Forget Yourself

Saturday night in Birmingham. The evening comes to an end as I walk out the door from a day's revelry with friends. A day spent watching college football, watching my Auburn Tigers scrap by with another victory and enjoying the excitement a momentary distraction brings. But the game's over now and it is time to leave my friends and drive home.

I drive through Mountain Brook, the wealthiest part of town that serves as a divider between my friend's house and my apartment. It is a short drive and one that I have made countless times on forgotten nights just like this one. The winding streets are familiar to me and could almost be traversed without much conscious effort, a fortunate circumstance considering my mind's wanderings. I don't pay much attention to the stop light up ahead or the turn I am about to make. I'm somewhere else right now, back in a dorm room with her wondering where it all went wrong. I've played it over a thousand times in my head without any resolution and nearly lost myself because of it. So I buried the memories deep and resolved to never visit them again, lest their hold on me became complete and I finally lost myself altogether. And then, just when I believed the memories were forever gone she re-enters my life, not in a purposeful way or one in which she planned. Curiously enough, not even in a manner caused by her own doing. But the memories are dredged up all the same, losing none of their vengeance over the years. I don't need this now. I don't need this ever. I just need the memories to disappear and only know of one method to ensure their departure.

My car veers from its normal path. I take a left when I should have turned right. Mountain Brook becomes a speck in my rear view mirror as I venture to another part of town not accustomed to recognizing my face, but not yet calling me a stranger either.

I park in a dimly lit lot just south of downtown. Its faded lighting casts my clothes in a burnt orange veneer that gives a sinister tone to the Auburn colors still emblazoned on my shirt. Half a minute later and I'm at the bar, deciding what I'll have while checking to make sure my wallet will cover the cost of the evening's indulgence. The bartender brings two shots of No. 7 and another of Patrón, a slight departure from my usual tastes but inconsequential for tonight's purpose. The two shots of whiskey go down quickly while I savor the tequila, its unique texture gliding across my tongue like the sting of a sensual kiss.

One more shot, then another, and finally a sixth to round out the half hour. Anything to erase the memories and the corresponding feelings they never fail to elicit. My left arms rests motionless on the table holding an empty shot glass while my right one lies sprawled out across the back rest of the booth that I'm sitting in. Almost without noticing, a girl takes a seat beside me and conspicuously places my right arm around her shoulder as she edges closer. She mentions something about how she saw me across the bar but her words clang together like the bells of some nearby church that will be ringing in only a few hours. I can't understand anything other than she is a student at UAB and wants to study education. Girls like her always want to be a teacher for some reason.

Thirty minutes later we are back at her dorm. Her roommates are gone and the room is completely dark save for a curious desk lamp with a pink lampshade over it. It casts the world into a starlit, faded crimson as we climb into her bed. She turns off the light while I succumb to an evening awash in alcohol and bad decisions.

The next morning I wake up to sunlight glaring through the window and the sound of quiet breathing coming from the body beside me. She's still asleep as I climb out of bed and get dressed. A moment later and her bedroom door is opening and closing behind me. The last time I was in a dorm room ended roughly the same way.

It's a two mile walk back to the parking lot and the mid-morning sun is only exacerbating the pounding between my ears. When I eventually find my car I notice a ticket placed just under the windshield but I crumple it and toss it to the ground without reading what it says. The drive back to my apartment is only a short distance away and by the time I make it home I'm having trouble remembering everything that happened last night. Something about a bad memory it seems. Maybe it wasn't that important...I'm sure I'll remember it tomorrow.

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Memories are our connections to the past. They show us how far we've come, remind us of who we were, and sometimes even let us relive a particularly important moment in our lives. When a memory is good, it can be a treasure to its holder and remind him of the very best life has to offer. But what of the other memories? What of the painful ones? When a memory is particularly painful it can seize someone by the throat and focus all your attention on reliving an experience that is seemingly inescapable. It can unmercifully bring you back to a place you repeatedly seek to avoid and hold your gaze there indefinitely. But what's more, it can make you forget. It can make you forget that things were not always this way and that tomorrow brings with it the promise of new adventures. It can make you forget that life is not about holding onto bad memories, but about making good ones.

