"At age 81, after decades of insisting belief is a mistake..."
Hmmmm. He's 81, not much time left on the calendar. Could this be a bit of philosophical CYA?
you took the words right out of my post. CYA time.
I've often wondered what percentage of atheists would pray to God if their airplane was going down.
My thoughts to, but, how many has he influenced to lead a life of secular desperation.
Satan believes in God.
Hes still going to Hell.
Salvation is in Jesus Christ.
I was thinking the same thing.
I wrote a novelle about this ... TURNABOUT. The main character of the story was an atheist, Carl Sagan type physicist who had a near death experience. When he awoke, after meeting God on 'the other side', he was no longer an atheist, but being an honest man, his revelation was met with a schism of believers and 'semi-believers', one sides reviling him for changing his tune, the other desiring a closer relationship with the one whom he had met and began freely talking about.
Hey, CYA is better than nothing! The Bible says that fear of the Lord is the beginning of Wisdom. So "CYA" is the first step.