God-Given Purpose

“I live to serve God.”

“The Lord gives my life meaning and direction.”

“I am His hands and feet on Earth.”

“The point of life? To know, love, and serve God.”

“I can’t imagine getting up in the morning without knowing I was made for a specific purpose.”

These sentiments took me no time or research to come up with because, frankly, I’ve heard them dozens of times. I may have uttered something like them at some point during my belief. In fact, I almost certainly did. When I was younger, I used to hold a firm belief that I existed for no other purpose than to serve my fellow humans. I was a tool in the hands of my Maker. There was nothing else I wanted or, as I thought at the time, deserved to do with my life. This viewpoint lasted up until the middle of college, when I finally began to think that perhaps I was getting stepped on by a few too many of my classmates and “friends”. That, however, is a story for another time.

The above outlook on life—and the problem of God-given purpose—is the topic of today’s post. What does that mean? Why would anyone want to hold that belief, and what effects does it have on their lives and the lives of those around them? Purpose is a huge topic, so I won’t get into more than the slimmest portion of its surface, but nonetheless: let’s explore.

Everyone wants their life to have meaning. Everyone wants their life to have a purpose. Without purpose, what is the use of living? Without direction, what does one work toward? Even the most hedonistic of lifestyles conforms to this rule, for the purpose of the hedonist’s life is to experience as much pleasure as possible. This is why they exist. Asking anyone on the street what the purpose of their life is will yield responses as varied as the winds. Overall, however, one thing is for certain: religion heavily influences the sense of purpose in the lives of Christians.

So let’s think about that a little bit. For many Christians, their life has only one purpose: whatever God tells them it is. To be more cynical, their purpose is whatever they think God is telling them to do, or more often, whatever someone whom they trust tells them to do from a position of authority. This view provides two very important things: a sense of direction, and comfort. But it’s intellectually unsatisfying, in my opinion.

There’s a lot of talk among Christians about giving themselves over to God for His use. The reasoning is thus: if God made me, He must have had a reason. My job, then, is to figure out what that reason is, and fulfill the purpose I was made to fulfill. For after all, I must have a purpose, or else God wouldn’t have made me. This is the question a Christian feels compelled to ask, and it’s a (somewhat) logical extension from the basic concept of creation: A tool in your kitchen drawer may look cool, but if it has no purpose, why did you buy it? Similarly, a person may be beautiful, talented, and charismatic, but if they have no purpose, why did God make them?

To summarize and/or get myself off this wandering track: Christians find purpose and meaning in their lives by doing what they think God wants them to do. They surrender their wills to their Lord, and act as servants in His service. Look no further than scripture for evidence of this view (Matthew 20:28 “In the same way, the Son of Man did not come to be served. He came to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many people”). Christians relinquish control of their lives. They discard the mantle of autonomy and self-direction in favor of a yoke of obedience. If God wills it, so it shall be. The Lord is my Shepherd; I shall not want. I am at your service, my King.

But as an atheist, I have to ask the big question: why would you do that?

We subject ourselves to the wills of others all the time. When a friend asks me for a favor and I comply, I’ve subjected myself to her desire over my own. My actions are for her purposes. This is not a problem, nor is it abnormal. Where I find things strange, however, is when the lens zooms out to focus on the bigger picture.

If the purpose and meaning of your entire life is granted by the whims of an invisible God, and the only real way He communicates is through feelings you get when praying and a book written thousands of years ago… aren’t you reaching a bit? Isn’t that just trying to find meaning where none exists? Moreover, doesn’t that make your life seem… less valuable? Less important? Doesn’t that diminish you as a person with thoughts, feelings, ideas, and dreams? I find it all somewhat saddening, now. What has this person given up by choosing to follow the whims of a petty, jealous tyrant God? What could he become, were he to loose himself from those reins and run free?

I’ll try to put this succinctly, because I think I’ve drifted: Christians find purpose for their lives by letting God tell them what to do. I think that’s unfortunate. When I first became an atheist, I struggled with the idea that my life had no purpose, other than the purposes I set forth for myself. Once I accepted this truth, however, I discovered a remarkable sense of liberation. No longer was I forced to live my life for someone else’s reasons. I could do what I wanted to do, and try to arrange things in a way that made sense to me.

