Questions for Atheists: Mixed Atheist/Theist Relationships

I am in a relationship with a new age mystic (astrology, homeopathy, acupuncture, etc), which I consider the same as theism.

I’m also one of those materialists that see liberal/moderate believers/mystics as creating an environment where fundamentalism can thrive.

Thus, we can get into some pretty serious debates. Usually, they end with some serious self-reflection and honesty – I am being hateful, and she is being solipsistic. There is always peace and humility at the end of the debates, but sometimes it takes a bit of heat to get there.

The debates have decreased in number over the past year, but they pop up every once in awhile.

And how, specifically does your girlfriend do this? Does she defend fundamentalist theology? Does she make excuses for their bad behavior? Is she out there picketing abortion clinics with them? In what way are fundamentalists thriving because of your girlfriend? (Especially considering that most fundamentalists would probably condemn your girlfriend to Hell for following “demonic” New Age practices.)

good question!

Peter: I’m also one of those materialists that see liberal/moderate believers/mystics as creating an environment where fundamentalism can thrive.

Mike: And how, specifically does your girlfriend do this? Does she defend fundamentalist theology? Does she make excuses for their bad behavior? Is she out there picketing abortion clinics with them? In what way are fundamentalists thriving because of your girlfriend? (Especially considering that most fundamentalists would probably condemn your girlfriend to Hell for following “demonic” New Age practices.)

Barging in, I kind of get Peter’s comment. The partner herself may not support fundamentalist views, but if she believes in stuff that can’t be proven and requires faith, and that’s okay in her world view, then cumulatively, over lots and lots of people, that faith opens the door to everyone’s beliefs being okay.

All religion is pretend, to me, and therefore none of it is truly benign, because all of it opens the door to faith without evidence, and I personally can’t buy into faith without evidence. But I was totally willing to spend my life with another person who did have faith. But if I ever expressed how I felt about faith, well, look out–fight coming.

One might wonder how, thinking that way, I could have any religious friends at all, but I do have religious friends. I no longer have a religious life partner, however! And I am more adamant these days about my view being “correct,” because I don’t have to compromise all the time to live with someone. Maybe that’s a bad thing in the end–two people who just sit around agreeing with each other. But I love it!

I too, am in a relationship with a religious person. We have been married for 9 years now and she still has not fully accepted my lack of belief. I was a Christian(Southern Baptist) for about twenty years and still considered myself one when we met. Since we have been together, she has become a Christian(Southern Baptist) and I have completely rejected all religious beliefs. I was an atheist long before I could even admit it to myself, but am now more comfortable with my beliefs than I ever was as a religious person. The discussions that my wife and I have had in the past have been somewhat heated at times, however it was different the last time we spoke about it. Our conversation finished up with her asking me if I was certain that there is no God. I explained that I try to keep an open mind about things and I am not opposed to examining some type of evidence to support the religious argument. Until then, I am an atheist. She seemed satisfied that I hadn’t completely closed the door on religion. I didn’t say anything to my wife, but it would have to be some pretty damn good evidence. After it was all said, our lives go on and we continue to maintain a healthy and happy relationship.

She put the literal interpertation of the bible and her love in God above all else and always insisted that by being with me, she was giving up everything she believed in. “You’re not losing if you just believe, I don’t understand why you won’t.”

Sounds like a wicked version of the ole “If you really loved me, you would…” blackmail. Yuck. Sounds like she would have been satisfied if you had merely said you believed just to make her happy. That’s a travesty of real love and religious conviction both, if you ask me.

“You’re not losing if you just believe, I don’t understand why you won’t.” Krikey.

Yeah, and I agree with Pete that this kind of statement doesn’t only come from fundamentalists. I used to get that line a lot from my ex, and he was just talking about New Age stuff. Honestly, he got on my case once about Masuru Emoto, this guy who claims he can change water crystals with his thoughts. I said, “Doesn’t sound like that’s really possible.” Boy, did I get it. Why couldn’t I have faith in something? ANYthing? Why was I so logical? Why did I WORSHIP science and logic?

I can’t quite explain it. I wasn’t bothered so much that he HAD to believe in something, but he could not stand my way of looking at things and my lack of faith. Explaining my side never did any good. It was always about how I didn’t have faith, and therefore I was on the wrong side of life.

It was so perplexing at the time. I had a very live and let live attitude, but it wasn’t reciprocated, as far as I could tell. If I could just have lied and said, “OK, I have faith in such and such,” I think it would have kept the peace. But why couldn’t he accept that I just didn’t?

