Every time I drive home, just after I cross the border and finally breathe that invigorating Minnesotan air, I'm greeted by a billboard on my left that reads ""ARE YOU GOING TO HEAVEN OR HELL?"" followed by a phone number. Most states would probably throw you a few meatballs first or even a toll booth or two before gettin' real on you like that, but after three and a half hours barreling through boring Wisconsin nothingness and past indoor waterparks listening to western Wisconsin country radio and random CDs found on the floor of the car (R. Kelly's hip-hopera ""Trapped in the Closet"" is full of so many twists and turns, I thought I was going to swerve right off the road!), that billboard has a strange way of reminding me I'm still alive. When I pass it, I like to imagine some frantic woman reading it and becoming so concerned about the fate of her eternal soul she violently brakes along the side of the road, whips out her cell phone and calls the number. In seconds, she is greeted by an automated voice that says, ""Thank you for calling Heaven or Hell Hotline, the instant summation of your predestination. At the present moment, you are going to ..."" and then a gruff voice from a man named Maslowski inelegantly interjects, ""HELL,"" and the line goes dead. She probably wouldn't find it very funny, but I always get a kick out of that.
I would guess that exactly zero people have called that number, first because we drive too fast to write it down and second because we all know that we wouldn't get Maslowski's jarring ejaculation on the other end but instead some blowhard droning on and on about the myriad reasons why we are, in fact, going to hell, sort of like those zealous fellows who occasionally grace our Library Mall. It's hard to believe this kind of in-your-face evangelism is inspired by good Christian compassion and it's easy to assume that it does not work. The old men who hand out New Testaments every fall are all right, but you have to imagine those criers with their signs on State and Lake keep more people from reading the Gospels than masturbation does by blinding little boys. Recently in Madison, however, a new force for evangelization has raised its ugly head, one much more silent but seemingly a good deal more sinister.
The Freedom From Religion Foundation has had it's little compound on West Wash for as long as I have roamed these streets, but it must have just recently raised enough cash from its stingy members' monthly dues to start spreading the bad news. On billboards and buses around town, we are now beckoned to walk in the bleak light of atheism, to slough off our antiquated religious superstitions and sleep in (finally!) on Sundays like the enlightened beings blind evolution intended us to be. I had thought college students to be about as religious as apples; to put these ads around campus seems to be preaching to the choir. Maybe the FFRF thought it'd be best to start out easy and work up to more difficult markets from there. But behind all its sleek ads and simple slogans there's something strange about this religious irreligion.
As a religious and enlightened television watcher, I've become utterly immune to all forms of advertisement and untrusting of any organization that would spend money to seduce me. As one of six siblings, I know that if something actually is good, people will go to great lengths to make you not want it so they get it all to themselves. That's why my older brother tries to tell me that the brownies are dry and don't bother tasting them, that's why my mom told us cookie dough kills you, and that's why I think it's probably not all that great to be finally free from our religious foundations. You don't see the Catholic Church buying ad space to say, ""The Eucharist: Mmm, Mmm, Good!"" or the Alcoholic Beverage Council taking out 10-second spots to tell us that getting drunk actually feels pretty great. Advertisements are meant to promote a certain interest; the truth spreads by word of mouth, and good things sell themselves.
I don't doubt that the members of FFRF are every bit as firm in their convictions as I am in mine. I understand very well the human impulse to convert others to those convictions. All the same, I can't help but consider these folks akin to that ill-fated kid in seventh grade who tries to get you to smoke cigarettes with him just so he isn't doing it all alone.
David is like ‘whatever' if you want to send an email to dhottinger@wisc.edu.
