God is Pretend

I am an atheist living in Alabama. I could go on forever, but I think you can form a pretty accurate mental picture of my life.

Lineage Inconsistencies

Genesis 2:7 And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.

God brought all of the animals to Adam and he named them and such. I suppose God sorted all of the animals out so as to differentiate between the similar species such as Lampropeltis getula getula and Lampropeltis getula goini.

Genesis 2:21 So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep, and while he was asleep, he took part of the man’s side and closed up the place with flesh. 2:22 Then the Lord God made a woman from the part he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.

That’s who we know as Eve.

Adam and Eve had two sons:Cain, and Abel.

Cain killed Abel. God then spoke to Cain and made him feel bad for what he had done. Cain then said something that would make people question the bible years later. God punished him by giving him a lifelong timeout.

Genesis 4:14 Behold, thou hast driven me out this day from the face of the earth; and from thy face shall I be hid; and I shall be a fugitive and a vagabond in the earth; and it shall come to pass, that every one that findeth me shall slay me. 4:15 And the LORD said unto him, Therefore whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold. And the LORD set a mark upon Cain, lest any finding him should kill him.

Who are these people that would be killing Cain? Who is God protecting Cain from? Who would God wreak vengeance upon sevenfold? There are only two other human beings on the earth at this time, his mother and father. True Adam and Eve had another son to replace the one Cain whacked.

Genesis 4:25 And Adam knew his wife again; and she bare a son, and called his name Seth: For God, said she, hath appointed me another seed instead of Abel, whom Cain slew.

Were there other people on the earth? If so, where the hell did they come from? Why are they not mentioned. Seeing as the first “few days” are chronicled pretty well, I’d think these important others would be mentioned, if not by name, at least in recognition of their existence.

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So, I think most logical people can agree that Genesis is a fairy tale full of holes. To believe in it requires a LOT of faith. Putting that much stock in the unprovable and unverifiable, to me, is akin to claiming steadfastly that there is a leprechaun that puts gold nuggets on your kitchen table while you sleep, but removes them right before you wake.

One could point to the fact that God created the two great lights, the sun and moon, and the stars, when in fact, the sun is a star, and the moon simply reflects the light of the sun. They didn’t have science when they wrote the bible, so I wouldn’t expect there to be much truth.

Do I know where the universe came from? More to the point, does knowing that help me lead my life so that I can achieve my goals? No. However, as science and technology continue to make the impossible possible, religion will be filled with the holes that science was once filled with. The mysteries of lightning, the changing of the seasons, eclipses, volcanic eruptions, electricity, and DNA will one day be the mysteries of a boat that held all the animals of the world, a man receiving rules on a mountain (all by himself), and a “virgin birth”.

Why Atheism?

Though the title sounds like one of an informational pamphlet, I intend to provide you with my personal reasons for being an atheist. I’m sure everyone has a different story, and I would love for you to comment with your personal reasons for not believing in the beyond.

I was raised in a household devoid of politics, sports, and religion. For that, I am infinitely thankful as it allowed me to grow in each area without any internal pressure from my family. It will be very hard to raise my children the same way since I am undoubtedly more active in all areas, but if I had to choose one to allow my children to grow in personally, it would be religion. After all, sports teams rise and fall in popularity, politics changes with the times, but religion deals with long-term issues.

I never prayed as a child. Bedtime prayers were never part of my nightly routine. Mealtime blessings were also absent from my day. The only time I was exposed to religion was when I would occasionally attend a vacation bible school with a friend from school. I don’t remember praying there either, but I do remember being incredibly bored. Coloring pictures of arks and watching puppet shows about Abraham were not sources of interest to me at that age, nor are they today. Throughout my entire youth, I can say I probably only ever attended church a dozen or so times. Some say had I attended church regularly, my views on the almighty might be different. I’m sure they might be. If I attended Klan meetings every week, I’m sure I would loathe everything that wasn’t white and Christian. That’s the power of weekly indoctrination.

For the majority of my youth, I never sought a higher being. That changed briefly in high school. I started my sophomore year of high school in Tennessee. A church on every other street corner, a bible thumper screaming of doomsday on the rest, and billboards with quotes from God himself were all warning signs that I was not in Illinois anymore. I didn’t have any pressure from my friends to come to church, because none of them knew that I found the idea of God laughable.

Girlfriends were the source of contention. One attended a pentecostal church which I attended ONCE. That night was one of the scariest of my life. I sat there shifting my eyes back and forth for signs of anyone carrying in a box of snakes. I had my exits chosen. One song that was sung that night involved seven different verses each with a different day of the week. You were supposed to stand up on the day of the week on which you were saved. I thought I had escaped this one by just not raising my hand. Oh no. They were watching. They noticed that my hand didn’t go up at all. I was approached after the service by the preacher. She asked me if I was saved. I told her that I was not. She then asked if she could pray for me. I said yes. After all, at this point in my life, I had come to think that there was something wrong with me for not believing in God. I thought that I had missed some important milestone in my life. So as that woman and a handful of members of the congregation stood around me and asked God to reveal himself to me in the way he knew was best for me, I closed my eyes, forgot the creepiness of the night, and opened my heart to whatever may come. Nothing came.

I don’t remember what day of the week it was; I can’t really pin the date down at all. I gave up on God. If he existed, he would have revealed himself to me by now, but the truth was that I knew what I had always thought. God was a fairy tale. The proverbial “opiate of the masses” created by the ruling class thousands of years ago with the sole purpose of keeping the uneducated lower class in check. What a fantastic document to go along with it as well. The Bible, chock full of miracles, magic, and mayhem has become the only multi-author, ancient text to be quoted in almost every conversation in the South.