I was taught that “giving myself over to God” was beautiful. Now, I see it as a cop-out. Christians, you don’t need God to tell you to be good; you can just be good! You don’t need God to tell you where to go or when to go there; you can just go!

Maybe next time I’m in a snarky mood and someone tells me “I have a God-given purpose for my life”, I’ll retort with, “What, you couldn't up with something on your own?”

The Simple Life

It’s been almost two years since I decided that believing in God was, like, totally for squares, daddy-o, and I wasn’t going to do it anymore. My life has changed a lot since then. One thing I can say for sure is this: I like it. I like being atheist. There are many reasons, and today I’ll briefly explore one of them: it’s simpler.

The universe is a complex place. Understanding its finer points is a task far beyond my capabilities. But that’s okay! I know that there are many wondrous things out there that I will never comprehend, and I’m not the least bit upset about it. No one is making me try to fathom how the universe came into existence, or how time can get all distorted by gravity and such, or how consciousness works. There are answers to these questions out there, and I have some idea as to what they are, but their nuances are beyond my current knowledge, and perhaps the knowledge of anyone. Nonetheless, there is a key difference between life before and after my deconversion: I don’t feel any pressure to try to figure these things out.

Life as an atheist in the big city is pretty easy. This is especially true given the fact that I live in a very liberal city—Seattle. My recent relocation to said township has caused a lot of unrest in my life, but I’m grateful for the fact that I don’t need to worry about going to church or anything like that. I work hard enough as it is during the week; I don’t need to waste even more of my free time on the weekend participating in some cult-like mumbo-jumbo. No thank you, I’ll pass on that.

Back to my point: being an atheist is just less mentally taxing than being a believer. Even as I write that I can hear the rebuttal of the theist: “Ah! So you admit that you’re just pretending God doesn’t exist so you don’t have to follow His rules! Checkmate, atheist!” Okay, okay, I’ll address you in a minute. Life is just better if you can live it without worrying about breaking some kind of obscure tenet set down by ignorant men thousands of years ago. I don’t need to wrap my head around why God would allow terrible evil, or how God doesn’t need a creator but the universe does, or why people who claim to believe in justice and goodness can perpetrate horrific crimes against others. All of that stuff is still there, but as a godless person, I can safely live my life without trying to answer those unanswerable questions.

I feel like I’ve drifted around my point here, so I’ll just end with this: I’m not trying to say that we shouldn’t ask big questions or examine our lives. On the contrary, I firmly believe that we should look into our beliefs with care. What I’m getting at here is the idea that as a believer I was called upon to hold a number of contradictory and obtuse beliefs. I was never very good at compartmentalizing those things away; they always gnawed at me. As an atheist, I take time out for science and philosophy. But the time is my own. And if I’d rather just spend an evening playing video games, I don’t run any risk whatsoever of irritating a petty deity.

Argh, this post is confusing and random. Still, more posts more often! That’s my new motto!

RE: Dominion

Well, it has been a while since I posted anything in here, hasn’t it? Sorry about that. I’ve been busy with the holidays. You know how it is. I hope to have some posts about Christmas to throw at you soon, but in the meantime, I want to give you something to hold you over. So how about this: A comment on one of my old entries, and my reply! The thrills never end. Let’s get to it!

Original Post

Robert Walker said...

You are correct, in a way. We do indeed have dominion over all the earth. And, we may at times want to control all of it. But what should separate us from "beastly protocol" is a central value system. Hence, the rest of the bible. I'm sure if man "ruled" his "dominion" as God stated within Genesis, we would be fine. But we have strayed from that "value system" via independant "higher thinking" most of which end in "isms" (Socialism, Atheism, Denialism, etc).. Once we started "managing" the earth, as God intended, out of our own "wisdom" instead of by HIS value system, things did indeed begin to "go to hell in a handbasket." So I do indeed agree with yo my friend..

December 1, 2009 6:52 AM

My reply:

@Robert Walker: Thanks for your comment. A few questions for you, if I may?

"But what should separate us from "beastly protocol" is a central value system. Hence, the rest of the bible."

Right off the bat, I want to know: Why the Bible over, say, the Koran? I know you'll probably tell me it's because the Bible is true and other books aren't, but I have no reason to agree with you unless you provide some evidence.

