12.01.2005

This I Believe - Penn Jillette

halloweenslide02
slide - erika

Morning Edition, November 21, 2005 · I believe that there is no God. I'm beyond atheism. Atheism is not believing in God. Not believing in God is easy -- you can't prove a negative, so there's no work to do. You can't prove that there isn't an elephant inside the trunk of my car. You sure? How about now? Maybe he was just hiding before. Check again. Did I mention that my personal heartfelt definition of the word "elephant" includes mystery, order, goodness, love and a spare tire?

So, anyone with a love for truth outside of herself has to start with no belief in God and then look for evidence of God. She needs to search for some objective evidence of a supernatural power. All the people I write e-mails to often are still stuck at this searching stage. The atheism part is easy.

But, this "This I Believe" thing seems to demand something more personal, some leap of faith that helps one see life's big picture, some rules to live by. So, I'm saying, "This I believe: I believe there is no God."

Having taken that step, it informs every moment of my life. I'm not greedy. I have love, blue skies, rainbows and Hallmark cards, and that has to be enough. It has to be enough, but it's everything in the world and everything in the world is plenty for me. It seems just rude to beg the invisible for more. Just the love of my family that raised me and the family I'm raising now is enough that I don't need heaven. I won the huge genetic lottery and I get joy every day.

Believing there's no God means I can't really be forgiven except by kindness and faulty memories. That's good; it makes me want to be more thoughtful. I have to try to treat people right the first time around.

Believing there's no God stops me from being solipsistic. I can read ideas from all different people from all different cultures. Without God, we can agree on reality, and I can keep learning where I'm wrong. We can all keep adjusting, so we can really communicate. I don't travel in circles where people say, "I have faith, I believe this in my heart and nothing you can say or do can shake my faith." That's just a long-winded religious way to say, "shut up," or another two words that the FCC likes less. But all obscenity is less insulting than, "How I was brought up and my imaginary friend means more to me than anything you can ever say or do." So, believing there is no God lets me be proven wrong and that's always fun. It means I'm learning something.

Believing there is no God means the suffering I've seen in my family, and indeed all the suffering in the world, isn't caused by an omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent force that isn't bothered to help or is just testing us, but rather something we all may be able to help others with in the future. No God means the possibility of less suffering in the future.

Believing there is no God gives me more room for belief in family, people, love, truth, beauty, sex, Jell-O and all the other things I can prove and that make this life the best life I will ever have.

- Penn Jillette

5 comments:

madge said...

I was all like, damn, is that text orange or am I going color-blind? I love the slide. Wow!

And this perspective is also intriguing to flip around in my mind...Penn?! Who knew. To me, he is forever that guy on Sabrina the Teenage Witch that was big + funny.

kimberlina said...

definitely not color blind. it was just a sentence i liked. color for emphasis - hopefully not epilepsy inducing. ;)

Meaghan said...

were sex and jello awfully close on the list of things that makes life great? is there a connection? was he a man? I heard the tail end of that segment and thought it was a woman talking, but it sounded strange... maybe because the woman is a man (gasp!)....

kimberlina said...

penn does have a strange mannish woman voice. *laugh*

FRITZ said...

Philosopher inside says,"By recognizing the characteristics of God, you are admitting your belief IN God, but just in a reverse manner."
But that's silly.

Wait a minute. What is the stuff of belief? Isn't it ultimately faith? Faith that God DOES NOT exist? Hm. Sounds a lot like the faith that GOD IS. But that might be silly,too.

I don't know. I don't begrudge ANYONE'S right to believe or NOT believe in God. I happen to believe in a Creator because it makes too much sense. But that's my belief.

And I think God IS those genetic pools, and beautiful moments, and sky and sun and everything in between.

But maybe that's just silly:)