Yesbama

Today is the first day of early voting in Florida, so this morning I went to the tax collector's office, stood in line for twenty minutes, chatted with some elderly folks behind me and cast my ballot. I've voted early in the past, but I don't think I went on the first day and I certainly don't remember standing in line. I was primarily excited to vote against McCain/Palin and against the “Florida Marriage Protection Act,” but I voted in every partisan race and on every ballot measure. I didn't vote on the retention of any judges because I know absolutely nothing about any of them. Everything went perfectly smoothly, but I was disappointed I still have never gotten a chance to answer an exit poll. As I left, I attached the “I Voted Early” sticker on the Obama sticker on my car. Now I have fifteen more days to wait for the final results.

Blasphemy Will Have to Wait for DVD

Today I was disappointed to learn that no cinema within at least fifty miles of Jacksonville, Florida, is showing Bill Maher's new anti-religion film Religulous. I had been planning on watching it for months and I thought it was notable that its release coincided with the fourth anniversary of my apostasy from the Catholic Church. I suppose that the local cinemas may have simply concluded they wouldn't make enough money from it, but perhaps they feared generating a backlash from religious groups. This seems especially plausible given that most cinemas today have eighteen to twenty-four screens and benefit from showing as many different films as possible. Now I will have to wait until it's released on DVD.

Ever since the film was announced, I've wondered why it's not spelled Religiulous. I can't think of a single word or even name has a soft G without an E or I following it. I thought it was pronounced with a hard G until I watched the preview!

Godfree for Four Years

Today is the fourth anniversary of my apostasy from the Catholic Church. Recently I've noticed it's becoming increasingly difficult for me to remember what it was like to really believe everything I now consider nonsense. My status as a former devout Catholic seems less important to my identity as time passes. Indeed, my status as an atheist seems less important than it did just a few months ago. Sometimes I consider discontinuing posting here, visiting forums, reading blogs, listening to podcasts and buying books because it often feels pointless to spend so much energy on the non-existent. But religion was my primary hobby, as it were, for more than a decade and irreligion has taken on that role for the past four years. There's no topic that interests me so intensely. Religion simultaneously attracts and repulses me, and I always want to discuss it even if there's nothing new under the sun. So until further notice, the pursuit of my fascination continues.

This year the date of my apostasy has additional personal significance: it's the birthday of my girlfriend of two months, who also happens to be an atheist. Since she was raised without religion in a socialist country, her experiences are very different from my own; religion doesn't really interest her at all!

Prayer at the Obama Rally

Yesterday I attended the Obama rally at Metro Park here in Jacksonville, Florida. It was the first campaign rally I've ever attended, so I didn't know exactly what to expect, but I was greatly disappointed by how it began: the very first speaker was a Christian minister who delivered a public prayer! What's more, it was explicitly Christian and partisan because he prayed “in Christ's name” and asked for blessings specifically for Obama and not the other candidates. I immediately wanted to boo to express my objection to this religious invocation at a supposedly secular political event, but I was afraid of the consequences of such vocal opposition, so I just kept my head raised, crossed my arms, frowned and looked around for others who shared my disapproval. I found some who didn't seem to be participating, and later a friend of mine told me she also had problems with the prayer. I know we weren't alone in our discomfort with it. Perhaps I will contact the Obama campaign today to register a complaint.

For me, the prayer put a damper on the entire event, though not enough to ruin the full experience. I got see and hear Obama in person as well as Senator Bill Nelson and few other political figures. The rally was certainly a success in terms of turnout: there were approximately twelve thousand people in attendance and another eight thousand who were turned away because there was no more room in the park! I just wish the Democratic Party would stick to the issues rather than pandering to the religious and sacrificing their commitment to secularism.

Reverse Stupidity

Yesterday I was driving down the road when I saw a red billboard with the outline of a horned head, a clawed hand and a pointed tail sticking beyond the basic rectangular shape. As I got closer, I realized it was an advertisement for a fundamentalist Christian church, one which combines reverse psychology and ancient scare tactics into a lethally idiotic mixture. It read, “Boycott New Life Fellowship” with “-Satan” in the lower right and the church's website address in the lower left. (I don't have a photograph and the image I found online is presumably a variant.) Beyond the absurd theology, the entire set-up raises several questions: If the devil wants you to know his feelings about the church, then why is he hiding behind the sign? Why doesn't he know how to use proper capitalization and punctuation? Why did he let the church deface his sign with their website address? Why did he hack their website but fail to remove their content and simply add graffiti? If on the other hand he doesn't want you to know his feelings, then why did he put his message on a billboard in the first place? All of this suggests the devil is highly incompetent and poses no threat to anyone with half a brain, but I suppose that's not the church's target audience.

