Pascal’s Wager is an often-used ploy and “rationale”. I had never even heard of Pascal’s Wager until right around the time I joined the AR. Looking back over my indoctrinated years, however, I now know that was a major factor in keeping me shackled to my religious chains. “But what if I’m wrong?”… No matter how much I questioned… No matter how many things made NO SENSE to me… No matter how much I learned that totally countered so many things in the bible… That ONE question always rang in my head and pulled me back in. In my mind it was, “Well, maybe it IS all a bunch of bullshit. I don’t know. But I suppose it is better to be safe than sorry.” No telling how many times I told myself that over the course of several decades.
Knowing what I know now, however, here is the hilarious irony of Pascal’s Wager most people rarely consider: As I was taught, the god of the bible knows EVERYTHING. Knows how you feel and knows what you think even better than you do. Matter of fact, that god knows everything you will think, feel, do, say throughout your ENTIRE LIFE, and it knew these things eons before you were ever born. BUT!.. “Even though I have doubts and don’t really believe this god is real, I’m gonna FOOL this god by pretending to believe in it, just in case it IS real. Surely it will never know the difference.”