FINDING MY RELIGION / Julia Sweeney talks about how she became an atheist

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With conservative Christians calling the shots in Washington, creationism crawling back into the nation's schools and even normally decadent Hollywood hopping onto the spiritual bandwagon, it's a beleaguered time for atheists in America.

Comedian Julia Sweeney, a former Roman Catholic who lost her faith in God, tries to keep her sense of humor. Best known for her portrayal of the androgynous character "Pat" on "Saturday Night Live," Sweeney recently completed a successful run in Los Angeles of a one-woman show, "Letting Go of God," which chronicles her own disillusionment with religion.

Now she is telling her story in a book, "My Beautiful Loss of Faith Story" (Henry Holt). Sweeney, who grew up the oldest of five children in Spokane, Wash., is now the single mother of an adopted girl from China. She spoke with me from her home in Los Angeles.

No. It actually wasn't. If I had gone to Salt Lake City and done this show, maybe that would have been different. But here [in L.A.] you're not defined socially by your religious views.

I think most of my friends were shocked that I actually thought about religion that much. I had several people come up and say, "I didn't know you were so religious!" I think they were more surprised by how religious I was before I wasn't religious than they were by the fact that I wasn't religious. [laughter]

I read that as a kid you fantasized about being a nun. What did you find attractive about that?

Oh! What's not attractive? To me it all seemed so glamorous! First of all, you get an outfit that's fantastic! And then you live together with all these women! I related to those films like "The Trouble With Angels" and "A Nun's Story." It all seemed so "Black Narcissus," you know? And the rituals, like going in and prostrating yourself before the cross, and the prayers, were appealing on some level. I still love it! I could join a convent, really!

At what point did you start having doubts about Catholicism?

Well, I kind of did always. You know, in high school I thought Catholicism was funny and sort of ridiculous, but then I also liked it, too. Like, I definitely turned to it in times of trouble. You know, even shallow things like, "Dear God, help this boy ask me out on a date." But I always had doubts about it. It's just that I didn't develop them. I had really, um, shallow doubts.

What caused you to take a deeper look?

I was 38, and I was going through a personal crisis where this guy I'd been dating for four years and totally expected to marry and have a family with abruptly broke it off. It really sent me into a tailspin. I was praying quite a bit -- "God, help me through this time" -- and waking up crying a lot.

And then I had one night where I had an experience that I considered to be religious -- it's not like God's face came and talked to me or anything, but I just felt a presence in the room, and then I felt really kind of healed.

I felt like I was being taken care of by God, and then after that, I thought, you know, I'm 38. It's time to get serious about religion. Let's go join the church and get those little envelopes and be a giver and sign up for some committees, you know? And so I did, and then one of the things I signed up for was Bible study class, and that was the beginning of the end.

In "Letting Go of God," you describe a number of passages in the Bible that you found shocking or disturbing. What was the most surprising thing you found?

Well, the most surprising thing overall is that anyone takes it seriously at all. Even if you were, say, Margaret Mead looking at Catholic Christian culture in America and you said all these people believe this thing -- every week they go and hear quotes from this book, and everything in this book is so sacred to these people -- I, as the Margaret Mead character looking at this, would be stupendously shocked that it was so contradictory and so obviously the result of a historic tribe trying to make sense of an unpredictable environment with limited scientific knowledge and a need for culture and cohesion.

It isn't that there aren't wonderful parts to the Bible, but it's just shocking to me that anyone spends their time defending it as anything more than a culturally special book. In terms of really taking it seriously as the word of God, I can't.

Of course, plenty of people don't take the Bible literally and still consider themselves religious. They think of it as metaphor, or just interesting stories.

Even the Catholic church does that. In my show, the priest says right away, "We're not to take this literally!" It is not literal. This is poetry. But still, even at that, I expected more.

To me, the Iliad offers more insight into human character and lessons than the Bible. You know, like Jesus was angry a lot. When he turned all those people into pigs and made them run off a mountain, it was so hateful, not just to people but to pigs. I felt upset for the pigs!

Was there a turning point in terms of your leaving behind religion? Did you just wake up one day and realize you were an atheist?

