The Death of Denial
Lee Randolph's post incited to me post as well. For over 25 years, I sat by while beloved congregational members and families squared off against the most painful, ridiculous and astonishingly godless forms of death. I gave them every prayerful platitude I could. I prayed with tears...and so did hundreds, thousands of others. No answer came from heaven.
During that time, I comforted myself with the concept that I would die and go to heaven...that my life would not end, but would continue with pain, without doubt, without heartache in the presence of a loving God (who never seemed to answer the prayers that were placed so sacrificially on the altar of his promise..."ask anything in My name and I will do it for you."
Today, I no longer have that hope. I believe that one day, sooner than I can imagine it, I will face annihilation. The best part is, I really won't be around long enough to realize that I have been annihilated. I will cease to exist. My consciousness will cease as my physical body dies. There will be no heaven. No eternal life. No god. No reunion with loved ones. It will be over.
I have been called a fool, a coward, and apostate for choosing to accept the inevitability of my annihilation. How cowardly can it be, to turn away from the hope of eternal life based on the evidence? It was inferred by someone on this blogsite (in a comment to a previous post) that I did not seriously want to know the truth. Actually, I did really want to know the truth...and I finally admitted it.
There is no God. The promises of Christianity are lies. Dying people are not healed. Prayers are not answered. Blessings may be found, but only by those who are looking for them on a planet that gives them only by default.
I knew a man, who was a very committed Christian. He died a horrible, agonizing and painful death as the consequence of a brain tumor. His wife and children and thousands of people throughout the state of Florida and the USA prayed daily for this man for years...fasted...wept. No answer from God...unless you count the thoroughly bullshit answer of "yes-no-not now" that is the excuse of evangelicals who feel as if they must defend their idiotic faith in a God who so blatantly breaks his promises. A seemingly answered prayer can be an accident of chance; an unanswered prayer by a god who promises to answer all prayers in his name is the only proof needed that there is no god there.
Good, faithful, diligent, loving, compassionate, biblically literate, tithing, moral, prayerful, Republican...and most of all, they have accepted Jesus as their lord and savior. They pray, they weep, they join with others...NOTHING.
NOTHING. NOTHING. NOTHING.
That is why I accept that one day, I will be nothing. You will be nothing. Bug food. A lost memory to generations yet to come. A plot of cloth and wood and bone matter, scraped away by a developer in some upcoming subdivision.
Ernst Becker wrote the seminal book of the 20th century (IMHO) "The Denial of Death." Christianity, all religions, are just attempts to deny the reality of personal annihilation, to rage against the dying of the light. I don't fault for them that, just for the false hope they cause in people who otherwise suffer when they watch their loved ones die.
"Tie me at the crossroads when I die,
hang me in the wind till I get good and dry.
And the kids who pass will scatch their heads and say...
'who was that guy?"
Tie me at the crossroads when I die."
- Bruce Cockburn
"I'm not a slave to a god that doesn't exist!
I'm not a slave to a world that doesn't give a shit!
The death of one is a tragedy, the death of millions a statistic."
- Brian Warner (aka, Marilyn Manson)
21 comments:
Hi Brother Crow,
I fixed the formatting to give it the "collapse/expand" feature.
Nice article. I can tell it must have been hard on you. I have always thought that preachers have one of the hardest jobs.
(who never seemed to answer the prayers that were placed so sacrificially on the altar of his promise..."ask anything in My name and I will do it for you."
This is what I use as one of my "proofs".
And Bravo on bringing up the False hope. From my perspective it is maddening and heartbreaking watching them deal with the cognitive dissonance that results.
Brother Crow:
Let me give my own take on what you have said. I realized the falsity of an afterlife about 45 years ago, and I truly accepted it. It never bothered me, because it was the way it was, and death would be the one experience I knew I would share with every member of the human race.
And I knew, even before that, that pain, horror, suffering, and tragedy existed. It made me sad, and horrified, and eager to change things. But it didn't make me angry that the world was not how I'd like it. I had no one to be angry with -- and imagining that it 'could have been different' implied the existence of a Guiding Intelligence that i also knew was non-existent.
There were (and are) things that got me angry with people, yes. I am angry at people who preach love -- and sow hate for those who do not think the way they do. And who think the best way of showing that love is to get the 'loved ones' to change one set of superstitions for another -- and then maybe help them in other ways, if there weren't other 'unchanged' to grab their attentions.