"I'm sure if man "ruled" his "dominion" as God stated within Genesis, we would be fine. But we have strayed from that "value system"..."

Excessive quotation marks aside, can you be a bit more specific about what God tells us in Genesis with regard to taking care of the Earth? As far as I am aware, the story goes that God made this awesome garden, threw Man in it, and told him to rule the animals. But the animals weren't wild, and Man didn't need to farm to keep himself alive, so ruling it was pretty easy. After the Fruit event (which I like to call the Biggest Cosmic Setup Ever), God kicked Man out without so much as a "how-to" pamphlet. I don't recall any rules in Genesis about how to handle floods, tornadoes, droughts, hurricanes, earthquakes, volcanoes, blizzards... or how to deal with animals that wanted to eat Man, rather than the other way around... or how to balance the desires of a species that was told to "be fruitful and multiply" with the desires of, oh, every other species on the planet, so that one doesn't snuff out the other. I guess what I'm asking is this: can you be a bit more specific about the "value system" you mentioned?

"Once we started "managing" the earth, as God intended, out of our own "wisdom" instead of by HIS value system, things did indeed begin to "go to hell in a handbasket.""

Again, what exactly do you have in mind when you say "HIS value system"? And moreover, unless you're an advocate for living in trees and eating nothing but berries (which I somehow doubt you are), I don't see how any value system could avoid stepping on the toes of other species. According to Genesis, God put Man here to be the ruler of everything, and "fill the earth and subdue it." How are we supposed to do that without bumping off species that would diminish our survival?

I think you missed my point in the last paragraph of my post. It reads: "Whatever the reason, too many people fail to see the difference between earning our place at the top of the food chain and deserving said position. We fought our way to the top. We were not put here."

We're just like every other species because we evolved just like every other species. Humans were lucky enough to be the first species to develop an intellect capable of the kind of thought we've come to take for granted. Along with that intellect came a weird feeling of entitlement: we feel like we were gifted our place at the top of the food chain, rather than realizing the truth; that is, the fact that our species struggled for millions of years to get to this point. If just a few things had gone awry, humanity as we know it wouldn't exist. Perhaps something else would instead? A reptilian race, or a canine or bovine one... who knows? The point here is this: there is simply no way to reconcile what the Bible says God wants us to do (multiply, dominion, subdue, all that) and how we actually feel about doing just that (I hope I'm not the only one who feels bad for wiping out other species). If, however, we face up to our evolutionary back-story, we’ll realize that this is just the way we are, and there isn’t anything wrong with it unless we deem it so. Species come and go. That’s life. It is, to put in simply and in one word, natural. And the sooner we get that through our heads, I think, the sooner we’ll be able to adopt a more reasonable, thoughtful, rational attitude about being the most powerful creatures on the planet.

Humanist Symposium #45

Fellow humans:

Thank you for tuning your Feeds to tonight’s presentation. As mandated by law, we are required to remind you not to engage in full-mind activities while driving, operating machinery, or performing any other task that may require the majority of your mental capacity to perform correctly. Remember, nourishing your mind can be dangerous if done without regard for your surroundings. Feed Safely™.

The International Council of Historians is most pleased to present tonight’s edition of: Humanist Relics.

*cue exciting music and dramatic, colorful title screen*

Here on Humanist Relics, we open the ICH archives and showcase some of the greatest works ever created by human minds. It is our ambition to bring the history of Humanism to the world so that all humans may know and remember the struggles our forbearers went through to actualize a society built on truth, reason, and the pursuit of equality.

Tonight’s piece is one of the crown jewels in our collection of timeless Humanist writings. It is with great honor that we present to you the following archival data, entitled: The Humanist Symposium #45.

Taken from the “Internet”, and written in 2009 (just three years before… well, we all know what happened in 2012 from our history classes, don’t we?), this collection of writings is an outstanding microcosm of Humanist thought during that time period. We’ve broken down the original long piece into a few subgenres and taken the liberty of reformatting them to meet current data specifications, for easier user processing. (Please note: All written data has been translated from Old New English to Modern Word. For the data in its original Old New English format, please contact ICH.) If your Feed is not equipped with the necessary emulators to run this ancient program, please activate this link to download the appropriate drivers.

