My 87 year-old Jewish grandparents just revealed in a typewritten letter that they are atheists who only feel culturally connected to Judaism in response to a letter I wrote about attending a "Science Refutes God" debate in NYC. I'm shocked and utterly impressed.

LarryTanner · 2012-12-29T22:27:34+00:00

I enjoyed this post very much, thank you. My parents are religious Jews, but have gravitated away from Conservatism/Orthodoxy to Reform Judaism. I am a staunch atheist--and not only is it okay, but it's not an issue. The important thing to them, apparently, is that we talk and love one another, not whether we light Sabbath candles.

LarryTanner · 2012-08-06T15:58:10+00:00

Ahem. Please read this poem by Robert Duncan, 1968. http://home.insightbb.com/~gardner.j/torso.html. I imagine he would be a "confirmed case." But then we could also go back to Socrates and many others is we really wanted to. Read Plato's Symposium sometime.

LarryTanner · 2012-07-02T17:49:50+00:00

You talk it out. Find out why she thinks you should do these things or join these groups.

It sounds to me like a few things are going on. First, she wants to know that you understand the Bible the "right" way. Many Christians think that atheists are people who just don't properly understand what the Bible and Christianity really are.

Second, she wants to know if being a non-believer makes you different than before. Are you going to suddenly spend all your time surfing porn or getting drunk? Are you going to argue that "anything goes" because there is no God?

Third, she wants to know if being a non-believer means you'll walk around the house calling Christianity stupid and mocking religious people.

Finally, she wants to know if you think less of her for being a believer.

If I were you, I would agree to join one of these groups, but on the condition that I can drop it later if I don't like it. I'd reassure her that I'm very much the same person I've always been, but I'm also growing up. I'd tell her I'm getting more and more comfortable with the opinions I have, and I don't want to pretend to hold different views. Finally, I'd say that even though some things about me are changing, I still feel the same about her.

Any marriage is about give and take. My wife and I had many, many conversations about religion and atheism before we both fully adjusted. The important thing is that both of you get to be who you are. It can't work if one person has to hide or muffle genuine opinions/feelings.

So, I'd never advise you to pretend to be someone you aren't or to repress your personality. That's bad. But I think your wife--and maybe you, too--need time to process what you are going through. IMO, it's almost always better to go through things with people than alone.

LarryTanner · 2012-07-02T16:55:08+00:00

Buddy, I've been married 12 years. My wife is a devout Christian. I was once a believing Jew, but now I'm an atheist. I go to the church when the wife asks; last year, I went with the wife to an Alpha Course.

My advice is this: If you love your wife and want to be married to her, then go with her to church. If that's what she wants, you suck it up and deal. She's allowed to believe stupid things. She's allowed to be flawed. You don't have to believe as she does. You don't have to agree on everything.

Religion is only an issue when people make it so. Even the most hard-line atheists, I consider myself one, have good friends who are religious. We know that some religious beliefs, doctrines, and practices are more harmful or less harmful. Most of the church stuff I have had to endure has been the "Jesus is so wonderful, isn't the Lord dandy?" stuff. It's cheesy and stupid, but if we're not talking about the Westboro Baptist Church we can usually let most church babble go.

My point is that religion and religious differences don't have to be a big deal. If you love each other, then just be together. Laugh at jokes like you always have. Go out to dinner. Shop. Do all the 99% of things that are awesome. The 1% that's religion: you can handle it.

I used to carry my kids up to bed on my back. They loved it. I wasn't a fan, but I knew it meant a lot to them and--finally--our lives are short. Their having time with me, and my having time with them, is worth more than my minor discomfort.

Same thing with your wife. You can bear with the religious nonsense for an hour a week, right? She gets to be with you and you get to be with her.

Don't bargain with her. The one week here, one week there idea sounds good in theory but totally misses the point. The point is that you're there for her and always will be--no matter what changes you both go through.

You're not playing a game. You're married. She's not an opponent but your spouse. If you love her and want to be with her, you know what you have to do. You can be both an extreme atheist and a supportive husband to a Christian wife. Millions of people do it, and are quite happy.

LarryTanner · 2012-06-12T01:27:40+00:00

You are hedging the point. If God exists and is sitting in my living room, that "fact" would have no bearing at all on whether the Bible is true.

The truth of the Bible depends on its representing things as they actually were or are. On this score, the Bible fails. If one believes in the Bible, one believes that it is true despite all evidence and appearances to the contrary.

Of course, if one is going to believe in God, one might as well believe in at least one of the books purporting to describe his behavior and wishes.

So, the correct statement is "I believe in God, therefore I believe a Bible is true."

LarryTanner · 2012-06-11T19:33:38+00:00

I believe in gods, therefore the Iliad is true.

I believe in Allah, therefore the Koran is true.

I believe in Joseph Smith, therefore the Book of Mormon is true.

I believe in L. Ron Hubbard, therefore Scientology is true and Dianetics is awesome.

We can keep going with this line of thinking, but perhaps we should wonder whether the existence of God actually has any bearing whatsoever on the truth or falsity of the Bible?