I get angry at those who teach religious tribalism because it leads to other forms of tribalism, and the battles between tribes, whether of different variants of the same religion or of different religions. And because it creates other evils springing from tribalism, like bigotry ande chauvinism -- in the literal sense.
I get angry at those who preach reverence for sacred texts, but blind themselves to all but the worst in them, who read the Old Testament and don't hear the teachings of social justice, who read the Gospels but skip over the parts about helping the poor.
(I also get angry at those who would take a Jewish rabbi who was so appreciative of sensual pleasures that his enemies called him a drunkard and a glutton, and turn him into a dour ascetic who thought pleasure was a distraction from his God.
(And similarly I get angry at those who applaud a Pope's preaching against sex and abortion, and run away from his condemnation of war and the death penalty. And I am infuriated at those who take one who loved the poor and demanded that those who loved him love the poor, and put the praise of 'free enterprise individualism' and 'lower taxes that ensure lower services' into his mouth.
But most of all I get angry at those whose superstition blinds them to science, to the science whose accomplishments are the only things that have made progress against the horrors. And even more that science whose method, with its demands for honesty, for evidence, for confirmation, for freedom of communication, and for acceptance of tentativeness and incompleteness represents man at his best and sanest.
Yes, the world has horrors -- less now than ever but they still remain. And yes, this life is all we have and when we die, we die completely -- though I hope, with no evidence, that everyone experiences, in the moment of death a moment of true understanding of what his life has meant to the other members of the club called humanity.
But dying is something we have to accept -- or delude ourselves with myths. But what counts is our living, our enjoyment of people, of the pleasures we can have -- without hurting others -- and what we do to help the whole club we're lucky enough to be members of.
Boy, Lee, you seem to have started an epidemic of attempts at eloquence.
Brother Crow:
I knew a man, who was a very committed Christian. He died a horrible, agonizing and painful death as the consequence of a brain tumor...
As a Christian, I would convince myself that the reason my prayers for healing, or at least a death without suffering, never seemed to be answered was that God, through their death, was affecting our lives and strengthening us in ways that I was never aware of. In his death would come ultimate good.
I heard that excuse recently when a young lady friend of mine recently died of stomach cancer. She was 40, and already a widow. I am sure God used her painful death to strengthen the two young orphans she left behind.
Dear God
I know that you have promised that this life, this body is temporal but the way we live and practice love and compassion, especially, towards those who mistreat us is a palpable demonstration of faith - I know that you did not create evil, but love even those who are infected with it. I know there are those who bear the marks of generations of sin passed down and I pray that intervention will break the cycle of destruction upon those who suffer such. I know with You what is possible. I know that you do not condemn but invite all to know and love you in return. I know that while You love all, not all will love You in return. The world hates You because You steal away it's tinder that fuels its voracious appetite.
When we are hurting and the pressures of the winepress bear down on us, I know firsthand that this can shape courage and compassionate outreach and faith or.......discouragement, destruction and abandonement of hope.
We do not have to believe - You allow us to demonstrate what we truly value and act out in our daily lives. You give to us that which we truly demonstrate that we desire and pursue.
I write this as one who is able to to see and hear your love even in the midst of persecution and hatred - it is an honor to live fully in the face of death. Thank You -
"When we are hurting and the pressures of the winepress bear down on us..."
This prayer might work, if we were all grapes.
"I am sure God used her painful death to strengthen the two young orphans she left behind."
That is just contemptible. Both that a god would do such a thing, and that someone would believe it's okay for a god to do such a thing. The lengths to which a religious mind will go to rationalize cruelty and pain astonishes and saddens me.
I write this as one who is able to to see and hear your love even in the midst of persecution and hatred
I would imagine God/Jesus would take offense at what you consider to be "persecution and hatred."
Does God take offense at hatred? or offer salvation from it??
no, mmm, He would take offense at you calling your relatively plush existence "hatred and persecution".
General rule of thumb--if you can publically complain about how you're being hated and persecuted, perhaps you aren't being as hated and persecuted as you think.
Hi Shy - thanks for projecting your personal opinion - are you in the habit of trying to get people to conform to your understanding?? I think that personal experience is...well, personal. I don't manipulate well.
