One of SHAFT’s primary functions is as a social sanctuary of sorts. In so religious a state as ours, where people with no religious beliefs are sometimes ostracized, it’s important that atheists/agnostics find like-minded or sympathetic company. Otherwise, being an atheist/agnostic in Utah can be a lonely experience.
I’ve had the good fortune never to experience that kind of loneliness—at least not for extended periods of time. Both my family and friends are accepting of my atheism, so my relationships haven’t suffered for it. If anything, my social life has been enhanced as an atheist, having met a lot of extraordinary people through SHAFT.
No, the loneliness I feel is more profound, more persistent. It’s a loneliness that isn’t diminished even when I’m surrounded by people. It’s that feeling that you’re stuck in your own head—that because you cannot express every thought, nobody will ever truly know you.
This, of course, is nothing unique to atheists. Perhaps it’s the human condition. But this mind-as-prison loneliness, for me, worsened without a belief in god.
Atheist author Christopher Hitchens often remarks that he’s relieved there is no god. He abhors the notion of a god who monitors our thoughts as tyrannical. “Who wishes,” he asks in the introduction to The Portable Atheist, “that there was a permanent, unalterable celestial despotism that subjected us to continual surveillance and could convict us of thought-crime[?]”
Like Hitchens, I find that god, the Abrahamic god, objectionable. I do, however, wish that there were some being who knew my every waking thought—the good, the bad, and the ugly. And when I did believe in such a being, I felt less lonely. (To be sure, believing that my thoughts were being monitored was cause for anxiety. But that anxiety was outweighed by the comfort of having someone totally understand you, and more than you understand yourself.)
So to compensate for no longer believing in any omniscient being, I try to be radically open, honest, and expressive. It borders on voyeurism, really. And often my frankness comes at the expense of social tact. On first dates, for example, I volunteer all the most embarrassing information about me. If they’re still interested in me after these disclosures (and they rarely are ha ha), then they’re worth dating.
My blogging, too, has largely been driven by this loneliness. It allows me to free some thoughts from my head—well, to the extent that I can articulate them into words.
All that said, I don’t regret losing my faith. I enjoy a happy, meaningful life. But I do nonetheless miss aspects of the religious experience, including that sense of being understood.