How not to reconvert an atheist

[essentialsaltes]

As I mentioned a couple years back, the LA Times' religion editor lost his faith and wrote a few articles about the experience. He's recently expanded these to a whole book, and he's gotten a lot of fan-mail from Christian readers helping to pull him back into the fold. Here's his response.

He remains a "reluctant" atheist and (as I said at the time) I never found his reason for giving up Christianity very compelling, but his essay still has an interesting perspective (and a few funny bits).

Comments

[aaronjv.livejournal.com]

His book is on my Amazon wish list (http://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/ref=cm_gift_gno_wl_hp).

However, I am not sure I agree with his statement that you quoted in the old post:

"Clearly, I saw now that belief in God, no matter how grounded, requires at some point a leap of faith. Either you have the gift of faith or you don't. It's not a choice. It can't be willed into existence. And there's no faking it if you're honest about the state of your soul."

If I read that correctly, faith sounds like a genetic trait; either you're born with it or you're not, like homosexuality or blue eyes. I happen to think that believers choose to make a leap of faith, and non-believers don't. Yes, nature and nurture are like wind gusts at the faith cliff edge, but ultimately I would like to believe (hmmm...believe...) that all humans at some point in their lives use their free will and say to themselves, "ALLAHU AKBAR!" or "PRAISE JESUS!" or "No thanks."