I'm an Atheist, not an asshole.

Well, I wanted my first blog to be a little lighter of heart, but life, or in this case death, got in the way.

      I am an Atheist, and a liar, but I am not an asshole. More accurately, I am not an asshole so I lie about my atheism. There are times when I am only too happy to argue about the existence of God. I have made it a point to not let people just assume that I believe in God. I don't let them get away with calling my hard work a Gift From God, or my good fortune the Grace of God, or even comforting my grief with God's Mysterious Ways. I have, proudly, I might add, declared my atheism at a church. I have even gone to the Mormon Temple in Salt Lake during their yearly celebratory Conference to debate with high ranking officials.

      What I will not do is tell a grieving mother,
huddled over her only son as she has to make the decision to pull the plug or not, that I think her belief in God is bullshit. I will not tell her that the life-jacket that she so desperately clings to is only in her imagination, that if she would only open her eyes she would see that she is swimming on her own. She is strong enough to weather the storm without her delusions.

      I will not. I can not.

      I had no idea what I would do if put in such a position. I had no clue what I would say. What comfort can you give to someone when you know that they will never see their loved one again. There is no magical place where we all get to be together again. That is too depressing a thing to say at the best of times, it's downright cruel when a person has lost a loved one.

      What do you do then? I found out today. I lie. I lie and lie and lie. When she says 'It's God's plan', I agree. When she says 'he's in a better place', I nod my head. When she says that he is in heaven with his grandpa again, I cry with her and wish with all my heart that she wasn't wrong.

He is gone. No amount of wishful thinking will bring him back. I will never see him again. I grieve for the loss without the fantasy of a reunion. It hurts, but I will weather the storm. As I've said before, religion is a life preserver for those that can't deal with the world and I've taught myself how to swim. But, that doesn't mean I will smack the preserver out of the hands of those that can't. I am an Atheist, a cowardly liar, and possibly a hypocrite, but I'm not an asshole.