The Hardest Conversion

I've been thinking about this for a while, but just now figured out how to put my thoughts into words. See, I was raised in one of the most frighteningly conservative and religious places I've ever heard of. I could give a bunch of examples, but really, I get tired of thinking about it. Anyway, it was completely unthinkable to not be a Christian--I was the hell-bound rebel because I did things like not hate gay people and think women should have equal rights. Having never been shown another option, I believed it, even if it did seem a little odd, illogical, and contradictory.

You can guess what happened next. Of course, I grew up to get overly educated and become an atheist. It's been a point of contention and something to constantly defend, and a choice I've learned to live with.

But you see, it wasn't a choice. How could it be?

Who would want to be an atheist? Who wouldn't love the comfort of some big loving daddy in the sky watching out for you all the time? Who wouldn't find infinite comfort in the promise of death being merely a transition--by the knowledge that those who have died are not gone forever, but waiting for you in a magical, wonderful, pain-free land? I would love to believe that again. But I can't. I can't re-believe in God any more than any one of us could re-believe in the Easter Bunny or the Tooth Fairy.

That's actually how things were in the last days of my faith in...well, something. I hadn't ever bought the whole shebang. I guess you'd say I was agnostic. It became very clear, though, that even that was a farce. Something I could tell myself to feel a semblance of control. Our Fathers were my way of controlling anxiety attacks--how terrifying to give that up. But it had to happen. In my heart, I knew the truth. I didn't believe. And I hadn't for a long, long time.

My coming out happened due to a convergence of events. I'd been reading Segan's Demon Haunted World and then Dawkins's The God Delusion. Both books explain that not just believing in superstition was dangerous, tolerating it was equally harmful for our society. At the same time this was sinking in, a co-working of mine was severely reprimanded by the principal for admitting to a student (who point blank asked the teacher's religion) that she is an atheist. I realized that this person was persecuted because cowards like me were afraid to be our true selves, out loud, in public. I saw laid out in front of me the very illustration of what I had just read. I may be a coward, but I am not a hypocrite or an enabler of oppression. So that was it. I had to open my mouth and say it. I am an atheist.

At first it was liberating--intoxicating, even. Like any new convert, I had (and in many ways, still have) zeal and confidence. But as the months passed, the burdens I bore like a red badge of courage got heavier. Never will the day come when all my questions are answered and I can have all the knowledge I want. The heady independence also has its down side when you need saving. No deus is coming from the machina, so you better get off your ass and save yourself. In moments of dumbfounding joy, there's no one to thank for the beautiful life you've been given (and even still, I say things like "given" instead of "made").

The hardest thing, though, came tonight. While making tombstones for our Halloween party, I had a kind of reverse memento mori moment: I remembered that they will die. Suddenly, I had a lifetime of losses to mourn. First the first time, it really settled in that all those people I loved so very much are gone. Forever. There will be no brightly lit reunion. I'd never missed them that much, because I felt it was temporary. Now, I have to grieve for the first time. I mentioned my grief to MS, who, while sympathetic, did not really understand. He never even believed in Santa. He always knew gone was gone. My grandfather died about the time I was in the death throes of my agnosticism--when I knew it was all bullshit, but couldn't make myself say it out loud. I realized tonight that that is why I took it so very, very hard. It was my first permanent death. Today I remembered that he was not the only one.

When everything is said and done, maybe I'll be wrong. And if I am, if this god in this heaven is really a good and loving god, he'll forgive me for my sin. If he is not, then I'm sure I wouldn't have passed muster, anyway. But ultimately, I think that any fair deity would would see the folly of creating logic then asking his charges not to use it. And I think he would realize that a life lived well, as a truly good person, as I strive so hard to be, without the hope of heaven or the fear of hell, is a life truly lived and loved and full of goodness, and is worth much much more than a mere trudging, sycophantic existence. Consider this my direct response to Pascal's wager: live life as though there is no god and it is entirely up to you to make the world kinder and more beautiful. If you're wrong, and there is a god, he will either be loving and be so proud of you for your work or he will not be loving and would have found fault in you anyway. If there is not god, you have lived like this: it is up to you and only you to save the world.