it's a shame that nobody ever looked good in responding to the question, "do you have faith in god?", by answering "no". it makes one seem.....well, a bit of an onion. but why? i imagine that this is a product of the associating of faith only with objects worthy of our approval - when was the last time that anybody asked you if you had faith in the devil? - and the misappropriation of those *happy* vibes to the unfortunate subject, of whom the question is demanded. if one has the faith in the good thing, then somehow it is likely to be the case that one is a good person. if one doesn't have faith in the good thing, then one is seen to be deficient not only in faith but also in the goodness that is thought by the questioner to attend the object of this faith. one could try to deal with this, assuming it's a dub asking the question, by simply rubbishing their god - there's plenty of scope for that as we know - but it would be more interesting and honest to examine faith itself. unfortunately, this tends not to happen since the pondlife with whom one is talking has already started packing his bags. faith's very own self protection mechanism!
pepheuga