I have one particularly bad memory in my life. It is not about anything unduly tragic or especially unique, yet it burdens my spirit all the same. For several years I have sought to rid myself of it and, for a time, believed I had accomplished my goal. But all it took was one happenstance to bring everything flooding back. One accidental correspondence to make me feel just as I did on that day so long ago.

If the particulars of my situation are vague you should know that it is by design. I choose storytelling as an outlet for my frustrations since narratives are assuredly less problematic than the actual behaviors contained therein. I simply don't know how to let go of a bad memory and even if I did, I'm not sure I possess the courage to bid it farewell.

Dragon Wings

The bell rang precisely at eight o'clock and signaled to both parents and students alike that the first day of school had just begun. All of the parents had come to class that day to give a few last words of encouragement to their children, although most of them didn't need it. Many of the first graders had bounded down the halls from the moment they left their parents' car and came running into the freshly decorated classroom. Their brightly colored backpacks overflowed with pencils and paper and were always decorated with each child's favorite cartoon character or superhero. One little boy tripped as he darted to a desk that he had picked out for himself, spilling the contents of his backpack over the floor but running still faster all the same. Only after he claimed his prize was the recently emptied backpack given any attention as his mother, who had struggled to keep up, finally reached him. Although she would normally have been upset at the mess he caused, the exuberance he showed for starting his first day of school provided a sufficient excuse. All of the school children seemed caught up in a whirlwind of excitement at the indescribable wonder that undoubtedly lay before them.

"Look Mommy...numbers and letters on the wall. I'm going to learn how to read and count!" one girl said, her eyes dashing from one numbered poster to the next.

"I love to draw Daddy," another little boy said. "I see crayons and markers everywhere!" His father simply nodded his head and smiled at the boy's exuberance.

Everywhere around the classroom children talked and laughed as their parents hugged them for the last time before quietly filing out of the classroom. A few of the mothers stopped to talk with the teacher and asked questions about when they could pick up their children that afternoon while the fathers politely shuffled them out with kind words of reassurance. In the parents' absence, the first seedlings of new friendships were just beginning to sprout as several of the boys and girls began talking with each other amidst intermingled claps and giggles. The classroom was alive with the sound of tiny voices and no child hesitated to add their own.

Except for one. In the fourth seat on the fifth row of an otherwise lively classroom, one little boy sat morose, his head looking down as his mother quietly tried to comfort him. Unlike the other children, this little boy looked nervously around and seemed hesitant to accept the unfamiliar surroundings that other children embraced wholeheartedly. He wasn't an unhappy child or even particularly averse to new experiences, but the prospect of being separated from everything familiar and thrust into a world of uncertainty was not something he naturally accepted. His response had not been to protest the situation but to instead simply withdraw from it, and it was this reaction that his mother was now trying desperately to alleviate.

"You'll make new friends," she said in her most convincing tone. "And what's more, you'll even learn the alphabet and how to write your name. Doesn't that sound like fun?" Still the boy sat silently, his arms crossed over his chest and his eyes never even offering so much as an acknowledging glance.

As the mother continued to offer what solace she could, the teacher was just seeing the last of the other parents out the door. The bell to begin class had long since rung and many of the children were growing anxious as they waited for the day's lesson to begin. Only the little boy's mother remained, though she knew that she would soon have to leave as well. Just as she was about to say goodbye to her son the teacher walked over to the little boy and his mother.

"I'm sorry for staying so long but I just wanted to make sure he is alright. I know that all the other parents have left and I was just on my way out," the mother said as she reached out to give her son one last hug. Very quietly she then said to the teacher "He's just a little nervous right now. I'm not sure why. He's never shy at home and truthfully I have never seen him so hesitant around new people".

The teacher leaned down to the student, expecting him to look over so that she might talk to him. Instead, the little boy sat with  his eyes transfixed on the desktop, remaining perfectly still except for the short breaths that betrayed his apprehension.

"Aren't you excited about making new friends?" the teacher asked him in her most enthusiastic voice.

He offered no answer as she continued, "You'll learn how to count and I'll even teach you how to add and subtract".