Florida Supreme Court to the Rescue

In my last entry, I discussed a pair of destructive amendments to the state constitution on the November ballot here in Florida. This morning I heard some good news: the Florida Supreme Court has removed three education-related amendments to the state constitution, including one that I mentioned! Amendments 5, 7 and 9 have been removed because the texts on the ballot weren't clear enough for the voters to properly understand. Amendment 5 concerned property taxes and school funding, amendment 7 would have allowed the state to distribute money to religious institutions – including schools – and amendment 9 would have directly reversed a legal precedent against vouchers. It's good to see these issues off the table for now. I only wish they could remove amendment 2, which would ban same-sex marriage and civil unions, on the same grounds, but the language of its text is unfortunately crystal-clear.

The Florida Supreme Court is an admirable group of judges. Remember that if their decision hadn't been overturned by the federal Supreme Court, the recount in 2000 would have continued, Gore would have become president and the world would have been spared eight years of Bush!

Religion on the Ballot

My home state of Florida has earned a very negative reputation, some of it completely warranted, for electoral ineptitude. Most of the country is only aware of the issues in presidential elections, but there's a more serious problem with the general electorate and the amendments to the state constitution we vote on as ballot initiatives. Florida has passed the highest percentage of ballot initiatives of any state in the union. It seems the residents of the state are even less skeptical than even the average American and will approve almost any measure that doesn't immediately appear like a bad idea. The majority of initiatives concern taxation issues because the state legislature doesn't want to risk passing an unpopular measure which will hurt their constituents' wallets, and they have learned that Floridians foolishly tend to vote yes by default when they don't understand a proposal rather than demanding a clear explanation before they change the state's supreme law. The problem has become so bad that in 2006 we passed an amendment that requires a sixty-percent majority for all future amendments, ironically with only a 57.8% majority. I'm afraid that even this new threshold won't prevent two very destructive amendments on this year's ballot from passing.

Amendment 2 would explicitly ban same-sex marriage and civil unions:

Inasmuch as a marriage is the legal union of only one man and one woman as husband and wife, no other legal union that is treated as marriage or the substantial equivalent thereof shall be valid or recognized.

Florida already has a statute against same-sex marriage, but proponents apparently want to make it even more difficult for homosexuals to be granted equal rights. Although there are indeed secular arguments against same-sex marriage, this is undoubtedly a religious issue. The secular arguments hold almost no sway among the nonreligious, primarily only among those who want rationalize their opposition based on either faith or simple bigotry. Every poll I've seen shows that the nonreligious support same-sex marriage by overwhelming margins.

Amendment 7 would repeal the constitutional prohibition on granting money to religious institutions:

An individual or entity may not be barred from participating in any public program because of religion and to delete the prohibition against using revenues from the public treasury directly or indirectly in aid of any church, sect, or religious denomination or in aid of any sectarian institution.

I don't really know what the first clause entails, but it must sound good to most voters, so it may only be there to distract them from the main issue: school vouchers. This amendment was created after an earlier voucher program was thwarted in state court precisely on account of this law. Perhaps proponents even have in mind a state “faith-based initiative” program like the federal program. Whatever the case, it's very clear this is a step in the wrong direction.

With taxation amendments, the problem is that voters don't understand the meaning of the text and vote for them anyway. With these two amendments, citizens will have little difficulty understanding. It's their failure to appreciate the importance of church-state separation that will be the problem. I predict that both will pass in November, but I hope I'm proven wrong. Wherever you live, take the time to vote and make your voice heard!

Atheism and the Internet

For those of us who became adults after the advent of the internet, it's sometimes difficult to imagine how anyone found any information without this very powerful tool. Almost every day I look up something online that I would have been unable to find otherwise and it makes finding everything else much faster and easier. This is especially true with respect to atheism. Indeed, the internet makes it easier to become and to live as an atheist.

When I began investigating my doubts four years, I bought a few books critical of religion, but most of skeptical materials that I read were only available on the internet. Since my deconversion, the internet has facilitated almost all of my interaction with other atheists. The vast majority has happened directly online through forums and blogs. All the groups that I've met or visited in person I first learned about online. I listen to atheist podcasts online. I find most of my atheist books online. Other atheist products I can find only online. If it weren't for the internet, I would be almost totally isolated from other atheists and would feel very alone. I sympathize with all the millions of atheists throughout history who had to struggle without any help whatsoever from fellow nonbelievers simply because they didn't know any and didn't know how to find them. It's still not easy to be an atheist in religious society, but the internet has certainly helped.

