QUOTATION MARKS - Whether God Exists Or Not Is Unprovable

 

Follow me closely now: whether God exists or not is unprovable, so for an individual person, whether He exists or not, is always going to be a matter of belief. But at the same time, quite independently, He either exists or He doesn't, irrespective of whether He's believed in. He's a fact, or a non fact, about the nature of the universe.

So if you believe, you're making a bet that God exists whether you believe or not. If you believe, you're not perceiving God as a creature of your belief, called into being by it, ebbing and flowing as it ebbs and flows. You're perceiving a state of the universe. You may be wrong, but if you are wrong, you're not wrong because you're weak and credulous. You're just wrong. 

Likewise, if you're right, you're not right because of anything you did or felt, because there was anything deserving or admirable about your feelings. You just are right. I realise this may come as a shock, but wishing does not in fact cause things to exist. Or to cease to exist. If something does exist, then wishing for that something does not infect it with wishfulness.'

Taken from Unapologetic, by Francis Spufford,
Published by Faber & Faber, 2012.