An ordinary whistler

I was brought up as a methodist, going to church 3 times a day every Sunday - [Sunday school in the afternoon.] My parents were definitely believers, but it was more a way of life - they had met all their friends and each other through the church, and it was their entire social life. The same was true for me until my mid teens. I remember being absolutely scandalised when school classmates said they didn't believe in God, and vigorously defending my "own" faith. But of course it wasn't my own, as I subsequently found out.

Eventually it was time for myself and a number of young friends from church to attend confirmation classes [in the Methodist church it was called "being taken into membership"]. I can't remember anything at all about these classes, but we attended for several weekly sessions at the manse, and then the minister asked us all in turn whether we wished to go ahead with the service to take us into membership. To my astonishment, one boy said no, he didn't feel ready. I thought, "he must be mad to say no after going through all this".

So the ceremony took place, and we young people took part in our first Holy Communion. When a fellow communicant dropped his glass of wine, I tried hard not to laugh, and I was desperately afraid my stomach would make loud gurgling noises, and then I thought, "hang on a minute, I'm supposed to be thinking about God", and that was when I realised for the first time that I didn't believe in God at all. I didn't choose this. You can't choose to believe if you don't.

At around this time, I started studying for French A levels, and was introduced by a brilliant teacher to the writings of Albert Camus. This did not influence my beliefs, because I already held them by then, but here was someone who agreed with me! I occasionally re-read some of Camus' works, but don't remember or understand them as well as I once did. Briefly though, I think what he was saying, and certainly what I believe, is that this life is all we have, so we must enjoy it to the full. Thus, the enraged doctor during the plague asks the priest how does he know that an instant of a child's suffering is worth an eternity of peace in an " afterlife", and the condemned man Meursault assures a priest that he would rather have a hair off a woman's head than all the priest's "certainties".

Meursault, like me, loved life, ordinary life, just the joy of beingalive. From the condemned cell, he listens to the world outside, decribes its "benign indifference" - one of my favouritephrases in literature - and in the early morning is filled with peace when he hears a man whistling as he walks along the street.

Not for us the fearsome prospect of meeting our maker in the hereafter!