And now, without further ado, tonight’s datastream:

Topic One: On Being Humanist - Writings about the world from the viewpoint of an atheist/humanist, and what it means to live in a world guided by humanist principles. (A note to our viewers: These pieces were written prior to the adoption of Humanism as the global worldview! A fascinating look into life as part of a growing minority population.)

Title – Funerals and Christianity

Author – Amanda ; Original archive – Free to be Me

Notable quotation – “I’m accustomed to Southern conservative Christian funerals being a ‘salvation’ sermon instead of a standard eulogy, but I guess I’d never really paid attention to it before because I was so involved. Basically, the message boiled down to ‘I know he’s in heaven; if you want to see him again, get saved!’ There was also your standard variation of hell sucks, if you want to avoid it get saved! Where, in either of these two examples, is there a motive of becoming a Christian because you believe in the saving power of Jesus Christ?”

Title – The Purpose of Life

Author – PaulJ ; Original archive – Notes from an Evil Burnee

Notable quotation – “In the absence of a religious purpose for human life (for instance, "the glorification of God"), it might seem reasonable for perpetuation of the species to be offered as a substitute. But reproduction is simply what humans, and other species, do. If they didn't, they would become extinct. Reproduction is not, therefore, a purpose, but simply the result of evolution. Those that are best at reproduction (which includes being good at surviving to reproductive age) are the ones who pass on their genes to the most offspring.”

Title – Life's Value

Author – the chaplain ; Original archive – An Apostate's Chapel

Notable quotation – “One does not need to believe in divine sanction to treasure life. Rather, all one needs is an appreciation for the wonder of a cosmos that humankind is just beginning to understand. As far as we can tell so far, life forms play small roles on the stage of the cosmos. Organic beings may be relatively few in number, but we’re pretty amazing nonetheless. This shouldn’t surprise you. After all, it’s often the bit characters that steal the show.”

Title – In Honor of Terry Pratchett

Author – Ebonmuse ; Original archive – Daylight Atheism

Notable quotation – “If you're an atheist and a regular reader of sci-fi and fantasy, you probably know the name Terry Pratchett - and if you don't, you should. He's the award-winning and much-loved author of Discworld, a series of fantasy novels set in a flat, circular world that's carried through space on the back of a giant tortoise…Pratchett is also an atheist, and many of the Discworld books (including my personal favorite, Small Gods) show the virtues of atheism and humanism - no small feat in a riotous fantasy world where, as the author puts it, ‘the gods had a habit of going round to atheists' houses and smashing their windows’.”

Title – Coming Out Atheist: Is Losing Your Relationship Worth It?

Author – VJack ; Original archive – Atheist Revolution

Notable quotation – “It is fairly common for people in a relationship to be as attracted to the potential of someone rather than to the actual person. And yet, it has been my experience that such relationships are often doomed if they do not quickly progress beyond this point. If I am in love with what I want someone to be rather than what they really are, I'm resigning myself to being perpetually disappointed and unhappy. One could reasonably argue that this wouldn't be a relationship at all but merely a form of narcissism. It is difficult to imagine it working in the long run.”

Title – Marriage, or why I really really want same sex couples to be able to marry.

Author – Michelle Bell ; Original archive – The Gaytheists

Notable quotation – “My emotional tie up is more than wanting equal rights, and it’s more than fighting against religion having a bitchfit that they can’t make the government their happy fun-time bigotry playground. I guess I have a little bit of a confession to make – I want same-sex marriage because I’m selfish.”

Topic Two: Humanism in Action – Writings about the ways in which Humanism and Humanists are working to make the world a better place for all people. (A note to our viewers: As commonplace as Humanist principles now are in law and social life, there was once a time when Humanist organizations were viewed as fringe and looked down upon by the majority of society. These activists were well ahead of their time, and should rightly be regarded as heroes for their efforts despite great opposition.)

