Interview Post

The first person I thought of, when I decided to do my paper on agnosticism, was my father. I was raised in an open household and he had always taught me that it was ok to believe whatever you believed, even if not popular. For this reason alone I interviewed my father, a life long agnostic who will openly admit it to anyone who was to ask.

The first question I asked my father was when he decided or realized that he was an agnostic.My dad replied that from a young age he was not really into church, however he did in fact have some beliefs that aligned themselves with the church. As he grew older he thought more about it and became more in tune with his leanings, soon becoming a full fledged believer in the idea of agnosticism. Obviously this did not happen overnight, it took several years of reading books and talking to people to really make up his mind on the subject, but once he had, it was clear that the ideas that agnosticism provided, were directly correlating with those that he had had since he was quite young.

The next question that I asked my dad more directly related to the exact issue of the paper that I'm writing, that being "Have you ever had a negative encounter/reaction to your agnosticism?" My father kind of paused for a minute to really think about the question, then replied with a simple yes. When I asked to elaborate he told me a story about his parent's friend who just happened to have been a priest, who was taken aback when he brought up something about my dad's ideals. In a nutshell of what happened, my dad was having dinner with his parents and their friend when the idea of agnosticism came up. My dad identified himself as agnostic in the conversation and the priest was quick to jump on him. While it wasn't necessarily mean, the remarks about not being "holy" were a little unwarranted and one of the most negative responses he's ever heard. 

The last real question I asked my dad was whether this exact ideal set had ever hindered him in any other ways. This question was answered rather swiftly with a quick no. He said that most people don't really find out so it's not especially an issue.

All in all, I think this interview helped me better understand the lifelong implications socially that this belief set may have on mine and many other people's lives.