Lapse

[bobquasit]

A few Christians on Askville suggested that atheists should be consider "lapsed" Christians. I responded that I preferred to be called an ex-Christian, or better still, an atheist - that "lapsed" implied "failure".

One of the Christians replied that I was making up that connotation, and probably suffered from a guilty conscience; perhaps I would eventually come back to the faith. I had to reply in detail:

I understand that many (probably most) Christians very much want to believe that deep in their heart, atheists "know" that God exists. It's probably gives comforting sense of moral superiority to think that atheism is a lapse. But Geppetto, I saw you palm that ace!

Frankly, I'm rather disappointed. Did you think that atheists were unfamiliar with the English language?

I won't copy the whole definition, because it's quite long. But I'll give you a link:

http://dictionary.reference.com/dic?q=lapsed&search=search

And here are a few key excerpts:

************************
–noun
1. an accidental or temporary decline or deviation from an expected or accepted condition or state; a temporary falling or slipping from a previous standard: a lapse of justice.
2. a slip or error, often of a trivial sort; failure: a lapse of memory.
...
4. a moral fall, as from rectitude or virtue.
5. a fall or decline to a lower grade, condition, or degree; descent; regression: a lapse into savagery.
************************

I already knew these meanings and connotations, of course; I think anyone would who was even slightly familiar with the word . Didn't you? And if you did, isn't it true that you were bearing false witness by suggesting that I had made up those meanings?

If you WERE bearing false witness, why? What did you hope to gain? What point where you trying to establish?

In any case, let me respond directly to your suggestion: no, I don't consider my current non-belief to be a fall from grace. Quite the reverse. Not because I feel that atheism is morally superior to belief in general, mind you. No, it's rather that atheism is the more truthful position for me.

When I "became" an atheist, I was finally admitting to myself what had been the truth for many years: I simply didn't believe. And any profession of faith on my part, at that point, would have been sheer hypocrisy; hollow and meaningless.

I suppose you'll continue to believe otherwise, but that's certainly something I can live with. I do wonder, though, why the prospect of an ex-Christian who is honestly comfortable with atheism (and even happy with it, though you probably can't believe that) is so threatening to some Christians.