Gay Byrne: Suppose what Oscar believed in
as he died in spite of your protestations.
Suppose it's all true, and you walk up to the Pearly Gates
and you are confronted by God.
What would Stephen Fry say to Him, Her, or It?
Stephen Fry: I will basically - that is theodicee, I think -
I’d say; "Bone cancer in children?
What's that about? How dare you?
How dare you create a world in which there is such misery
that is not our fault? It’s not right, it’s utterly, utterly evil.
Why should I respect a capricious, mean-minded, stupid god
who creates a world which is so full of injustice and pain?
That's what I'd say.
GB: And you think you're going to get in?
SF: No, but I wouldn't want to.
I wouldn't want to get in on his terms. They're wrong.
Now if I died and it was was Pluto, Hades
and it was the 12 Greek gods, then I would have more
truck because the Greeks were..., they didn’t pretend not to be human
in their appetites, in their capriciousness
and in their unreasonableness. They didn't present themselves
as being all seeing, all wise, all kind, all beneficent.
Because the god who created this universe - if it was created by a god -
is quite clearly a maniac,
utter maniac, totally selfish, total. We have to spend our live
on our knees thanking him? What kind of god would do that?
Yes, the world is very splendid, but it also has in it insects
whose whole life cycle is to burrow into the eyes of children
and make them blind.
They eat outwards from the eyes. Why?
Why did you do that to us? You could easily have made
a creation in which that didn't exist. It is simply not acceptable.
So, you know, atheism is
not just about not believing there isn't...
not believing there is a god. But on the assumption there is one,
what kind of god is he? It's perfectly apparent.
He is monstrous, utterly monstrous, deserves no respect whatsoever.
The moment you banish him, life becomes simpler, purer, cleaner,
more worth living in my opinion.
GB: That sure is the longer answer to that question
I got in this entire series.