No Gods, No Children

Since my deconversion almost four years ago, I've only dated women who were at most only nominally religious, and it seems increasingly unlikely that I'll end up with even a moderate believer. Ideally, I would prefer to marry another atheist. It's very difficult for me to fully respect anyone who professes belief in the supernatural and almost impossible to respect anyone who claims to have no doubts. It's not really a problem if she has an unbiblical view of God as love or a hopeful belief in some vague almost universalism in which only murderers and rapists are sent to hell and everyone else is admitted to heaven. But if she believes that the world was created in six days, that her god magically takes the form of bread and wine during a sacred ritual, or that anyone outside of her religious group will be roasted for all eternity merely for thinking differently, then it's an absolute deal-breaker. If I'm to share my life with someone, it would be best that we at least share a similar relationship with reality. Unfortunately, I'm usually not really compatible with most female atheists. I can form friendships with them perfectly well, but the harmony of personalities necessary for romantic relationships seems to be lacking. Perhaps this is because atheism isn't fully socially acceptable in American culture, so atheists, and female atheists in particular, are often intellectually and emotionally stronger than average, but I tend to be attracted to weaker, more passive and more traditionally feminine women. The only explicitly nonreligious women I've dated were from socialist countries where irreligion is promoted as the societal standard. The difficulty I experience in finding someone with the same worldview is the way that religion most directly affects my life.

A much larger issue for me is that I don't ever want to have children. I've always felt this way, for as long as I can remember, though during the height of my religious devotion, I believed my future wife and I would be morally obliged to have as many children as were conceived without contraception, so I tried to convince myself that it was God's will. I thought it was the only way I could have sex without risking eternal damnation! I'm very happy I didn't find a woman during that time willing to marry me! Today I can say without any guilt that I don't want children. In fact, I feel it's more responsible because I won't be contributing to the problem of overpopulation. While I understand the biological basis of the desire to reproduce, I find myself unable to relate to people who sincerely want children because I never have at all. Finding a suitable match is difficult enough without having desires contrary to the evolutionary urges and socialization of the vast majority of one's potential mates, but I doubt I could make myself want children and I refuse to have them unless I'm absolutely certain I want them.

There's a significant overlap between the membership of the godfree and the childfree, but so far this statistic hasn't done anything to help me find the right woman and I don't expect that it will. I would really love to find someone special with whom to share my life, but I've accepted that, because of my unpopular beliefs and desires and because of me personally, I may spend the rest of my life alone. I haven't given up; I've just become more realistic about my chances.

Divine Comedy

Yesterday evening I spent an hour and a half in a Christian bookstore. My visit, however, had nothing to do with religion. I'm a member of an improv comedy troupe and we were invited at the last minute to perform at an open mic there, which I guess usually consists of musical performances. It was a disappointing event, though not because of the nature of the establishment. There was nothing remotely resembling a stage or seating area – I don't understand how they've hosted such an event without these basic elements – and we ended up performing in an area near the front counter in front of some children's books with only a handful of onlooking shoppers stopping to watch for a few minutes from time to time. I wondered how we came to such an unusual venue until I spotted several copies of a newly published book by one of our members about living with diabetes on a table near the entrance. At least I now know how we learned of their open mic!

We've just started looking for a new location after the coffee shop where we used to perform was closed. I don't know whether our director intends to have us return, especially given the lackluster facilities, but I think I'll decline to participate if she does. Although our performance last night wasn't affected by the venue, I'd rather not be at all associated with purveyors of irrational nonsense. I love to perform any chance I get, but I must draw the line at places where Jack Chick tracts are sold!

The Importance of Religious Literalism

Although I discarded all my religious beliefs several years ago when I deconverted, I have retained one metabelief throughout my life: it really matters whether the claims of religion are true. If there exists an omnimax deity who created the universe, who loves me, and who has instructed me how to be happy, then I want to listen to him and follow his plan. If heaven exists, then I want to live there forever. If hell exists, then I want, more than anything else, to avoid being condemned to suffer there for all eternity. Indeed, I simply can't imagine anything which would more justly merit my concern. If, on the other hand, there are no deities, there is no heaven and there is no hell, then I see no reason to maintain any religious tradition merely for the sake of tradition. And if religion is nothing more than a metaphor, then I don't care any more about biblical stories than I do about Aesop's fables. In fact, the message of the bible is essentially tyrannical and barbaric and, even though it contains some benevolence, I don't want to give the impression that I respect the more pervasive malevolence or give special credence to any of it as divine. If any religion is true, then I want to accept it as truth, but if it's false or just symbolic, then it's simply not of any interest to me.

