The agnostic and the believer were chatting on Facebook one day. The agnostic finally decided to break the news.
“Listen, there’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you for a while, but the moment just never felt right. I’ve stopped believing in a god. Well, I don’t believe, but I don’t disbelieve either. I guess you could say I believe it’s not possible to know for certain one way or the other.”
“Why?!” the believe asked, clearly shocked by the news. “What happened?”
“First” the agnostic said, “understand when I say this I’m not trying to convince you of anything.”
“I accepted it when people told me religion is literal truth. I accepted it when people told me it’s as much a fact that Moses parted the Red Sea as it is that birds have feathers. I can’t accept that anymore. The evidence simply isn’t there. But I don’t say there is no god because I don’t think I can prove that either. I can’t prove there is intelligent life on other worlds, but I can’t disprove it either.”
“Okay,” the believer said with intent, “never mind all those details. Answer me one simple question. If you don’t believe in a god, where do you think the universe came from in the first place? It must’ve come from somewhere.”
“I don’t know how the universe came into existence,” said the agnostic, “I wasn’t there when it happened.”
“Yes,” the believer replied, “this is perfectly logical. But let me tell you why I believe, and I’m not trying to convince you of anything either. There were times I asked god to help me, and what I asked for came to be. I felt god was really there when that happened. When I pray, I just know someone is there with me. When I go to beautiful places or houses of worship, I feel there is a god there. That’s why I believe. I don’t care about all that scientific stuff. I believe there is a god because I can feel it in my heart, not because I can prove it scientifically.”
“I understand,” the agnostic said, “and I have absolutely nothing against that.”
And the conversation ended like that.
Short Stories
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Thanks for sharing it’s nice to see that the conversation didn’t degrade into something offense the way most things do on Facebook.
I do believe, though, that when referring to God in the way you are that it should be a big G.
This is super cool. I really appreciate this conversation. I love how it ended on just an understanding than a conversion. Conversions are great but I find they come with many meetings with a person and prayer. For someone who doesn’t believe they respond EXACTLY this. They always want to challenge you on the scientific when you’re not a scientists.
I feel this could be an awesome flash story just make the revisions needed and you’ll be good.
I agree with ZBERG and mikaylamoss, it’s really nice to see a conversation that wasn’t a believer hitting the new agnostic over the head with Scripture or making threats about the security of their soul. While the believer may think these things, may be worried for their friend, they temper their response with charity and listening to these doubts their friend has raised.
ZBERG has it right about the capitalization too, but I suspect in this context this might be a story lifted from a real FB conversation so the lower-case is preserved to maintain authenticity. If I’m wrong, though, ‘god’ should be ‘God,’ as ZBERG said.
Why did you choose to share this story here, aknight? I’m interested in the larger context of the story.
Thank you for your comment. This story is reflective of a personal experience I had. I guess I decided to share it for the reasons you and the other comments already cited. Usually conversations about religion are not this cordial and I felt I could share it as a good example of how they can be perfectly civil.
Hey, I enjoyed the story and in my mind I can see how this conversation goes the way it goes, neither trying to push their beliefs on the other. I like what the believer said and agree, thanks for sharing.