To my mind, this need to believe in something, anything, is a by product of being brought up with religion. I was brought up without religion, so it’s very hard for me to relate to faith at all, although I’ve always tried to respect it. But it’s nice not to be pestered about it all the time.

My wife and I have settled our differences amicably, though she’s upset that I don’t believe in god. Fortunately, she realizes that there’s no way to force me, and the best she could hope for is that I lie to her.

However, when our daughter, Mickie, get old enough to ask why I don’t go to church, we’re looking at a round of ugly debates. I’m afraid what it will do to my relationship with my daughter, my relationship with my wife, and the relationship between them.

This could get really ugly.

Advice?

Brett,

Stick to your beliefs (or lack there of) and make sure your daughter knows with no uncertainty what you think and that ultimately the decisions about religion are hers as a free adult. Your relationship with her will be just fine if you are completely open – you are her dad. As for the wife, can’t help there – I’m married to a cynical and skeptical biologist.

I grew up Catholic and met my Evangelical Christian wife in high school. Religion was never that important to me, so I just went along with her to her church most of the time. (I think starting out in an interdenominational relationship at first kind of eased us both into seeing that it’s ok to have differences.) About a year and a half after we got married, (about 9 months ago) I came to the decision that I could no longer accept the doctrines of Christianity. I told her I would still go to church with her if she wanted because that was important to her. She still tithes to the church, half of what you are supposed to (5%). But I think giving is important too, so I try to ‘tithe’ the other half. Only I give it to charities instead of the church. We both try to keep an open mind about religious issues and kept discussions civil and prevent them from turning into arguments. Like Jeff, we are both interested in learning about religion, which helps. (Actually we are in the middle of a Bible study class at the church that I agreed to take with her.) I ask her a lot of questions and talk about science a lot. It makes her think hard about faith stuff without seeming confrontational or belittling (I hope). She has become much less fundamentalist and conservative since we started dating, and even since getting married (so have I for that matter). She has changed her mind on a lot of things that goes against her evangelical upbringing (evolution, gay rights, not taking the Bible literally…)
I think the main reason for her opened mind is that she respects and values my ideas, because she knows I have put a lot of thought into them. (And vice versa.) Also she knows I love her very much. I agree completely with what Jeff said and I think she might even agree:

“Personally, I break the central directive of my church (”put God first”). I put family first. If it comes to a choice between my family and my beliefs (or non-beliefs) about God, my beliefs (or non-beliefs) come in second.

I am not sure how exactly we will handle children, but we have agreed to not teach them only about Christianity (ie that some version of Christianity ‘has it all figured out’), but about the other choices out there as well. We will tell them what we each believe and let them decide for themselves. Teaching critical thinking is important to both of us.
All that being said, she still hopes that I will someday come back to the faith.

I have to hand it to all of you in mixed relationships who have been able to make it work because I doubt I could. One of the things my wife (fellow atheist) and I enjoy is our shared sense of humor which often comes at the expense of the religious. If I were to have ever married a religious person, it would have had to have been someone with a very thick skin, that’s for sure.

Wow, Julie, that sounds terrible! It’s really funny, how long have we known each other? I didn’t know you were going through that!

Anyway, I’m really happy for you now.

Yep, it was terrible. And faithful dummyhead left me in debt, after all that! I think the only stupid thing I ever had faith in, in spite of all evidence to the contrary, was that he would get a job!

OK, obviously my experience is so skewed–I hereby absent myself from further discussion! I’m really only posting so much because I am putting off Christmas shopping, after all.

My hubby is still a fundy while I am now an apostate. It’s not been easy, and I do feel sorry for the poor man. He married a good, submissive Christian wife (yes, ladies, we were supposed to SUBMIT to our husbands!) and wound up married to an independent-minded and outspoken atheist, of all things. And he was the one who was the science major, no less, while I hated science in school (I had a terrible teacher). Go figure.

But we are celebrating our 25th anniversary next month and have two incredible boys, so we’ve decided there’s too much invested in the marriage to trash it over something as silly as religion (that’s my take on it anyway).

The main problem is that there’s a lot of stuff I can’t discuss with him, and vice versa, because it leads to arguments and it’s generally unproductive. So, where it stands currently is that he attends church alone and I attend my Skeptics Society meetings alone and neither of us tries to convert the other. It’s working out, but it certainly isn’t ideal. I wouldn’t recommend a mixed marriage to anyone. My parents had one and they broke up after 13 years, with religion being one of the major problems.

