an atheist at Christmastime
It's three in the morning and I have relatives coming tomorrow. Therefore, I'm hanging around on LJ (which has been dead all day), treasuring this last little bit of time during which I'm responsible for nobody but myself. (They leave on the 28th, but until then, it's my job to make sure they have a good time.)
At this very moment, I'm listening to Barenaked Ladies' "Christmas Medley." The line "Glorious now behold him arise / King and god and sacrifice" always makes me shiver. Considering I don't believe in the God the song celebrates, or indeed in any God, that might be considered odd.
I'm strangely attached to Christianity, really. I haven't genuinely believed in God since I was a young teenager, though I've gone through some phases of trying to believe. For a long time I was hesitant to identify myself as an atheist, because so many atheists are belligerent about it. (This is, I suspect, the obverse of the liberal Christian problem, where right-wingers so publicly and aggressively insist on their Christian belief that they make other Christians look bad.) I don't care if other people believe in a divine being (or several), so long as they don't push their religion on me or attempt to enshrine their religious teachings as civil law. I, however, don't believe in (any) god, a divine plan, the soul, or the afterlife.
But Christianity was a major factor in my childhood. My mother (for reasons best known to herself, since she's not religious at all) insisted that I go to church. I grew up with Christian stories, both in their "for children" versions and in the glorious language of the King James Bible. Two or three times I even went to a Christian summer camp, where I routinely won the prize for memorizing the most Bible verses. That immersion in rich seventeenth-century prose was, I think, one reason why I later became interested in literature.
So the scriptural stories, to me, are a lot like those beloved books people have in childhood. You can grow out of them as an adult, or at least realize their limitations, but they never lose their emotional impact on you. The idea of "God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son" is so damn wonderful, so powerful as a story, that it's hard not to want it to be true. And the myth of the infant Jesus, the word made flesh, born into poverty and suffering but attended by angels and the stars themselves, is the most compelling of the lot. It's in me, indelibly, part of the structure of my thoughts and feelings.
We're made of stories. Sometimes, we've made of stories we no longer accept. It means that Christmas is a peculiar time for me, because I love the religious aspects of the holiday without being a religious believer. I love them from a distance, as it were. I sing along with "Joy to the World" and I smile at myself.
*****
At this very moment, I'm listening to Barenaked Ladies' "Christmas Medley." The line "Glorious now behold him arise / King and god and sacrifice" always makes me shiver. Considering I don't believe in the God the song celebrates, or indeed in any God, that might be considered odd.
I'm strangely attached to Christianity, really. I haven't genuinely believed in God since I was a young teenager, though I've gone through some phases of trying to believe. For a long time I was hesitant to identify myself as an atheist, because so many atheists are belligerent about it. (This is, I suspect, the obverse of the liberal Christian problem, where right-wingers so publicly and aggressively insist on their Christian belief that they make other Christians look bad.) I don't care if other people believe in a divine being (or several), so long as they don't push their religion on me or attempt to enshrine their religious teachings as civil law. I, however, don't believe in (any) god, a divine plan, the soul, or the afterlife.
But Christianity was a major factor in my childhood. My mother (for reasons best known to herself, since she's not religious at all) insisted that I go to church. I grew up with Christian stories, both in their "for children" versions and in the glorious language of the King James Bible. Two or three times I even went to a Christian summer camp, where I routinely won the prize for memorizing the most Bible verses. That immersion in rich seventeenth-century prose was, I think, one reason why I later became interested in literature.
So the scriptural stories, to me, are a lot like those beloved books people have in childhood. You can grow out of them as an adult, or at least realize their limitations, but they never lose their emotional impact on you. The idea of "God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son" is so damn wonderful, so powerful as a story, that it's hard not to want it to be true. And the myth of the infant Jesus, the word made flesh, born into poverty and suffering but attended by angels and the stars themselves, is the most compelling of the lot. It's in me, indelibly, part of the structure of my thoughts and feelings.
We're made of stories. Sometimes, we've made of stories we no longer accept. It means that Christmas is a peculiar time for me, because I love the religious aspects of the holiday without being a religious believer. I love them from a distance, as it were. I sing along with "Joy to the World" and I smile at myself.
*****