Quite often, when people find out that I'm an atheist, they ask me why I believe in such things as Tarot reading and fortune telling. I always answer their question with another question: "What does my disbelief in God have to do with reading Tarot cards?" Invariably, they respond with a variation of: "But you people don't believe in anything. How can you be a Tarot reader, when you don't believe in anything that science can't prove?"
For some strange reason, people seem to equate atheism with a lack of spirituality. Atheism is simply the absence of belief in Deity. It most certainly is not the absence of belief, period. Rejecting the idea of a supreme being does not mean that we reject all spiritual or esoteric beliefs. When I say that I don't believe in any God or Gods, it does not mean that I believe in nothing.
My spiritual beliefs developed and changed over the years, but I've always been certain about one thing: I always knew that the God I was being taught to believe in couldn't be real. The way I feel about the idea of God is pretty much the same way we feel when we finally figure out that there is no Santa Claus or no Tooth Fairy. It's that moment of clarity when we realize how silly we were for ever believing any of it was real. The only thing lacking in me was the inevitable disappointment that follows the realization, because I never truly believed that there ever was a God to begin with. I always knew there was "something" out there that is greater than all of us, I just never believed that this "something" was a God or Goddess or any other sentient, omniscient, omnipresent higher being. The "something" I believe in doesn't think, doesn't feel, doesn't judge and most certainly doesn't punish or reward. "It" just is. It's a neutral force that flows through all things in the material world and beyond. It's not someone or some thing, it's everything and nothing. Both good and evil, light and dark, male and female, life and death. Everything. And we're part of it. All of us.
This is what I believe in and this is where I draw from when practicing magic, reading Tarot cards or using the pendulum. My being an atheist does not prevent me from having spiritual beliefs that don't involve worshipping an imaginary being. All Gods are man-made. We created them, because they were the only comforting answer we could find to the endless questions about the mysteries of the vast Universe we're suspended in. I just can't accept that in a world filled with a rich mythology and dozens upon dozens of different religious icons, there can be any way of telling which one is the one true God above all others. To me, they're all the same thing: stories told around the campfire to pass the time. Stories and legends that were passed on from father to son, mother to daughter over the course of history, but that were never more than made-up fairy-tales. Some were probably inspired by real characters or events, but were undoubtedly embellished and exaggerated for dramatic effect.
As Bertrand Russell very eloquently said: "I contend that we're both atheists. I just believe in one fewer God than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible Gods, you'll understand why I dismiss yours."
Either way, the atheist in me is not a hindrance to the Tarot reader and never was. Quite the opposite, in fact. I think my lack of belief in a supreme omnipotent being gives me a different perspective when it comes to unraveling the mysteries that still shroud the symbolism in Tarot cards. When the mind is free from the chains of the conventionally accepted belief that there must be a higher power, it can go further in its search and see a much broader picture with infinitely more ease.
If I believed there was such a place, I would say that the atheist and the Tarot are a match made in Heaven.
Image from the Tarot of Dreams by Ciro Marchetti