MMM:
While my immediate response to your complaint about 'persecution and hatred' was the same as Shygetz' I realized we were both being unfair. First, I believe we immediately jumped to the conclusion you lived in America, at least I did. Perhaps that is not true. Certainly if you are a Christian in Egypt, Pakistan, or China, you HAVE possibly undergone persecution.
So let me ask you what country you are writing from, and please give use some example of what you mean by 'hatred and persecution.' If you don't want us to intrude on your personal life, give us examples of someone else you know who has experienced this.
Prup, you seem to have a good and noble heart - one that truly does seek the truth.
I appreciate your asking. I do not suffer persecution here. I think Shygetz may have presumed that I was inferring such. My writing was spontaneous and reflective of the suffering I have endured in an area that is quite wealthy but spiritually impoverished. I live in the US and the suffering I have endured does not come from confessed atheists or confessed non believers - on the contrary. I have a soft spot for nonbelievers.
prup, I didn't assume that he was from America, I assumed he was from a country that had unfettered internet access. I realize that I may have been mistaken; mmm may have been writing from a pirated account in one of the countries you mentioned. However, turns out both of our assumptions were correct.
mmm said: "I do not suffer persecution here. I think Shygetz may have presumed that I was inferring such."
and also said: "I write this as one who is able to to see and hear your love even in the midst of persecution and hatred - it is an honor to live fully in the face of death."
You are right, it was very presumptuous of me to read into your writing that you claimed to suffer persecution and hatred. My bad.
Sigh... I really do hate responding to these polemics, namely because the problem of evil proves basically nothing. In contemporary philosophy almost all sides are willing to admit that, unfortunately this site is amoung the sources which necessitates the "almost". The mystery of evil is just that, and while I think there are good reasons to allow the world to be the way it is it is still a mystery. But as I have said... do you think Jesus did not know this on the cross? The early church being martred? Blase Pascal, on of Christianity's greatest intellectuals, died a terrible death at the age of 39 yet echoing many of the great Christian thinkers he said these great words "The life of a Christian is to suffer". Of course I can emphasize with this site using the problem of evil, many people have a faith so shallow that it takes far less than a philosophical cantrip to cause them to lose it for less than rational reasons.
Shy you are naive - your understanding prompts a sense of protectiveness within me....
Ah, glorious patronization; I take it that, in the face of your own contextual and accurate quotes, you have nothing of substance to say.
gordonblood said: "I really do hate responding to these polemics, namely because the problem of evil proves basically nothing. In contemporary philosophy almost all sides are willing to admit that, unfortunately this site is amoung the sources which necessitates the "almost"."
A bald assertion. Evidence please. Otherwise, I will not accept your word for it. I have read many modern philosophers of religion that state that the PoE is THE major problem for 3-omni theology, and NO secular scholars who have said it is not. Now, I'm not saying they don't exist, but from my informal survey they certainly don't seem to be the vast majority that you imply. John Loftus is much more well read on this topic than I; perhaps he will weigh in.
The mystery of evil is just that...
"Mystery" being the religous synonym for "apparent paradox". The PoE is a simple idea that weighs strongly against the tradiational notion of a 3-omni God; the fact that you must appeal to mystery is a capitulation, not an impasse.
But as I have said... do you think Jesus did not know this on the cross?
I do not think Jesus was who you thought he was, so I would reply that he certainly wasn't thinking about the PoE during his crucifiction, if indeed it occurred. His thoughts were probably much more primal at the time.
The early church being martred?
Look, gordonblood, I don't think anyone here denies the sociological and psychological power of religion; we simply deny its truth and require reliable evidence to be convinced of it. You must remember, almost every major religion (and many minor ones) has its martyrs, and most of them are mutually exclusive; this fact alone proves that people are willing to suffer and die for a lie. Now I can't speak as to how often these martyrs thought about the PoE, or the depth of their understanding of these matters. It wouldn't surprise me if they, like you, punted to mystery.
many people have a faith so shallow that it takes far less than a philosophical cantrip to cause them to lose it for less than rational reasons.
Skeptics point out a fundemental contradiction in traditional Christian theology; Chritians are forced to punt to mystery, leaving this apparent paradox unanswered. You consider this an irrational reason to harbor doubt?
Death makes our lives meaningful. Life without end would become torture. Nevertheless, death comes way too soon. So stay healthy, and have lots of kids.
