Did that title make you think I was going to apologize for the excesses of Christianity…or possibly the reverse…that somehow I imagine I am better than non-believers?
Actually, it was a play of this interesting article I saw a few days ago:
“My atheism does not make me superior to believers. It’s a leap of faith too”
Based on what I’ve seen in social media, a lot of new atheists should read the piece…for instance:
But my conviction that there is no God is nonetheless a leap of faith. Just as we have been unable to prove there is a God, we have also been unable to prove that there isn’t one. The feeling that I have in my being that there is no God is what I go by, but I’m not deluded into thinking that feeling is in any way more factual than the deep conviction by theists that God exists.
I keep this fact in mind – that my atheism is a leap of faith – because otherwise it’s easy to get cocky.
And, after noting that religion doesn’t have a corner on bad attitudes, the author posits:
Perhaps this is not religion, but human nature.
As I once said in a Twitter dialogue with Penn Jillette:
And “blind faith” in anything, religious or secular, is a very dangerous thing…
Sometimes our blind faith is in ourselves…what we “know.” The article’s author, Ijeoma Oluo, probably realizes that too.
I hope she finds the God she doesn’t believe in (yet). Her intellectual honesty can be used within the church…and that God wants her in His fold.