My Road to Unbelief
“Two roads diverged in a yellow
wood / And sorry I could not travel both... Oh, I kept the first for another
day! / Yet knowing how way leads on to way / I doubted if I should ever come
back... Two roads diverged in a wood, and I - / I took the one less traveled by
/ And that has made all the difference.” (Robert Frost, The Road Not Taken)
I’ve
done a lot of reading and thinking over the last year, and that’s led to me
posting a lot of things on Facebook that probably offended some of my friends
and family who are Christian. While I stand by everything I’ve posted, I
realize that no one likes getting on Facebook to be preached at. That is why I
am starting this blog. It’s a chance for me to take a stand on my soapbox and
give voice to my opinions. I’ve found that it’s much easier to achieve clarity
on an issue when you put your thoughts down on paper (metaphorical though it
may be in this case).
If
you’ve read this far, I’d like to give you fair warning here and now that my
posts may be rather lengthy. I didn’t write this whole thing in one sitting, so
I wouldn’t expect anyone to read it that way. I will also warn you that a lot
of the things I write in this blog might be offensive. The vast majority of
people I know are religious, and most of those are Christian. Every religious
person necessarily takes their faith very seriously. My hope is that nothing I
write here is perceived as a personal attack, but rather as a fair and open
criticism of religion. I think that everyone is free to believe what they want
about the world, as long as they don’t force their beliefs on others. So while
I don’t have the right to tell others their beliefs are wrong, I do stand by my
right to think they are wrong. To be
exact, I believe Christianity is morally, factually, and logically wrong. If
you disagree with my reasoning or think that I’m just flat-out wrong about the
whole thing, feel free to respond to me. I don’t take this subject lightly, but
I believe that open discussion of all subjects is the mark of a truly free
society. Without any further ado, let’s get down to the nitty-gritty of this
post.
The
word Atheist carries with it a lot of connotations, some good but mostly bad.
There’s been a lot of talk about Atheism during its resurgence in America in
the last decade: they’re bad people who have no moral compass, who strive in
every instance to put down or discard religion, and they are acting in
collusion with the gays and the immigrants to destroy America. I’m not kidding;
I’ve heard people say these things before. I promise you that Atheists are no
worse of people than any Christians you’ve met. Chances are that you know more
Atheists than you think; they don’t always make their non-belief known because
their worldview doesn’t hinge on convincing others to believe. Atheists tend to
get a bad rap in America because they push back against religion, which only
makes sense as they are a minority here in America. Sometimes that means that
they take it too far (like petitioning a university to ban players from putting
crosses on their helmets to honor a dead teammate), and the actions and beliefs
of the fringes of Atheism make it seem as though the idea is rather absurd.
That
being said, I’ve realized over the last year that being a Christian is
infinitely more absurd than being an Atheist. The Bible is a comedy of errors
(almost like the Purdue Football team); it’s full of historical inaccuracies, self-contradictions,
questionable morals, and logical pitfalls. Several examples include: 1) if
Jesus was born of a virgin, how was he born into the bloodline of David? 2) If
the Ark had no rudder, sail, or motor, why did Noah send a dove out to seek dry
land? 3) Why was it okay for Lot to stop the crowd from raping God’s messengers
by offering up his virgin daughters instead? 4) Without eating the fruit from
the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, how were Adam and Eve supposed to
know that disobeying God was wrong? This is by no means a complete list, but it
should give you a good idea of the problems I have with the aforementioned
text. I’ve also found out a lot about Christians through personal experience
and observations of people around me. One of the things I’ve noticed is that
many believers (and this is true in all religions) are very complacent in their
view of the world. Speaking mainly from examples that I’m familiar with,
Christians tend to acquire their entire worldview from the Bible. That’s
perfectly fine if someone wants to structure their core belief system around a
religious text, but they don’t seem to realize that there is so much more to the world than what is covered
in any single book (even one as massive as the Bible).
The
Bible may be able to tell you what is morally right and wrong (I’d argue we
don’t get our morals from the Bible at all), but it doesn’t tell you anything
about the nature of the universe. If you went to a university – not a Bible
college, but an actual university – and claimed that the only information you
needed to get your degree was in the Bible, they would laugh you out the door.
