From: jaker@csugrad.cs.vt.edu (Jake Rose)
Newsgroups: alt.atheism,talk.religion.misc
Subject: Re: What brought you to atheism?
Date: 7 Oct 92 14:26:12 GMT
Organization: Virginia Tech Computer Science Dept, Blacksburg, VA

bskendig@netcom.com (Brian Kendig) writes:

>Jeff, that was a wonderful story about how you came to the beliefs you
>have today.  I think that most of us fellow atheists have similar
>stories of unanswered doubt; you're in good company!

>[Talk.religion.misc readers: the story was only posted to alt.atheism,
>but it's very much worth popping over to that newsgroup to read.]

>to me, I'd be a convert in an instant!  Could it be that some sort of
>deity existed, but that he didn't want to talk to me?  Or that I'd
>been so devout in my atheism that I hadn't even allowed myself to
>consider the possibility that he might be real?

It's good to see people thinking instead of blindly following one
thought or another.

>Having decided this, though, I was still hesitant.  A moment's
>soul-searching revealed why: I was afraid.  Afraid that the entire
>framework of what I know to be true would be shattered; afraid my life
>would become more difficult if I had to worship a deity.  But
>eventually even this was overcome; like I said, I _had_ to know.

>Saturday night was the night I was ready.  I knelt by my bed and
>prayed -- not a "hail-mary" sort of prayer, but a prayer to whatever
>might be out there listening, whatever sort of 'god' was in charge.  I
>explained -- to myself, to the darkness, to Beyond, Christian or
>otherwise -- how badly I wanted to know the truth, wherever it would
>lead me.  I begged the silence for some glimmer of godhood to be seen,
>even just some faint sense that there was something special around me.
>In short, I opened the door of my mind.

>There was no one there.  For quite a long time I remained there,
>waiting and hoping beyond hope, but no god ever showed up.  Nothing
>happened.  There was no rush of love and happiness and wellbeing;
>there was no shimmering light; there was no choir of angels; there
>wasn't even any quiet sense of inner peace.  There was only me, my
>bed, and my dark room.

>I've thereby regained my confidence in my atheism.  How can I believe
>in a god who can't be found even when I go looking for him?  If he
>does exist, then why should I believe in him if he hides from me?

>as well play a character in _Waiting for Godot_).  The best I can do
>is to go about my life without concerning myself with gods, but I'll
>always be listening just in case any god _does_ come knocking on my door.

>I still don't know how it is that some people claim to have
>experienced some wild stuff that they attribute to "revelations from
>God", but I'm no longer interested in trying to find an answer.  If
>God wants to win my faith, he knows where to find me.

There are many possibilities - one is that humans are a lot more self-
deceptive than we give ourselves credit for - people might actually have
these feelings, but they might well be self-inflicted, or if you want to
consider the possibility of true empathy or telepathy (I'm not advocating
that these things exist, mind you), they could be getting them from others.
Since we don't know everything about the human mind to say the least, it
might also be possible that those who have experienced these things were
having a seizure or in fact possess an abnormality in their brains.  Who
knows?  The point is, neither athiesm or theism can be *shown* right - let's
say that there is a god, but it's not omnipotent, for example.  In this case,
maybe it *did* try to communicate with you, but *your* brain isn't equipped to
receive - there are many possibilities along these lines, as you can see.

Agnosticism, on the other hand, accepts these facts and says that we can't
really know anything about a god even if one did exist, and we can't know that
one doesn't exist, either.  In the same line of thought, we could have been
created 15 milliseconds ago just as we are now, and we'd never know - you
creationists can't know that you aren't the result of evolution.  I tend to
think that the scientists are right, but no one can ever be sure of anything.

>_/_/_/  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.
>                             Si je ne vaux pas mieux, au moins je suis autre.
>                                                                 -- Rousseau
-- 

Wulf                    |Ask not for whom the telephone bell rings - if thou
jaker@csugrad.cs.vt.edu |art in the bathtub, it tolls for thee.

-- 

Wulf                    |Ask not for whom the telephone bell rings - if thou
jaker@csugrad.cs.vt.edu |art in the bathtub, it tolls for thee.
Organization: Freshman, CIT general, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA