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anonymous authors, then how
can we believe with any confidence? Yes, the Book of Life, like the
gods themselves, may help believers feel special but this does not
mean they necessarily exist.
    I can understand when believers say they feel good about a god
who knows them and cares about them. I can imagine how such a
belief might allow some to cope with life a little better. But there is
another way. Everyone does not have to believe in Allah, Yahweh,
Jesus, Ganesha, Vishnu, or other gods to feel significant. We can be
happy, feel important, and lead meaningful lives without gods. Hundreds of millions of nonbelievers around the world manage to do it
every day. One does not necessarily have to look any further than
family, friends, and the joy from being productive or creative to find
satisfaction and purpose in life. These real things can be so wonderful,
in fact, that I wonder why anyone would ever want to take time away
from them in order to worship a god who has not yet been proven to
even exist. Believers might consider the possibility that every minute
spent thinking about and talking to gods up in the sky is a minute
wasted down here.
    Believing in an unproven god may offer some level of comfort but
it certainly is not the only way to feel a connection to something
bigger than yourself. Besides, it is not really so hard to confront the intimidating reality of our place in the universe. It is possible to meet
it head on by embracing the power and mystery of it all rather than
shrinking from it. For example, when I was writing the opening paragraphs of this chapter, describing a universe that is billions of years
old and billions of light years wide, I didn't feel overshadowed, overwhelmed, or intimidated. I felt excited and inspired. I love living in a
universe that is outrageously big; anything less would feel claustrophobic. One does not have to be left feeling cold, hollow, or depressed
by the realities of time and nature. Don't bow down and cower in the
immense shadow of this universe. Stand up and claim your place in it.
Be the opposite of those who glance up at the night sky and feel small.
Look up and be a giant because you are a part of it all. Furthermore,
you are special because, as a thinking and creative lifeform, you are
one of the most fortunate collections of atoms in all the universe.

CHAPTER 5 BIBLIOGRAPHY AND
RECOMMENDED READING
    Sagan, Carl. Cosmos. New York: Random House, 2002.
    Tyson, Neil deGrasse, and Donald Goldsmith. Origins: Fourteen Billion
Years of Cosmic Evolution. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2004.

     

Oap&r 6
Atheism is just another
religion.
    If atheism is a religion, then bald is a hair color.
    -Mark Schnitzius
    ome believers charge that atheism is just another religion.
Atheism requires faith like any traditional religion, they say. "It
takes more faith not to believe in a god than to believe," is a common
quip these days. Some believers even claim that atheists worship
humans and look to science as their religion.
    These are strange but surprisingly common claims. I have heard
them many times. Some believers apparently find it difficult to comprehend the existence of people who are not convinced that any gods
are real. The weirdest thing about calling atheism a religion is that
some religious people say it as if it's an insult. I know they don't mean
it that way, but it sounds a lot like, "You atheists are as silly as we are."
That aside, believers need to be aware that declaring atheism to be a
religion does not help the case for the existence of a god. Whatever
atheists may or may not be has no bearing on whether or not gods
exist. Therefore, labeling atheism a religion is no justification for
believing in a god. By the way, no atheist thinks Charles Darwin, Carl
Sagan, or anybody else is a god. If they did, they wouldn't be atheists.
They would be believers.
    I suspect that many people who believe in a god are eager to call atheism a