Stoic Conversations 12

"If you became an atheist, you'd be a member of the best club, with the best folks. Atheists are the kindest, most open-minded, must understanding people you'll ever meet, not like those dogmatists and haters. They just suck."

"Now please bear with me. I won't pull the 'Hitler Fallacy' here, precisely because it is a fallacy, what I think they're now calling Godwin's Law, a form of hasty generalization. 

"The Führer himself was an atheist. So were Stalin, and Pol Pot, and Mao Tse Tung. That neighbor who stole my Amazon package from my porch last week also likes to tell me that he is an atheist.

"You would be quite right to counter by saying that Torquemada, or the Ku Klux Klan, or General Franco, or Osama Bin Laden were all theists. That neighbor who stuffs your mailbox with condescending religious pamphlets, and gossips about you at the grocery store, also says she is a theist. 

"No, what concerns me more is whether individuals are just or unjust, loving or hateful, honest or shifty. Let their character speak more about them than their tribe. Some of them say they believe in God, and some say they don't. What bothers me is that you seem to have decided that some other class of people just suck."

"Well, you suck!"

"And there we have it. You and my Bishop are apparently in complete agreement. We're already building bridges."