Lisa Hickey was asked by a Good Men Project contributor how she reconciles all of the religious ceremonies of the day with the fact that she is atheist. Here is her answer.
This post was first published on September 11, 2011.
Today, on The Good Men Project, we have an amazing series stories on 9/11. I wasn’t going to write, because I thought so many other people did it better – Lyle, the photojournalist who took the photo that landed on the cover of Time Magazine; Jackie, who lost a firefighter friend; Lili, who opened her apartment to the rescuers who were digging out ground zero while searching for survivors – and the dozen others who all had a story that touched me, that changed me, that helped me see the extraordinary complexity around what happened that day. Surely whatever I had to say couldn’t compete with those stories.
But then, long time Good Men Project contributor/evangelist Roger Durham, asked me for help.
Knowing that I am an atheist, he emailed me this note:
I have something I need you to help me with. If you have been watching the memorials of 9/11 today, help me to understand how an atheist views these overtly religious observances? Do they have meaning for you? Do they bore you? Do they frustrate you? And how does an atheist mark moments of grief and memory? How does an atheist honor the dead? I am seriously curious about that, Lisa. – Sincerely, Roger
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And I realized this is the story I had to tell.
♦◊♦
Like most people, in the days following September 11, 2001, I struggled to make sense of it. The night it happened, I watched the videos of the planes flying into the towers over and over and over again. I couldn’t get enough of it. It was as if, for the first 20, 40, 50 times, my eyes still couldn’t comprehend what they were seeing. I needed to watch it enough times to get over the shock, to make it real.
Afterwards, I read. I was inextricably drawn to every written word I could find on the subject. I was especially drawn to the stories that showed maps of the buildings. Who survived and who didn’t. How they got out, helped others, died trying. And all the stories of the “jumpers” – the more than two hundred people who consciously chose the moment at which they would die.
The most haunting story – the one that stuck with me – was from a journalist who described a few people who had taken tablecloths and tried to use them as parachutes. This journalist described seeing a man who jumped, caught the wind just right, and remained aloft for about two seconds, “before the force generated by his fall ripped the drapes, the tablecloths, the desperately gathered fabric, from his hands.”
And it was the moment that I read that sentence that I stopped believing in God.
♦◊♦
I was raised a Catholic. Baptism, communion, confirmation, church every Sunday. I stopped going to church when I left home for college. I became a non-practicing Catholic, then a self-proclaimed “sort of a Christian.” And later, Agnostic fit me well – I simply didn’t know. Never did I feel a happiness over having a religion, nor a void at not having a religion to call my own. It wasn’t something I particularly cared about one way or another.
♦◊♦
But on Sept. 11, 2001, I cared. That moment I read that sentence I made a conscious choice, driven by the image of the man trying to parachute with a tablecloth. Surely those people had prayed to a God – any God — in their final moments. And for the guy that had floated far above Manhattan with a tablecloth in his hands – for two full seconds he thought his prayer had been answered.
Not only could I not reconcile any sort of God with one who could allow that to happen, what changed my mind was this: I no longer wanted to.
♦◊♦
God aside, there are things about organized religion that I think are valuable. A moral upbringing is important. A group of people you can discuss ethics with. Rituals around birth and marriage and death. A sense of community.
And – my favorite church ritual of all times – the moment I would look forward to in great anticipation whenever I went to church – the moment when the priest said “May we offer each other a sign of peace.”
That was something I could believe in.
♦◊♦
When I was in recovery, I was told to “believe in a higher power.” At that time, my belief in a God was nil. At one point, I was in a meeting, semi-circle of filled folding chairs, barely listening to others, because I’m puzzling over whether there is any power greater than myself I could possibly believe in. It is my turn to speak. I tell the story of how in college, when I was drinking all the time, I used to walk around campus holding my coat closed. This was in upstate NY, where the winters were fierce and the blizzards were frequent. And yet, I simply wouldn’t button my coat, despite the fact that people would see me and yell out to me, “Lisa, button your coat!” And so, I told the group, the only insight I could offer them was this. Not only did I not believe in a higher power of the traditional sort; but, for most of my life, I didn’t even believe in the higher power of buttons.