I kept quiet about my beliefs. After what I had heard some of my friends say about atheism, I knew that it would be socially detrimental for me to make known my disbelief in the figure that almost everyone I knew held so dear. I grew accustomed to my closet. It was lonely, but it was safe. I remained socially accepted, and my views were not challenged. Even to this day, I have to keep quiet about this subject in certain social circles. Living in a highly conservative and largely unaccepting area of the Deep South, I have to withhold certain things in the interest of success.

I used to keep it quiet so that I wouldn’t alienate my friends, but then I said “Bump that!” No true friend would shun me for being an atheist. Though it has cost me a few relationships and a friends along the way, the friends I have are open-minded and great conversation partners.

If you are holding back your beliefs from friends, family, acquaintances, etc., please find a way that is comfortable for you, and share your thoughts. Someone will always be there to support you. I’m here. Comment. I’ll listen.

Prayer… WTF?

Random Christian prays for X.
X happens.
Answered prayer!

Same Christian prays for Y.
Y does not happen.
Y was not in God’s plan.

I guess I am just gifted with too much logic, but how does that not reveal to the entire praying population that what they are doing is pointless? Some would argue that it’s the good feelings that you have that can make a difference for yourself. That’s fine. Think good thoughts. Don’t try to say those thoughts aloud to a classroom though.

Time and time again, prayer has been clinically shown to have no connection to the recovery process. What was the response I read to this? “God stepped in on this one. He won’t stand by while you tear him down ‘fact by fact’.”

Christians are so absorbed in their mythology that they will do or say absolutely anything to remain in their comfortable bubble. Try speaking your mind to a state full of these mindless folks. It’s not easy.

One of my friends knows that I am an atheist. She knows a child that is very ill. Instead of asking me to pray for him, she said, “Please keep him in your thoughts.” I respect not only her acceptance of my beliefs, but the profound amount of logic that this course of action displays over prayer. Keeping someone “in my thoughts” will not beam magic healing beams to them, but it will serve as a way for me to keep those less fortunate in the forefront of my mind. It will keep me in closer touch with his condition, and ultimately have much more beneficial results than looking upward with hands clasped and jibbering to the sky.

Why do people even bother to pray before meals anymore? It’s a waste of time. Whenever I find myself eating out with a group of Christians, I find myself waiting for every last one of them to be seated and words to be jibbered before I can tie into my food. Of course, I could just start eating, but I wish to respect their practice, pointless as it is, just as some few respect mine. It’s not even like these prayers contain anything of substance either. Every blessing is the exact same.

“Dear Lord. Thank you for this meal. Please bless this food to the nourishment of our bodies so that we may live through you. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.”

Give or take a few words, that is every single meal blessing you will likely ever hear. You think they could just print it on an index card, lay it on the table, and accept the minutes as read in true Robert’s Rules fashion. It would be a lot quicker and would display the same amount of creativity with each new prayer.

I think I remember praying a couple times when I was young. I even remember that time when I desperately sought Jesus Christ in my early-mid teens. None of those prayers was even remotely answered. If they had been, I wouldn’t be on this blog right now exposing the ludicrousness of the Christian faith.

I came to the conclusion that others are either to scared or stupid to take. I realized that I was pursuing the ultimate tooth fairy and that if anyone was going to lead my life in a positive direction, it would be me. Sure enough, trials and tribulations abound, I have pressed on to become a much more focused and goal-oriented person than I was last year. While my Christian counterparts might say “God was there with me through the hard times” or “I owe my successes to Him”, I say “While I didn’t do it on my own, I sure as hell didn’t enlist the help of the boogeyman.”

Proof of God

There is nothing short of a visit from the man himself that would make me buy into such a deception. But would that even convince me? Would we even accept that we had just been visited by the almighty? Would we shake it off as a bad dream? Would we tell ourselves to lay off the weed?

What if we have already been visited by him?

Could God even prove himself? He could have presented himself in any form he wished and you may have written him off as a random bum, a religious zealot, or a kind face on the subway. Before this turns into a Joan Osbourne song, let me get to the point. Would God’s inability to prove himself lend to a lack of omnipotence? Some might say that faith cannot exist with proof. God sure didn’t have a problem revealing himself to the people of the Old Testament. Of course, those stories were written by the very people who he revealed himself to, which might mean they have some sort of bias. If the Nuclear Regulatory Commission produced a report about how amazing nuclear energy was, we might be a little skeptical.

The following excerpt from The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy pretty much sums up the story.

Now it is such a bizarrely improbably coincidence that anything so mindbogglingly useful [the Babel fish] could have evolved by chance that some thinkers have chosen to see it as a final and clinching proof of the non-existence of God. The argument goes something like this: “I refuse to prove that I exist,” says God, “for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing.”

“But,” says Man, “the Babel fish is a dead giveaway isn’t it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don’t. QED.”

“Oh dear,” says God, “I hadn’t thought of that,” and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.

The homeless you pass without a second glance. The atheists whose rhetoric you scoff. The gays you treat like second-class citizens. Any of these could be your God in disguise administering your final exam on the teachings of his son. Jesus Christ, the teacher of forgiveness, acceptance, and brotherly love did not give exceptions. Why should you? Think about that the next time you spit on an atheist’s backpack. Because if God doesn’t kick your ass, I sure as hell will.