Brett, what I did when my kids were old enough to understand – probably about 13 and 15 – is just level with them. I sat them down and explained that I had done a lot of research and thinking and that I didn’t believe in god anymore. They were a bit shocked, but the conversation was very calm and I let them ask any questions they wanted and tried to answer honestly. My older son hasn’t mentioned it since, although he’s definitely critical of the religious right and expresses no interest in church. My younger son told me later that he “never believed that stuff either,” so I think he’s probably taking after his mom. 😉

Thanks for the post, Jeff!

I’ve seen how differing beliefs take a toll on a marriage. I have a friend who is a fundie Christian whose husband is an atheist. While I love them both, I know that she cannot fully accept his atheism, and he cannot fully accept her faith. On the surface, the marriage looks to be working. But I know from many late-night phone conversations that there are deep seeded frustrations surrounding the difference in beliefs.

I have another friend who is a fundy (is it y or ie?) protestant and her husband is a devout Catholic. He never misses church, and he gives to the church religiously. He goes through all the motions of a good Catholic, but does not discuss his beliefs with anyone, not even his wife. She has no respect for his religious ways, and somehow puts herself above him spiritually. To outsiders, though, the marriage looks to be working.

I know there are many factors that can make a marriage difficult (as no marriage is easy); but when there are belief issues involved, I have to admire the people who can still respect each other’s beleifs (or non) and make it work for them.

I’ve been an atheist all my life and my wife has been someone who has just gone through the motions of being a Christian all her life. We both knew this about each other going into the marriage and neither one of us have changed. I also kind of promised myself when we first got married that I wouldn’t fight and argue with her over anything if I could help it. Why get mad and argue. That just turns one bad thing into two bad things… I think my wife also likes being the most religious person in the household.

She never pressured me to go to church at all for the first 8 years of our marriage. During this time I didn’t feel any need to express or discuss religion. I was simply focused on living my life. Then around two or three years ago my wife started to get the urge to attend a church (any church). She attended a couple of different churches but neither of them really “did it” for her. Her best friend was also “church hopping” and found a contemporary Baptist church that she liked a lot that had lots of fun activities in the kids program and a soft-rock band that plays during the service. She got my wife to go a couple of times with the kids. Then she got me to go along and the church broke my expectations of what a Baptist church was like.

The church was experimenting with an outreach program to the “unchurched” and tailored the sermons to people that did not grow up in a church. Yes, people like me. I was quite impressed with the message and was learning a lot about this flavor of Christianity so I started to attend regularly. I figured if I was going anyway, I might as well volunteer in various capacities in the church and join a “small group” for bible study.

On one trip home, my 9 year old was quite agitated in the car and blurted out that there wasn’t a God and it was all just made-up stuff. This startled me because I had never discussed religion with him before, but I was quite proud of him. I later told him that it was indeed all an invention by man but to view it as somewhere to go to learn about what other people believe. He hasn’t been agitated since. But as time when on, we started getting pressure to make more substantial monetary contributions to the church. They want 10% of our pre-tax income. Well, there is no way in hell I’m paying that for something I don’t believe in… but, just so my wife doesn’t lose face, I do write a small check with each visit….more than I want to leave but less than she wants me to leave. I think we tithed at about 2% last year. Anyway, I started getting agitated just like my 9-year old did.

By then I was used to the sermons and realized that they were not as liberal as I originally thought. It was basically the same old message just packaged in a contemporary way. A lot of the virtues of Christianity, like not getting mad (Matthew 5:22) is just good secular advice. It doesn’t need the added motivating factor of Hell-fire damnation. That’s about when I started my own blog pointing out the absurdities of the foundations and motivations of Christianity. The blog (even though it was mainly a monolog) helped me release tension that otherwise may have been directed in unhelpful ways. I started looking around the internet and noticed that there were lots of people with similar atheist blogs. I was just one of many.

Anyway, I don’t now how much longer I will continue with the church. I was about ready to drop out a few months ago… but posting comments on the this blog and others has helped me to maintain a even composure. I do find religious belief very interesting and my wife will probably always want us to be involved in some church somewhere. We might end up trying another denomination after a while. That’s the one nice thing about Protestant churches. You can always “church hop”. I’ve always wanted to try a snake-handling church. I bet that would be interesting. 😉 I would probably get bit every time, though. 🙂

(Especially considering that most fundamentalists would probably condemn your girlfriend to Hell for following “demonic” New Age practices.)

