Godless (54 page)
We have also talked with
The Nation
columnist and author Katha Pollitt (
Learning to Drive
), Scott Dikkers of
The Onion
, scientist/activist Eugenie C. Scott of the pro-evolution National Center for Science Education, children’s author Philip Pullman (the week
The Golden Compass
movie was released), Pledge of Allegiance attorney/plaintiff Michael Newdow and actress/comedian Julia Sweeney (whose hilarious play and movie,
Letting Go of God
, is quite moving and, to borrow a phrase from the play, “scathingly brilliant”).
The Nation
columnist and author Katha Pollitt (
Learning to Drive
), Scott Dikkers of
The Onion
, scientist/activist Eugenie C. Scott of the pro-evolution National Center for Science Education, children’s author Philip Pullman (the week
The Golden Compass
movie was released), Pledge of Allegiance attorney/plaintiff Michael Newdow and actress/comedian Julia Sweeney (whose hilarious play and movie,
Letting Go of God
, is quite moving and, to borrow a phrase from the play, “scathingly brilliant”).
Other guests include
God is Not Great
(another blockbuster atheist book) author Christopher Hitchens, Nebraska senator Ernie Chambers, state/church plaintiffs Ellery Schempp and Jim McCollum, abortion-clinic bombing victim Emily Lyons (who barely survived and is now half blind with nails still embedded in her body), NBC correspondent Betty Rollin, editorial cartoonist Steve Benson, atheist and actress Janeane Garofalo, 90-year-old Nobel Laureate Paul D. Boyer and 93-year-old Carnegie Hall conductor David Randolph (both Lifetime members of the FFRF), scientist/author Robert Sapolsky (
Primate’s Memoir
),
The Progressive
editor Matt Rothschild, journalist William Lobdell (author of
Losing My Religion: How I Lost My Faith Reporting on Religion in America
),
New York Times
science writer Natalie Angier (author of
The Canon
), author Ann Druyan (Carl Sagan’s widow and co-author of
Contact, Comet,
and
Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors
),
Kingdom Coming
author Michelle Goldberg, poet and Darwin scholar Philip Appleman, feminist author Ellie Smeal, feminist author Robin Morgan, feminist author Barbara G. Walker, feminist songwriter Kristin Lems, skeptics Michael Shermer and the “Amazing” James Randi, as well as dozens of other fascinating national and local activists and authors.
God is Not Great
(another blockbuster atheist book) author Christopher Hitchens, Nebraska senator Ernie Chambers, state/church plaintiffs Ellery Schempp and Jim McCollum, abortion-clinic bombing victim Emily Lyons (who barely survived and is now half blind with nails still embedded in her body), NBC correspondent Betty Rollin, editorial cartoonist Steve Benson, atheist and actress Janeane Garofalo, 90-year-old Nobel Laureate Paul D. Boyer and 93-year-old Carnegie Hall conductor David Randolph (both Lifetime members of the FFRF), scientist/author Robert Sapolsky (
Primate’s Memoir
),
The Progressive
editor Matt Rothschild, journalist William Lobdell (author of
Losing My Religion: How I Lost My Faith Reporting on Religion in America
),
New York Times
science writer Natalie Angier (author of
The Canon
), author Ann Druyan (Carl Sagan’s widow and co-author of
Contact, Comet,
and
Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors
),
Kingdom Coming
author Michelle Goldberg, poet and Darwin scholar Philip Appleman, feminist author Ellie Smeal, feminist author Robin Morgan, feminist author Barbara G. Walker, feminist songwriter Kristin Lems, skeptics Michael Shermer and the “Amazing” James Randi, as well as dozens of other fascinating national and local activists and authors.
We have interviewed FFRF founder Anne Nicol Gaylor, who as a volunteer runs The Women’s Medical Fund, the nation’s longest-running abortion charity. The Fund has helped tens of thousands of indigent women exercise their constitutional rights. (Who said atheists don’t do good deeds?) Instead of preaching religion, I get to do a radio sermon called “Pagan Pulpit” in which I analyze the bible and current events from a freethought perspective. Other segments on Freethought Radio include “Theocracy Alert,” “Ask an Atheist” and “Freethinkers’ Almanac,” in which we profile the lives and accomplishments of famous nonbelievers in history. We also discuss our current lawsuits and state/church complaints and play historical and contemporary freethought music.