♦◊♦
I would never, ever, think to judge someone else’s religious beliefs. I would no more judge someone for their religion than I would judge them for enjoying bowling as a sport. That’s exactly the way I feel when someone asks me to partake in their religious ceremonies – as if they had asked me to go bowling. The truth is – I would do either one of those things – with joy, with zeal even — if I loved the person or people I was with. I would embrace the ceremony, sing the hymn, jump up and down at the last minute strike as the bowling ball hits the tenpins. And yes, if I was not in either of those places voluntarily, if I was not with a person or a community I loved, I would be bored. And you can tell me, well then, “God is Love” but I won’t believe you. Love is Love. The difference is, love is of the moment, it is an experience in the present time, it is an action taken where you get outside yourself to do something for someone else. And that “feeling” that you get when you step outside yourself to do something that truly connects you to someone else – yeah, that sure feels spiritual. I get that. But that is not the same as believing in God.
♦◊♦
When I die, I already have it in my mind that I am going to have someone publish a blog post, after my death, titled “I’m dead and it’s OK.” Not that I want to die – wow, no, never. Or at least not until I’m 120 years old, which I how long I tell my kids I’d like to live to be. But the fact is, I have very little control over when that moment of death will happen. And the only way that I can ensure my death will be “OK” is to ensure that my life is filled with as much meaning as possible. When your days are filled with only that sole purpose—when you love life in all it’s complexities, good and bad, all the people and connections that go with it—that is peace. That is joy. And that is happiness. And life itself is your religion.
♦◊♦
The week after I told my button story, I went back to that same recovery group. I still didn’t have a higher power. I was quiet. I let others talk. At the end of the meeting, one girl walked over to me and handed me a button.
Here’s the thing. At that point in my life, getting sober was a matter of life or death for me. A complete stranger understood that. And so, she gave me something which symbolically said “I care whether you live or die.”
That is what I had always hoped a God would do – care whether I lived or died.
♦◊♦
When the guy with the tablecloth in his hands was aloft for two seconds, thinking to himself, “maybe, just maybe this will work” — there’s no God that I know of who cared whether he lived or died. But someone on the ground most certainly did. And the fact that someone cared is what gave his life meaning.
For the 2,919 people who died on September 11, 2001, their life had meaning. The religious ceremonies are but one expression of that, and so, for that reason – even as an atheist – those ceremonies bring me great joy.
And it’s why the stories we tell are so important. So that the meaning that is shared by the people that we love will continue to live on forever. And that’s all the spirituality I can wish for.
—
photo: steakpinball on Flckr
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TFM, thank you for your extensive, and respectful and serious reply. I have spent the better part of the evening writing a reply back to you. I decided, though, not to post it all. This is a conversation better had face-to-face. When it comes right down to it, the choice for me is as simple as a choice about music. Some people like country music. Some people like rap. Some people like classical music. You can tell a lot about a person by the music they prefer. And the music we listen to has some part in shaping the way… Read more »
Roger, that is one of the most beautiful and eloquent articulations of faith I have read. Thank you for that.
Roger, we could have different tastes in music, and even though some aspects of music could be compared and contrasted on objective qualities like tempo or what instruments are used, the final judgment of how pleasurable or inspiring our respective music choices are would be subjective. Aesthetic choices like that aren’t either/or, and so whatever “truth” is involved is largely up to the person making that choice. I agree with Lisa that you beautifully describe your faith and you do it in such aesthetic, abstract terms that there’s not much to disagree with. You sound kind and tolerant to me,… Read more »
TFM – deist, theist, Buddhist, Christian, Jewish, atheist……those distinctions don’t really mean much to me. Ultimately, I think we are all searching for the same thing – a way to make sense of our existence. Let me try another analogy. Each of us is free to choose the story that we want to define our lives. The story that we choose gives us a way to understand the world and to organize our relationship to it. From what you have said, atheists choose a strictly rational story as their own. If it is not rational, it does not fit, and… Read more »
You’re so agreeable to disagree with, Roger, that I sometimes can’t tell which one I’m doing. 🙂 I believe in the importance of stories, too, but I suppose I draw sharper distinctions between literary or allegorical truths, and the kind of reality that science deals with. For example, I think there’s a real, valuable lesson to be learned from Green Eggs & Ham, but Sam-I-Am doesn’t have to really exist or talk like a strict rationalist to make the message true. In fact, I’m pretty sure he doesn’t exist, though if you want to get technical, I’m forced to admit… Read more »
Read “Watership Down”, oh Literal/Rational one. But don’t take it literally. Let it be metaphor. And check out my bowling response above.
