Free Godless by Dan Barker Page A

I should put myself under the microscope. If everyone else could be wrong, then so could I. My religious experiences did not get weaker. They did not start to feel hollow or empty. (In fact, I can still reproduce those feelings today, just as strong.) What happened is that another part of my mind—the rational mind—started looking at the emotional part of my mind as if from a distance. I became my own test subject. “Look at that! I’m talking with God. It sure feels real, but it must be a trick of the brain.” It had to be a trick of the brain, since it was beginning to look like a personal god probably did not exist. What a strange and wonderful thing to realize.
     
    At that time in my migration, with my theology trying to keep pace with my intellectual and rational maturing, I still believed in a god but had no idea how to define it. All the while, I was still getting invitations to preach and sing in various churches, many of which were fundamentalist and conservative evangelical. Long before then I had stopped my direct “soul winning” sermons and tailored my message to be palatable to just about any church. This was easy since most of the churches that invited me at that time were interested in my published music, so I could simply perform a number of songs with brief inspirational introductions and keep the preaching to a minimum. I was able to adjust to the expectations of the audience, becoming more or less evangelistic according to the flavor of each church. Even then, I felt somewhat hypocritical, often hearing myself mouth words about which I was no longer sure, but words that the audience wanted to hear.
     
    In my secret life of private reading I was impressed with enlightened writers in science magazines. In particular, an article by Ben Bova about “Creationist’s Equal Time” in OMNI magazine turned the lens around so that I was gazing back at the fundamentalist mindset. The article laid bare the dishonesty of the “equal time for creationism in the science class” argument by asking how many Christians would welcome a chapter about evolution inserted between Genesis and Exodus. I became more and more embarrassed at what I used to believe, and more attracted to rational thought. Like an ancient bone that slowly fossilizes, the bible became less and less reliable as a source of truth and reason slowly took its place. I found myself asking heretical questions.
     
    Where did we get the idea that words on a page speak truth? Shouldn’t truth be the result of investigation and analysis?
     
    If I think it is so easy for millions of people to be misled into a false religion because of a tendency to believe error, what makes me exempt?
     
    If the Prodigal Son is a parable and Adam and Eve are a metaphor, then why is God himself not one huge figure of speech?
     
    I kept moving and moving, picking up the pace, enjoying the scary feeling of “growing up” and learning. My mind felt like it was waking up. In my thirst for knowledge I did not limit myself to Christian authors since I also wanted to understand the reasoning behind non-Christian thinking. I figured the only way to truly grasp a subject was to look at it from all sides. If I had limited myself to Christian books I would probably still be a Christian today. I read philosophy, theology, science and psychology. I studied evolution and natural history. At first I laughed at these worldly thinkers, but I eventually started discovering some disturbing facts—facts that discredited Christianity. I tried to ignore these facts because they did not integrate with my religious worldview.
     
    During those years of migration, I went through an intense inner conflict. On the one hand I was happy with the direction and fulfillment of my Christian life; on the other hand, my intellectual doubts were sprouting all over. Faith and reason began a war within me. And it kept escalating. I would cry out to God for answers, and none would come. Like the