A big HELLO to anyone reading here. My name’s Mark and I’ve just wandered down the corridor from the Kidney Cancer department where I’ve been having a wild couple of years with Stage 4 RCC. Saw this door ajar. Poked my head around.
Here’s the thing. The older I get, the more atheist I get. Is that normal? Having grown up in an intensely religious household, I see my adult life as the (often painful) process of having that entire worldview stripped from me, and then - stumblingly - developing an internal map of the world that’s more aligned to reality. I turn 61 this week; at present, I have mets to my lungs and in my back, and I know what the 5-year survival rate statistics say. But feed me into an MRI and turn the thing all the way up to 11, you won’t find a trace of religious, superstitious, magical or supernatural thinking anywhere in my system. I’m so relieved. To be NED - No Evidence of Deities! Couldn’t be happier.
All of us here have been through serious stuff. All of us here are facing serious stuff. Yet even in my darkest hours I feel no need to cry out to, make bargains with, any kind of imaginary supernatural being. Why would I? I understand evolution, I understand how the processes of life, disease and death work (to the extent my limited intellect allows, anyway). I understand how mythology, fiction and metaphor work too. None of that is difficult.
What I don’t understand is how religion can be of much comfort. Recall the very worst of what you have already been through. Now consider that your suffering is (depending on the small print of one’s particular faith, sect or denomination): caused by god, either as a test or as a punishment; allowed by god, either because it is part of some unfathomable plan, or because he is unwilling or not able to do anything about it; or even more bizarrely, it’s the fault of something a mythical first couple did; or even the result of something you must have done in a previous life! Each of these options has truly disturbing implications and, if they genuinely explain how the world works, none offers a scrap of comfort.
From my point of view: Cancer diagnosis, huge shock. Surgery, brutal and magnificent in equal measure, immediate aftermath the most intense days of my life. Recovery, both gruelling and immensely rewarding. Living with cancer spurs me to pay much closer attention to, and value, the ordinary things of everyday life. I’m most likely to start drug treatment in January and that will bring its own challenges. Will I make it to 70? I don’t know.
Without god, I can accept that these things happen, and deal with the reality and the practicalities of the situation as best I can. With god, I’d have all that to deal with AND unlimited emotional confusion, psychological turmoil and a head clanging with cognitive dissonance. So glad I don’t have that any more.
The best to us all,
-Mark
Now there’s a name I recognise from KC, hi buttercup01, it’s great that we have our own Community Champion on the premises and you seem exactly the right person to do that. (I’d be rubbish.) Hello and BenD too, you have a lot going on, both of you, and it’s great to meet you, even - I mean, especially - under these circumstances.
Yes, I too have people in my life who tell me they are praying for me. I’m not offended by that. If, at some point in their busy day, they are willing to pause and think about me for a few moments then that is a lovely thing. But: I do not believe that they are in a position to alter my physical reality - either with simply the power of their own thoughts, or by asking an imaginary friend to step in and do it for them. So, if “I’ll pray for you” is simply a well-meaning fancy way of saying “I wish you all the best”, then fine. I appreciate that. I’ll readily smile and thank them.
Also, I would never undervalue the good works that believers do, in hospices or volunteering or any other area of life where such good works are needed. But: I don’t see that one needs to have bizarre, contradictory and entirely unsubstantiated beliefs about the nature of the universe, in order to do good works. One day, hopefully, the secular world will catch up, but Faiths have got a good few hundred years head start in these areas.
I picture, centuries ago, the Churches putting up fences around perfectly normal areas of human experience, and saying, “No. These belong to us now.” And it’s a measure of how complete this land grab was that, even now, it’s hard to talk about awe, contemplation, gratitude, transcendence, and so much more, without using religious terminology. I sort of resent the common idea that to be a good person you have to believe these sets of very odd things; or to turn it the other way around, if you don’t believe these peculiar things, ie you’re an atheist, then you cannot be a good person. An atheist has every bit as much capacity for, say, love, compassion, selflessness, joy, feelings of transcendence, as any Believer. Because these are human experiences, they don’t belong exclusively to religion or “spirituality”.
But I’ll shut up now, I’ve gone on way too long. Just want to say how much I appreciated your responses, and I wish us all the best 
- Mark
Hi there greg777 and ownedbystaffies, good to meet you.
On a (finicky!) point of clarification:
Gnosis and a-gnosis are to do with knowledge. Theism and a-theism are to do with belief. Different areas entirely. As you rightly say, none of us really knows; so if absolutely everybody is in the category of not-knowing, then the label Agnostic is effectively pointless. So the question becomes: do you actively *believe* in supernatural divine beings - or not. If yes, theist; if not, atheist.
Now you can pelt me with rotten fruit.
Oh yes. Forget to mention the other day:
buttercup01 Please continue to be an anomaly! 
