I’ve been reading the blog Unreasonable Faith for quite some time now. Today he highlighted a man named Josh and his response to the 33 page letter his Grandma sent him.
Josh Sullivan received 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.” So he did what most intelligent young men would do — he wrote her back and explained why he thought the way he did.The letter he wrote back is excellent, and I highly recommend you read it. You can also read some of his grandmother’s original letter. He posted both on reddit which has received almost 500 comments.
Josh’s letter is thought out, thoughtful, and accomplishes what he set out to do. The only drawback is the footnotes. They are cumbersome and lengthy, but I do see why he kept them out of the body of the letter.
As I was reading, my initial reaction was he wrote this to his Grandma?!?! (I was, of course, picturing my own grandmothers.) Then it was revealed that she has a Masters in Biology, so I’m sure that, while my own uneducated grandparents would have trouble with the contents of the letter, his grandma probably did just fine.
All in all, he presents a case that is very similar to my own thought process in de-converting, although his was deliberate and mine just happened over time. I certainly wasn’t looking to leave that part of life behind me!
