group of 400 mourners, who all miss this friend terribly, and believe that he is smiling down on them from Heaven. There was community in the grief, and I was part of that, but also felt keenly separate because I cannot reclaim the belief I had a long time ago that people die and go to Heaven, and we all reunite after death in the loveliest place imaginable. I don't want that belief back and could not find it even if I did, but it's interesting to me that while grieving him, I think I am also - and perhaps more distinctly - grieving the loss of the ability to believe that death is not the end of relationships. Death is certainly a transformation, but not the kind religion asserts. We transition into our component parts, become a different kind of piece of the physical universe, but the mind? That's gone, not to be reclaimed. That makes death a horrific prospect - not for the one dying, but for those left living and grieving.
Grieving doesn't inspire sudden belief just because some kind of comfort feels so necessary, or make the ridiculous credible, so I felt alone in a group of 400 mourners, who all miss this friend terribly, and believe that he is smiling down on them from Heaven. There was community in the grief, and I was part of that, but also felt keenly separate because I cannot reclaim the belief I had a long time ago that people die and go to Heaven, and we all reunite after death in the loveliest place imaginable. I don't want that belief back and could not find it even if I did, but it's interesting to me that while grieving him, I think I am also - and perhaps more distinctly - grieving the loss of the ability to believe that death is not the end of relationships. Death is certainly a transformation, but not the kind religion asserts. We transition into our component parts, become a different kind of piece of the physical universe, but the mind? That's gone, not to be reclaimed. That makes death a horrific prospect - not for the one dying, but for those left living and grieving.
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
Atheist Blogging
Religion bothers me.
It's bothered me for decades, to varying degrees. Today, it's not just bothering me - it's pissing me off. So what do I do? I create a blog where I can write about it. I have been considering doing this for months and delayed while I tried to figure out why I would bother to write about it. It came to me today that this feels like the journal writing I did as an adolescent: writing to sort through things I find distressing and/or confusing. Maybe no one will ever read it, and there is no point in having it online, but perhaps someone will say something that makes sense to me.
Anonymity is important because attaching my name to posts that will certainly sometimes be more rantings or ragings than mere musings will inevitably hurt my therapy practice. It would also make gatherings of my extended family more irritating than they already are. See...just now, I self-censored (changed "irritating" to "uncomfortable," and then changed it back again), imagining what it would be like if my mother read this post and felt hurt because I find family events "irritating." Well, I do, and she's never going to read this, so "irritating" stays. Yes, anonymity is good.
I've been thinking about whether there is a point to this blog. Do I need to convince anyone? Maybe, but I doubt I can. "Sides" are pretty much chosen. Other atheists might cheer, but theists won't budge. At least, in my experience, they don't, unless they are ready to do that on their own. I was once, after all, a Good Little Catholic Girl, and now I think religious belief is a culturally specific delusion that meets certain human psychological needs. My shift was primarily a result of...um. Well, I am not certain. Maybe that is how I get rolling with this: the history of my evolution from Catholicism to atheism.
It's bothered me for decades, to varying degrees. Today, it's not just bothering me - it's pissing me off. So what do I do? I create a blog where I can write about it. I have been considering doing this for months and delayed while I tried to figure out why I would bother to write about it. It came to me today that this feels like the journal writing I did as an adolescent: writing to sort through things I find distressing and/or confusing. Maybe no one will ever read it, and there is no point in having it online, but perhaps someone will say something that makes sense to me.
Anonymity is important because attaching my name to posts that will certainly sometimes be more rantings or ragings than mere musings will inevitably hurt my therapy practice. It would also make gatherings of my extended family more irritating than they already are. See...just now, I self-censored (changed "irritating" to "uncomfortable," and then changed it back again), imagining what it would be like if my mother read this post and felt hurt because I find family events "irritating." Well, I do, and she's never going to read this, so "irritating" stays. Yes, anonymity is good.
I've been thinking about whether there is a point to this blog. Do I need to convince anyone? Maybe, but I doubt I can. "Sides" are pretty much chosen. Other atheists might cheer, but theists won't budge. At least, in my experience, they don't, unless they are ready to do that on their own. I was once, after all, a Good Little Catholic Girl, and now I think religious belief is a culturally specific delusion that meets certain human psychological needs. My shift was primarily a result of...um. Well, I am not certain. Maybe that is how I get rolling with this: the history of my evolution from Catholicism to atheism.
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