Seven months ago I railed against Roger Ebert because he was apparently a creationist. 

Recently he has blogged again with an entry called “How I believe in God.”  In it he says he is not an atheist, believer or agnostic but rather some sort of mash-up.  His views are somewhat close to mine (which maybe I’ll fully reveal in a similar large blog entry at some point), but unlike Ebert I can recognize that I’m agnostic.  Admitting that there are unanswered questions means you are Agnostic.  I think perhaps Roger is afraid to admit this because most of those Nuns he knew as a child would lump agnostics in with atheists, and he subconsciously doesn’t want to let them down (or feel the “you’re going to hell!” guilt associated with their dissaproval).

The first comment on his new blog asserts “sorry, Roger, you’re an Atheist.” Wrong!  An atheist contends to KNOW that god doesn’t exist.  This notion is just as silly as thinking for sure that he does exist, and certainly nowhere does Ebert profess that he knows God doesn’t exist.  In fact, to the contrary he leaves the question quite open (again – this is the agnostic “belief”).

So, why did I rail against him originally?   Well, if you look at his blog entry from back then it becomes clear he was answering the questions about creationism not as his own opinions, but as what current creationists think of the issues.  He doesn’t state whether he agrees or thinks all of it is hogwash (and he probably thinks neither).  But he doesn’t preface the entry with this disclaimer.  So, I jumped to conclusions and assumed he was answering in defense of his own views, when in fact he was simply providing fodder for debate (and ad revenue for The Chicago Sun Times which hosts his blog, how clever) … and so it turns out I have more in common with RE than I thought. 

The Terminal was still a horrible movie though….