I’ve seen the cover of “Watership Down” – does that count? I’ve certainly heard of it, but never got around to reading it. I think when it was on an elective reading list back in junior high, I opted for “Lord of the Flies” because based on covers, I judged “Watership Down” to be about a bunny. I’ll put it on my list. While we’re sharing stories that influenced our thinking, I was especially fond of “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance”. It’s been a while since I read it, but if I remember right, your ideas on goodness… Read more »
I told you, “DON’T BE LITERAL”. Look past the bunnies! I’ve read “Zen and the Art of MM”. Don’t remember the character, or the point of the book, but I do know it influenced my thought. Maybe more than I realize.
I should have used a winky to be safe, but I was just poking a little fun at how my junior high self could literally judge a book by it’s cover. I’m a lot more sophistimacated now. Robert Pirsig is the author of ZAMM, but since it’s a first person philosophical memoir, I guess you could call him the main character, too. There are motorcycles in it, but that’s not what it’s really about.
That’s a good suggestion. Atheists need more opportunities to be heard, and your site affords this to them. We assume you are Tom Matlack, but could be wrong about that.
Ah. Sorry the pseudonym led to confusion but no, I’m just a reader who came across this article through a link in Google News. (I keep “atheism” as a watched topic.) I don’t know Lisa and this article is my first exposure to this site, but I’m impressed so far. Still haven’t had much time to check out other articles here between being busy composing replies and busy tending my toddlers. As for content dedicated to atheist topics, I read lots of it on other sites and blogs, so it’s familiar territory to me in that sense. It’s always nice… Read more »
Hey, THAT’S a bowling party I could believe in!
If I knew you, I would take you up on the beer. And I think 4 against 1 would be fair! Kidding, of course.
I never said we’d be the only 5 people in the tournament, but even if we were, are you saying you’d be outmatched even with Jesus on your side? Sounds to me like we won already. 😛
Hey – from what I hear, Jesus is a kick-ass bowler. I mean, anyone who can walk on water and calm storms can surely turn a gutter ball into a strike! When it comes to 4 against 1, plus Jesus on my side, well “Jesus is just alright with me, Jesus is just alright, oh yeah”.
Nice! I’m not sure applying that kind of miracle to bowling would be fair play, but if he resorts to that, I’ll counter with the claim that we won or at least tied anyway, because in one of the many co-existing realities out there, every ball we rolled was a strike.
Sounds like an episode of Twilight Zone that I remember. A guy dies, goes to what he thinks is heaven. Has everything he wants. Women. Food. Booze. And a pool table. Every time he takes a shot, he pockets all15 balls. Everything is perfect. Too perfect. Finally, the guy screams, “If this is Heaven, I would rather be in Hell.” To which, someone standing nearby says, “Where do you think you are, pal?”
I forgot to add: the Doobie Bros are just alright with me, too. I think we’ll get along fine.
TFM is not Tom Matlack, he is a first time visitor. Since it is my piece that is being thought about critically, I will jump in here. First of all, I never meant this to be a critical-thinking piece about atheism. I meant it to be an honest story about why I believe what I believe. After reading the comments, I’m not even sure I *want* to be an atheist by your definition. What I want to be — with absolute certainty — is a person who does not believe in a “God” as an entity that has some sort… Read more »
Well put, Lisa. You saved me the effort. I could not have said it as well as you: “that’s part of the reason for this site’s existence – to understand, learn, think about, debate, issues related to men that often have some moral or ethical debate at their crux.” Thanks for creating a venue such as this.
