“What is God?”
“Are you just saying that to make Daddy happy?” The little boy is silent again. He shifts uncomfortably in a big, wheeled office chair. He shrugs.
“That’s right,” the man says, turning to me. “He’s too young to know. He doesn’t have all the information to make a rational decision yet.”
Why not, Forbes asked.
“No,” Sherman replied. “We’re atheists.”
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The evening turned out just as Sherman had expected. Ricky and he were denied entry into the Cub Scouts by Forbes because they refused to sign their applications. When I spoke with Sherman the next day, I asked him if Ricky really wanted to be a Cub Scout. He was quiet for a brief moment, as if my question had wounded him. “Of course he does,” Sherman said finally. “He’s an American, isn’t he?”
Then there was the Christmas season that Sherman had baseball caps printed up with the word atheist on them. Rob & Ricky posed for photographers wearing the hats. And, of course, there was the infamous Chicago Tribune interview with reporter Eric Zorn. Sherman put Ricky onstage for Zorn. He grilled the kid about why the Sherman family didn’t celebrate Christmas. “Because we’re what? It begins with an A,” Sherman asked. Came Ricky’s reply, “Assholes?” “What is this kid like? What is their relationship?” Eric Zorn still wonders.