No. It was a long process. I just became a stronger agnostic, and then I started to realize that everyone who was saying they were agnostic really hadn't thought about it that much. Still, I went with agnosticism for a long, long time because I just hated to say I was an atheist -- being an atheist seemed so rigid. But the more I became comfortable with the word, and the more I read, it started to stick.

You're close with your family. How did they react to your coming out as an atheist?

They each had their own reactions. My mom said, "Well, you're brilliant, but you're wrong!" And then my sister Meg, who is so sweet and wonderful, said, "Well, I just think most people haven't thought about it as much as you have" -- which I thought was a very nice thing to say.

And then my brother Jim was very funny. He said, "Well, Julia's looked into it -- I guess there is no God!" He goes: "She does good research. I believe her, because I would never read all that stuff! Well, she just saved me a lot of time!"

How do you relate to people who strongly believe in God?

If somebody has credible evidence that there is a supernatural power that knows what I think and cares about me and offers me a life after death, I would look at that evidence with an open mind. On the other hand, I can't imagine there would be that evidence.

I mean, I have all kinds of people writing me and saying, "Oh! I'm so glad you are open-minded, because here is the evidence!" And then the evidence is "Jesus is God. Read the Bible." I realize that those people don't know what evidence means. They don't have a scientific view of the world.

It's not as if you're trying to convince anyone to abandon their faith. Or are you?

Well, yes and no. If somebody feels they've looked at the evidence and they are Christian or whatever -- I would march on my bare feet to Washington, D.C., to guarantee their rights to make that decision.

But what I wish is that people who haven't really looked into it but -- kind of like I was -- have a vague idea that there must be something there [God], I wish that they would look into it, because I think they wouldn't let people who are religious walk all over them as much as they do in our society.

When someone asks you, "What makes you so sure, Julia, that there is no God? Aren't you just taking a leap of faith in saying that?" What do you say?

To a certain extent I am taking a leap of faith. I'm adding up the evidence on either side, and I'm seeing the evidence of there not being a God is overwhelming compared to the evidence for there being a God.

Just like I take a leap of faith with my babysitter, you know? Based on what I know and what I expect, I believe this is the probability of her actually picking up my daughter from dance class at this very moment and driving her home. But I am taking a leap of faith based on the best evidence I can get that she is going to do that.

People often turn to religion for a sense of meaning and purpose in their lives. How does giving up your belief in God affect your sense of your life's purpose?

After I stopped believing in God, I realized it was completely up to me to create my own meaning and my purpose was my own. God didn't care if I was working at the gas station my whole life or writing great novels. It didn't really matter in the universe what I did, but it mattered to me.

I keep thinking about my dad, who just died this last spring. He was a really great dad and had a huge effect on my personality. Now I have an adopted daughter, so I think my meaning comes partly from the fact that I'm going to influence her personality by my presence.

Are you teaching your daughter about religion? How are you handling that?

Well, at school they say the pledge of allegiance, and that's actually been pretty upsetting to me because you have to say "under God." So I told her to say "under laws." [laughs]. And she said, "No, mom, you have to say under God in order to be nice." Her feeling is she doesn't want to stick out, right? She wants to do what everyone else is doing.

What do you tell her about God?

I said God is this idea of a big man who lives up in the clouds and he created everything. And she goes, "Well I believe that!" And I go: "Well yeah, because it sounds like a cartoon character. But the truth isn't that, and I'll tell you the truth."

And then I actually teach her about evolution, and she asks me about it all the time as a bedtime story. She'll say, "Tell me about how the dinosaurs weren't here when people were here." And then we'll go over it again. I don't know how much of it she really gets, but she likes the story. And then, she's kind of over it now, but she would go, "I believe in God at school, but when I come home I don't."

That's certainly one way of handling it.

I told her: "That's because you have to say this pledge of allegiance. First of all, you can believe whatever you want, but I'm going to tell you what I think, and then you can figure it out for yourself."

And whatever she decides will be OK with you?

Yeah. I can't say I would be thrilled if she joined a church. I mean, unless she was so messed up that the church actually helped her out. [laughs].

During his far-flung career in journalism, Bay Area writer and editor David Ian Miller has worked as a city hall reporter, personal finance writer, cable television executive and managing editor of a technology news site. His writing credits include Salon.com, Wired News and The New York Observer.