From: "Alan"
Subject: Re: Atheism, another religion or is delusion universal?

I have browsed your WebPages with interest and enjoyed the Humour and the invective. However, I am a committed Christian converted from Atheism and sadly you have not convinced me that reverting back to the nothingness of Atheism is going to offer me something better than I have already got. ... Your pages convince me that you do not have any respect for the numinous, rather you believe truth is what you can see, hear, feel or touch therefore I know Atheism has nothing else to offer.

It is curious that Alan, an official with a small local council in Britain, assumes that my purpose is to "convince" people to convert to the "nothingness of Atheism." Curious, but not surprising. Many religious people are consumed by the idea of converting others to their own beliefs - it's as if their beliefs aren't secure so long as there are those out there who disagree. Mormons in particular engage in a great deal of proselytizing and Alan is a Mormon, so it isn't really a surprise that he might assume that anyone who writes differing opinions from his and who critiques theological positions must therefore be engaged in the same sort of proselytization he participates in. It's simply a matter of not understanding that not everyone is exactly like he is.

It's also curious that he assumes that atheism has or needs to have anything to offer - a common assumption that I see used by many Christians. It seems to me that they misunderstand atheism on a fundamental level. Atheism, to them, represents some sort of philosophical or religious position that is equivalent in terms of structure and nature to their own religion. Therefore, they expect atheism to "offer" things in the same way that their religion "offers" things.

This, as I noted, indicates a fundamental misunderstanding of atheism - a rather deplorable situation in this case since Alan claims to have browsed my site "with interest." Taking this and other comments of his into account, I can only assume that "browse" must mean something like glancing quickly at a couple of dozen pages and then forming his opinions - not unlike how people "browse" television stations by quickly flipping through them with a remote control.

As for the numinous - I'm afraid that I simply don't know of anything "numinous" to respect or disrespect. I know of people's claims about things "numinous," but lacking any clear reason to believe that such things actually exist, there's no point in forming any respectful or disrespectful position with regards to them. This is not at all unlike people claiming that atheists "hate God," a nonsensical statement in light of the fact that atheists don't believe in gods in the first place, so there is nothing there for them to hate. At most, they might hate belief in gods - but that's an entirely different matter.

Alan finally claims that I "believe truth is what you can see, hear, feel or touch." This is a common assumption about atheists and I challenged Alan to cite a single place on the site where I proclaim or endorse such premise - but he failed to do so. There are, perhaps, atheists who really do limit themselves so severely that they don't believe anything unless they can "see, hear, feel, or touch" it - but I have never met such a person. For the most part, we must regard this as a straw man caricature created by theists about atheists.

Granted, being able to see, hear, or feel something is usually an excellent reason to believe something - but it isn't the only possible reason and every atheists I have ever known has recognized this. For one thing, atheists are quite willing to accept the truth (or at least the probable truth) of something based upon logical arguments and personal testimony, depending of course upon the topic at hand. Atheists are also willing to accept the existence of concepts, like freedom and love, despite the fact that people can't actually "see" freedom or "touch" love.

I don't know if "delusion is universal," but delusions about atheism and atheists are rather common - and Alan, it seems, has been suckered into quite a few of them.

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