I think what upsets me the most about many Christians is their incessant need to remind non-believers we are going to burn in eternal fire for not subscribing to their religion. Personally, I find it a most repulsive idea, and the tragedy is most of these individuals are convinced that by reminding us our ‘souls’ are facing eternal torture, they are actually doing us a big favor.

The problem here is not their proselytizing; I actually don’t mind when people try to change my opinion about a subject. It allows me to ‘preach’ my atheism back to them, so at least there’s an implicit understanding there. My problem is how easily these people seem to gloss over the fact fundamentally, they have no moral objection to seeing me eternally tortured. They believe since the rulebook wasn’t written by them, it isn’t their responsibility as to what happens when non-believers die; that’s all God’s doing.

There are plenty of terrible examples of the kind of horror humans inflict on one another when they are simply ‘following orders’. The Millgram experiments in the 60s showed so long as human beings are told by a person of authority what to do, over half of the test subjects were willing to kill someone if ultimately the responsibility wasn’t theirs. It was a chilling reminder that even the nicest people can do evil things given the right circumstances.

My message to Christians is fairly straightforward; you shouldn’t accept the poisonous idea non-believers are condemned to hell. If your God really is all loving, there’s no reason to punish those who simply fail to accept his existence. Besides, there are so many religions out there the odds are stacked AGAINST anyone actually getting the right one, so it’s likely that we’d all end up in Hell anyways. What a terrible thing to think, is it not?

So, please stop trying to pass the buck and claim it isn’t your choice that I go to Hell. If you are a good person, how could you accept that your Buddhist, Hindu, Atheist, or Jewish friend will be burning in brimstone and ash while you enjoy the comforts of paradise? Could you eat a great meal if you had to consume it in front of a bunch of starving African children? If you could, then shame on you.