In the spring of 1986, I took a History of Christianity course at Cal. In his introductory lecture, Professor Bouwsma acknowledged that many students might come from Christian backgrounds. We might have deeply held beliefs, he said, but we should expect to be challenged and discomfited. He invited the believers in the class to think of their faith like a warm jacket.
“When you’re out and about in the chill, you need to wear your coat,” Bouwsma said. “When you come in here, I ask you to take off the coat of your faith and hang it on the back of your chair. You can put it right back on when you leave, but while you’re here, you don’t need it.”
The young woman next to me said, under her breath, with a mixture of pain and wonder that I can vividly remember almost forty years later, “But it’s not a coat. It’s my skin.”
I didn’t say anything. I remember I felt sorry for her. Raised an agnostic in a culture that valued skepticism and rationality not just as servants but as masters, college-aged Hugo pitied deeply religious people. Imagine walking through the world “blinded by your priors!” Imagine taking your faith so seriously you couldn’t let go of it for a sixty-minute lecture! No wonder the world is a mess — even here at Berkeley, fanatics and fundies abound! I bet she doesn’t believe in sex before marriage either!
It would take me years before I realized that my own