The rejection of literalism and scriptural inerrancy is the mark of liberal religion. It seems in particular that one can't be a liberal believer without rejecting the doctrine of hell, or at least the belief that nonbelievers are condemned there simply for not believing. But without the threat of hell, there is no reason to take religion seriously except societal pressure, personal preference or the belief that religious devotion is rewarded in this life and there is certainly no reason to obsess about it. Over the past several centuries, even the Catholic Church has liberalized its teaching on the salvation of those outside the church. (Of course, church leaders refuse to acknowledge the change and refer to it doctrinal development.) The traditional teaching was that only baptized Catholics in good standing could hope to be saved. The possibility was later extended to those who lived before Jesus or who otherwise never heard the gospel. Next unbaptized infants or aborted fetuses were included. Then it was non-Catholic Christians who could be part of an “invisible” church. Now some theologians argue that all non-Christians and even atheists might achieve salvation. I know not all of this has become official dogma, but the overall trend toward universalism is unmistakeable. If the church officially renounced the doctrine of hell, however, and apologized for the enormous amount of suffering it has caused through the ages, I would be no closer to returning the fold as there would be even less incentive to return since I would be admitted to heaven no matter what. I attended mass every single Sunday for twenty-five years, with only a small number of exceptions which I later confessed, until the day I decided to apostatize. Not once since then have I ever even considered the idea of returning for the community or the nostalgia. Attending mass was at most a tolerable experience from which the only pleasure I ever really derived was my belief that I had fulfilled my obligation for yet another week. Attempting to follow all the moral rules was at best an annoyance and at worst pure torment. I want to leave all vestiges of my former faith in the past where they belong. Perhaps the only significant difference between liberal believers and nonbelievers is that the former like religion and want to preserve it, even if they have to mangle it in the process, and the latter generally don't like it and are content to live without it.

Ironically, I share this metabelief that religion matters with conservative believers, who are usually opponents on political and social issues, but not with liberal believers, who are usually allies on these same issues. Since individuals rightly have their own unique opinions, it's usually not possible (or necessary) to find others who share the exact same thought processes, only similar conclusions. We can use all the allies we can get for political battles.

Happy World Humanist Day!

Today is World Humanist Day, a day to celebrate and raise awareness of Humanism as a life stance. Unfortunately, this holiday holds even less significance for me than Humanlight since I know of no local events in which I can participate and it has no popular holiday to create a festive atmosphere from which it can indirectly benefit. Nevertheless, I would like to wish all of my visitors a Happy World Humanist Day! Perhaps next year I will have someone with whom to celebrate this special day.

Pain and Suffering

Yesterday I went to the beach for the first time in years, excluding visits during which I simply walked along the sand or the pier, and I paid the price for spending so much time in the midday, summer, Florida sun. I completely forgot to apply sunblock to my feet and failed to sufficiently cover the backs of my lower legs, resulting in severe sunburn, primarily on the tops of my feet. In addition, I had to walk back to the vehicle barefoot over sand which was absolutely scorching, the hottest I have felt during my entire life. My feet are still in constant pain more than twenty-four hours later despite my use of multiple cooling, soothing and healing agents. I'm sure that I will recover soon enough, but all of this pain reminded me of the change in my approach to suffering from when I was religious.

As a believer, none of this pain would have seemed pointless because I could have offered it to God. I believed this would reduce the amount of time I would spend in purgatory after my death and perhaps even gain me some merit in the eyes of God. It didn't matter that the causes of suffering didn't always seem just; the offering itself gave it meaning and perhaps made it easier for me to accept. This response to suffering has most likely played a major role in allowing religion to largely sidestep the problem of evil, which even believers acknowledge as the strongest argument against their faith, and is just one way in which religion makes life easier for believers by making unsupported promises.

As an atheist, now I have to accept any and all pain as essentially meaningless. It's true that it will teach me to more carefully apply sunblock before spending hours in the merciless sun, but this is a lesson which I could have learned without pain and which has no real moral value. The same is true of much greater suffering such as major illness, accidents or even death. We have to face cold hard reality without any promise that everything will be all right in the end and that everything will balance out. It's not easy, but it still seems better than comforting fantasy.

Individualism and Infallibility

In my previous entry, I discussed the tendency of modern Catholics to adopt Protestant attitudes toward theology and proclaim the autonomy of the individual in determining religious truth. During my deconversion, however, I realized that even the most conservative Catholic must also necessarily implicitly hold this position because of the inescapable fact that it's always an individual who chooses to follow a religion and thus always an individual who act as the final authority. Catholics attempt to avoid this issue by claiming to recognize an infallible pope as the final authority, but the individual still must be the ultimate arbiter between who is fallible and who is infallible! All Catholic dogma does is reduce the number of personal judgments to one, but this judgment still must be made by each fallible person. It would be circular and thus invalid to argue that the pope is infallible because he claims to be, so in the end, each Catholic really only says, “I think the pope cannot possibly be wrong.” So much for building the church upon a rock.

