"The foundation of morality is to ... give up pretending to believe that for which there is no evidence, and repeating unintelligible propositions about things beyond the possibilities of knowledge." -T.H. Huxley

Keeping up a healthy skepticism and a balanced, loving irreligion was no mean feat in this culture. You're pretty much on your own: there are no weekly gatherings of the flock to support you, and nobody writes "Chicken Soup for the Godless, Free-Thinking Soul." But I found some books to cherish and to open from time to time to steel me for further struggle.

Mark Twain's hilarious "Letters From the Earth" neatly skewers the sort of theological muddle people get into when they assume a god who's too personal and too much like us.

My favorite general introduction to the Bible as a book is "The Unauthorized Version" by Robin Lane Fox. It's a close reading of the Old and New Testaments, taking Pilate's taunt ("What is truth?") as a starting point. He gives good account of the dubious texts that secularists need to know for their daily battles with fundamentalist: The two, contradictory accounts of the creation of Man in Genesis; the versions of Christ's birth in Matthew and Luke that are provably false in terms of Roman history (Augustus never decreed "that all the world should be taxed"); and the "aggressive forgeries" that pepper the Epistles. On the other hand, Fox tells how the "higher criticism" that Christians so often scorn actually proves that the Gospels are much older than people once assumed, and that most of the Epistles really were written by the same person.

"The Barbarian Conversion: From Paganism to Christianity" by Richard Fletcher is an authoritative account of how Christianity made the leap from the disintegrating Roman Empire to the "barbarian" tribes that toppled it -- largely by selling itself as part of the package deal of Roman civilization. Fletcher gives accounts, sometimes amusing, sometimes harrowing, of how Christian missionaries won over the kings and warlords and worried about the common folk later. Amid the stories of sacred groves hacked down and idols burned are many more ambivalent cases where a pagan custom or shrine was simply given a Christian paint job. Fletcher also knows how to find the little details that open up big pictures. Such as the Northumbrian Priests' Law, a code of conduct attributed to Archbishop Wulfstan of York (1000-1023) that laid down four rules for the Anglo-Saxon men of God: Clergy must shave regularly, must not bring their weapons to church, must try to keep out of fights, and must not perform as "ale minstrels."

"Mere Christianity," by C.S. Lewis, comes as close as any book ever has to making me accept Christianity. The trouble is, he does it by appeals to goodness, to reason, to the heart and mind of a modern educated person. There's no mention at all of the Bible. You close the book thinking, "I want to give this guy's belief system a chance," but where do you have to turn? To the Bible, that blind, blood-boltered book. You're confronted with all the old idiocy and hatred and superstition and historical mazes.

For a good skeptical look at believers and their world, try David Hume's "The Natural History of Religion" (1757) and his other writings on the topic. He said, in more precise terms, what Tom Paine ranted 40 years later in "Age of Reason."

"Ethics Without God" by Kai Nielsen is difficult and philosophical, but not so difficult as to be beyond the reach of a non-philosopher like me. Can a Christian also be a good person? Is one of the questions this book sets out to answer. It's no mere provocation, it turns out there are serious philosophical problems in reconciling fidelity to God and ethical behavior. Of course, a quick glance at the list of religious wars and attrocities raises the same question, but this book doesn't take on hate-mongers hiding behind Bibles, but rather the pure question of good and evil in people of honest motives.

Ought we to obey the will of God? Of course we should, the believer answers. But why? Because he is almighty and powerful and will punish us if we do not obey? Well, then, obeying God is no better than obeying Stalin and Hitler. Or because he is always good? In that case, you admit to something within, some discernment of good and evil, that you apply even to an order from God. So why not dispense with the cumbersome deity altogether, and focus on the internal discernment?

"It is as great a presumption to send our Passions upon God's Errands, as it is to palliate them with God's Name." -William Penn

(God's answer to all humanity's selfish prayers and thoughtless imprecations, courtesy of the Hubble Space Telescope)