let’s take christianity as a starting point, the way i see it is that a long time ago people had to address the idea of death because of the powerful emotions death releases among those who are bereaved. it became apparent to living individuals that dead people live on through their senses in a nether world mainly accessed through dreams. in this way the dreams of the living initiated belief in the afterworld and also served to dampen the horror of death among the living because it gave hope by the denial of death to the existence of an afterlife.

later ‘holy’ people, in their search for god, became venerated by their contemporaries both in life and death because of the sacrifices they made in their quest for a holy and constructive life. many of these holy people lived and died in remote locations practicing denial etc. later followers of these venerated individuals built temples around their graves usually marking the saint’s burial spot by placing the temple’s main alter above the saint’s grave.

these locations became venerated sites for pilgrims and as the influence of these churches grew the rich people living in the vicinity bequeathed land etc to the church in exchange for a good burial spot in the church close to the alter of the saint (look at tombs in old churches for example st patricks cathedral). by close proximity in death to the saint they believed they stood a better chance of the saint’s intercession and of getting to heaven. relics (dug up bones) of these saints were used to grow the influence of the churches through the establishment of more churches nearer the population centres and in this way the churches grew in wealth and influence and became the big business it is today. in the same way all religions are big businesses competing with one another.

so religion, dealing with death, afterlife etc are all constructions of the living and have nothing at all to do with the existence or otherwise of a so called god. so i believe life is for living and helping others if possible and not worrying about the afterlife or about getting caught up in the murky world of big business religions. more flowers along the path of life less along the grave!!

If only.

I feel the difference between you and me is more down to semantics. I say this largely because I agree with all the points you made in your article.

For me, being a theist means saying “There IS a God and I don’t have to prove it”, whereas being an atheist means saying “There is NO God and I don’t have to prove it.”

By that measure, I consider myself neither, but respect the fact that other people feel the need or desire to be one or the other. The only time I would have a problem would be in a religious state where they would oblige me to be religious, or a communist state where they would oblige me to be atheist.

Very much looking forward to disagreeing with you further.

Although I suspect we will end up agreeing most of the time… How boring!

President George Bush of the United States of America, Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom, and the country music singer Kris Kristofferson are not actually human beings. They are actually alien space lizards from another planet, who have taken human form in order to rule our world as part of a conspiracy that involves sacrificing human children and drinking their blood.

Most rational people, as their default position, would reject the idea that George Bush, Queen Elizabeth and Kris Kristofferson are non-human alien space lizards. They may accept, in a purely theoretical sense, that it might be theoretically possible, but – despite that theoretical possibility – they would not, in ordinary language, describe themselves as being agnostic about whether George Bush, Queen Elizabeth and Kris Kristofferson are non-human alien space lizards.

Well, the idea that gods exist is even more improbable than the idea that George Bush, Queen Elizabeth and Kris Kristofferson are non-human alien space lizards, in that the alien space lizard idea is marginally closer to being consistent with the laws of nature as we understand them. So, whatever excuse there is for being agnostic about the bizarre delusional ravings of David Icke, there is even less excuse for being agnostic about the idea that gods exist.

I certainly feel that the general notion of God is inconsistent and I don’t understand why modern ideas of God are any more reasonable than that of Zeus or Odin.

Still, I don’t believe atheism is tenable either, because no one can say they know the universe so well as to be certain that there is no being who does not have God-like characteristics.

Who knows? Maybe there is a Q out there somewhere.

I am more comfortable calling myself a “practising agnostic”, which means I kneel beside my bed each night and recite one hundred times “Fucked if I know.”

Still, despite its title, your essay isn’t actually about promoting atheism, it’s more about promoting secularism, which I can’t disagree with, much as I would like to because that would probably my comment more interesting.

Keep up the healthy skepticism!

Declan

Like the new blog and although I feel atheism is as untenable as theism, I look forward to reading your thoughts.

All the best.

Declan