A man named Shelby Sherman wrote a powerful story of his struggle to understand religion, which appeared at Ebon Musings. The second paragraph of his essay sets the stage for the story of his struggle:

Hello, I am 55 years old and an atheist. I was married to the same woman for over 33 years, lived in the same house for 12 years and my taxes are paid. My wife and I raised two sons who are both college graduates and doing well. The last 37 months of her life I was a full-time caregiver for a wife who was unfortunately diagnosed with an incurable, anaplastic astrocytoma (malignant brain tumor). After a three-year struggle, she passed away on May 5th, 2003 and I will miss her terribly. Taking my marriage vows seriously, I gave up my career and I considered it an honor to care for my wife. In the past three years I have lost virtually everything, my wife, my career, most of my net worth, my medical insurance, my freedom and most of my friends. When I die, according to the Christian belief system, I will head straight to HELL without any hope of intervention. I will face an eternity of unspeakable pain and torture for simply not believing in a concept that is not backed by a single shred of evidence. Jeff Dahmer, who was convicted in Wisconsin of twelve 1st degree murders and was sentenced to fifteen consecutive life terms for these murders, accepted Jesus Christ as his savior and was baptized in prison. Jeff was subsequently murdered in prison and will go to HEAVEN for simply believing in these concepts. The fact that Jeff brutally murdered who knows how many young men, tortured them, slept with some of the corpses before chopping them up and either freezing or eating them, does not matter to the Christian cult. According to the doctrine of Christianity, Jeff goes to heaven, to be greeted with open arms by God, Jesus and all the heavenly hosts, a child of God. Can anyone else see anything wrong with this picture?