Still no response as the little boy sat stoically, hands now thrust deep into his pockets without the slightest indication of showing any interest.

At this point the teacher tried rather unsuccessfully to repress a smile before saying to the little boy, "You can be a dragon".

The boy's head instantly turned as the confused look in his eyes was only surpassed by their unbridled curiosity.

"A dragon?" the boy said, unsure of what the teacher meant but too inquisitive to remain aloof.

"Or a knight, a prince, or even the king if you'd like," she replied, a clever grin that was requiring more energy to restrain now forming.

"No, I think I want to be a dragon," the boy said, albeit still confused. "But how, how can I be one?"

"I'll teach you. It's actually quite easy. A lot of people don't realize that you can become a dragon anytime you want". The teacher then reached out her hand and took a well-worn book off the shelf. "Take this book for instance," she said. "This book tells you all about how to become a dragon. It tells you how to breathe fire like a dragon, grow claws like a dragon, and even how to fly like a dragon. But no one ever bothers to read it. It's a shame really because it's quite easy to do, and as everyone knows...being a dragon is so much fun!"

The little boy looked at the slightly tattered book that the teacher now held in her hand and reached out for it in eager anticipation. Just as she was about to offer its pages he stopped, closed his hand, and said to her, "But...but I can't be a dragon. I don't know how to read." A look of helplessness quietly flashed across his face as the adventure that had just a moment before been in his reach vanished as quickly as it had arrived. His eyes began to swell with tears as his gaze met his teacher's, a gaze that betrayed his disappointment far more succinctly than the words of frustration other children may have chosen.

Just as his tears threatened to breach their boundaries and flow slowly down his reddened cheeks the teacher took hold of his empty hand and said, "That's what I'm here for. I'm here to teach you how to read. You'll read stories about dragons and knights, about courageous heroes and the beautiful princesses they rescue. You'll read about faraway lands, exotic lands where the risk of danger is never far away and the thirst for adventure is satisfied with the turn of every page. It's all in there. It's all found within the pages that your eyes will dash across as you become the characters that for a moment are the only fascination of your mind's eye. I'll teach you how to become a dragon...I'll teach you how to fly."

The little boy managed a smile while his teacher used a neatly folded handkerchief to begin wiping away his tears.

"And someday," she continued, "after you've read the words of all the great storytellers and have let the poets guide you through their labyrinths of beauty and suffering, you'll pick up your pen and begin to write too. You'll introduce your readers to an entirely new world of wonder where layers of prose merely serve as the stage upon which the timeless play lead. If you'll just trust me now, someday you will write stories that teach others to fly too"

The tears that earlier threatened to come streaming down the little boy's face had long since dried up. For the first time in his short life he realized the importance of words and the power they contained by those who could wield them. They had the power to comfort, to illuminate, and to inspire. Most importantly, they have the power to set people free from their own self-imposed limitations. It was a gift given to him by his teacher on that day, a gift this child would only come to fully understand many years later.

"I think I am going to like the first grade," the little boy said as he once again reached out eagerly for the book's welcoming pages.

The teacher placed the book in his hand, closed his tiny fingers around it and replied, "I think you are too Bobby"

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Every Sunday for the past ten years I have called my mother just to talk. It was a routine that started during my freshman year of college and has continued over the years as a way for us to keep in touch while helping me stay close to my family. This Sunday, only a few hours ago, I was speaking with her when she informed me that she had some bad news. Expecting that it would be some minute happenstance pertaining to a family member or friend of the family, I was somewhat surprised when she told me that my first grade teacher (Mrs. Blackmarr) had passed away last week. It was a tragic event that surprised many in my hometown and seemed to have come without warning. After going to the hospital last Saturday for unusual symptoms, she was diagnosed with liver cancer and was given a month to live. She died three days later.

Although I had lost touch with her over the years, I was still deeply saddened to hear of her passing. She was an exceptionally kind woman and always treated me with more patience and understanding than the six year old version of myself probably deserved. Her funeral is tomorrow and, although I will be unable to attend, I can at least offer what tribute to her I can through my words. It was in her class that I first began writing. She encouraged me to always be creative and never rebuked the often times strange and elaborate narratives that my first grade mind would create. If I ever achieve my goal of becoming a professional writer, my success is attributable in no small measure to her support. She was a good woman and will be missed.

