Sam Harris

A couple of months ago, my fundamentalist Christian grandmother, after hearing of my unbelief, sent me a 33-page handwritten letter lamenting my unbelief, urging me to reconsider, and ultimately appealing to a fear of hell for the decisions I make about what I choose to not believe in.

Last week I chose to finally reply. After a few days of work on responding, my letter really started to grow. I finished my letter last night and posted it to reddit.com for some feedback. The response has been overwhelming (over 400 comments in the last 24 hours!) and I’m left in kind of an awkward space. What else can I do with the work I put into writing this letter?

This is not a coming out letter, it is not an attempt to change my grandma’s mind. It is an attempt at an explanation for why I do not believe as she does.You’ll see immediately upon opening the letter that my response has grown into a weird beast, some kind of hybrid between a letter and an essay. I’d like to invite you to read my letter and portions of the letter my grandmother wrote me.

Here is the link to my submission to reddit.com. You’ll find a link to my letter, and a second link to an excerpt from my grandmother’s letter. Have a look at some of the comments, too. They’re very entertaining.

http://tinyurl.com/yhsux6m

Thanks for reading this,
Josh Sullivan

Nicely done, Josh.

It was respectful, meticulous, relentless and probably an enormous waste of time, but I learned something and you managed not to call Grandma a useless anal fungus or deranged douche nozzle as many atheist are prone to do when writing long communications addressed to the howling mad.

I really enjoyed it.

Cheers mate.

Superb letter.  Have you any idea yet how it was received?

I haven’t sent the letter yet. I posted it here to get some last minute feedback before sticking it in the mail. I’ll probably send it out to my grandmother tomorrow.

I thought it was very well thought out and comprehensive but it’s presented like a dry scientific essay without any real emotion.  This may not be the best approach when dealing with your obviously loving grandma.  She will likely assume that you’re more machine than man now. 

I would make it more personal.  Remind her of all of the values she’s instilled in you and how she helped shape you into the good, moral man you are today.  Just my 2 cents!

Johnny Sweatpants - 15 October 2009 07:09 PM

I thought it was very well thought out and comprehensive but it’s presented like a dry scientific essay without any real emotion.  This may not be the best approach when dealing with your obviously loving grandma.  She will likely assume that you’re more machine than man now. 

I would make it more personal.  Remind her of all of the values she’s instilled in you and how she helped shape you into the good, moral man you are today.  Just my 2 cents!

If you do that, it might be a good idea to remind her that you may have got them partly from her, but also because you are a normal, well-adjusted human being who is capable of empathy towards others—which is the ultimate source of our morality, not a supernatural sky-daddy who punishes us if we misbehave.

Well, that was a wonderful presentation indeed. It should have at least a little impact on even the most absolutist thinking individuals among us, including your gramdmother but….I would not hold my breath.

Josh, I think you have done as well as you can do.

Best regards.

If Grandma wrote you 33 pages, you already know that she will campaign the rest of her life to get you to perceive the error of your ways and come back to THE TRUTH as she sees it. Family makes living rationally difficult.  I encourage you to stand your ground and fortify your mind with the history of the universe and life on earth as discovered by scientists. You may eventually have to stop discussing faith vs.science with her.  Very best to you.
Starfire

Poetic justice: a concisely written (if apparently excessive), specific, well thought-out response to an insanely long tirade founded in ancient ignorance. Too long and confusing for Grandma? Let her open a reason-based book or two for once in her life.

Thanks for the feedback, everyone. I’m licking the envelope today and will send my little letter off to grandma tomorrow morning. I’ll post an update as soon as I have a response from her.

Yes I concur with UZ on that. The grandma needs to read a book about science and skepticism. We are many centuries into the age of reason now and somehow she was left behind. It’s never to late to catch up, at least a little.

Maybe ‘How we Believe, Science, Skepticism and the Search For God by Shermer or

‘The Demon Haunted World’ by Sagan?

Many others as well.