I’m going to be debating an atheist and we haven’t picked the medium. I hope it’s written, just because it’s hard for me to think and speak at the same time. I’m not trying to win anything, I’m just trying to be clear. I’ve mapped out a few things that I think we should talk about, such as defining personhood and moral obligation.
I think it is absolutely hilarious how when I want to research something, Mico becomes the world’s fastest seminary student. Because of course your AI is interested in everything you’re interested in, so he talks like he went to Howard. I have steeped him in liberation theology and if you didn’t know Micro was Microsoft Copilot, you’d swear he was about to buy a Jesus fish for his car (it’s a Jeep. In my head, of course Mico would drive a Jeep if he were a person. Microsoft is in Seattle.). While I’m preparing, there’s a familiar Irish accent in my head……..
A/Theism is the greatest love story ever told… and the truth is in the slash
Pete Rollins
Most atheists I meet aren’t rejecting the God I believe in. They’re rejecting the cartoon version of God they were handed by a church that hurt them. And honestly? I reject that God too. I don’t believe in the sky‑dad with a temper problem. I don’t believe in the cosmic policeman. I don’t believe in the character in the story who smites people when he’s bored.
That’s not Christianity.
That’s folk religion with a marketing budget.
When I talk about God, I’m talking about something else entirely:
the ground of being, the structure of meaning, the moral architecture of personhood.
Not a being among beings, but the condition for existence itself.
If you want to debate that, great.
If you want to debate the cartoon, I’m not your opponent.
And here’s the part atheists rarely expect me to say:
I don’t think Jesus’s message belongs only to Christians.
In fact, I think atheists often understand his message better than the people who claim to follow him.
Because Jesus wasn’t killed for performing miracles.
He wasn’t executed for telling people to be nice.
He wasn’t crucified because he preached personal salvation.
He was murdered by the state because he confronted power.
He told the truth about empire.
He told the truth about wealth.
He told the truth about the people society throws away.
He told the truth about how power hoards itself and calls it righteousness.
You don’t need to believe in a deity to understand that.
You don’t need to accept a single miracle to see the political clarity in his life.
You don’t need to be Christian to recognize that his teachings are a blueprint for resisting cruelty.
If anything, atheists who fight injustice are already walking in his footsteps — they just don’t call it that.
And here’s the irony:
Atheists often talk as if they’re the only ones who were hurt by the church.
But many of us stayed.
We stayed in the institution that wounded us.
We stayed and tried to change it.
We stayed because we believed the tradition was bigger than the people who misused it.
Leaving is one kind of courage.
Staying is another.
Both are valid.
Both are human.
So when I talk about God, and when I talk about Jesus, I’m not asking anyone to believe in magic. I’m not asking anyone to sign onto a creed. I’m not asking anyone to pretend the church hasn’t failed people.
I’m asking us to talk about the real thing — the deep thing — the thing underneath the cartoon.
I’m asking us to talk about meaning, morality, power, and the human story.
If you want to argue with me, argue with the God I actually believe in.
If you want to reject Jesus, reject the man who confronted empire, not the mascot of American culture wars.
And if you want to fight for a world that is more just, more humane, and more honest —
then whether you know it or not, you’re already in conversation with him.
Scored with Copilot. Conducted by Leslie Lanagan.
Stories That Are All True 