Protestant Catholics

Although there are far more atheists than professed Catholics in this country, I felt more alone intellectually when I was believer because only a small percentage really thought like I did beyond their basic belief in the divinity of Jesus. I thought that miracles and logical arguments proved the authority of the Catholic Church and I accepted absolutely everything that the church taught for that reason. The majority of self-identified Catholics, however, even those who attend mass regularly, don't truly recognize that authority (if they dissent from even one teaching) and are essentially Protestants in that they consider themselves the ultimate arbiter between true and false, right and wrong, good and bad. I felt especially alone because all these people who supposedly shared my religion really didn't; at most, they shared some superficial beliefs, but they lacked the core principle that I considered so important to my identity. As an atheist, this is not the case. I fully accept the primacy of the individual conscience, and my reasons for disbelieving generally align with those of others: lack of evidence and the meaninglessness of religious language. The general populace might look at me with suspicion when I say I'm an atheist, but at least I know that I'm not alone in my thinking.

Perpetual Adoration

Catholics believe that the bread and wine consecrated during the mass “transubstantiate” into the body and blood of Jesus, that is, truly become God without changing their outward appearance. As such, they become proper objects of worship within the mass and, sometimes, outside of the mass. In some parishes, there is a practice known as perpetual adoration in which a consecrated wafer is placed in a monstrance and displayed in a chapel twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, three hundred and sixty-five days a year with volunteers scheduled such that at least one person is always present in the chapel offering adoration.

Volumes have been written criticizing the belief in transubstantiation and the reception of communion, but my intention here is only to indicate the absurdity of asking people to keep God company around the clock, even within the context of church teaching. The practice is supposedly voluntary, but it's rather more complicated than it seems because of the goal of continually uninterrupted worship. First, in order to set up and then maintain the practice, the organizers need people for every time slot throughout the week, so parishioners could feel guilted into participating. Second, if someone cannot come during their regular time slot, because of a vacation, a new work or school schedule, sickness, accident, etc., a replacement must be found, even if it's for two o'clock in the morning. And if the person following someone doesn't show up, they're not supposed to leave until someone else can replace them. I fully realize that it's supposed to be a sacrifice, but I object to asking people to make sacrifices which put the elderly and the sleep-deprived on the road in the middle of the night, all to visit a deity who is supposedly present in every corner of the universe. As is typical with religion, it's just absurdity upon absurdity.

The Day I Almost Deconverted

Although my actual deconversion several years ago was a rather thoughtful and deliberate process, there was a memorable day approximately eleven years ago when I seriously considered becoming an atheist in the matter of a single day. It was the summer after I graduated from high school and I was working at a supermarket as a bagger. I remember that I had recently had conversations with a couple of friends who were atheists in which they had refuted the apologetic arguments that I had presented to them, even though I didn't really recognize the validity of their responses at the time. As I carried the groceries out of the store to the customers' cars and brought back the shopping carts, I imagined how it would feel to be an atheist. I can't seem to recall the particular issues that I was pondering, but I do recall the surge of emotion that I felt, a mixture of excitement and fear. At home at the end of the day, I decided that I couldn't ignore the arguments from miracles and the peacefulness of the religious, though it was certainly the fear of hell which provided the greatest motivation to remain a believer. It seems truly strange that I almost rejected a lifetime of belief with hardly any thought and I wonder what could have happened if I had deconverted that day. If it had stuck, I might have saved myself from a lot of grief that I was to experience in later years, but if it hadn't, then I might have ended up worse than I actually did.

One of those friends correctly predicted that I would eventually become an atheist because, in his opinion, I was too smart to remain a believer. I haven't seen him since high school and I have occasionally wondered whether he would even remember his remark and whether he would be pleased to learn that he was right. If I ever talk to him, I will be sure to ask and probably report on it here.

Sounds of Peace

Whenever writing a blog entry, I listen to quiet music to soothe my mind and I've found that my most frequent selection is my collection of Gregorian chant on my computer. It's rather ironic that I compose my thoughts against religion to the sounds of the sacred liturgy, but it's simply the best choice for the purpose. Chant is both very beautiful and completely calm. It's also performed in Latin, a language which I've studied but which I can tune out without any effort. If I automatically understood what the performers were singing like I would if they sang in English, I think that I would be annoyed by the words themselves and most especially by what they signify and that I would be unable to concentrate. As it is, however, I can enjoy chant for what its actual sound conveys to me: peace and meditation.

Hell: The Evilest Doctrine

The single most influential idea on my religious outlook is undoubtedly the doctrine of hell. It was hell that sparked my initial interest in religion during my teenage years, it was hell that kindled the scrupulosity which tormented me for years, it was hell that ignited my investigation and subsequent deconversion and it is hell that continues to fuel my antipathy toward Christianity. It's difficult to envision how my life would have been if I had never believed in hell, but it certainly would have followed a markedly different course.