Title - The gay marriage: All animals are equal but some are (apparently) more equal than others

Author – Robert Nijssen ; Original archive - Gibburt

Notable quotation – “If you would want to defend that you have a certain right, but you would not want to extend that same right to your neigbor [sic], there is an easy strategy to follow: first find a distinguishing quality between you and your neighbor…an example could be that the neighbor wears glasses. Then you take that feature and argue that because of this feature he should not be allowed to have this right, for example people with glasses are not allowed to use the public bus system. And presto no more people with glasses on public buses (this last step of course will only work if you can convince enough other people of your idea).”

Title – World Food Day

Author – Michael Fridman ; Original archive – a Nadder!

Notable quotation – “But suppose we could teleport food. Surprisingly, this can cause more harm than good. The USA gives more food than any other country. But its policy (or law?) is that it must be US-made food brought on US Navy ships. This floods the local market with food, driving prices down and sending local farmers into even greater poverty. And ironically it’s local farmers who’re most likely to go hungry. Their crop becomes worthless so they can’t sell it to buy other produce they need. So even giving food is no silver bullet.”

Title – Repair Job

Author – Secular Guy ; Original archive – Towards a Rational America and an Enlightened Judaism

Notable quotation – “If nothing else, it's in our own self-interest to try to improve society and in turn benefit from these efforts. Moreover, through such responsible living perhaps people will mature ethically and will outgrow the need to look to an imaginary supreme being for guidance. Under these circumstances, ‘God’ will wither away, and civilization can then advance, liberated at last from the constraints of theism.”

Title – Brights co-founder on atheists and the 'non-religion religion ballgame' (video)

Author – Paul Fidalgo ; Original archive – Secularism Examiner

Notable quotation – “…but I also think that if the Brights approach adoption from the standpoint of ‘being an atheist is too stigmatizing,’ they will continue to have trouble, as most momentum that I've seen is on the side of pushing broad acceptance and pride in the a-word…They will have to sell themselves as an augmentation, a clarification, much as the term ‘humanist’ is, if they wish to woo more atheists to their particular cause.”

Title – Scientific Thinking to Guide Compassion

Author – Andrew Bernardin ; Original archive – the evolving mind

Notable quotation – “But I do realize that simply throwing money at a problem can miss the mark. What the practice of throwing money at a problem accomplishes is the comforting thought that you are doing something, and sometimes little else. I want to help, but not if in the end it’s not helping.”

Topic Three: Appreciating Humanism – Writings about gaining a deeper understanding of Humanist principles, tenets, and concepts. (A note to our viewers: It may seem strange to write articles about topics that are now commonly taught in schools and public forums, but at the time these pieces were written Humanist ideas were still in development. Historical archives such as this one are enthralling because they show the development of Humanism over time.)

Title – Why The New Humanism

Author – Greg Epstein ; Original archive – The New Humanism

Notable quotation – “It is also important to note that the New Humanism and the New Atheism absolutely share the same views on questions such as whether God exists (almost certainly not), or how best to understand the nature of the world around us (science and empiricism). And as to whether we ought to fight for such causes as the separation of Church and State, the teaching of evolution, and the promotion of atheism and Humanism as valid, patriotically American ways of life, our answers are also the same as those of the New Atheists -- you bet your life we ought to.”

Title – Science and the Worship of Truth

Author – Eric Michael Johnson ; Original archive – The Primate Diaries

Notable quotation – “While religious proponents believe that there is a One Truth that has been revealed through their sacred book, science operates under the assumption that human reason is finite and that a scientific theory is only valid until further evidence either refines or discards it for a better explanation. Science is never finished. It's a continuing work in progress and any accepted theory is merely ‘provisionally true’ for the time being.”

Title – A Few Words on the Dangers of Language

Author – E.M. Cadwaladr ; Original archive – e.m. cadwaladr

Notable quotation – “…Social identity is, as it were, familial identity writ large. It is an expression not of the need for a reliable source of knowledge, but rather it is the expression of the need for a reliable source of personal context and security. To be either a Christian, a communist, or even (to an admittedly lesser extent) a certified public accountant is to project what is essentially a family identity onto a group of individuals far too large and diverse to be a family. It is to expect a certain level of protection from inclusion in this group, even if, in some cases, this protection only amounts to a vague sense of social legitimacy.”

