You Don't Know What You've Got...

I wonder if they stopped to think of the consequences before they set about trying to depose God. Come to think of it, I wonder if it really was as calculated as that makes it sound. More likely, it was just a matter of one small step logically following on from the last. The move from urging respect and tolerance for other beliefs to endorsing all beliefs (including no belief) as equally valid was so subtle that hardly anyone noticed. Carrying on to insist on prosecution for anyone who taught that their own belief was somehow objectively true seemed a reasonable and responsible step. From that point, discussing religion at all seemed dangerous, and anyone guilty of doing so had to be imprisoned, simply in the interests of tolerance and civil liberties. And then came the final, inevitable step: the 2027 Abolition Act, outlawing religion altogether. It was greeted as a great day for humanity; a triumph for tolerance, reason and enlightenment; the end of centuries of bigotry and oppression.

A world without God. A brave, new world, indeed. After all, what purpose did God serve? We didn’t need a divine provider any more, since the endlessly benevolent Internet gave us everything we needed. We certainly didn’t need any kind of cosmic judge. The justice we meted out to each other was more immediate, more proportional and somehow fairer than anything we could expect from him. We had no need of miracles, either, now that science could solve practically any problem we could imagine – even creating life. All that was left of God was an archaic, superstitious concept.

But the fundamental error that the atheists made was in not realising that trying to eliminate something is certain to make people realise they miss it. The increasingly shrill anti-God polemic only succeeded in reminding people that God was, actually, good. The championing of the human spirit as the pinnacle of existence merely made people reflect on how flat life seems without someone or something, greater, better, other than oneself. The draconian fines and prison sentences might have driven religion underground, but they also drove people through the doors of clandestine places of worship in unprecedented numbers, dwarfing any previous religious revival Britain had ever seen. It would appear that God has a great deal to thank atheists for.