Once Upon a Time in the West

In a former life I'm told I was a cowboy. A wild rustler of sorts, perched stoically atop a roaming stallion that's been broken by the dust covered hands that now pull firmly against a fastened bridle. It's a curious allure I suppose, one in which the promise of independence somehow outweighs both the cost and pleasure of fidelity. To be truly alone in the wilderness has always held a special fascination for me, yet such moments are all but forgotten in a world where the mundane is often mistaken for progress. Just once would I like to experience life out there in the desert. Just once would I like to leave my cares behind and slip away into a world where stallions still roam free and the man atop their backs is both stranger and hero to us all.  

And so I packed my bags and headed out west. Did I abandon all of my responsibilities and cares to start anew in a land yet untamed by man's infectious touch? Were my dreams of fame and fortune to follow the path of those who came before me as they steadfastly pushed forward into a land full of promise, yet equally inhospitable? Well, not exactly. In fact, my journey was made not in months or years, but instead just hours as I whisked through the air at hundreds of miles an hour en route from Birmingham to Tucson. For my trip into the great American West was made not out of necessity or longing, but rather for the purpose of business and pleasure. For you see, my company just had their annual employee retreat as a recognition of a job well done and our prize was an all expense paid trip to the luxury hotel Loews Ventana Canyon located in beautiful Tucson, Arizona. So sit back as I take you on a tour of my rugged journey through barren lands filled with unrelenting heat, poisonous rattlesnakes, and the last vestiges of a savage culture that once called these scorched plains home. It was quite an adventure...and I've got the pictures to prove it.

Upon arriving in Tucson I was immediately scheduled to take an off-road Jeep tour through the desert. The gentleman wearing a quite fashionable leather cowboy hat was George, my guide for the tour and an apparent repository of information on all things Tucson related. George regaled me with colorful tales of Cowboys and Indians as we took in the dry desert air. As an interesting aside, the Jeep that we took had neither doors or a roof other than the cloth canopy above our heads. While George's cowboy hat would have undoubtedly sheltered his head in the event of a rollover, I am afraid my lack of appropriate western headgear would offer no such protection.

These horses came right up to the Jeeps and appeared to only show interest when the prospect of food might be forthcoming. If I had an apple or carrots I would have surely given them some...but in return I would demand a customary free ride.

George is attempting to show me how to shoot an arrow. While I appreciated his enthusiasm for bronze age weaponry, I prefer to do my killing like a true man...with my mits!

I also got a little practice with a cowboy's must trusted friend: the lasso. As you can see from this picture, the deranged bull is making a full speed charge that threatens to kill us all. Not to worry though, once that quarter-inch rope is around his neck he will become as docile as George during siesta.

Apparently all of our rustling and cow herding attracted the attention of the Federalis and they sent two Chinook helicopters to monitor us. Our close proximity to the border and obviously suspicious behavior most assuredly sent border patrol into a frenzy. Undoubtedly they thought we must be drug smugglers. After all, if you saw a group of grown men lassoing a bull made out of a 55-gallon drum wouldn't you suspect that drugs were somehow involved?

The desert is full of cacti, some large others small, but this guy is just showing off. I think I saw a horror movie once about a mutant cactus that attacked unwary travelers by hugging them to death with its countless prickly arms. It was called "A Right to Bear Arms" and must have been co-produced by the NRA. The reason you have never heard of it is because this cactus was not cast as the lead.

Ancient people used to call this area home and some of them even left their mark for us to see all these years later in the form of petroglyphs. Here we see a flower carved into the rock that undoubtedly represents beauty, love, or some other such sentiment worthy of preservation.

As I walked through the desert in search of more petroglyphs I came across this piece of broken pottery. Although it is somewhat hard to see in the picture, partial remains of decorative painting are just visible on its surface.

