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Re: your kind words about the episode...thank you.

"On a completely different and impertinent tack, I am curious to know
if you feel any impact from being perhaps the most visible atheist
since Ms. O'Hair?"

Not really. I think that a large sector of the religious
community is still trying to figure me out...because yes, I'm an open,
avowed atheist, but I've done stories about religion and spirituality
that -- if the mail from priests and rabbis and ministers and even a
few folks from other, non-western religions is to be believed -- are
more fair and respectful than just about anyone else in TV is doing,
even according to last week's Christian Science Monitor.

They openly ask, "How is it that an atheist is able to get
stories of great faith on the air when nobody else will do it?" To
which I generally have started replying, "Only Nixon could go to
China."

I think that if I were using my show as a bludgeon to convey my
own personal beliefs, or lack thereof, as an atheist, that would be a
whole different kettle of fish. But I don't. I have an obligation as
a writer before anything and everything else...that means that if I
create a character who is religious, I must treat that character with
respect and, just as importantly, *authenticity*. I must, in short, be
*fair*.

Where this works to my benefit is that if I, as an atheist, do
an episode showing a religious character in a positive light, the mail
comes in thanking me for being fair to points of view I don't agree
with. Then, when I do a show implying Ivanova and Talia were briefly
lovers, or when you have Marcus and Franklin undercover as a married
couple, they start to go to the keyboards to complain...then remember
what they said about fairness to other points of view.

As a result, even with all the very subversive and challenging
shows we've done in four years, and even being an open atheist, I can
count the harrassing religious fringe-mail on one hand. (Thinks for a
moment...okay, maybe two hands, but that's all.) As long as I stay
honest with the writing, I'll be okay. The moment I start to use it as
propaganda, they'll be all over me...and rightly so.

BTW, on the issue of Madalyn O'Hair...or O'Hare, I can never
remember which it is...interesting thing is, I worked for her magazine
for a while, doing a couple of columns and articles. At the time, I
did so because I felt (and still to some extent feel) that atheists are
easy targets in society. You will never see an avowed atheist in the
White House or Congress, whatever it may say in the constitution about
this being a secular government with separation of church and state.
When then-Vice President Bush could say, at a press conference at an
airport in Chicago, "Well, I don't really see how an atheist can be a
patriot, this is after all one nation under God," then you see how bad
things can get.

But in working for her magazine, I gradually figured out that
she wasn't oriented toward equal respect on both sides, for atheism and
religion, which is where I am...she was anti-religion and looking to
sabotage that element of society, which I do not condone. It's simply
wrong. I've always said, the day they try to shut down the churches,
I'll be the first one on the firing line to fight back...I just hope
that the other side will join me when they try to shut down the
libraries. Which, finally, is why I resigned from her magazine. I'm
pro-tolerance, and don't have time for bigots of any stripe.

jms