We applaud “TFM” for his loyalty in defending his friend’s article. However, since he seems to misunderstand our criticism, here’s an explanation. 1.TFM says, “It appears to be one person’s unexamined idiosyncratic summary of two persons’ idiosyncratic perspectives on the original article.” We are two people responding to one person’s unexamined idiosyncratic summary, so your parody seems to be confused. 2.TFM says,”They have scorn for politicians and preachers who try to score points off of 9/11 memorials.” Yes we do. Our point is clear. What is your point? 3.TFM says we said, “. . .she’s not atheist enough.” Actually we… Read more »
GJG, I probably should have resisted the impulse to satirize your comment, but my intended message was not far off from your closing request. You ask for a more generous reading of your criticism, which is what I thought you should have done with the original article. I understood your criticism fine, but most of it was based on stuff she didn’t say and closed with a final swipe at an error (trivial or not) that was more a reading comprehension mistake than sloppy writing. I want to encourage good atheist thinking and writing, too, so let’s agree on that… Read more »
GJG’s comment is a mixed bag. It appears to be one person’s unexamined idiosyncratic summary of two persons’ idiosyncratic perspectives on the original article. They have scorn for politicians and preachers who try to score points off of 9/11 memorials, which is always a crowd pleaser (who says, “Yay, politicians!”?), along with some speculation that Lisa has been brain-washed because she’s not atheist enough. There were some points about bowling and buttons that didn’t register with these readers, so Lisa must have been rambling. Then they mis-paraphrase some stuff she said and put quotes around it to make it look… Read more »
This is a mixed bag; a lot of genuine surface feeling there, but only one person’s unexamined idiosyncratic perspective, sometimes confused in its rambling about buttons and “bowling for Jesus.” This sounds like it was written by a sincere “ex-Christian child,” who is still in the grip of religion’s thrall; perhaps even brain-washed, despite claiming she is an Atheist. Everyone selects what they want to focus on—for us it is the people—for the author, it is apparently some inner need to be assured that someone “is looking out for her.” We are not impressed by memorial services, but rather the… Read more »
GJG say: “We Atheists by definition are judging religion to be ridiculous all the time—there is no other way to express it. It is our sine qua non.”
That is as judgmental a statement as I have heard in a long time. Exchange the word “atheism” for “religion” and you could hear those word coming out of the mouth of a fundamentalist Christian.
Extremists, no matter from what end of what spectrum, do nothing to foster understanding, further dialogue, or engender respect. I have no tolerance for such extremism.
I’m an Atheist and when I see all the religious crap, I go, “So, the shit that caused it only grew, eh?”
Religious ceremonies aren’t good, they’re bad. The group dynamic allows the concepts to easier infect and poison the minds of young children, and easily keeps adults poisoned.
My wife dragged me into watching a good bit of the ground zero ceremony yesterday. I was not going to but was glad I did. We both found it odd that the President read from the Bible. Don’t get me wrong, I happened to like the passage but just thought it might offend non Christians. Then we went to the little Episcopal church down the block (one kid went to Catholic mass with his mom). The readings happened to be about forgiveness. The idea that we find salvation in forgiving no matter what as Christ forgave us. Our rector is… Read more »
Thanks Tom, for your thoughtful reply. Your words, like the words of others who replied above, help me frame a belief *system*, to get away from the idea of god as an “entity”, and make me realize, once again, the futility of debating actual words. As Roger said, above, we may actually agree on a lot more than it appears — his idea of “I see God as the organizing principle behind Love, not some amorphous entity” is similar in sentiment to your “Said another way I guess I don’t believe in GOD, I believe in god.” It is the… Read more »
Oh, just a lighthearted quip Lisa. I’m in agreement with your stance, and also in appreciation of your attempt to tease out the more positive aspects of those very things you don’t personally believe in. Not many people do that sort of thing.
Welcome to the dark side Lisa!
You may encounter push back from Deists on your rationale for disbelief, and the comeback is “unintelligent design”, really?
Please elaborate —
I don’t see anything “dark” about what I’m talking about at all. I see a belief system that brings me great joy and allows me to act with love as I live. I’m not trying to convince to believe what I believe in — simply holding the conversation.
I think 9/11 did more to fracture faith than cement it. I was an atheist before 9/11 and remain so today. 9/11 was just another bit of confirmation of the believe, really. I disagree with Dan Mcm above who says that he feels sad that you won’t experience a great joy now that you don’t believe in god. I’d say the rewards for being humanistic and secular far outweigh the religious ones. Regardless, this was a well written piece anyway. I agree with you on life/death: I’m not under the illusion that there’s another chance waiting for me, I have… Read more »
In my personal view, “the rewards for being humanistic and secular far outweigh the religious ones” as well. There are without a doubt those who get great personal joy from religion, and I am happy for their joy. The same way I am happy for my own. Thanks for stopping by.
