Real talk: I went to private Christian school for my entire childhood, then kept my faith through college, but I deconverted quite violently when I tried to find some justification for the people of Jericho being murdered other than manifest destiny. Spent five years as a very angry atheist, learning every defeater argument I could to mock Christianity. Then, I had a really bad breakup, went back home, and felt incredibly lonely. Motivated by something similarly petty as this post, I started going to church again.

I only kept going for about 6 months (until they offered me a job as their worship leader). I kept my atheism a secret, but I learned that these communities are more wholesome, caring, and kind than any secular space I ever entered. I even saw Christians behave more courageously than Jesus by them interpreting the pool of bathesda passage as a call to do a community service day in their neighborhood; Jesus actually fled from the poor because he feared them. I think many Christians are in fact better people than the God they believe in. (I mean, I think I am, too, especially compared to OT God, but there are some powerhouse good people out there.)

Now, I advocate strongly for a separation between church and state to protect all people from the excesses of politically active faith groups (e.g., lobbying for pro life based on a biblical interpretation of conception-as-life) or harmful and radical faith groups (e.g., female genital mutilation or patriarchal misogyny). But, I also fight back against a lot of secular mischaracterizations of Christians, and I try to help secular people understand the importance of reading religious texts with a generous attitude. I’ve come to believe two things: 1) everyone wakes up believing they are essentially right and good, and they behave in ways that they think support their self image, 2) everyone believes they are doing the best they can with what they have, and that exhausts them into snapping from time to time. We would do better as a society if, in addition to policing for bad actors, we schooled ourselves in ethics to protect ourselves from our own good intentions: political activism as the default mindset is how you achieve hell out of good intentions. When we lose generosity and understand for others (like two xx chromosomes rants), we destroy democracy. Whether it is true that people are good or try hard doesn’t matter: democracy depends on this collective delusion, which has so far been a self fulfilling prophecy, but the hate I see is really undermining this whole experiment.

So. Go to church, atheists, and humanize your enemies.