When I read this entry I was wondering why people who do not believe in God are still worried about how their lack of faith might appear to believers. Would we similarly worry about how we treat a child's faith in the tooth fairy? Why is believing in God any different than believing in the tooth fairy? Why do people who have no qualms in eating free pizza at ACM suddenly worry about the free food they consume at these religious meetings?

It is sad fact of life that religion is so ingrained all around us that we never even question why religious beliefs are considered sacrosanct. Religion has always been the worst nightmare for mankind. From holding back science in the dark ages to the great cruelties that the Christian missionaries inflicted on indigenous population nothing has causes mankind more harm than this delusional belief that there some God who has created this life and there is a heaven or hell to go to when this life is over. Qualitatively there is no difference between the perpetrators of 9/11 and people who bomb abortion clinics. This belief in God allows man to commit intolerable cruelties to his fellow men as long as they have been sanctioned by God. People are already on the slippery slope to dogma once they accept as fact something which has no evidence. Once this first step is done it is not long before you can be convinced to kill in the name of God.

For agnostics who want to sit on the sidelines of this debate I cannot but point to this poem by of all people a Priest

First they came for the Communists, and I didn’t speak up,
because I wasn’t a Communist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak up,
because I wasn’t a Jew.
Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn’t speak up,
because I was a Protestant.
Then they came for me, and by that time there was no one left
to speak up for me.

If you believe that someone else should take up the cudgels and fight the religious right while you safely pursue your selfish interests thinks again. What would happen if everyone thought like you? This country is already perilously close to becoming a theological state. We are surrounded on all sides by these evangelical Christians, who believe in unabashed proselytizing. If we do not take some steps soon we would no longer have the luxury of disbelief.