Shygetz, at first I didn't understand some of what you were implying especially about being patronizing, so I wanted to add a few remarks regarding perspective -You said a couple things that seemed presumptive and do not apply to the meaning of what I wrote.
Firstly, you inferred that what I wrote was a complaint - I wrote that it was an honor to live fully in the face of death. Where did you get the notion of complaint from?
Secondly, you mentioned that God would take offense at my situation and what I was calling persecution. On the contrary, if it were not for God, I would have myself been cooperating with hatred instead of seeing it for what it is. Jesus knew that the seed of violence and death began in the spiritual realm in the form of hatred. Jesus Himself accused the Pharisees of trying to kill Him long before they actually had Him turned over for crucifixion. Hatred does breed consequences as does love - both can be palpable within the material/physical world. I think you envision persecution to mean religious persecution from a government/political power. While I put value on freedom of speech as well I am not blind to the ways that hatred can begin to erode at the foundation of our freedoms. I can assure that there are different forms of persecution that having nothing to do with oppressiveness from political/governmental powers. Jesus was not persecuted by having a government power keep Him from speaking - He was accused of blasphemy and punished by death for speaking the truth about how believers should portray God in the world.
Without God I believe that people eventually come to a point of justifying the mistreatment of those they deem a threat to their own status quo. Jesus said there would always be war and poverty. People who believe that they are here on this earth by themselves can justify saying and doing terrible things to one another and feel "right" about it.
That's about all I have to say for now - thanks.
MMM: I have to argue with several of your points. First with the idea that the Pharisees had anything to do with Jesus' death. They were not a group that would persecute even a group like the Essenes, far more radical in their teaching than Jesus was. (His teachings are very close to those of the school started by Hillel, and even the 'Golden Rule' was Hillel's first. In fact, Hillel's formulation "Do not do unto others as you would not have them do unto you" actually makes more sense.)
The idea that the Pharisees or the Jewish people in general had anything to do with the Romans' putting Jesus to death only makes sense if you accept the accounts of the 'trials' as accurate. Unfortunately for holders to 'biblical inerrancy,' not only do all four contradict each other, all are contradicted by everything we know about the Sanhedrin, Jewish legal procedure, or even the rules Jews did and do observe for their holidays.
(I also point out that, even by the biblical accounts, Jesus was arrested and tried alone, not with any of his followers. And the concept of 'public trials' didn't exist for hundreds of years, so where did these reports come from? If you say some Sanhedrin member was a later convert, this does not give any witness for the supposed trials before Pilate and Herod Antipas -- and the story about Pilate is completely against all we know of his character.)
No, it was the Romans who killed Jesus. The only question is why. (I have a theory on that but it is so speculative I won't even discuss it until i have a chance to do more research.)
As for your statement "Without God I believe that people eventually come to a point of justifying the mistreatment of those they deem a threat to their own status quo. ... People who believe that they are here on this earth by themselves can justify saying and doing terrible things to one another and feel "right" about it." deserves, I'm afraid, only one comment.
What world have you been living in? It has been the religious people, the people who claim to be 'with God' who have been doing the persecuting, and the guilt is straight across the board. The history of anti-Semitism, from the Lutheran Germans, the Catholic French (The Dreyfus Affair and the years after that), the Orthodox Russians (pogroms) and the activities of the Americal evangelicals that were the Ku Klux Klan os one place to start. Or look at the anti-Muslim bigotry -- and the Muslim violence. Or the Irish situation. Or the situation in the 'former Yugoslavia' where the multiple hatreds involving the Orthodox Serbs, the Catholic Croats, and the Muslim Bosnians have a strongly religious basis that dates back far before WWII. And the battles in Nigeria between christians and Muslims, the Muslim-Hindu struggles in the Indian subcontinent -- which killed more people in the partitrion riots than all the others I mentioned except the Holocaust -- the Muslim persecution of Christians in Pakistan.
Read some history. it really would help you.
Thanks Prup - you put a lot of thought into your responses.
Without God people do justify hurting one another - and the religious often do act upon their own volition without God.
There are references in scripture that indicate that there are those who are religious who are not believers.
Without God people do justify hurting one another...
Yet at least they must come up with a justification. God DIRECTS people to kill in his name, making the justification quite simple.
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