Chris Beha on Why He Isn’t An Atheist Anymore

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Mar 11, 2026

Christopher Beha, novelist and former Harper’s editor, recounts his shift from Catholic childhood to atheism and back toward skeptical Christian faith. He talks about a teenage mystical experience, wrestling with suffering and consciousness, the limits of materialist atheism, and how love, family, and church practice pulled him toward belief while retaining doubt.

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ANECDOTE

Answered Prayer Became A Problem

Beha rode in an ambulance with his brother after a pedestrian accident, prayed with his sister, and his brother survived despite doctors predicting he wouldn't.
That answered prayer became an intellectual problem about why God saves some and not others, contributing to Beha's turn toward atheism.

INSIGHT

Skepticism Led Back To Belief

Beha valued skepticism after leaving Catholicism, seeing it as a stance of evaluating claims by reason rather than authority.
He frames his current stance as a 'skeptical believer' who reached faith through personal experience and critical reflection.

INSIGHT

Two Distinct Atheist Traditions

Beha distinguishes two modern atheist traditions: scientific materialism that trusts objective science, and romantic idealism that centers subjective experience and authenticity.
He notes these schools are mutually hostile and shape how atheists justify meaning and knowledge.

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Former Harper’s Magazine editor Christopher Beha on his journey from skeptical Atheism to skeptical Christianity.

Watch the video of this episode on YouTube here.

For many people, faith and skepticism are opposites, but novelist and former Harper’s Magazine editor Christopher Beha argues that the two may be more intertwined than we assume. In this conversation about his new book, Why I’m Not an Atheist, Beha reflects on his journey from a devout Catholic upbringing to atheism and eventually back to Christian faith.

Beha describes how an early mystical experience and later personal tragedy pushed him into deep questions about suffering, prayer, and the nature of belief. In college, those questions led him to identify as a skeptic, valuing reason and intellectual independence. Yet over time he came to see that skepticism itself has limits. The turning point came not through philosophical argument but through life itself, like falling in love and becoming part of a family. Those experiences prompted Beha to return to church, where he began hearing familiar Christian teachings in a new way: not primarily as moral demands or metaphysical propositions, but as a story centered on love and relationship–without setting aside his questions.

Together, Russell and Chris reflect on what it means to believe while still wrestling with doubt, how parents might talk with children who are questioning faith, and why the path toward belief often begins not with certainty but with simply showing up.

If you’ve wrestled with the Christian life being sold as putting aside all questions and doubt to choose unwavering certainty, you may appreciate hearing from Chris.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

Why I Am Not an Atheist by Christopher Beha

Essays by Michel de Montaigne

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