Every person values and seeks happiness. It's the ultimate motivation for all our thoughts and actions, whether we pursue it directly or indirectly (by making others and then thus ourselves happy) and even paradoxically when we find it in feelings of sadness. Hell is the antithesis of happiness and is by definition the worst possible concept imaginable. It's a place (or “state”) of eternal pain and suffering and has been symbolized as an unquenchable lake of fire. And it is, despite its simplicity, without a doubt the vilest concept ever conceived of by humanity.

No person could ever deserve to be consigned to hell, for the pain endured therein would be infinitely more than any pain inflicted by a finite being. Even the most brutal dictators caused only a limited amount of suffering and would be unjustly punished in hell, even by the most vindictive standards of justice. And I find it both laughable and depressing to hear believers argue that an omnimax deity cannot prevent people from being roasted for eternity. This claim can only result from complete ignorance or from a complete lack of imagination.

Whenever I hear Jesus referred to as loving or merciful, I wince. While the gospels do contain some benevolent teachings, these are completely overshadowed by Jesus' recurrent threat of unending torture for anyone who fails to accept his message. One cannot expect praise for preaching love while simultaneously executing divine blackmail. An objector might arguing that hell is only a metaphor and that Jesus' threats weren't meant literally. To this, I respond that this isn't the Jesus of Christianity but instead a sanitized caricature of Jesus that has been altered in response to moral progress of the past twenty centuries. To claim that the vast majority of Jesus' followers throughout history have totally misunderstood him and that the true message of Jesus perfectly corresponds with modern western humanistic values is to engage in completely unsupportable historical revisionism.

I simply cannot imagine that the billions of people who profess to believe in hell truly do so, or at least not that they believe they themselves might actually go there. If there is truly even the slightest possibility that one could be tortured forever and ever, then no response is too radical to prevent this possibility from being realized. For many, however, hell is just a place for murderers; everyone else will be admitted to heaven upon death. With this thoroughly unbiblical perspective and because most of us aren't emotionally close to any murderers, hell is relatively easy to ignore. I would like to stress that this is a very good thing; billions of people obsessing about it would result in worldwide chaos. It was, after all, belief in hell which fanned the flames of the crusades and inquisitions. We would all do well to toss the concept of eternal punishment into the trash bin of history.

I would like to comfort my readers by reminding them of a truly glorious truth which finally ended my personal religious struggles and which I hereby resolve to reflect upon each day: Smile! There is no hell!

No Sacred Cows

Atheism, unlike religion, has no sacred cows. There is nothing that someone can do which can cause especial offense to atheists beyond the mere desire to offend. There are no gods to blaspheme, no prophets to mock, no dogmas to ridicule, no scriptures to desecrate, no temples to profane, no sacred objects to defile and no rituals to parody. This is certainly not to say that you cannot offend atheists, only that we don't set ourselves up for offense by treating something or someone as inviolable. You never see an angry atheist mob form in response to a cartoon caricature, an obscene sculpture, an incisive documentary, or the publication of a controversial book. We might well feel upset over any of these but only because they misrepresent our position and not simply because someone had the audacity to portray it differently from ourselves. Even then, our response is far more measured than that of most believers.

Muslims in particular are known for the extreme amount of offense they claim and for their verbally and physically violent reactions thereto, but Christians aren't immune to emotional reactions to alleged blasphemy. Although they very thankfully almost never threaten real violence, we have all probably heard believers threaten and even wish others hellfire for even questioning their faith. It's difficult to appreciate just how violent this response is unless you realize that these people actually believe that hell exists and that they want you to suffer unspeakable torment there for all eternity! Perhaps even more remarkable is that the majority of Christians only condemn the desire to see others in hell and not the threat itself, which is an integral part of the gospel message. (Most people think the message is love and forgiveness whereas it's actually, “Believe or fry!”) Even if an atheist dismisses all believers as fools, that doesn't even begin to compare with what the average believer thinks about atheists. And atheists certainly don't express the same level of emotion when someone insults their beliefs.

It's not surprising there is no reaction when you believe that blasphemy is a victimless crime.

False Tolerance

Freedom of expression is today informally limited by a false sense of tolerance widespread in our culture. Many people are reluctant to express their thoughts critical of religion out of fear of offending someone. Self-censorship thus silences many who would otherwise contribute to the public discussion of religion and its place in our society that is so badly needed. In light of this lamentable situation, I would like to encourage my readers to assert your right to express your opinion and disregard any attempt to invoke an imaginary right not to be offended in order to prevent you from speaking your mind.

