DangerousTalk

One of my issues with the Abrahamic religions is that it doesn’t just focus on the ridiculous belief in an all-powerful supernatural being, but that they demand that we worship this imaginary being (often times in some strange and interesting ways).

A popular argument that some fundamentalist believers use is that humans were created (by their God) for the sole purpose of worshipping our alleged creator, God. Personally, I think this seems pretty vain of a deity to create beings for the sole purpose of worshipping him. In fact, to me it is a very unpraise-worthy trait. While I have lots of issues with this line of thinking (if you could call it that), that is not the issue that I want to discuss today.

Some of these fundamentalists will claim that if we don’t worship their God in their way, then we must then worship something else in an attempt to fill our “God-shaped hole in our hearts.” I have often told Christians who have made this argument that while I admire a lot of different people, I don’t worship anyone. No pope or priest or rabbi fills my “God-shaped hole.”

That doesn’t satisfy them. Instead, they then insist that I must then worship drugs, alcohol, money, or some other type of material thing. Well, I have never done any illegal drugs nor do I drink in any excess. In fact, I tell them that I have never even been drunk. I am not really about money either since I tend to live a pretty frugal life (although if people donated to DangerousTalk more that could change, lol).

That too doesn’t satisfy their need for my God-shaped hole. So next they often tell me that I try to fill my God-shaped hole with sex. I love this one because these prudish people set themselves up to be offended as the jokes about filling holes begin. They usually try to change the subject pretty quickly.

Finally they find the answer. Surprisingly this is usually their last effort:
Believer: “You fill your God-shape hole in your ‘heart’ with science!”
Me: “Yup, and oddly enough it really seems to plug it up nicely.”

Science isn’t a thing that can be worshipped; it is a tool that we use to understand the world around us. The scientific method is way of thinking which has given us all the technology that most people take for granted. We use the scientific method because it works. It is the best tool we have for understanding the world around us.

Interestingly enough, it seems that when science hasn’t yet figured someone out about the world, it is God which fills in the gaps. It is kind of funny when you think about it, God fills the science-shaped hole and that back when we couldn’t travel to the stars, believers filled that science-shaped gap with Heaven. Now that we have been to the stars, God lives in another dimension or something. Maybe God-believers need to start re-thinking this God-shaped hole bit, because it really seems like it is the theists using God to fill the gaps.

Filed under: god of the gaps, God-Shaped Hole, Religion, responsibility