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Frank B. Finite (a "true" atheist)
Alternate Resurrection Theory of the Month
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Frank B. Finite
A "True" Atheist
It's time to try something new, yet traditional...
Now I know that I am going to catch some flak over this next proposal. But hear me out before tossing tomatoes.
As you may or may not know I recently got back from a vacation stint on the Galapagos Islands, and had a lot of free time to think things through.
After the last few months of debating with fellow atheists, it became apparent that the situation with my beloved atheism is more critical than I first thought.
I have had to deal with a fellow brother who had a religious name and refused to change it. Then I had to defend myself against a self-described "weak atheist" who contradicted himself, then used fundy arguments to make excuses for himself - as well as Mao, Stalin and the Humanists!
All of this got me down, so I took a little break away from it all to think. And I may have figured out the problem and solution.
It's time to borrow some plays out of the fundy handbook.
They have some really neat traditions and rituals which the blind sheep seem to enjoy. We also need to make atheism fun as a group activity.
So I'm suggesting that we adopt some of these fundy traditions and rituals and transform them for the glory of atheism.
Here are my proposals . . .
Atheist Church:
We have to meet once a week in order to practice some of the preceding rituals and to plan our atheistic strategies.
We can discuss plans which may include but are not limited to, "demographics" - which people are most likely to be atheists and who are are best potential recruits; "market research" - just what do people want out of their atheism? And so on.
We also need need activities for our youth, senior citizens, parents, etc. However, it's apparent that every activity should only be the hunting for transitional fossils since we still haven't found any. That should make planning a breeze.
I believe that Wednesdays are the best suited for our "church". We need to meet when the fundies are busy so that it is less likely that fundy spy will drop in and take notes.
Sunday mornings are way too early to get up, and I like to spend that whole day lazily looking for transitional fossils in the town park.
The meeting place should be next to a large body of water (you will see why below). And a place containing lab equipment would be a plus. It sounds like a marine biology lab would be best suited, but I am not going to be dogmatic about that.
Atheist Communion:
The fundies eat bread and drink wine to commemorate their mythical Jesus (who was, as we all know, really a pagan copy-cat).
What we can do is take the wine (representing the primordial soup) and pour it onto the bread (representing the earth). Then we will leave it out for a week until we meet again. As we're gone, mold will spontaneously form and grow on the bread.
This will represent life bursting forth from nothing and evolving until the whole loaf (earth) is completely covered.
Then we will toss this evolution example in the trash and go eat at IHOP.
Atheist Baptism:
The fundies also have "baptism" in which one dunks another into water and this supposedly represents Jesus' death, burial and resurrection (which we all know didn't happen).
Our baptism will first consist of stripping off all our clothes (because life obviously first began nakedly, and any enjoyment that one receives out of this is completely natural) and walking into a lake, river or ocean.
Then we squat down until completely submerged. Next we jump up and burst forth out of the deep. After jumping up, we then crawl on all fours out of the body of water and onto dry land.
This represents life emerging from the sea - our common ancestral womb.
Afterwards, putting your clothes back on remains optional as you mingle with your fellow atheist brothers/sisters and eat finger sandwiches.
Atheist Hymns:
Most every great movement in history has had some equally great music behind it. The fundy hymns are one such example.
So naturally following the greatest force in the universe - 'the path of least resistance' - I propose that we borrow fundy hymns which are already developed (thus not wasting more of our precious fleeting time on this earth) and placing our own lyrics within them.
I shall get the ball rolling on this, so here is my contribution:
'Amazing Chance' (sung to the tune of 'Amazing Grace'):
Amazing Chance how great
the odds,
That formed a man like me.
We once were blobs then arthropods,
After emerging from the sea.
We learned to breath the outer
air,
Our gill slits filled right in.
Scales morphed into feathers then into hair,
And each limb sprouted from each fin.
As millennia passed we grew
more complex,
Chance formed our DNA.
The odds are such as to make us perplexed,
But that's what some scientists say.
Out of the primordial vat,
And into the clan of primates.
Some want to say that we're more than just that,
But we're really just talking apes.
We believe only science rules,
And we think religion is dumb.
We only trust in visible tools,
Like our brains and opposable thumbs.
As we look back on our long
lost past,
We have faith in evolution.
God's out of the way we can finally say,
Thanks to our own Charles Darwin.
My brain wants to receive some more possible atheists hymns, so contact my brain via e-mail and my brain might publish it in a future issue.
Truthfully,
Frank B. Finite's brain
(a chance evolutionary byproduct since the accidental dawning
of time, space and matter)