I climbed atop a rock outcropping to survey the land before me. The mountains on the horizon are twenty, forty, and eighty miles away as you look further into the distance. Although I had already traveled over 1,400 miles by plane that morning, those outstretched miles before me seemed as daunting as they did endless.

The desert is home to all sorts of strange wildlife. Someone caught a tarantula and brought it back for everyone to see. You will notice that the spider seems curiously docile, a sure indication that it had just fed on some unfortunate traveler and was no longer interested in making dinner out of us all.

As the day drew to a close it was time for me to saddle up and head back to camp/ Loews Ventana Canyon luxury hotel. I climbed atop my trusty stallion and began to ride stoically into the sunset as the winds whipping through the canyon rustled my frayed duster and freshly grown mustache.

In the last few moments of dusk, the light shone just brightly enough for me to make out a curious petroglyph that was almost hidden from the rest. It was a series of intertwining lines carved on the mountainside that seemed to get larger as they expanded from the center. These lines have special significance to the indigenous people who used to live here. Unlike the other designs that were only meant to convey beauty, these simple lines held within them something much more. These were the lines of two lives shared together. Each line represents a season that these two people spent together as husband and wife and as time passed the design would grow larger. In this case, the design only lasted four seasons...just one year. I wonder what caused the time these two people shared together to be cut short. Was it loss of desire, the death of one partner, perhaps even a betrayal. Whatever the reason, it is one that has long since been covered over by the shifting sands of the Arizona desert and the slow passage of time. But oh how brightly it must have burned in that year as devoted sentimentality overflowed from the heart and burned itself onto the sunbaked rock for all generations to bear witness. Words cannot do such emotion justice as the remembrance of it stirs the imagination even now.

The Apology of Martiro: Part 10 of 10

Finally, if you have truly retained an open mind from your "careful and deliberate study," then you should avoid making pronouncements about the Christian faith that imply an unwillingness to consider the possibility of arguments you have not yet come across—or perhaps ones you have considered but have rejected for poor reasons. In the words of Charles Peirce: Do not block the path of inquiry!

Several years ago I was approached by two Mormons who asked to come inside my home and speak with me about their religion. For over two hours we debated the tenets of the Mormon faith and whether or not its claims could be reliably justified. By the end of that two hours, they had presented several arguments for Mormonism that I had never heard before. Yet, I still remained unconvinced. Exasperated, one of the Mormons said to me:

 "How can you reject all of these arguments that we have just presented to you? You were admittedly unfamiliar with them when we arrived and yet you reject them without ample time to consider their merits. Should you not withhold judgment until you are able to reflect on every argument in greater detail?"

To his impassioned plea I responded:

"If I am to withhold judgment until every possible argument regarding your faith has been made and rejected, I must delay judgment on all matters of all faiths everywhere. I must be equally open to accepting the tenets of Islam and Christianity, of Hinduism and Janism. I must adhere to all religious doctrines and systematically go through each and every one refuting their claims. Rather than analyzing claims from a position of disbelief, I should advocate belief in all claims as the default position until they can be proven false. Is this what you are advocating? Is this what you believe?"

After a few moments of awkward silence, the two Mormons left without engaging me in the customary prayer of reception that typically marks the conclusion of their conversion attempts. I have thought about that meeting many times in the ensuing years and the requests that those two men laid upon me. It is in some ways similar to the request that you are making now. While you do not seem to be advocating a default position of belief, you are asking me to withhold judgment of Christian claims until not only all arguments are heard, but also all potential arguments. Considering that even after a lifetime of study one would be unlikely to come across all possible arguments for the validity of Christianity, are you suggesting that no one is permitted to cast doubt upon its claims? If so, then could not the same argument be used for the claims of countless other religions? If not, then what makes you think that I am unwilling to consider the possibility of arguments that I have not yet come across? I know that there are other arguments out there. There are also countless arguments "proving" the truths of Islam that I am unaware of. Should I withhold pronouncements about the Islamic faith as well? While I may never be able to consider every apologetic argument, the main ones are apparent to anyone who engages in even a cursory study of the subject. Of the most frequently cited arguments, I have found none that adequately withstand the same level of scrutiny and critical thought that I apply to every other area of inquiry in my life. That is not to say that I will not one day stumble across an argument that erases all doubt from my mind through a series of unassailable rational proofs. But have you ever asked yourself, if God's message is so obvious and so important for Him to convey to man, would it really require all of the complicated arguments that have been designed to prove it? After countless millennia of sincere and honest men all wrestling with the questions of God's existence and identity, yet arriving at answers as varied as the personalities of each, does this seem like a God that even wants to be known?

