From: bskendig@netcom.com (Brian Kendig)
Subject: Re: An open question on the A.A FAQ/Intro ...
Organization: Starfleet Headquarters: San Francisco
Date: Tue, 29 Dec 1992 01:44:43 GMT

news@illusn.enet.dec.com (Mark Sornson) writes:
>
>>"But of course atheists see no evidence for the existence of God -- they are
>> unwilling in their souls to see!"
>>
>>Many, if not most atheists were previously religious.  As has been explained
>>above, the vast majority have seriously considered the possibility that God
>>exists.  Many atheists have spent time in prayer trying to reach God.
>
>    My question is:
>
>        Q:  For anyone (currently an atheist) who has had this experience
>            (having spent time in prayer trying to reach God), what did it
>            mean for you to have tried to reach God?  (In other words what
>            were you praying for and what sort of answer were you hoping
>            to receive?)

Mm, that's a fair question.  Let me see what I can do.

"Trying to reach God" meant baring my soul, trying to be as truthful
as I could, and supplicating to what I believed was a loving and
all-powerful deity who was sparing a few moments from his busy
schedule just to listen to me.  I admitted my failings, and I really
did my best to let him know that I still cared, and asked for help in
becoming the person he wanted me to be.

In return, I hoped to receive some feeling that I was guided, and that
I was loved.  I didn't really expect anything fancy -- just a feeling
that something was Right, perhaps a small sign here and there that I
was doing the right thing, but mainly some sense that a god was
present in my life, ready to help me if I called out to him.

And I did see signs, and I did feel the presence.  And all was well.

That didn't last forever, though.  There came a time when my life went
into a tailspin, mainly because my high marks in school had attracted
many bullies to me.  Through it all I did my best to remain steadfast
and true -- "turn the other cheek," the Bible said, "forgive them for
they know not what they do."  And I clung to God, because God was all
I had -- my self-confidence was being eroded day by day.

I began to wonder why I was the subject of all this punishment.  I
began to become disillusioned as I found myself falling deeper and
deeper into despair, with nothing but a 'presence' to comfort me.  I
began to experiment: I would look for a sign about something, and I
would later see something that I could interpret as having fulfilled
what I was looking for; I came to realize that 'signs' were largely a
result of my subconscious.  I realized that the 'presence' was there
only because I had wanted to feel it, much as a child sincerely
believes that his teddybear will protect him or as a gambler has the
utmost faith in his rabbit's-foot.

One day I sat in front of the chapel, mulling over my fate.  And I
distinctly remember what happened: it was like someone had finally
focused the slide-projector, or tuned the static out of the radio; but
I suddenly had the singular sensation of being completely and utterly
alone.  It had never really occurred to me before that there might not
really be such a thing as God; atheists were always considered as
'misguided, lost souls who had not seen the Light' in my classes.  But
all at once everything snapped into clarity around me, and my heart
finally admitted what my mind had been trying very hard to avoid
seeing: that the universe is what I make of it.

It's difficult to describe the feeling I had that day, but I do
remember just laughing for a long time at the irony of it all.  From
that day forward I took command of my own life, claiming praise for my
successes and accepting blame for my failures.  God, if he exists, has
never found reason to interfere.

>...
>    One point from the outline was that some people are atheists because in
>    the course of their education, they are influenced by authority-figures
>    (particularly in the realm of science) who are also atheists -- which
>    is to say that some follow the course of their 'intellectual superiors'
>    due to the fact that they ARE viewed as authorities (which, I believe,
>    is similar to the notion that some people become religious because the
>    authority figures in their life are also religious).  If anyone has
>    something to say on this point, I'd be willing to listen to it as well.

I had no atheists in my life.  I became an atheist after I had been
attending a Catholic school for five years (and scoring high in my
theology classes), and very soon after I had been confirmed as a
Lutheran.  Like I said, at the time I abandoned my faith, I wasn't
even really aware that there was any organized atheism in this country.

I hope this clarifies things a bit for you!

-- 
_/_/_/  Brian Kendig                             Je ne suis fait comme aucun
/_/_/  bskendig@netcom.com                de ceux que j'ai vus; j'ose croire
_/_/                            n'etre fait comme aucun de ceux qui existent.
  /  Nolite te bastardes     Si je ne vaux pas mieux, au moins je suis autre.
 /    carborundorum.                                             -- Rousseau
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