A child of an atheist blogger writes a beautiful “pop-quiz” essay at school on the theme of “What I want for Christmas.”
Here’s a small part:
As I glance around this classroom, I see that many of my friends are feverishly pumping out manifestos dictating what gadgets and goodies they wish to find under their Christmas tree on the morning of December 25th. My mind, however, is reeling over the presumption that my public school teacher has addressed our classroom and assigned an essay in which she presumes that the entire lot of us are Christian or celebrate Christmas.
I take another look around my classroom and notice that Mahmeed is absent-mindedly cleaning underneathe his fingernails with the cap from his pen. Emily is feverishly trying to catch my eye and, having done so, mouthing the words, “I don’t celebrate Christmas…I’m Jewish.” in a quizzical manner. Jayden is doing what he normally does during such pop essays: he’s looking out the window- probably wondering where his parents will get the money for January’s rent and feeling guilty for daring to think about a gift. He’s pretty sensitive.
I have never admitted it to any of my friends, but I think I must be an atheist.
Please read the whole thing. It’s short, and it’s tender and touching.
The responses have been, almost predictably quite negative.
From her teacher, she got the comment that she couldn’t possibly be an atheist because she showed empathy for her friends, which of course is a trait that only Christians have.
But it didn’t end there. Comments came in on this writer’s small personal blog, including a set of them from someone claiming to be a baptist minister in her area. Many of the blog responses to this minister’s attacks on the girl’s parenting come from personal friends of the mother. As I said, it’s a small, personal blog.
It can’t end there. The story can’t end there with the ugliness of people’s angry responses. The girl’s essay is inspiring, sympathetic and moving. She said more with just a couple paragraphs than the 100 or so email responses trying to attack her mother’s parenting or defend her.
I’m raising a daughter who I hope has the same generosity of spirit of the girl who wrote this.
Siamang
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By Siamang
A big discussion going on in atheist circles, and a rather embarrassing one, is the Churchill/Chamberlain debate.
I haven’t brought it up here because, quite frankly it embarrasses me as an atheist. I find it petty, small-minded and intellectually void.
I’ll sum it up here, for those who haven’t heard about it.
Atheist writer Sam Harris, author of “Letter to a Christian Nation” has written that moderate theists give cover for their radical counterparts. His point is that “faith is a virtue” is a notion that the masses of moderate believers follow, and create a world where extremists can grow. In the minds of the Sam Harrises of the world, moderate believers are to blame for the sins of radicals.
This notion has created a divide among some public atheists. Hopefully this is an argument that’s only taking place on the internet, because I’d hate to think otherwise. But the divide is this: If you’re with Sam Harris against the moderate believers, you’re on the Winston Churchill side of the debate. If you think that moderate believers are properly allied with atheists on issues like science education in schools, public policy for social services, etc, then you are an appeaser of the Neville Chamberlain variety.
Yes, it’s an ugly way to argue. In fact, it’s so ugly that I’m ashamed of it on behalf of atheists.
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So I haven’t written about it. Partly out of embarrassment and partly out of not having anything constructive to say about it other than to complain.
But yesterday I read a thoughtful post by Josh Rosenau over at ScienceBlogs, and it hit the spot. He argues that the “enemy” isn’t religion. The enemy is authoritarianism. That’s the problem, and there are people who will follow authoritarian leaders in political movements, social movements and religious movements. But moderates of all stripes are natural allies.
And it’s the perfect antidote to these “Churchill/Chamberlain” types. Give it a read.
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Siamang
A Funny Friday Video.
Posted in A Cacophony of Posts, Siamang | 1 Comment »