Sunday, November 6, 2011

The Reality of an Athiest's mortality


There are times, Christian community at large, that you seriously overestimate how easy it is to be a non-believer. 

In my “early” days of atheism, I actually thought that this would be easy. I knew what I knew and I could scientifically prove my stance and those who didn’t want to listen could piss off because I didn’t care. I’m also though, the kind of atheist who doesn’t wear it on her sleeve. I believe what I want - you believe what you want. Don’t ask me to go to mass and I won’t ask you to sacrifice ugly babies with me (because that’s what Atheists do. We’re haters all of all that is good and pure, right?).  I’m not the kind of person who enjoys telling society what to do, nor do I think that my personal way is the only right way. Abortion? Meh, I wouldn’t do it but, I’m also not a 14 year old who was raped by a relative or any number of other reasons a woman would choose that. Until I walk a day in her shoes, I can’t say so when it comes ballot time? Hell yes! Kill the babies. Gay Marriage? Again, not my cup of tea BUT, if in 15 years my son wants to marry a man, I pity the bastard who tells my son that he can’t love who he wants.

A few months ago, I read a story about an atheist woman who lost her husband. He had died and she was having a hard time reaching out to the atheist community because there really isn’t as wide a net for secular resources as there are religious based resources. It was only then that the reality of my life really dawned on me. And quite frankly, was anything ever going to send me running back to the almighty, this would have been it.  Someone ( a “believer” ) callously commented that “He’s dead. He’s in the ground. Get over it and move on.”  It enraged me at first. It sounded terrible. Who the Hell did he think he was saying that kind of crap to a widow? Then I got it. That’s exactly what it is. That’s what it means not to believe anymore. I don’t get to see Grandma Mary on the other side. She’s not watching me smiling, she could give a shit less because, she’s gone.   In his attempt at a snarky comment, he hit the nail right on the head.

I started to take a really hard look at what the differences are. I suddenly realized that as passionate as I am about my place in the world and being a true atheist in every other regard, this sucked…bad.  I started to think about the things that my Christian life had promised me. I was promised salvation, a place in heaven, an eternity with my loved ones, that you “never have to say good-bye” because they’re on the other side waiting for you.  My new life though, my reality, was much harder to swallow. That was my first bitter taste of atheism. The reality of the atheist afterlife is the same as the atheist “before-life”, there is none.  You didn’t exist  before you were created and you won’t after you’ve lived. I started to think about the end of my life and the lives of those I love.  I got pretty damned depressed, quite frankly. I thought about my son. My beautiful child that I adore more than anything in the world, what if I got into the car today, died in an accident and I never saw him again? My husband, the man I have loved every day since I was 16, would he ever really know how much?  I began to think about the things I’d never get to say, the things I shouldn’t have said, and I tried to anticipate how I’d feel those final moments. 

Several nights later, we were watching one of my favorite shows and Ann Druyan (Carl Sagan’s widow) came on. A woman I have immense respect for and inevitably, Carl came up in the conversation.  I remembered something she had said more specifically about Carl earlier and I dug it up off the internet (IF there is a god, his name is “google”). I keep it handy for when I need it, when the reality of life becomes little much to bear:

When my husband died, because he was so famous and known for not being a believer, many people would come up to me-it still sometimes happens-and ask me if Carl changed at the end and converted to a belief in an afterlife. They also frequently ask me if I think I will see him again. Carl faced his death with unflagging courage and never sought refuge in illusions. The tragedy was that we knew we would never see each other again. I don’t ever expect to be reunited with Carl. But, the great thing is that when we were together, for nearly twenty years, we lived with a vivid appreciation of how brief and precious life is. We never trivialized the meaning of death by pretending it was anything other than a final parting. Every single moment that we were alive and we were together was miraculous-not miraculous in the sense of inexplicable or supernatural. We knew we were beneficiaries of chance. . . . That pure chance could be so generous and so kind. . . . That we could find each other, as Carl wrote so beautifully in Cosmos, you know, in the vastness of space and the immensity of time - that we could be together for twenty years. That is something which sustains me and it’s much more meaningful. . . . The way he treated me and the way I treated him, the way we took care of each other and our family, while he lived. That is so much more important than the idea I will see him someday. I don’t think I’ll ever see Carl again. But I saw him. We saw each other. We found each other in the cosmos, and that was wonderful.”
I have yet to revisit my initial trepidation about my place in the world and things beyond my control. I’m pretty thrilled with the fact that even when I was faced with great temptation, to “take the easy way out” I still took the realist way out.

I know that many believers think that our lives are easy. We’re supposed to be selfish, self-centered devil worshipers.   To that, all I have to say is: Imagine for a moment that you’re wrong.  Imagine that there is no promise of an afterlife.  Can you really say that you lived your life just for the sake of being a good person? Can you say that you lived your life to please nobody but the people who truly mattered? Can you say that you lived without judging others?

Nobody is perfect. But living a true life and not being afraid to ask questions, and living for the moment, loving people while they’re here, is the most fantastic way to live.  I know you pity us, but please don’t. Walk a mile in our shoes. Live 1 day for yourself, thinking and doing for yourself, then you will truly be free.