Candide

marcescence asked: Heym, just came across your blog on the athiesm tag. I haven't read any of your posts yet, but I also think that "His Dark Materials" was a huge factor in my becoming athiest after 15 years of Catholic school. Glad to know that story has opened up other people's minds as well!

It’s a wonderful, beautiful series.

Your question has inspired me to write up how I rejected God.

Yeah, when I was a kid I loved science, especially astronomy, and geology, evolution and dinosaurs. And I remember really struggling to reconcile what I knew about the history of the world with the story of a Biblical creator. I came to the conclusion independently that it must just be metaphor and was happy to say that til age 9ish. Then I read HDM and it opened my eyes to the idea that, wow, there were people that actually criticized the Church. I was coming from a place where everyone is Catholic and goes to church every Sunday - I had never met a Protestant, or a Hindu, or a Muslim, or whatever. I didn’t really know they existed. Anyway HDM sowed the seeds of doubt in my mind and it was a philosophy book called the Philosophy Files that crystalized for me the implausibility of a personal God. I was astounded and excited about this. I thought I’d made an amazing discovery. Age ten I walked into school and during RE proceeded to explain to the teacher that the Bible wasn’t the written word of God, and that the New Testament was cobbled together in the 5th century AD. I told her there wasn’t much evidence for God. And she started crying! I mean actually, crying. She thought I was going to hell.

Then the headteacher came and started shouting at me that I was an arrogant little brat and how dare I think I was right when everyone else in the world believed in God.

My parents didn’t believe me. 

Ever since that day I realized God was irrational. I was forced to go to Church still tho.

When I was sixteen I said I was done, and refused to go to mass anymore. My dad said I would go to church as long as I lived under his roof, and that I’d get kicked out if I didn’t. I was banned from everything and ignored. I live in a crazily Catholic community and not going Church is equated with evil. In the end i decided that they were all too childish to change their minds and so, I’m ashamed to say, I caved in and I still grit my teeth to go to mass to keep em happy… I don’t want to fall out with them, as I need to finish my education.

When i turn 18 I’m gonna try again to quit. I’m gonna have a talk with them before my birthday and explain why as an adult I deserve the respect to choose my own views. While I was a kid I ‘respected’ their blind faith, now I ought to get some respect too.

blueskiessunshine:

So I finished The Amber Spyglass.  I’ve just reread the whole His Dark Materials series by Philip Pullman.  The first time I read it I was in middle school, and it affected me powerfully even then, but I don’t think I understood it nearly as well then as I do now.  It’s stunning.  For one thing, the entire series is crafted perfectly.  I really don’t think there’s anything wrong with it.  And I truly believe that it is one of the most beautiful, touching, inspiring, heart-wrenching love stories ever told.  I’ve decided that rather than writing a proper review, since this book speaks so strongly for itself, I’ll just post a few of the most perfect quotes from the last thirty pages or so.  If you haven’t read the books, or haven’t in a while, I suggest reading enough of the quotes to convince your self, and then stopping so they’re not spoiled (though I can and will read them over and over again).  Anyway, here they are:

“‘I will love you forever, whatever happens.  Till I die and after I die, and when I find my way out of the land of the dead, I’ll drift about forever, all my atoms, till I find you again…’

‘I’ll be looking for you, Will, every moment, every single moment.  And when we do find each other again, we’ll cling together so tight that nothing and no one’ll ever tear us apart.  Every atom of me and every atom of you…We’ll live in birds and flowers and dragonflies and pine trees and in clouds and in those little specks of light you see floating in sunbeams…And when they use our atoms to make new lives, they won’t just be able to take one, they’ll have to take two, one of you and one of me, we’ll be joined so tight.’”

—-

“‘And if we - later on -’ she was whispering shakily, ‘if we meet someone that we like, and if we marry them, then we must be good to them, and not make comparisons all the time and wish we were married to each other instead…But just keep up this coming here once a year, just for an hour, just to be together.’”

—-

“Being cheerful starts now, Will thought as hard as he could, but it was like trying to hold a fighting wolf still in his arms when it wanted to claw at his face and tear out his throat; nevertheless, he did it, and he thought no one could see the effort it cost him.”

—-

“‘But really I don’t know what to do anymore.  I’m lost, really, now.’

“They looked at her: her eyes were glittering more than usual, her chin was held high with a look she’d learned from Will without knowing it.  She looked defiant as well as lost.”

—-

“‘That’s why we needed our full life, Pan.  We would have gone with Will and Kirjava, wouldn’t we?’

“‘Yes.  Of course!  And they would have come with us.  But -‘

“‘But then we wouldn’t have been able to build it.  No one could if they put themselves first.  We have to be all those difficult things like cheerful and kind and curious and patient, and we’ve got to study and think and work hard, all of us, in all our different worlds, and then we’ll build…’”

—-

And for the rest, you’ll have to read yourself.

I read the series when I was nine or ten. It changed the way I thought about the world. 

If the God of the Bible existed, I’d do my best to make him not exist.

If he knew everything and could do anything, I know I’d probably fail. But hey! Better to die than live under that kind of tyranny.

If he had the power to create me with the free will to defy him, he has the power to take that free will away. That’s a worthless form of free will!

If he was all-good and loved me, I still wouldn’t forgive him. Because, you know what, my mother loves me and would do anything in her power for me, but we still don’t let her have the power to do whatever she wants for me, do we? We value our independence!

A benevolent dictator is still a dictator.

I don’t believe in God, but let me tell you this, if a scientific experiment proves tomorrow that the God of the Bible is real, it doesn’t follow logically that I need to worship him. There’s truth in that adjective God-fearing. If God is real, I’d be really afraid, because no matter how good his intentions, no matter how much he loves me, that much power concentrated in one person can’t be good.

God is the ultimate police state. He see and hears everything. God is the perfect totalitarian. He has complete control.

What life would be worth living if it’s not your life to live? If your life is just in the hands of God?

If you can show me God exists, the first thing I’ll do is make the Case For Satan!