This response is not written to you. Although your critique of my initial post provided the catalyst for a more thorough explanation of my disbelief, nothing herein is conveyed for your benefit. There is nothing I can say and no refutation I can give that will make you change your mind on this subject as is apparent by your adherence to faith. That is the problem with faith. It starts with a presupposition and then looks for corroborating evidence to validate it. This is the very antithesis of the Scientific Method and a direct affront to how we go about determining truth. This post is written for every other person who may have encountered these doubts within their own mind but has been unwilling or unable to express them out of fear of condemnation. The pursuit of truth is not something that anyone should be afraid of...it should be something we embrace. My only goal when I started down this path of inquiry was to arrive at an accurate understanding of the world by looking at evidence and using reason. My position is not so rigid as to be unaffected by new information as it is not bound by any dogma. If God is able to present Himself in a way commensurate with every other facet of reality constituting the world around me, then I will readily recognize his existence. Until that time, I am not only justified in my disbelief, but am required to do so if I am to be intellectually honest. And that is the one thing in all of this convolution that I am certain of. I may never find the answers I seek or convince others of my true motivations, but I know that my journey is a virtuous one all the same. It is on the shoulders of giants that I look out into the vast distance before me so that I might peek just over the horizon. Somewhere out there is the truth of which I seek...and if you'll come with me, I promise you'll always be in good company.

A short clip from The Atheist Experience weekly broadcast from Austin, TX. Host: Matt Dillahunty

The Apology of Martiro: Part 9 of 10

Eighth, when you say, "Such a man is unwilling or unable to accept reality on its own terms and live his life accordingly, preferring instead to rely on religion as an anesthetic to make sense out of an otherwise very uncertain world. It is a crutch. It is a narcotic," do you mean to assign this as a criticism to all believers, or only those who have a very weak faith and in fact to rely on religion as an anesthetic? If the former, I can think of quite a few believers throughout history who faced a much harder reality than you or I could even imagine. Take Bonhoeffer, for example. And, at a theoretical level, I would add that accepting Christianity doesn't remove the uncertainty from the world. The need to trust God presupposes that uncertainty, so it very clearly can't eradicate it.

If you rely on faith as an acceptable means of understanding our world then you are anesthetizing yourself from reality. Far from those with weak faith most egregiously committing this error, I would argue that as one's faith increases so too does his or her misunderstanding of reality. Facing hardship probably induces some people to gravitate towards faith because it helps makes sense out of an otherwise chaotic world and justifies their experience. Bonhoeffer's trials were likely made somewhat easier in his own mind by believing that his suffering was unavoidable and that his life was being used for a greater good. This still has no bearing on whether or not any of that is true. I never claimed that accepting Christianity removes uncertainty from the world, only that those who ascribe to its doctrines use them to attempt to anyway. After all, didn't you know that everything happens for a reason?    

The Apology of Martiro: Part 8 of 10

Seventh, shouldn't we expect that a God who is Logos and is responsible for giving us the imago Dei, by which we have intellect and will, will not demand blind faith? If it is part of Christianity's greatest commandment—straight from the Old Testament and accepted by Jesus himself in the Gospels—that we should love him with all our minds, shouldn't this be intellectually significant? It strikes me as rather disingenuous for you to say that Christianity involves surrendering our reason. Some of the greatest philosophy and science, not to mention the university, has come to us as a result of Christianity. Only if you conflate Christianity with Christian fundamentalism can you "in good faith" reject faith's relation to reason.