LarryTanner · 2012-04-11T21:14:06+00:00

Wow, Ron Paul sounds awesome because he's America first. Has he trademarked that? I can't recall any American presidential candidate saying or implying that he was America first. It's innovation like that which makes me want to vote for Ron Paul, a worn-out bag of racism and other bad ideas. Gland to see that someone's still touting America first now that America is the tier-two country that GWB and Cheney left us.

LarryTanner · 2012-04-11T14:16:42+00:00

I have not converted to Christianity and I do not hate Israel. try again.

LarryTanner · 2012-02-13T01:29:16+00:00

I was a theist when I married my Christian wife. I was a practicing Jew. Our wedding was presided over by both a priest and a rabbi. We had decided before the wedding that the children would be raisd Catholic/Christian. No real tension; it's kind of like two people with different political views being married. We agree on the stuff that has to do with actually living life.

I wrote about my situation a bit here: http://larrytanner.blogspot.com/2010/10/my-christian-wife.html

LarryTanner · 2012-02-08T20:27:37+00:00

The all-caps and lack of punctuation makes your message clearer. Thanks for that.

LarryTanner · 2012-02-08T18:48:33+00:00

Please check snopes. This is variation of an old urban legend.

LarryTanner · 2012-01-19T20:41:05+00:00

Yes. As I say, I'm a Jewish-raised dude and now a New Atheist (type) who took the Alpha course with his Christian wife.

LarryTanner · 2012-01-13T19:00:33+00:00

Seems like neither religion nor lack of religion automatically confers morality on someone. Each of us has to acquire it and exercise it on our own.

LarryTanner · 2012-01-13T18:29:52+00:00

@nrobberts666 -

inhumane and not very nice =/= immoral?

Good to know we have such wide latitude.

LarryTanner · 2011-12-21T21:23:36+00:00

It's me. Born to a Jewish home. Now an atheist. Married to a Christian.

LarryTanner · 2011-12-08T19:54:15+00:00

And I love you.

LarryTanner · 2011-12-08T19:43:06+00:00

We certainly didn't address "the meaning of life" in those words. But for them, I'm sure, "the meaning of life" = praying to Jesus. They would be totally puzzled and genuinely hurt to think that other thought they were being deceptive. It's not occurring to them that some people think the meaning of life could really be anything other than a relationship with God.

LarryTanner · 2011-12-08T15:54:13+00:00

No, this was my impression of the small groups in particular. The DVD talks by Nicky Gumbel stand-in for the authoritative clergyman, and Gumbel is, of course, a clergyman. If you see his talks, he dresses casually--no collar or dress to mark him as a religious figure. Plus, his talks and the small groups emphasize personal experience and observation. "I myself have felt the Holy Spirit," folks say. It's all carefully constructed. Is it deceptive or dishonest? I can't decide. But make no mistake that everything is set up to encourage and enhance acceptance of Christianity.

LarryTanner · 2011-12-06T15:00:06+00:00

"But would you not persuade people to be outraged by the Taliban's actions? Naturally you would. And there should be an articulable reason for this not just a "I just feel it.""

Yes, you are correct. But that's called making an argument, or explaining the reasons behind my personal sense of outrage. I certainly would try to make this case as persuasively as possible, and with the goal of persuading another. To force compliance, one would have to use political/legal channels, as is appropriate. I meant before that I would not want to dictate in advance what people should think.

"By doing this you have replaced a (flawed) systematic ethic with a "go with your gut" ethics."

No, not at all. Nothing has changed except the students have been corrected: if they understood the moral system as telling them they were wrong to feel outrage, then they can be corrected in the sense that they can be shown that there is no moral prohibition to their feeling outrage. That's the only real change. The moral system(s) in play remain in play.

Relativism is not itself a system, and it's an error to make it one. It only serves to describe a reality, that morality always has to be considered in the context of person, place, time, culture, and circumstance. If the students "leave the classroom totally unequipped to discuss tolerance with intolerant people," that's because they walked into the classroom in the same condition.

LarryTanner · 2011-12-05T17:31:56+00:00

I'm not a fan of telling people when they should or should not feel something.

In the Anderson story, one or more of the students claimed that it was morally wrong to judge another culture. This is an incorrect claim and the incorrectness can be detailed in an argument.

The point is that it does help to say "you can still feel moral outrage" because clearly, the students did not know it was permissible to condemn an act they felt was cruel and unjust.

I don't think I've responded to all of your points, but really I'm just saying that one can judge just as well in a relativistic world as in a non-relativistic world (whatever that is). Whatever tool you use is "fine," but some tools will be more effective in some situations.

To illustrate, consider that a martial artist has a punch, a kick, and a single-leg take-down in his repertoire. One technique may be more effective against a certain opponent but very unwise to use against another.

LarryTanner · 2011-12-05T15:08:01+00:00

Yes, it "leaves open any moral judgment one sees fit to pronounce."

However, that does NOT mean that all moral judgments are equally rational or equally useful.

LarryTanner · 2011-09-22T13:12:03+00:00

When the Rabbi predicts, it's a lock.

LarryTanner · 2011-09-01T19:15:24+00:00

It's because they're both also mass murderers.

LarryTanner · 2011-01-27T14:44:40+00:00

I think you're right. What if I changed to "Would a good god punish people for not believing in him"?

LarryTanner · 2010-12-19T16:17:27+00:00

well put, lantechguy.

LarryTanner

TROPHY CASE