Give Us This Day

By Keith Taylor

As an atheist I don't get exposed to the word of God too much, but nowadays I feel as if I'm in a revival meeting. The two top candidates for president are carrying their love for God on their sleeves with the fervor of evangelists. In addition one of the candidates for vice president suggested we somehow give religion official sanction.

Bush tells us how he became born-again, and we're expected to assume that makes him a better candidate. Gore lets us know his decisions are based on "what would Jesus do?" Both ask God to bless us whenever the cameras turn their way.

Lieberman certainly is not an evangelist, but he would leap right in bed with the fundamentalists with his "constitutional place for faith in our public life."

As would be expected the criticism comes not because Lieberman is religious, but because he has the wrong religion. Not a word of concern for those of us with no religion at all.

Perhaps we should be used to it by now. The Boy Scouts won't have us, and the Supreme Court says they don't have to. The Scouts' argument was they are a private organization and can admit whomever they please.

Seven states won't let us in either, and I have no idea how they get away with that. Even the most ardent states-right advocates don't claim the states are private. Yet, the constitutions of Arkansas, Maryland, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas all require a belief in God in order for a person to hold any office in those states. .

Suppose they (or the Scouts for that matter) specifically excluded Jews, or Baptists, or Mormons, or any other group. Would we see a howl about that? But nobody howls when the likes of Albert Einstein, Mark Twain, Thomas Payne, Walter Lippmann, Luther Burbank, and 93% of our top scientists are excluded from everything from dogcatcher to governor

In fact a nonbeliever couldn't be elected to much of anything anywhere. Even in the 43 states that don't specifically prohibit them from holding office you'll not see an avowed atheist or agnostic holding office. If one would run, you can be certain his heresy would be exploited.

This "wisdom" prevails despite more than 20 centuries of religiously inspired inquisitions, crusades, wars, library burnings, censorship, and gratuitous killing. Today those who embrace any idea of God are accepted, applauded, and lauded. Those who have one less religion than the rest are shut out of the whole process.

Blind faith carries more water than hard facts. In the fourteenth century virtually every European prayed for deliverance from Black Plague. Still one quarter of the population--some 25 million--died. Compare that to the fact that in the last 100 years scientists, few of whom even believe in God, have doubled our life expectancy.

Still, lately more and more of our candidates for high office insist their prayers--not decisions based on hard facts--will serve our country well. In 1992, Gore, who dared write in favor of science was sneered at as "Ozone Head" for his writing. Thereafter he emphasized his piety not his scientific acumen.

Dan Quayle, who was criticized for nearly everything he said, claimed the first thing he would do if he became president would be to say a prayer. It was one his few remarks that passed without comment or question. Perhaps the reporters didn't want to seem to question the common perception that good things happen to those who pray. Perhaps it does. We haven't had a plague for quite a while.

Now we have a major candidate who would seem to defy the first amendment and give religion the imprimatur of law. Thank goodness it raised a minor ruckus. Religion is out in the open. Now let's take a good look at it. Let's decide if it is deserving of a free ride, or if it is just something that sounds good.

My hope is to live long enough to see Americans willing to challenge unproven ideas and willing to actually consider the wisdom of those who dare to doubt. Perhaps one can even hold office somewhere.

(Keith Taylor was the President of the San Diego Association of Rational Inquiry when this was written)