How can I not believe in God? It's easy! And if you follow these ten simple steps, you too can free yourself from this superstition:

1. Understand that no god has ever really loved humanity. The god most familiar to those of us in the United States is a sociopath throughout the Old Testament, at various times commanding his chosen people to slaughter entire cities of men, women, and children.

2. Imagine your god commanding you to slaughter innocent children with a sword. You've travelled back in time, you're an Old Testament Jew, and you must kill children, including infants, with a sword. What is your reaction? Can you do it? Do you do something you know to be wrong, or do you disobey your god? Those are your options.

3. Understand that religion is a means of control. If your faith in your god is so strong, why is backsliding so very easy? You're not weak: your faith is illogical. It's a means of roping you into a lifestyle no human being would naturally seek out. It's a means of keeping you docile, more concerned about an afterlife than about the real life you're currently living. You put up with more abuse - lower pay, less respect, censorship of perfectly natural thoughts and feelings - because you don't have to worry about reality.

4. Listen to the silence that answers your prayers. This god of yours never speaks. Isn't that strange? I know, I know - he's communicating to you in code. Doesn't that belief strike you as odd? That an invisible deity who never speaks is talking to you in code - in mysterious signs and symbols? How is this belief different from the belief that aliens are beaming messages into your head? Are you absolutely sure you haven't joined a cult?

5. If you don't believe in organized religion, ask yourself how your belief in a superhuman deity is different from organized religion. Is your deity kinder and gentler? Easier to obey, to love? Isn't your deity just a replacement for absent or emotionally unavailable parents? (Cognitive therapy is a much more effective way to deal with these issues.)

6. Look at how petty your beliefs are. You oppose homosexuality because your church tells you to oppose it, but why do you care so much? Do you really find gay people so offensive, so threatening, or are you just harassing and vilifying a minority that chooses to live a different lifestyle than you?

7. Realize that you cannot justify a god who tortures people, and certainly not one who tortures people for all eternity.

8. Understand that a pastor repeatedly threatening you with torture is an abusive person who does not deserve your time or money. You wouldn't let anyone else threaten to burn you. Why do you let religious people threaten to burn you? (Or maybe you believe hell is some sort of metaphor. A kinder, gentler version of an essentially psychotic idea?)

9. Suppose you've been deceived. Suppose your belief system is just a human construct, a set of myths. Do you really need those myths to survive? To be happy? To be a good person? You already understand good and bad. Why do you need a church to tell you to feel guilty?

10. Imagine total freedom and honesty. Imagine a world in which your thoughts are never censored. In which there is no such thing as purity, and there is nothing above you, looking down and judging your every little mistake. You are now free to understand the things you fear, instead of avoiding them. There are no taboos, and you aren't putting on a performance for anyone.

Now look at what your god demands, and ask yourself why you put up with it. What are you afraid of?

Learn more about this author, Jonathan Young.
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