I didn’t venture onto social media yesterday to wish my mum a happy Mother’s Day, as well as to tell her how I loved her ‘to the moon and back’, or 477,710 miles to be precise. She’s too dead for that, having shuffled off her mortal coil some 24 years ago and given my lack of ‘faith’ there would have been no point in wishing her a ‘happy heavenly day’ or that saying that I looked forward to meeting up for a Whisky and Lemonade – her favourite tipple, once I have shuffled off mine. But I have felt a slight change in my lack of belief in a supernatural God above the clouds. My self-proclaimed status, if you can call it that, as an atheist is a very slight shift from being an anti-theist. For that I have to acknowledge the influence of three people: the legendary comedian Dave Allen, the writer and comedian David Baddiel and a friend who for the purposes of this blog we shall refer to as Terry.
When I first watched the Dave Allen Show on the BBC, I was young and innocent and had no real feelings about religion, nor even any idea of what an atheist was. Allen’s shows were a combination of stories and sketches, many of which were about religion and in particular the Catholic church. In retrospect, they were quite risqué and occasionally incurred the wrath of the devout but Allen ended every show with the line, “Goodnight, thank you, and may your God go with you.” I didn’t understand what he meant by that, but I do now. While Allen was an atheist, he respected the right of others who weren’t.
David Baddiel is about to publish a book called The God Desire, in which he expresses his wish that there was a God, not least because he doesn’t want to die, but for him there isn’t one. He shows great respect not least to his friend Frank Skinner who is a passionate Roman Catholic, far more than I have ever done towards people of religion. Unlike Baddiel, I don’t want there to be a God because the idea of being under permanent surveillance and supervision by some form of celestial dictator frankly appals me. I don’t want to die, either, but I am resigned to the fact that sooner or later I won’t be here. In other words, I don’t expect to survive my own death. However, religious folk do anticipate an afterlife and Baddiel wishes there was one.
And my friend Terry has taught me by example and through love that I should refine my hard line views. His constant support and incredible generosity, never once asking for anything in return, has humbled me. I had come to the conclusion that religion was a bad thing, which I still maintain by the way, but also that those who had religion were bad, too. There is a philosophical argument for another day, although I accept without qualification that many worshippers of the various Gods on offer are among the best of us. I remain closely aligned to the views of the writer Christopher Hitchens whose book God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything probably shifted my atheism to anti-theism, but I don’t want to extend that level of hostility to those whose views on everything except the existence of God align closely with my own. Those with faith who acknowledge people’s differences, in terms not just of tolerance but willing acceptance of issues of equality, such as equal marriage and the like are not a million miles away from my views on life.
My mother didn’t proselytise because she had no deep faith herself, which is probably how I evolved from agnosticism to atheism and why I don’t expect to meet her again in the great distillery in the sky. And anyway, I just can’t get my head around the form she would now be in if she was in Heaven. Her young healthy, happy self or the older, physically broken woman, in constant pain? And if God made us all the same age, would she feel like my mum? And would she be on good terms with my dad, assuming he’d have passed through those Pearly Gates? But that’s my life and not yours or anyone else’s.
This minor attitude shift won’t affect my disdain for the fanatics of all shades, whether they are Islamist maniacal suicide murderers or, for example, the fanatical Christians in America, many of whom are little more than crooks and pickpockets. But they aren’t everyone.
Acts of religious madness, as I see them, may affect my minor conversion to the acceptance of the religious beliefs of others. But in my secular world, I am very happy to acknowledge and support the rights of others to believe in whatever they want to believe, as long as it does not affect my own life. If, for example, you are a religious person who opposes abortion and so-called gay marriage the answer is simple: don’t have an abortion and don’t marry a gay person. Just don’t tell anyone else what they can or can’t do. Agree with that and we can get along just fine and dandy. Just like me and Terry.