Hey Lisa…. Great post. Thank you for being willing to share your heart with people that may or may not agree with you – not very many people are willing to do that. I have a bit in common with you. I grew up Catholic, fell away in college and started hitting the bottle heavy. I did end up coming back to faith though, and quit drinking a few years after that (22 years last month.) When I read your comment – ”it was the moment that I read that sentence that I stopped believing in God” – I was… Read more »
It is possible that I never believed in God to begin with — but I completely disagree on the fact that “I’m missing out on some of the greatest joys in life.” I am just not experiencing YOUR joys. It would be the same as saying I’ll never ride a surfboard on a 100 foot wave in Hawaii and therefor miss out on a great joy. That is undoubtably true. But I don’t want that joy. I want the joy that is part of my here and now. I experience that all the time. I am not going to judge… Read more »
Im a new yorker and was also raised roman catholic. I too become an athiest after the attacks of september 11. Watching over and over images of people taking a leap of faith to an ending demise and planes flying into buildings. I started to ask myself is god real? Why is this happening? I rejected the high power of god and instead believe in the natural order of the universe. I was saddened by timothy dolan of the arch diocese of ny who said there are no athiests in foxholes, there were no athiests 9 11. I decided to… Read more »
Thanks Benny,
I like that — how 9/11 might make people “more tolerant of other peoples creeds and customs”. I agree. And to make love a conscious choice. It’s important.
thanks for the connection.
I just left a long-winded comment…. sorry about that. I hope you realize before and after you read that I don’t disrespect your views, even if I don’t agree on everything. I agree — love must be a conscious choice, and treating people right regardless of where they are coming from is very important.
Take care….
Thanks Roger. I’m glad you asked me the question you did, when you did. I appreciate your caring enough to want to know. I like the idea of having a “system of beliefs” and not a belief in any one thing (like a god). It allows for a spirituality which is as connected and intelligent and complex as life itself.
And please, keep asking questions!
Thanks for sharing this story. I share your atheistic perspective and just wish that somehow today would be a reminder that extremists don’t represent their faiths, neither do violent acts symbolize what it means to be human! I love the line where you say that someone on the ground cared and that gives life meaning. Poignant and thought-provoking.
cheers.
Thanks Judah. That’s a brilliant line: “violent acts don’t symbolize what it means to be human.”
Lisa, that is a far more eloquent and powerful answer than I was looking forward to receiving. You never cease to amaze me. Though you don’t believe in God, you are as spiritual as any person I know. And I am grateful for your friendship. Let me ask you some other questions, though. What if the guy with the table cloth didn’t believe in God either? What if he was counting on his own strength and the strength of that cloth? If so, then it was not God who let him down. Or, let’s say he did believe in God,… Read more »
Roger asked: “Let me ask you some other questions, though. What if the guy with the table cloth didn’t believe in God either? What if he was counting on his own strength and the strength of that cloth? If so, then it was not God who let him down. Or, let’s say he did believe in God, what kind of God would it have been who would have answered his prayer, but not the prayers of the other 200 hundred who did not survive the jump?” I don’t know what Lisa’s answers would be (great post, Lisa), but as another… Read more »
Thanks TFM — I wouldn’t have phrased the answer as “so what”, but your answer helped me articulate what I wasn’t able to put into words before — that there is NO answer to those types of questions that would make even the *idea* of a God make sense. And that’s why I am so at peace with myself as an atheist. I know that atheists sometimes feel like they are somehow ostracized, but that doesn’t bother me at all. It is my belief. I don’t mind that there is no “proof” of God — simply that there is no… Read more »
TFM – you say: ”All that is why I think those are “so what?” questions. What significance or insight did you thing they might lead to? What happened to those jumpers and everyone else who perished on 9/11 is consistent with my belief that there is no omnimax god working miracles in times of need, so I don’t see any answers to your questions that would change that.” First, I wasn’t trying to add insight, I was following Lisa’s line of thought. If that one jumper was the thing that made Lisa stop believing in God, then those questions matter.… Read more »
