If you were ever a theist...

[Cephus]

There's a difference between being positive about things that are realistic and being pie-in-the-sky, believing-in-unicorns irrational.  Do I have hope in humanity? Sometimes, but at least humanity demonstrably exists.  I don't have hope that magical spirits are going to come down and save the world.  That's foolish.  And just having hope doesn't mean a thing, you actually have to take actions to make said hope come true.  Just sitting in the  corner hoping things happen doesn't actually result in anything happening.  Hope, in and of itself, is pointless.  It requires action.

I do agree, that hope by itself is useless...absolutely. I never said otherwise though. 

But, and I'm just generalizing here so don't take it personally, but a lot of people seem to think that all they have to do is believe and pray and sit around waiting for something to happen and when it never does, they just make excuses for not believing enough, or God having a plan or some other such nonsense.  We come right back to hope being generally useless without action and action does all the work.  What's the point of hope if you actually have to make things happen?

So yeah, I don't hope things get better, I get up off my butt and make things better and encourage others to do the same.  I really see no point for God in the mix because God doesn't demonstrably exist, nor does God ever seem to do anything worthwhile.