Title – Atheism, Openness, and Caring About Reality: Or, Why What We Don't Believe Matters

Author – Greta Christina ; Original archive – Greta Christina's Blog

Notable quotation – “There is an impossibly huge infinitude of things that we could imagine about the universe. Only the tiniest fraction of those things are actually true. If we're going to be truly open to the mind-altering magnificence and hilarious freakiness of the universe, if we're going to truly understand and accept and explore what is true about the universe to the best of our ability, we have to be willing to say ‘No’ to the overwhelming majority of things we can imagine about it. We have to be rigorous in sorting out reality from unreality... and relentless in our rejection of unreality.”

Title – Reverse-Engineering Religion, part four: A Humanist Creation Myth

Author – D ; Original archive – She Who Chatters

Notable quotation – “So see your vanity for what it is, embrace your vexation with all your spirit, and chase after the wind with a joyous heart. In the fullness of time, there shall be no reckoning, for everything that there is shall return to the nothing from whence it came. Fear nothing, and hold to the Law. All the World is open to you now, so take up understanding and love and pleasure, and be at peace with your mortality. This is the final mystery, for as death comes to us all, in death no one knows any thing, and so even your love and understanding and pleasure shall pass from you even as you yourself pass into the nothing.”

This concludes our program for tonight. Tune in for our next show on November 29^th, 2009, when we’ll be presenting The Humanist Symposium #46 (due to restrictions from our network hosts, this presentation will be broadcast on an alternative Feedquency entitled You Made Me Say It!) Thanks again for your interest in the diverse, fascinating, and inspiring history of Humanism!

Be well, and may prosperity and peace flourish in the lives of all of humankind.

Unshakeable

Tonight I attended a training session designed to educate me about child abuse. I needed to go to this because I’m going to be working with kids next week and it’s required that all volunteers undergo training of this kind. Members of the Catholic Church put the training materials together (why I’m attending Catholic training of this sort is a matter for a separate entry, which I’ll hopefully have finished by tomorrow, but the long and short of it is that I’m going on a Catholic mission trip). I went in with no expectations. I came out shaken to my core.

I suppose this may be one of the many lines that separates me from the believer I used to be—or, if I’m honest with myself, might well have never been. We saw a few training videos that included commentary from actual sexual abuse victims and stories told by real, convicted child molesters. These stories were utterly devastating to listen to: children as young as two being taken advantage of; girls being touched by their pastors, priests, coaches, foster fathers; boys being touched by their teachers, uncles, friends of their parents; abusers who found themselves unable to stop despite repeated attempts to quit… the list goes on and on. One particularly horrifying story involved a boy who was already a “problem” student when the abuse began; he felt trapped by his previous behavior, because his credibility had been damaged and he no longer thought anyone would trust him. On the other side of the spectrum, one of the perpetrators told his story on screen as a bearded adult, but ended it with the revelation that he was 15 when he was caught, thereby implying that he’d been in prison or rehabilitation since that time. Every story was heart wrenching. I became simultaneously horrified and furious: what sort of world is this that we live in where these things happen?

And as these emotions hit me, so too did something familiar: doubt. I remembered the doubts I’d faced many months ago, and the fact that some of them had come about because of similar situations. I’d hear about some kind of ghastly violence or terrible disaster, and I’d gaze upward and wonder, “Would a good God let this happen?” As I sat reminiscing, the rest of the class began discussing the films. I was easily the youngest person there, and undoubtedly the only non-believer. After all, this was a Catholic event: why would anyone who didn’t believe in God be present? But, again, that’s a story for another time. I noticed that instead of any expressions of uncertainty about God, everyone seemed quite able to fit sexual abuse into their Catholic worldview.

This may all seem trivial, but allow me to make my point: these stories of child abuse did not cause the die-hard Catholics in the room to question their God in the least (as far as I was able to tell). But that same stimulus, when shown to an atheist, made me wonder how anyone could believe in a perfectly good God (and I say this with full awareness of my own past faith). I was sitting there asking myself how I could’ve ever thought God was watching out for humanity, while everyone else was perfectly fine with letting God permit such despicable evil.

What justification can there be for sexual abuse of children? What possible reason could God have for letting innocent children be abused? I’m aware of the stock answers: free will, opportunities for others to be caring, unknown purposes, and so on, but (as is likely obvious) none of these answers satisfy me.

