My mother never declared herself an atheist, in fact, I don't believe she was one. But she did feel that if there was a god, we knew very little about him, and that those sentiments ascribed to god, like the 10 commandments, the Golden Rule and the Sermon on the Mount, were good ideas and should be respected.

When she took me to see the movie "Ulysses", a sword and sandal Italian version of the Odyssey starring Kirk Douglas and Anthony Quinn, she explained it as the Ancient Greeks' Bible. Allowing me to enjoy its drama and philosophy without sacrificing my ability to reason. From that moment on, I became fascinated with all things Greek.

What really impressed me about that film was how differently the two wellsprings of Western Civilization treated the pursuit of knowledge. God cast Adam and Eve out of Paradise, and punished them and their posterity for eternity, for the crime of eating the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. Ulysses had his shipmates tie him to the mast so he could hear for himself the sound of the Sirens Sweetly Singing.