"Faith is intellectual cowardice disguised as virtue."
I scrawled the words across the whiteboard, watching my students scribble notes. Some nodded. Others shifted uncomfortably. A few looked like they wanted to argue but lacked the courage.
Good. Discomfort meant thinking.
"Professor Vale?" Sarah Chen raised her hand from the third row. Brilliant girl. Top of her graduate program, but she carried a small silver cross that caught lecture hall light. "Isn't that statement itself a form of faith? Faith in rationality?"
I paused. Twenty years teaching philosophy, and students still surprised me.
"Elaborate."
"You believe reason will lead to truth. You have faith that empirical evidence matters more than spiritual experience. But you can't prove reason is superior to faith using reason alone. That's circular logic."
The lecture hall went quiet. Sarah's dark eyes held steady confidence. She wasn't attacking—she was thinking. Exactly what philosophy was supposed to teach.
"Interesting point." I set down the marker. "But reason has predictive power. It builds bridges that don't collapse. Faith builds... what? Hope?"
"Faith builds meaning. Purpose. Community." Sarah leaned forward. "A bridge connects two points. Faith connects the human heart to something larger than itself."
"And when that 'something larger' demands violence? Oppression? Blind obedience?"
"When reason demands eugenics? Nuclear weapons? Environmental destruction?" She smiled. "Every tool can be misused. That doesn't invalidate the tool."
Clever. I'd taught her well.
"Fair point. But reason can be corrected through evidence. Faith resists correction by definition."
"Does it? My faith has changed as I've grown. Deepened. Become more complex. Static faith isn't really faith—it's ideology."
The bell rang. Students packed bags and shuffled toward exits. Sarah lingered, organizing her notes with careful precision.
"Office hours are Thursday," I said.
"I know. But I wanted to ask—do you really believe faith is cowardice? Or do you just fear what you might find if you looked honestly?"
The question hit deeper than it should have. I'd built my career on rationality. Published papers on the dangers of religious thinking. Lectured about humanity's need to abandon supernatural comfort blankets.
But late at night, alone in my office, sometimes I wondered...
"Professor?"
Heavy boots echoed in the hallway. Too heavy for students. Too rhythmic for casual visitors.
The lecture hall door exploded inward.
Men in dark tactical gear poured through. Masks covered their faces, but red crosses blazed on their chests. The Order of Sacred Truth—religious extremists who'd been making headlines lately.
"Professor Marcus Vale," the lead figure spoke through a voice modulator. "You stand accused of corrupting minds with heretical teachings."
Students screamed. Chairs toppled as people scrambled for exits. The tactical team moved with military precision, blocking escape routes.
I stepped in front of Sarah. She'd gone pale but hadn't run.
"Let the students go. Your problem is with me."
"Our problem is with all who spread poison." The leader raised a weapon—some kind of energy projector with religious symbols etched into its barrel. "But you're right. You're the source."
"Wait—" Sarah grabbed my arm. "Professor, just run—"
"Stay behind me."
The weapon charged with a low hum. Other team members herded the remaining students into a corner. This wasn't just an assassination. It was a statement.
"Any last words, heretic?"
I looked at Sarah. Her silver cross caught the light, and for a moment I saw something in her eyes. Not fear. Peace. Absolute certainty that whatever happened next, something larger was watching.
Faith.
"Yeah." I pushed Sarah further behind me. "I think you're proving my point about religion and violence."
The weapon fired.
White-hot energy tore through my chest. Pain exploded outward, burning every nerve. I collapsed, gasping. Blood pooled beneath me, warm and spreading.
Sarah knelt beside me, pressing her hands against the wound. Futile. I could feel life draining away like water through broken glass.
"Professor? Stay with me. Help is coming."
I laughed. Probably not appropriate, but dying made social norms seem arbitrary.
"Sarah?"
"Yes?"
"I was wrong."
"About what?"
