Death and Atheism

It's not unusual to find that somebody who is now an atheist was once quite religious. I have found that there are usually two triggers that make somebody reject the very idea of God.

1. They examined their religion and found it to be inconsistent with the Bible. (As far as I can tell, this says far more about their religion than it does about the existence of God. Getting a counterfeit bill doesn't mean that real money doesn't exist).
   
2. Somebody close to them has died. A.N. Wilson is a well known biography writer, who also gained a reputation for his book, Against Religion: Why We Should Live Without It; he said, concerning the death of his father, "From the moment he died I stopped being religious."
   

While this is not an unusual motivation to reject God, it is completely nonsensical. The logic seems to be, "If God existed, then nobody close to me would ever die; only those I don't like or never knew would die." In essence, those who think this way place themselves at the center of the universe, and a perfect world would keep them from ever feeling any sort of pain or suffering. I've often said that there is pain and suffering in this world so that we won't want to stay here forever; we'll look forward to going someplace better. Death might be unpleasant for those left behind and it might be unexpected if the person is fairly young and healthy, but it shouldn't be seen as a sign that God doesn't exist; if anything, it's a sign that you're not God.