As for me, I refuse to recognize anyone's claim to a right to be automatically respected. If you don't want anyone to criticize your religion, then you should defend it rationally and show why the detractors are wrong. If you can't do this, you should abandon your beliefs as indefensible or humbly accept the criticism. Demanding that someone else respect your faith and refrain from criticizing it, however, is not an acceptable response. You have the right to promote your opinions and I have the right to promote mine. You have the right to criticize my opinions and I have the right to criticize yours. Any respect in the marketplace of ideas must be earned and not arbitrarily granted. If one's beliefs don't hold up under scrutiny, then they simply they aren't worthy of respect. Religion doesn't receive any immunity from criticism merely because of its importance in some people's lives, especially since its effects are far from uniformly benign. It's in fact far more disrespectful to insulate others from your ideas, assuming their justifications for the beliefs or their feelings are so fragile that you must protect them from the hard truth like little children.

I want to be clear that the above applies only to public society and not to private society. The latter has a totally different set of standards regarding politeness and access. If you fail to respect the beliefs of the company you keep by attacking or mocking them, then you cannot expect that company to continue welcoming you. They have the right to exclude you from their homes for whatever reason they deem appropriate, just as you have the right to exclude them from yours. In the world of public discourse, however, no one should be excluded. Anyone should be able to express their opinions by making speeches, writing books, publishing websites, distributing pamphlets, organizing rallies, singing songs, creating paintings or sculptures, producing films or television programs, and no one should attempt to silence them by labeling them intolerant, fundamentalist or militant for simply expressing criticism of the ideas of others. Attacking an intolerant ideology is a service to, not against, tolerance.

I'm very thankful that I myself was able to find books and websites critical of my former religion when I undertook my investigation several years ago. If those authors had chosen to censor themselves, I wouldn't have found the necessary resources to escape the mental prison of irrational faith. Think of how many more people could bask in the light of reason if only they had more opportunities to join the conversation and think for themselves.

The Necessity of Doubt

I simply cannot respect anyone who claims to have never doubted their beliefs. This statement tells me they have never really examined their opinions, no matter how much time they have spent thinking, reading or discussing them. Whatever your beliefs regarding religion, the vast majority of the world disagrees with you. I find it incredible that a person can go through life, aware that billions of people hold opposing viewpoints, without once thinking, “Perhaps I'm wrong.” While it's possible to understand this failure to doubt in the culturally homogeneous societies of the past where literally everyone you knew belonged to the same religion, it's nothing short of inexcusable in modern, cosmopolitan America. Despite this absurdity, I still occasionally read interviews of religious leaders in the local newspaper in which they state they have not once doubted their faith. And very few of those who do acknowledge their doubts then say they have pursued and investigated them logically, instead preferring to rely on prayer and scripture to resolve their uncertainties. Of course, if they approached the question of religion from a rational perspective, it's extremely unlikely they would have become religious leaders in the first place.

Why I Joined the Green Party

UPDATE: I re-registered as a Democrat on 15 May. I decided to accept the reality of the two-party system and make my liberal voice heard within the big tent of a major party. In addition, Florida has closed primaries and I want to vote as often as possible.

My trek across the political spectrum has been as radical as that across the religious spectrum, and for much the same reasons. Within a few weeks of turning eighteen years old, I registered to vote for the first time. Since I was religious and conservative, I chose to affiliate with the Republican Party. Several years later I became so frustrated with the Republicans for not being conservative enough that I almost registered with the reactionary Constitution Party. I acquired a new voter registration form, filled it out, but then decided not to mail it in for whatever reason. After my deconversion during my mid-twenties, without the influence of religion, my politics quickly changed. I had been taught my entire life to listen to ecclesiastical authority instead of thinking for myself and now, having thought for myself by investigating my doubts about the faith, I had very explicitly rejected that authority. So I carefully examined my political positions, which had mostly been based on dogma and ignorance, not on reason and wisdom. As a result, many of them changed radically; some remained the same. In the end, however, I came to identify myself as a liberal. I wasn't in a hurry to change my party affiliation, but I did switch to the Democratic Party before the next major election. That's where I remained until yesterday, when I mailed off a new registration form in order to switch to the Green Party.

My departure from the Democratic Party is primarily the result of the party's failure to represent my voice. The single largest issue is the Iraq war. The newly elected Democratic majority in Congress has failed to bring any troops home and there's still a real possibility that the superdelegates will award the party's nomination to someone who voted to authorize the war in the first place and who has shown utter contempt for the democratic process throughout her campaign. If Obama wins the nomination, I still intend to vote for him in the general election. If Hillary wins, I absolutely refuse to vote for her and will most likely cast my ballot for the Green Party nominee. Other issues are the party's connections to corporate interests, its pandering to the religious, and its lack of support for democratic reform of our electoral system. I acknowledge that my joining the Green Party is mostly a symbolic gesture of protest against the Democrats and in support of the Greens, but it feels good and I'm glad I've done it.