When I was a Christian, I used to draw a distinction between faith and blind faith. I felt that faith was believing something to be true after first building a rational bridge to get me halfway there. For example, I believed the world was created by God because I could look around me and see that the world exhibited order to it. I could use my mind to understand mathematics, explore the bounds of my creativity, and reason through logical absolutes to help give me a better understanding of everything I experienced. Even though I didn't fully understand how any of this worked, I believed that there must be a higher power that had given me these gifts. I accepted this on faith.

Conversely, blind faith meant simply believing any random claim that was made about anything. Accepting that Zeus threw lightning bolts from high atop Mount Olympus would be a claim accepted on blind faith and all such notions were summarily rejected. But as I began to reflect on the merits of accepting something on faith, I noticed that this method of inquiry still shared a unsettling trait with its blind counterpart. Both faith and blind faith were not, as I had once believed, different in kind but rather only in degree. It was only when I realized that even if faith were not blind it still meant believing things for which I had no evidence that the line between the two began to blur. I realized that in no other area of my life did I apply such a standard. In my understanding of the human body, nature, physics, etc., I always used reason and evidence as a means of determining truth. Yet in the one area of my life where ultimate truth is concerned, I was being told that evidence is not enough. Faith was required.

My mistake was in believing that truth was subject to my desire to know it. It was an error that sacrifices understanding for the promise of assurance and conflates hubris with enlightenment, all under the guise of a supposed humility rooted in faith. Faith promised me a comprehensive understanding of my world when the weight of evidence had not yet provided me with the answers I was seeking. The thought of admitting ignorance on many of the fundamental questions of our existence was anathema to me and faith was a way to avert this dilemma. It was not until I realized that it is acceptable to admit to myself that I don't know all of the answers that I was finally able to cast aside the false promises of faith. Reason and evidence may never be able to provide me with all of the answers I am looking for but this does not mean that I should simply fill in the missing pieces with unsupported claims. I should simply admit that I don't know and keeping searching.

The Apology of Martiro: Part 7 of 10

Sixth, your acceptance of the Euthyphro dilemma really shows how insincere or superficial your study of apologetics really was. Countless Christian philosophers have pointed out that this is a false dilemma. It is not the case that the good is good independently of God, as a standard to which he is subject. It is also not the case that whatever God wills is good simply by divine fiat, which would make the good arbitrary. Rather, God is the good—God is goodness. Goodness is neither arbitrary nor a standard independent of God's nature. God is the standard.

                                               

Personal attacks have once again reared their ugly heads. My insincerity notwithstanding, perhaps we can debate the problem of Euthyphro's dilemma on its own merits rather than mine. I simply disagree with your contention that this is a false dilemma. Asserting that "God is goodness" seems like a esoteric way of averting the question at hand, yet it also suffers the same  problems of any other faith-based claim. Namely, you have made an assertion without evidence. "Good" is not personified in anything but is instead a concept we use to determine how we are to behave towards one another. It is completely dependent on the human experience. If all humans ceased to exist, so too would the concepts of good and evil since there would be no one to experience these things.

Attempting to make the argument that God is the good and this goodness is thereby a part of his nature also suffers from the same problem of the Cosmological argument. The most obvious question to ask is "Did God choose His nature?". If so, we are once again confronted  with the first horn in Euthyphro's Dilemma. If not, the second. All we have managed to do is once again push the question back a single step without getting any closer to an answer.

However, I have a more primal objection to your claim that "God is goodness" that relates to the Moral Argument for God's existence. If God is truly the standard of good, why does he advocate so many things in the Bible that are simply not good? One has only to turn to the Old Testament to find countless stories of God advocating murder, infanticide, rape, and slavery. In the New Testament we do not see this side of God as much, but we still have stories of Paul advocating slavery when he commands slaves to "obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling" Eph 6:5. Would this not have been a perfect opportunity to condemn slavery as being wrong in all times, in all places, for all people? Some Christians will attempt to make exceptions for these verses by claiming that read in the proper context, God is not advocating slavery but rather making some other point. This is patently absurd. There is no context. There is no context in which the owning of another human being is ever considered permissible. And when someone starts attempting to justify atrocities out of an unwavering belief that God's commands are somehow justified by His inherent nature, they are on a slippery slope of moral ambiguity.