The poster you’re responding to didn’t qualify “fundamentalism” with the word “Christian” by the way. There are other types of fundamentalism out there. Fundamentalism of any sort is tied together by its antipathy for argument based upon logic or reason. Faith is the assertion that valid arguments can be constructed without logic or reason. Moderate believers of any sort hold faith. Large numbers of believers create the impression that faith is a valid epistemic tool. Ergo, moderate believers provide cover to fundamentalism. I’d classify it as a statement which is true, but also not very meaningful. Since it’s not a productive means of stopping fundamentalist thought patterns, I don’t really see why either ‘side’ cares so much about it. (Okay. I’m done being off-topic now.)

Jeff,

You know how I feel about you. I’m so glad I now got the chance to know the whole story. It was always very puzzling to me why you attend a church, not to mention wondering what kind of church. I guess I never asked you the right questions and just assumed that you would volunteer the information if you wanted me to know. Now I know, and I understand. Thank you.

I hope you and your family will get a chance to come and visit my church someday. That would be wonderful.

Personally I find it frustrating that the term “faith” has been twisted to now mean “the tenacity of one’s belief in religious doctrine.” And I think that may be part of the issue here. When we allow the fundamentalists to define faith this way, it robs us (the non-religious) of the opportunity to participate in the kind of “faith” that Mike alludes to here. Faith, when defined as a hopeful optimism and motivation to do what we think is right in spite of opposition or complacency. Now that’s a faith I *DO* honor and admire. Blind belief in doctrine in spite of evidence – that’s not faith at all in my book. I think it’s time we non-theists reclaim that word to not be the sole property of the religious believer.

I’m an atheist married to a Christian, although a pretty moderate Episcopalian one. We have a great relationship, and honestly the best marriage of any couple I know. I guess it’s because we both put our marriage as the number one most important thing in our lives. Period. There isn’t even a #2. I don’t think it’s any harder than that. Just pick someone who is good at being married (not everyone is) and sell-out 100% to them and the marriage. We’re going on 8 years now as a religiously mixed couple and have had no serous problems.

Tithing: when we budget, we allow ourselves each some spending money. If he wants to donate his share to his church, that’s his decision. Simple as that.

Hooboy, I am so tired of the “my abridged dictionary has the final word on all the possible denotations and connotations of word X” thing. Look it up in the OED and let’s talk.

Well, I suppose I’ll join the fray. Eighteen years ago, I met a cute Atheist. At the time I was a liberal and rather tepid, CEO sort of Christian. We never really talked about it and we certainly never argued, but I would bring his Atheism up every so often because I was fascinated by what could fill the void left by belief. Years on and I still think nothing fills it, it’s just that if you examine religious beliefs hard enough they get weathered down by evidence until finally there’s nothing left. At least that’s what I think happened to me.
I still show up at a Unitarian church once in a great while, when I miss the community of faith. But that’s about it, and I go alone even though the congregation welcomes Atheists. My husband won’t set foot inside and we’re both fine with that. That way he can make breakfast. 🙂

Pither: Faith, when defined as a hopeful optimism and motivation to do what we think is right in spite of opposition or complacency.

OK, monkeymind, but it still doesn’t mean this! The point is that it was being redefined incorrectly here. Bring on whatever dictionary you like, and get as sarcastic with me as you please. I can totally take it.

MikeClawson said,

Agreed monkeymind. Didn’t we just have this conversation in the last thread I put up? 🙂

There’s glory for you!

And by glory I mean, here we go again! 🙂

Sorry, Julie, you got some blowback from an unrelated discussion. I don’t think Mike or Pither were claiming that their definition IS what faith means in some essential sense. Words don’t have meanings outside of how they are collectively used, and often opposing sides will struggle over “ownership” of a word. Part of being precise with language is knowing how different audiences are likely to respond to a given word, and if you are using a connotation peculiar to some sub-group, to make this clear implicitly or explicitly.

I think you will find that “faithless” and “unfaithful” are used mainly pejoratively, except for some attempts to redefine “faithless” (along with “godless”) as positive, much like gays redefined “queer”. When I see the word faithless used in this context, it doesn’t bother me at all and I don’t feel the need to point out the “dictionary” definition to people who are obviously using the word in a different and perfectly legitimate way.

Sorry about the grammatical error in my post. You may take points off for the typo if you like.