A Letter to My Christian Friends

This is a sincere letter to all of the people I know who are Christian.  I'm not going to be rude.  I'm not going to try and convince you that your faith is wrong.  I'm going to genuinely thank you for certain things, but I understand that every person thinks differently, and, by extension, every Christian thinks differently.  With that in mind, I'm going to have this letter in sections.  Each section will target a particular group, and some of you may find yourself in multiple groups or even no group at all.

To the first group:  You're the group who values women.  You're the group that takes the time to listen to what women think, how they think, and why they think what they think.  You're the person who doesn't think a woman is filthy while menstruating.  You understand that a simple act of nature doesn't mean a woman should be separated from men.  You don't think that if a man comes into contact with her, then he is also contaminated, and they should be banished.  You may think it's weird if a man has sex with a girl and later her mother.  Maybe you even think it's wrong, but you don't think the women should be set on fire.  We've all heard the stereotype about how preachers' daughters turn out.  I'm sure even some of you have first-hand knowledge, but, none of you would burn a to death a prostitute with a priest for a father.  You also don't view women as objects to the point that they should be considered spoils of war.  You might not approve of premarital sex, but I sincerely doubt you'd hold a public stoning of your daughter for doing it.  Men, if your wife interferes with an argument between you and another man by grabbing you by the nads, you might be a little put off, maybe even downright confused, but I doubt you'd lop of her hand for it.  You probably think that marriage should be between two people, and I doubt you'd be in favor of a ruler having seven hundred wives.  I'd argue that within the boundaries of that marriage, most of you think the husband and wife have equal say.  In your church, you let women teach, even if it's just a Sunday school class.  If your husband is mistreating you, or if you disagree, you probably evoke your right to tell him no, and if he continues, you'll take action.  You are modern people who understand that women are not property to be valued solely for their vaginas.

To the second group:  You are the group who doesn't condemn the gays.  You don't think two major cities should be destroyed because they allowed gay festivities.  In the same way a menstruating women isn't abominable, you likely don't think being gay is.  For these same reasons, you don't think a gay male should be killed.  If your son turned out to be gay, you wouldn't kill him or his lover.  In a similar vein, you don't think a woman wearing "manly" clothing, whatever that might be, is a horrendous crime.  You wouldn't condone the removal of all gay people from a society, and of course, this includes lesbian women.  You may not approve of gay people getting married, and while that still bothers me, you at least don't wish death upon them.  It's a step in the right direction.

To the third group:  You are the group who doesn't think slavery is OK.  You don't think people should be able to buy and sell other people like livestock.  A man is not a cow, a woman is not a sheep, and a child is not a goat.  Or any variation thereof.  You have grown past this belief and understand that people are people, and you should never pierce one's ear to mark them as property.  You might be OK with the idea of indentured servitude.  The notion that one might be a servant for a set amount of time before being freed would be a good bargaining chip if you're willing to partake.  It's a gray area of slavery, to be sure, but, I'd sincerely doubt you would hold your servant's child ransom in order to persuade the child's parent to remain your slave for life.  On the same not as child slavery, you're the group of people who would never sell your daughter as a slave.  You would be appalled to learn that, unless she "pleased" her master to his liking, she couldn't be resold to foreigners, since he picked her and should have picked better.  But, let's say that you see no problem with free labor, you'd have a problem with beating your laborers.  You see that it's wrong to beat people to death, but you also see it's wrong to nearly kill them, provided they live a day or two after your beating.  You likely would tell a slave to stand up to his captor, rather than treat the captor like a god.  You are the group who understands that slavery is wrong, regardless of the reason behind it.

To any Christian who finds that this letter is directed toward you:  I sincerely, from the bottom of my heart, thank you.  You have done what so many other Christians, Jews, Muslims, etc. have said were impossible.  You've shown that you can be a good person without following God.  You've demonstrated to everyone around you that your bible got many moral questions wrong.  You don't kill your daughters for having premarital sex.  You don't kill you son for being gay.  You don't own slaves, least of all sex slaves.  You don't sell your daughter as a slave.

These are grounds that you, Christians, and I, an atheist, have in common.  I also don't think any of this stuff is morally acceptable.  Neither you nor I think killing is morally acceptable.  The bible does.  Neither you nor I think a rape victim should be forced to marry her rapist, providing he pays her father for it.  The bible does.  Neither of us think murder is morally acceptable.  Neither is rape.  Neither is theft.  Neither is torture and genocide.  While I understand that not all of these things are specifically in the bible, we both probably agree with them.  We have both demonstrated that our sense of morality transcends the bible's sense of morality, and, by extension, the morality of the one you claim to have inspired it: God.  Christians, neither you nor I need the bible to teach us how to live.