About.com's atheist section has a recent post discussing Daniel Dennet and Linda LaScola's interviews of various protestant pastors who self identify as atheist or close to it. It's not that there are closeted atheists out there, we've had those for, likely, centuries. And before that we had closeted Christians, and Jews, and whatever the hell the Hittites worshiped. No. What shocks me is what the pastors are. Southern... Baptist?!
I mean, my god! If the interviewees had been Anglican, or some jovial Irish Catholic, I could have been like "Oh. Alright. I guess that's not too surprising." But Southern Baptist? They might as well have been snake handlers who say in secret interviews "Yeah, I don't buy all this, I just like snakes."
Dennet and LaScola were unable to find any Catholic or Orthodox atheists, which isn't too surprising. I guess I would have expected at least a few Catholics, if nothing else. But wow. Southern Baptist. Wild.
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