We have met many of the
Freethought Radio
guests in person, since some have been speakers at the annual national conventions of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, where atheists and agnostics around the country come for freethought fellowship, camaraderie and music. For me, the greatest adventure of atheism is getting to know all of these smart, empathetic activists. Author Oliver Sacks, describing himself as “an old Jewish atheist,” gave his first talk on rejecting religion at our 2005 convention in Florida. We also got to meet Nobel Prize-winning physicist Steven Weinberg, White House correspondent Helen Thomas, author Taslima Nasrin (who is under threat of a death fatwa), ethicist Peter Singer (it is interesting that the world’s leading ethicist is an atheist), political cartoonist Edward Sorel, editorial cartoonist Don Addis, attorney Alan Dershowitz and many other fascinating thinkers and shakers.
Freethought Radio
guests in person, since some have been speakers at the annual national conventions of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, where atheists and agnostics around the country come for freethought fellowship, camaraderie and music. For me, the greatest adventure of atheism is getting to know all of these smart, empathetic activists. Author Oliver Sacks, describing himself as “an old Jewish atheist,” gave his first talk on rejecting religion at our 2005 convention in Florida. We also got to meet Nobel Prize-winning physicist Steven Weinberg, White House correspondent Helen Thomas, author Taslima Nasrin (who is under threat of a death fatwa), ethicist Peter Singer (it is interesting that the world’s leading ethicist is an atheist), political cartoonist Edward Sorel, editorial cartoonist Don Addis, attorney Alan Dershowitz and many other fascinating thinkers and shakers.
Meeting these people in person is, for me, almost like dining with royalty. When I took Oliver Sacks to lunch in Orlando before his talk, he showed me his journals in which he was working on his latest book about music (which became
Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain
). He is a delightful person, like a child wide-eyed with wonder at the marvels of the universe and the weird intricacies of the brain, still carrying the periodic table in his wallet. He is somewhat hard of hearing and the restaurant was a bit noisy, and this provided the occasion for a humorous moment. I asked him what he thought about the hypothesis that music is a result of the brain’s need to perceive vowel sounds. He stopped and looked at me like I was crazy. Then he laughed and said, “Oh. I thought you said ‘bowel’ sounds!” (Well, I
have
heard some music like that.)
Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain
). He is a delightful person, like a child wide-eyed with wonder at the marvels of the universe and the weird intricacies of the brain, still carrying the periodic table in his wallet. He is somewhat hard of hearing and the restaurant was a bit noisy, and this provided the occasion for a humorous moment. I asked him what he thought about the hypothesis that music is a result of the brain’s need to perceive vowel sounds. He stopped and looked at me like I was crazy. Then he laughed and said, “Oh. I thought you said ‘bowel’ sounds!” (Well, I
have
heard some music like that.)
Since then, Annie Laurie and I have twice had the pleasure of accompanying Oliver Sacks to Carnegie Hall to hear David Randolph conduct the exquisite St. Cecilia Chorus (a completely secular group, David reminds us, with perfect vowel sounds) perform Mendelssohn, Orff and Verdi. Hearing Verdi’s
Requiem
while sitting in the center of the first balcony in the box next to 93-year-old David’s engaging 93-year-old wife Mildred was a freethought triple-header: the atheist David Randolph conducted the atheist Giuseppe Verdi in the hall named for the freethinker Andrew Carnegie. David Randolph, by the way, is the oldest person to have conducted at Carnegie Hall. He also holds the world record for complete performances of Handel’s
Messiah
: more than 170 times with full orchestra and chorus. (How’s that for being a tolerant atheist?)
Requiem
while sitting in the center of the first balcony in the box next to 93-year-old David’s engaging 93-year-old wife Mildred was a freethought triple-header: the atheist David Randolph conducted the atheist Giuseppe Verdi in the hall named for the freethinker Andrew Carnegie. David Randolph, by the way, is the oldest person to have conducted at Carnegie Hall. He also holds the world record for complete performances of Handel’s
Messiah
: more than 170 times with full orchestra and chorus. (How’s that for being a tolerant atheist?)
That Verdi performance was May 2, 2008. The next morning we caught a direct flight from New York to Los Angeles, arriving just in time to change into “black tie” attire for Julia Sweeney’s wedding to Michael Blum. What a show! (They should have charged admission.) Julia, looking gorgeous (
nothing
like the Androgynous Pat character she used to play on
Saturday Night Live
), and Michael were married by Father Guido Sarducci (comedian Don Novello), who used the hotel menu and Wikipedia as his source texts and only referred to the bible to criticize Jesus’ handling of the water-to-wine incident (calling it a “frivolous miracle.”)
nothing
like the Androgynous Pat character she used to play on
Saturday Night Live
), and Michael were married by Father Guido Sarducci (comedian Don Novello), who used the hotel menu and Wikipedia as his source texts and only referred to the bible to criticize Jesus’ handling of the water-to-wine incident (calling it a “frivolous miracle.”)