I like that insight, Roger, that “God has gotten a bad name because of all the religion that has been wrapped around him/her.” I guess my point with both the tablecloth story and this post in general is this: that for me, personally, a “God” serves no purpose. I had always thought that is was some entity that cared if I lived or died, but I just don’t see that anymore. I don’t need a God to be present around rituals, especially around death — I’d rather the ritual be around the person’s life and not about their death. And… Read more »
Lisa, you and I may agree on a lot more than either of us realize. I see God as the organizing principle behind Love, not some amorphous entity. God, in my view, holds the container for Love, expressed most completely, so far, through human beings. When we get it right, God smiles. When we get it wrong, God weeps. I don’t think God cares whether you and I live or die, ultimately, because that is a distinction of human creation. But I also think that God, as that organizing principle, understands death in a very different way than you and… Read more »
Thanks for your replies, Roger & Lisa. Respectfully, Roger, I don’t see how those questions would matter even if that one jumper was the breaking point for Lisa’s faith. If the guy was a non-believer, that wouldn’t make it easier to continue to believe in an all-loving God for letting him perish. If he was a believer, but too arrogant to pray because he trusted his own strength instead of God’s, his demise would not be more consistent with an all-loving God. If God let him die because it would have been somehow capricious or unjust to save him and… Read more »
TFM, thanks so much for taking the time to articulate your thoughts. I understand your questions. I understand your doubts. I’m not a believer in miracles, as many faith traditions have historically presented them. I don’t believe that the Bible is unquestionable and “true” in the sense of being historically or scientifically defensible. But I do believe that evolution is inadequate when it comes to explaining the capacity of human being to Love, that there is something beyond human understanding that has created the capacity for Love, and that creation has reached that capacity in the form of human beings.… Read more »
Thanks again, both TFM and Roger, for your thoughtful additions to the discussion. Roger, the story you tell about your brother is amazing, and because it is so concrete it is easy to grasp.
And it also helps me understand this — discussions like this are not designed to *change* anyone’s viewpoint, that certainly isn’t the intention for me. But what they do is help us all *understand* the others view, for that is the root of all empathy. And empathy is a form of love.
Couldn’t agree more, Lisa. When our intent is to *change” someone’s viewpoint, we don’t tend to listen very well. And when we don’t listen, we often miss the opportunity to learn and to understand and to empathize. Thanks for getting that.
I’ve enjoyed our dialogue, too, Roger. Sorry if my comments have become walls of text, but with fast typing and small composition boxes, length gets away from me sometimes. Besides, I’m naturally long-winded when I write. Hopefully it’s not so bad here since the conversation isn’t flying by with dozens of commenters and hundreds of comments. The story of your brother and mother is heartbreaking and heartwarming at the same time, and the core theme that love is complicated resonates with me. (I also have some personal experience with mental illness, so that resonates, too.) There’s nothing about it that… Read more »
Hi TFM (Roger), I had meant all my replies on this thread to be both to you and Roger. Did not mean to exclude you! But your posts could be a blog post in themselves, as could Roger’s story about his brother. One thing I am curious about — “Letting innocent people suffer and die horrible deaths despite having the power to spare them.” — is that what people who believe in God believe? (That’s how I was brought up). Or is there a different story, one that says God does NOT have the power to spare people? I’m really… Read more »
First off, I’m embarrassed that I butchered the first sentence in my 9/13 11:20p comment where I was attempting to compliment Roger’s writing. Hopefully my point wasn’t butchered beyond comprehension, but in a post that took all day to write, I got sloppy with my editing when I just wanted to get it submitted before bed. I’m pretty tolerant of other people’s typos and goofs in discussions like this, but kick myself over my own. Lisa wrote: “Or is there a different story, one that says God does NOT have the power to spare people?” Like you, I was raised… Read more »
Lisa, you ask: “Letting innocent people suffer and die horrible deaths despite having the power to spare them.” — is that what people who believe in God believe? There is not one current line of thinking on this. The question you are asking, though, is one that people have been trying to answer for, well, forever. Some answer it as atheists have, which is to say that God cannot exist where suffering exists. Some people of faith believe that God does have the power, but in offering free choice, has chosen not to intervene on behalf of people. That creates… Read more »
Sharp thnkniig! Thanks for the answer.
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