In the days when the Bible was written, the prevailing notion was that the
Earth was the center of our universe and Heaven and Hell were physically
adjacent. We now realize that the universe is bigger than we ever imagined,
estimated to be approximately 93 billion light-years in diameter and almost 14
billion years old! Likewise, we’ve also discovered concepts like the germ
theory of disease and how to replicate nuclear fusion in the core of our Sun. I
can safely say that our knowledge of the universe and its inner workings has
increased exponentially since Biblical times. And yet Christians will attempt
to use their Bible, which is itself one of many copies of innumerable
translations of ancient manuscripts detailing conflicting eyewitness
testimonies, to refute all that we’ve learned. I find it a constant source of amazement that
so many people I know - people that I consider extremely intelligent and open-minded
- actually accept the truth claims of that book. But I digress from my point.
The
point that I’m trying to make here is that life is an uphill battle, much like
the ancient Greek myth of Sisyphus; he was forced to an eternity of rolling a
boulder up a mountain only to have it roll back down each time he approached
the summit. We are transient creatures, and thus have only two options: go
backwards or press forwards. I’m convinced that to remain static in life is to
be dead. We must constantly try to improve ourselves, whether it is physically,
mentally, or spiritually. Therein lays the biggest problem with Christianity.
Instead of embracing progress, Christians prefer the status quo. They teach
that the world is how it is because God made it this way, and there’s no need
to change it because it will all come to an end soon enough. That’s why many of
them reject global warming, deny basic human rights (after they leave the womb,
of course), and despise evolution. This desire to stubbornly resist societal
and scientific advances is creating a lot of friction in America, considered by
some the most progressive civilization in history. There is no driving force
for change in Christianity, and many people are leaving the church because of
it.
The
process of change for me has been a long, often confusing, and occasionally
upsetting road to some form of personal enlightenment. I met special people
along the way that have shown me time and again how to break from the mold and
think for myself. I have read, and continue to read, many books about subjects
ranging from science to history, and as far as philosophy and psychology. I
watch debates on Youtube about the existence of God, the beginning of our universe,
and the origins of morality. I encounter new arguments on an almost daily basis
and try to determine which are true and which are false. I even continue to
learn amazing new things about my own particular area of interest (nuclear
power plants) in classes they hold at work. I won’t claim that I know
everything there is to know or that I hold some great personal truth, but I’d
like think that I become a better person with each new thing that I learn. The
Nobel Prize-winning French author André
Gide put it very succinctly: “Believe those who are seeking truth. Doubt those
who find it.” One of my favorite lecturers that I’ve heard (though
unfortunately not in person), Dr. Lawrence Krauss is fond of saying that all of
his students should have one of their core beliefs – something which they feel
they could not live without – proven wrong at least once in their lives. I tend
to agree with that sentiment.
The
things that I held true for the majority of my young life seem to me in
retrospect like those of a toddler. As we grow up and become adults, we put
away childish things. Don’t get me wrong; I’m not saying that Christians are
like toddlers. I’m simply asserting that adults, like children, tend to accept
what they are told, because they don’t know any better. We believe in Santa
Claus until one day we realize that our parents sneak the presents under the tree
while we are asleep. Likewise we believe in whatever deity our parents believe
in until we’re old enough to understand that it was just a legend, a tradition
passed on by the generations before us. Religion is a tool that humans created
to explain our origins and our purpose, defining what we knew about the world
and our place in it. Science has since shown how narrow our knowledge was back
then, and even now we can only imagine what the future holds for our species.
The truth about our genetic origins is being uncovered and the reason for
existence of our universe is out there somewhere in the vast unknown. I find
the fact that there is so much more to know about this reality extremely
tantalizing. How could a book that claims to possess ultimate knowledge ever
capture the magnificence of the unknown?
I
haven’t nearly covered everything I have to say about religion, but I think
that’s going to be the end of this post. I want to thank you for reading this
narrative of mine; I’m not immune to the vain hope that others read and take to
heart what I write. In regards to the contents of this post, if you agree,
disagree, or simply want to share your own thoughts on the subject, feel free
to contact me anytime.
Sincerely,
A
Follower of Paths Less Traveled