The atheist/agnostic culture is still so rarefied that it seems possible to meet just about every freethought dignitary in the world. As co-president of the FFRF, it has been my lucky lot to make many of the award presentations at our annual conventions. Handing the Foundation’s “Emperor Has No Clothes” award to Julia Sweeney, Christopher Hitchens, Steven Weinberg, Steven Pinker, Robert Sapolsky, Oliver Sacks, Alan Dershowitz and Peter Singer, among many other notables, has been an immense pleasure.
I was interviewed by NBC News correspondent and author Betty Rollin at Lake Hypatia (where she pronounced Alabama a “bad hair state”) for a
Religion & Ethics News Weekly
television segment on atheism.
Religion & Ethics News Weekly
television segment on atheism.
I was taken to lunch at the Bowery Bar in New York City by Deena Rosenberg (author of
Fascinating Rhythm: The Collaboration of George and Ira Gershwin
) and her husband, Ernie Harburg, who picked up the check and said, “Let’s let ‘Somewhere, Over the Rainbow’ pay for the meal.”
Fascinating Rhythm: The Collaboration of George and Ira Gershwin
) and her husband, Ernie Harburg, who picked up the check and said, “Let’s let ‘Somewhere, Over the Rainbow’ pay for the meal.”
We got to take Richard Dawkins to lunch before he gave his Distinguished Lectures talk at the University of Wisconsin, a talk that “sold out” like a rock concert with people showing up begging for tickets. (By the way, the Richard Dawkins Foundation produces a scarlet letter “A” pin and I wear one almost wherever I travel. So far, I have only met one other person wearing such a pin: Richard Dawkins. Who wants to be next?)
Atheism has no hierarchy, no clergy and no chosen people more “holy” than anyone else. The members of the Foundation are just as important as the speakers and guests. We are all part of the same species, using our individual talents to make the world a better place, in our own way. Many of the bravest people are those who need to remain anonymous, local residents complaining about a violation of state/church separation in their town, risking retribution to their families if the people in their superstitious county learned their identities. This was especially true of the courageous family that challenged bible classes being conducted in the public schools in Rhea County, Tennessee. Not even their own children knew it was their parents who complained! When the FFRF filed suit with that family as plaintiffs, the Chattanooga judge granted a federal protective order after learning that many conservative Christians in the city of Dayton (famous for the 1925 Scopes Trial) were demanding to know their identity, threatening to run them out of town. They were able to file anonymously as “John Doe,” “Jane Doe” and “Doe Child 1,” etc.
It was a real adventure for me to fly down there and meet secretly with the father to talk through the process. I sensed both his palpable fear of the local bigots and his intense devotion to the principle of keeping religion and government separate. Although it was a long fight—the school board and county board would not budge an inch—we won that case easily. Our lawsuit (which we nicknamed “Scopes II”) stopped a 50-plus-year violation that had students from the fundamentalist Bryan College (a legacy of William Jennings Bryan, the creationist attorney who debated Clarence Darrow in the Scopes Trial) entering the public schools during class hours to teach the bible to fifth graders. To this day, no one (other than the attorneys, who are under a federal order) knows the identity of that family, which doesn’t want any recognition.
These
intelligent, ethical, working class people are my real heroes. They are much more courageous than any Christians I have ever known.
These
intelligent, ethical, working class people are my real heroes. They are much more courageous than any Christians I have ever known.
Another real adventure is finding other former clergy, like myself, who are now atheists or agnostics. Richard Hewetson, an Episcopal priest whose bishop knew he was gay when he was ordained, says that the reason he entered the ministry was that, at the time, he considered the church to be the best vehicle for helping people. Dick, who is one of the funniest guys I know, says another reason he became a priest was so that he could be around men who wore dresses. He left the ministry because he could “no longer pretend to believe the church’s teachings or practices.” Today he is retired, living in San Francisco on a pension from the church, volunteering for progressive causes and speaking out as an atheist, finally able to help people without the fog of superstition.
