On Atheism: The Heretic, Heine and Me

• Atheist (noun). A person to be pitied in that he is unable to believe things for which there is no evidence, and who has thus deprived himself of a convenient means of feeling superior to others.

— Chaz Bufe, The American Heretic’s Dictionary

I empathize with following your gut, testing a possibility, letting go of worry or following any number of other rational directions whose hypotheses remain unprovable. Pre-enlightenment, Heine's idea about when religion "makes sense" (see below) fit, in a way. Since then, the religion of science has been at times as wildly foolish as the science of religion. These days though, the church and fetish crowd just makes me shudder. Hypocrites...ewww.

• In dark ages people are best guided by religion, as in a pitch-black night a blind man is the best guide; he knows the roads and paths better than a man who can see. When daylight comes, however, it is foolish to use blind, old men as guides.

— Heinrich Heine, Gedanken und Einfalle

There's something about this analogy that I like, though I can't agree completely. It works in a historical context, I guess. But personally, even in the darkest depths, I'm not going to follow the yellow brick road and sleep in the poppies. I might flail around and look quite mad, but not knowing is not knowing.

• An essay: Authenticity and Art Making

— Trish Szymanski, CityBelt

Who's the creator here, anyway?

...