When I examined the Green Party's 2004 platform, I found a number of my own views in it which the Democratic Party's 2004 platform lacked:

• unequivocal opposition to the Iraq war
• reduction of military spending
• repeal of the Patriot Act
• establishment of single-payer universal healthcare
• abolition of the death penalty
• full support for gay marriage
• support for proportional representation, preferential voting, and neutral redistricting
• abolition of the electoral college
• support for statehood for the District of Columbia
• support for stringent environmental standards (naturally)

There was even one section entitled “Religious Freedom and Secular Equality” which I would like to present in full:

The United States Bill of Rights guarantees freedom of religion. We affirm the right of each individual to the exercise of conscience and religion, while maintaining the constitutionally mandated separation of government and religion. We believe that federal, state, and local governments must remain neutral regarding religion. We call for:

a. Ending discriminatory federal, state, and local laws against particular religious beliefs, and nonbelief. The U.S. Constitution states that there shall be no religious test for public office. This requirement should apply to oaths (or affirmations) for holding public office at any level, employment at all government levels, oaths for witnesses in courts, oaths for jury membership, and the oath for citizenship.

b. Prosecution of hate crimes based on religious affiliation or practice.

c. Elimination of displays of religious symbols, monuments, or statements on government buildings, property, websites, money, or documents.

d. Restoration of the Pledge of Allegiance to its pre-1954 version, eliminating the politically motivated addition of “under God.”

e. Ending faith-based initiatives and charitable choice programs, whereby public funds are used to support religious organizations that do not adhere to specified guidelines and standards, including anti-discrimination laws.

f. Ending school vouchers whereby public money pays for students in religious schools.

g. Ending governmental use of the doctrines of specific religions to define the nature of family, marriage, and the type and character of personal relationships between consenting adults.

h. Ending religiously-based curricula in government-funded public schools.

i. Ending the use of religion as a justification to deny children necessary medical care or subject them to physical and emotional abuse.

j. Ending the use of religion by government to define the role and rights of women in our society.

k. Revocation of the Congressional charter of the Boy Scouts of America. Any private organization that practices bigotry against certain religious beliefs and classes of people should not have a Congressional endorsement or access to public property and funds.

Of course, I can't say that I agree with everything in the platform, but it certainly reflects my views much more closely than that of any other party. I'm glad to be a Green. I don't know whether my political journey has ended, but it has certainly been a wild ride so far. I might be the only person in the country to have voted for both Alan Keyes and Barack Obama in presidential primaries. I can only claim mental illness in the first case.

Happy Earth Day!

The March equinox is one of the two different days recognized as Earth Day by the United Nations. I want to wish my visitors a pleasant spring or fall, depending on which hemisphere you call home. Let's all work together to protect the planet from ourselves.

Atheists Have Values, Too

It troubles me that people tend to interpret atheism as the repudiation of everything that religion happens to represent in their minds rather than simply the principled rejection of the core of religion, belief in the supernatural. While it's true that someone could be diametrically opposed to absolutely anything even remotely associated with religion, it's wrong to assume that atheists necessarily are; I certainly have never encountered one who was. As for me, I embrace a number of values which religions commonly profess to promote such as peace, justice, empathy, compassion, honesty, loyalty, responsibility, temperance, introspection and reflection.

I also, however, strongly embrace skepticism, which has led me to disbelieve the supernatural claims of upon which believers (wrongly) claim to derive their moral values, and freethought, which allows me to evaluate the worth of moral values with my own individual judgement rather than deferring to an unquestionable authority such as scripture or a religious leader. These twin values foster others which most religions don't inherently support and which some even explicitly oppose such as liberty, equality and secularism. They have also led me to reject irrationality, superstition, fear, hatred and ignorance, which most religions support or have supported to varying degrees throughout their histories. It is my skepticism and freethinking which distinguish me from believers, not a lack of virtue.

In truth, I yearn for a community in which I can foster my personal growth through contemplation of, discussion about and action based on my values without any compromise to supernaturalism. My several visits to a Unitarian Universalist congregation and my casual online investigation of Buddhism were part of an as-of-yet unsuccessful quest for such a community and identity. Humanism presents the greatest promise for fidelity to my beliefs, but it lacks the type of formal structure that I desire, perhaps for fear of being too similar to religion, and it's not distinct enough from increasingly humanistic western culture to provide a unique focus and identity. All I can say is that I'm a naturalist in search of a place to call home.