Love, Death and the Hard Truth of Atheism

By David P. Diaz, Ed.D.

It is a natural inclination to love and to want to be loved. Indeed, the desire to love seems to have been hardwired into our very existence. However, for atheists, love is merely a residual effect of blind materialistic activity, an unguided process that is ultimately random and without purpose.

People, of course, also have a natural tendency to die. In fact, they do so one hundred percent of the time. Moreover, on atheism, death is stronger than love.¹ This means that, from an atheistic perspective, all loving relationships will end at death. Forever. When death arrives, all lovers cease to share their love. The abrupt and permanent end of love is one of the hard truths of atheism. On the other hand, from a Christian perspective, physical death represents a new life, the mere beginning of an eternal love relationship with God and with others who also enter into this eternal state.

Another hard truth of atheism is abandonment. Atheist philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre believed that, in a godless universe, “we are on our own to create our values and to define our very selves. There is no given plan or path to follow to find meaning and truth.”² Atheism suggests that humans are adrift in the cosmos, abandoned and without ultimate purpose; all presumed purposes are transient and end at death.

A further hard truth is insignificance. Under atheism, there is nothing significant about human existence; the world can get along just fine without us. Indeed, it is unfathomably improbable that we were ever born. As famous astronomer Carl Sagen put it: the Earth is just “a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark.”

Indifference represents another hard truth of atheism. According to Thomas Nagel, “Our first-person subjective desire to go on living clashes ruthlessly with the objective reality that the universe is indifferent to our continued survival.³ Indeed, as Werner Herzog said it: “The universe is monstrously indifferent to the presence of man.”⁴ Richard Dawkins put a fine point on it: “The universe that we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but pitiless indifference.”⁵

A final hard truth of atheism is a “will to power.” German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche explained that power is a greater driving force for human action than love or altruism. Just as no one blames birds of prey for their ruthless desire to overcome their victims, it is absurd to expect strong humans to refrain from manifesting their strength. It is not “within the discretion of the strong to be weak, of the bird of prey to be a lamb.”⁶ In an atheistic belief system, the strong rule the weak simply because they want to and can. On atheism, power is a supreme motivator of action—the powerful seek to rule—and love plays a subordinate role if any.

Thus, under atheism, the future is transient at best and eternally dim at worst. However, there is abundant hope for those who believe in God because love is stronger than death.⁷ “God is love” (1 Jn. 4:8, 16), and he is eternal (Ps. 90:2). There will come a day when death will no longer rip apart loving relationships because love, like God, is eternal.

Christians believe that love can and will be shared for eternity. Humans were created to share a close, loving relationship with God and with other created beings forever. Because of God’s love, humans are neither abandoned nor insignificant. God loves his creation so completely that he allowed his only Son to suffer unspeakably to provide redemption to all humankind (Jn. 3:16), even those who have turned away from him. Jesus entered willingly into this relationship by laying down his life so that all might be saved (Jn. 10:18).

God invites all humans into the family composed of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit: “God’s love for us is manifested in his generously inviting us into this charmed circle… thus satisfying the deepest longing of our souls.”⁸

In a world without God, there lies only ultimate despair. In his absence, life and love provide neither hope nor meaning. However, with the existence of an all-powerful, all-knowing, all-good Creator-God comes a coherent and satisfying explanation of life, love, human existence, suffering, and even death. With God also comes the promise of an everlasting loving relationship with our Creator and Savior, who awaits us in the abode that he has created for us from eternity.

About the Author

David P. Diaz is an independent researcher and retired college professor. His writings have ranged from peer-reviewed technical articles to his memoir, which won the 2006 American Book Award. Dr. Diaz holds a Bachelor’s and Master of Science degrees from California Polytechnic State University, a Master of Arts in Philosophical Apologetics from Houston Christian University, and a Doctor of Education specializing in Computing and Information Technology from Nova Southeastern University. 

Footnotes

1. See Jerry L. Walls, “The Argument from Love and The Argument from the Meaning of Life,” in Two Dozen (or so) Arguments for God: The Plantinga Project, Kindle Edition. (ed. Jerry L. Walls and Trent A. Dougherty, New York: Oxford University Press, 2018), Kindle location 7600.
2. Ibid., 7698, italics added for emphasis.
3. Ibid., 7693.
4. Werner Herzog Quotes. BrainyQuote.com, BrainyMedia Inc, 2021. https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/werner_herzog_504574, accessed October 12, 2021.
5. Richard Dawkins and John Curless, River out of Eden: A Darwinian View of Life (United States: Recorded Books, Inc., 2018), italics added.
6. Walls, Two Dozen (or so) Arguments for God, 7760.
7. Ibid.
8. Ibid., 7598.