{"id":7076,"date":"2013-03-18T12:24:09","date_gmt":"2013-03-18T16:24:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/?p=7076"},"modified":"2013-03-18T12:24:09","modified_gmt":"2013-03-18T16:24:09","slug":"a-week-tell-me-youre-a-_____","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2013\/03\/a-week-tell-me-youre-a-_____.html","title":{"rendered":"“A Week?” Tell me you’re a _____"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

If you cross-read the atheism portal here at Patheos or have atheist friends who are heavily engaged with the movement, you may be seeing images like this pop up across Facebook this week.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s \u2018A\u2019 Week, which, as Hemant Mehta explains at his blog, is a challenge to atheists to come out and give their friends a chance to know they know atheists. \u00a0This year\u2019s celebration seems particularly well-timed, falling right after\u00a0Rob Portman\u2019s rapid about-face on gay marriage<\/a> demonstrates that people may not bother imagining how they feel about their beliefs and prejudices when they move down one level of abstraction.<\/p>\n

Discrimination against atheists is still a problem, and an\u00a0embarrassing\u00a0number of people elide \u201cYou can\u2019t metaphysically sustain a philosophy of objective morality without God\u201d into \u201cYou can\u2019t\u00a0follow<\/em> objective morals without God.\u201d \u00a0So I\u2019m glad that Hemant, JT, and others will be forcing people to confront the places where their model of atheists and atheism is in error.<\/p>\n

But, if it\u2019s a tradition to come out on A Week, it\u2019s also a tradition (the last two<\/a> years<\/a> running) for me to wish it went further. \u00a0And I don\u2019t feel inclined to skip it just because I\u2019ve swum the Tiber in the interim. \u00a0My complaint about A Week is just that atheism isn\u2019t very interesting or specific. \u00a0While you\u2019re telling your friends and family what you\u00a0don\u2019t<\/em> believe, why make them pick up what you\u00a0do<\/em> believe implicitly from your actions?<\/p>\n

Atheism is a really big tent. \u00a0And I\u2019m pretty sure my atheist bookclub friend<\/a> might be likely to come to (probably-rhetorical) blows with any number of the A Week participants, just as he frequently did with atheist!me a year ago. \u00a0So why not use Facebook\u2019s spacious cover photo slot to mention something about what you\u00a0do<\/em> believe in? \u00a0Presumably, it\u2019s what you want your religious friends to come around to after their deconversion, so it\u2019s only polite to pitch it now.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

So, start a more\u00a0interesting<\/em> conversation\/fight and, atheist commenters, tell me what you would have stuck in your version of my Reason Rally sign.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the most pertinent and\/or interesting thing for someone to know about your ideals, once they already know you don\u2019t believe in God?<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I\u2019ll take a roundabout crack at it. \u00a0If someone already knows I\u2019m Catholic, I think the most useful next thing for them to know is that I have a really Aristotelian\/MacIntyrian understanding of virtue\/right action. \u00a0Every action you take is a choice to reinforce\/ratify that way of thinking and acting for the rest of your life. \u00a0Which is still basically my sign from last year.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you cross-read the atheism portal here at Patheos or have atheist friends who are heavily engaged with the movement, you may be seeing images like this pop up across Facebook this week. It\u2019s \u2018A\u2019 Week, which, as Hemant Mehta explains at his blog, is a challenge to atheists to come out and give their […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":127,"featured_media":7077,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7076","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-atheism"],"yoast_head":"\n"A Week?" 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