Patrick Maguire was formerly a Roman Catholic priest. He and I were once guests on the national
Sally Jessy Raphael Show
, talking about our respective deconversions. He
looked
just like an Irish priest, with his twinkle and hint of a brogue. “I realized that in the origins of Christianity there was nothing really unusual about Catholicism,” he said. “They had taken all kinds of things from other religions (such as Mithraism), even the title ‘Father.’ Those religions believed in a God who was born of a woman, very often a virgin… For these reasons, and much more, I came to the conclusion that I simply could not believe.” He left the priesthood and the faith, while his brother, Daniel, left the priesthood but remained a liberal believer, teaching at a Catholic university.
Sally Jessy Raphael Show
, talking about our respective deconversions. He
looked
just like an Irish priest, with his twinkle and hint of a brogue. “I realized that in the origins of Christianity there was nothing really unusual about Catholicism,” he said. “They had taken all kinds of things from other religions (such as Mithraism), even the title ‘Father.’ Those religions believed in a God who was born of a woman, very often a virgin… For these reasons, and much more, I came to the conclusion that I simply could not believe.” He left the priesthood and the faith, while his brother, Daniel, left the priesthood but remained a liberal believer, teaching at a Catholic university.
Patrick very soon fell in love with a woman, but they decided to wait for five years to get married. “The crazy reason was that I didn’t want my colleagues to get the idea that I left for anything except my conviction, which is rather silly, really.” When they finally did get married, his wife became ill and, tragically, died within a few months. “Was it worth it?” he asked. Religion denied them those years of happiness. Patrick taught philosophy at a California college, where he was once asked by the students to give an atheist invocation at graduation.
Jim O’Brien is another one-time Catholic priest who didn’t realize what he actually believed until it was too late. He was teaching a class of high school girls and a box with random questions was being passed around the room. He drew the card asking, “Do you believe in God?” The girls all laughed when they heard such a ridiculous question for a priest to answer. “I laugh, too,” Jim reports. “But I can’t think of an answer. In fact, I can’t think of anything to say. The room goes very, very quiet. I am still a blank, but a tiny voice in the back of my head says, terrifyingly, ‘You’re out of a job.’”
Delos McKown was a Baptist preacher who left the ministry and became head of the philosophy department at Auburn University. Reading Corliss Lamont’s
Illusion of Immortality
had a profound influence on his thinking. Charles French was another Baptist minister who was more concerned with the “social” in the “social Gospel” than he was with the “Gospel,” so he left the church and the faith but continued to work for social betterment.
Illusion of Immortality
had a profound influence on his thinking. Charles French was another Baptist minister who was more concerned with the “social” in the “social Gospel” than he was with the “Gospel,” so he left the church and the faith but continued to work for social betterment.
Ed Wilson was a Seventh Day Adventist minister who abandoned the religion and is now an agnostic: “I have come to believe that the doctrine of self-abnegation is one of the more damaging tenets of Christianity. This degrading of the self in the exaltation of Jesus… the ‘I am nothing, Christ is all’ teaching is a stultifying approach to life which I believe has crippled the psyches of millions. Good sense humility is healthy, but the self-abnegation which is taught as a central idea in Christianity is sick.”
Farrell Till was a Church of Christ minister and missionary who made the mistake of studying the bible too closely. “Once my faith in inerrancy was shaken,” he wrote, “I was able to see the folly of stupid attempts to justify the despicable conduct of the Hebrew god. When I crossed that line, I had gone too far ever to turn back again.” Adrian Swindler (what a great name for a minister!) was also a Church of Christ minister who saw the light and left the faith.
Hector Avalos was a child preacher who became so obsessed with the bible that he immersed himself in Hebrew. He was the first Mexican-American to get a Ph.D. in biblical languages from Harvard. I used to preach on the very hillside in Nogales, Mexico, where Hector was born, and it is not impossible that he was one of the little children who came to listen to me playing the accordion and preaching in that city when I was a teenager. He also knew the Christian records of Manuel Bonilla that I had produced in Spanish. Now Hector and I can smile and compare notes about what we used to believe and preach (in two languages). He is currently a professor of religious studies, teaching the bible as an open atheist, at Iowa State University and is author of
Fighting Words: The Origins of Religious Violence
and
The End of Biblical Studies.
He is one of the experts whose brain I often get to pick when it comes to biblical questions.
Fighting Words: The Origins of Religious Violence
and
The End of Biblical Studies.
He is one of the experts whose brain I often get to pick when it comes to biblical questions.
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