Blood filled my mouth. Speaking became harder. "Faith isn't cowardice. It's..." I struggled for words. "It's looking at the universe and choosing to believe it means something. That's not cowardice. That's..."
"What?"
"Brave."
She cried. I wanted to comfort her, but my body stopped responding. Darkness crept in from the edges.
Twenty years of atheism. Twenty years of teaching students to abandon hope, to embrace meaninglessness, to find comfort in randomness. And here, dying, I finally understood what I'd been fighting.
I hadn't been brave. I'd been terrified. Terrified that the universe might actually care. That actions might have consequences beyond death. That I might be responsible to something greater than my own intellect.
Sarah was right. I'd had faith all along—faith that nothing mattered. And that was the most cowardly position of all.
The world faded.
...
I stood in a place that wasn't a place. Void stretched in every direction, but somehow I could see. Silver light pulsed rhythmically, like a cosmic heartbeat.
"Marcus Vale."
The voice came from everywhere and nowhere. Not heard—experienced. It resonated in bones I no longer possessed.
"That's my name."
"You taught that existence is meaningless. That consciousness ends at death. That morality is evolutionary accident."
"I did."
"Yet you died protecting another's faith. Shielding belief you claimed to despise."
I considered this. Hard to lie when standing in... whatever this was.
"Maybe I was wrong about some things."
"Were you wrong? Or were you afraid?"
The question echoed through the void. Around me, images flickered—every lecture I'd given, every student I'd taught to abandon hope, every moment I'd chosen cynicism over possibility.
"Both," I admitted. "I was afraid of being wrong. So I built walls out of rationality. Called it courage."
"And now?"
"Now I'm dead. And apparently consciousness doesn't end at death. So I was definitely wrong about that."
Something like laughter rippled through the void.
"Honesty is rare among the learned. Most cling to error rather than admit ignorance."
"Are you God?"
"I am what I am. The question is: what are you?"
I thought about Sarah's cross. Her unshakeable certainty. The peace in her eyes even as violence erupted around her.
"I'm someone who spent his life running from meaning. And I think... I think I'd like to stop running."
"Even if meaning requires sacrifice? Service? Faith?"
"Especially then."
The void pulsed brighter. Images swirled—burning cities, twisted creatures, people crying out for hope they couldn't find. Darkness spreading across a world that looked like Earth but wasn't quite right.
"Aethermoor stands at a crossroads. Corruption spreads. Faith weakens. Those who should lead instead grasp for power."
"What does that have to do with me?"
"Everything. You understand both sides—doubt and faith, reason and meaning. You've lived the cost of choosing wrongly."
More images. A grand cathedral. Robed figures arguing over doctrine. Common people suffering while leaders played politics. And through it all, something dark and patient, feeding on despair.
"You want me to help?"
"I want you to choose. Return to the void, or accept a burden beyond your comprehension."
"What kind of burden?"
"Leadership. Authority. The responsibility to guide souls toward light when darkness seems easier."
I laughed. "I'm an atheist philosophy professor. I don't know anything about leading people to God."
"You know what it means to lose faith. To find it again. To sacrifice for something greater." The voice carried infinite patience. "Those who never doubt never truly believe. Those who never fall never learn to stand."
The images shifted. I saw myself—not Marcus Vale, but someone else. Younger. Different face. Wearing robes that spoke of authority and responsibility.
"A Pope?"
"Among other things."
"I don't know the first thing about being Pope."
"You will learn. Or you will fail. Either way, you will have chosen."
The void began to spin. Reality stretched and warped around me.
"Wait—I haven't decided yet—"
"You decided when you stepped in front of the weapon. Everything else is just details."
Text blazed across my vision in letters of fire:
[DIVINE MANDATE SYSTEM INITIALIZING]
[Soul evaluation complete: WORTHY]
[Reincarnation in progress...]
The voice spoke one final time, fading as consciousness slipped away:
"Your sacrifice proves worthiness. Prepare for service beyond your comprehension."