Esbensen, 53, who was ordained as a Unitarian Universalist minister in 1996 and recently became head of a Madison congregation, does not believe in God or life after death. She calls herself a "humanist atheist." She thinks belief in deity has arguably done more to hurt than help the world. "People who do not believe in God are actually kinder, gentler people," she says. A personal belief in God, for instance, was not needed for Esbensen to comfort the dying woman in Minnesota, to "say what she needed to hear."The self-actualization self-help-book pseudo-churches have some of the most fractious, crazed loony congregations, and they wind up either trying to force out their pseudo-pastor, or go looking for another zany pseudo-church. And, btw, she's FOS, atheists are not kinder, gentler people -- or maybe she's never heard of Lenin and his 1921 cabinet members. Thanks chickadee.
Atheists are forced to compete with religious people. That’s why so many atheists are good. They also feel the joy of love in their hearts, but without a religious society to bouy them, they devolve.
“Unitarian Universalist minister...calls herself a “humanist atheist.” She thinks belief in deity has arguably done more to hurt than help the world.”