Perhaps they never did. Perhaps my faith was never as strong as I thought it was. But I’m ok with that now, because I can stand behind one thing that I’m very proud to say: I will not make excuses for a God who does nothing to prevent the sexual abuse of children.

My Deconversion Story, Part 3

I can’t really pinpoint a moment or a specific event. Most people can't, it seems. And part of me is really glad for that fact, because if I could point to one thing and say, “That's it. That’s what did it,” then I’d have to wonder if maybe I just haven’t done a decent job of getting over whatever tragedy I blamed on God and religion. Maybe that would be easier for my Catholic friends to accept. Maybe if I had this big, terrible event I could blame, then I could get my faith back.

But it wasn’t like that. It wasn’t just one thing. It was thing upon thing upon thing.

“Why is there so much suffering in the world? Why does God seem to answer only the most random of prayers? Why is it that even when I pray for someone with the deepest convictions of my heart, nothing changes? Why do I have to watch my friends go through pain and agony of many different kinds—physical, spiritual, emotional—without so much as whisper of reassurance from God? Why is it that every night I stare at the ceiling for hours, wanting so badly to feel that presence again, but try as I might I can’t? Has God abandoned me? Furthermore, why does it seem like I’m coming upon more and more aspects of God that just don't make sense? If God is good, why did he perpetrate so many evils in the Bible? If God is all-knowing, how can we have free will? If God is omnipotent, why is this world as horrible as it is? If God is perfectly just, how can he send people to Hell?” I could go on and on, and I know these questions aren’t particularly complex or deep, but they all came cascading down on me in the final months of my tenure as Retreat Planner. They shook me to my core. I sought professional counseling, for these and other problems. I wanted so badly to go back in time and erase the doubts, but I knew that was impossible.

Summer came and went. I thought a lot about what I believed. I realized that the reasons I’d had in the past weren’t trustworthy because they were primarily emotional. I believed in God because I felt like he existed. I loved Jesus because I felt like he loved me. But I had no reasons to back up those feelings. And try as I might, I couldn’t let myself believe something just because I wanted it to be true. I had to seek truth on its own, for its own sake, and without bias if possible. Nothing else would satisfy me.

I told myself I would take a break. See how things went without attending mass. Maybe I was just burnt out? Maybe I’d spread myself too thin during my service year? After all, some of my friends thought that, and I’d certainly devoted the majority of my free time to the Ministry. As my next and final year of college began, I opted to stay home on Sundays instead of going to mass. I tried to avoid weekly house prayers, but ended up going to those for the sake of keeping everyone on good terms. And a remarkable thing happened: nothing. I wasn’t struck by lightning. I didn’t get horribly sick. In fact, I had better grades that quarter than in any quarter of the previous year. I made new friends. I started living life for myself, instead of living for the expectations and approval of others.

And slowly, but surely, I let go of my faith. It was terrifying. It hurt so bad. But I let it go. I began studying arguments for and against God, seeing which ones held their ground and which ones fell flat. I told myself I was an agnostic, but once my last quarter arrived I could no longer deny how things had progressed. It felt good to step blinking into the sunlight. I was finally ready to face what had been coming for a year or more.

My name is Dale. I am an atheist. I once believed in God and his son Jesus Christ, but I don’t anymore. I don’t know what’s out there; I won’t claim to be sure that God doesn’t exist. But I know that I haven’t found a reason to cling to my old beliefs in the supernatural. I can understand a world that is purely physical. I can see it. It makes sense to me. And a world without a god seems more likely than a world with one, so for now the best answer I can give is that it’s likely that god does not exist.

I’m still searching for the truth. That hasn’t stopped either. This blog is a chronicle of my journey, written backwards, but also forwards, because even as I look at what I used to be, I get images of what I will become. I think and grow as I read more and more. Who knows? Maybe someday I’ll be eating these words. Maybe not. That’s part of the fun, isn’t it?

Our lives are a one-shot deal. Now that I’m no longer encased in a web of superficial, paper-thin illusions and imaginings, I can start making the most of mine.

Thanks for reading.

Something Awful

If you’re in the mood to become thoroughly disgusted by humanity, read this. Then go outside and stare at the sky and ask whatever god you believe in, “Why?”

I promise you, no one is going to answer.