No, Mr. Arnaud. Atheism isn’t an intellectual luxury for the wealthy at all. I sensed a great deal of “evangelical fervor” in your tales and photography.

I grew up very poor and also raised 2 children by myself. It was for that reason, and the hypocrisy of the churches I was exposed to as a child which turned me into an atheist. I see people using religion every day—not as “faith” or a real belief, but as a social medium in which they make social and business contacts. What church you attend is more important than the university you went to, or your expertise.

I’ve seen religion used to bang people over the head because you weren’t one of “them”. The arrogant assumption that people make when you started a new job, or moved into a new neighborhood about being religious always astounded me. And no others judge you more harshly than those whose ideas you reject.

It’s not surprising that many of the subjects of Mr. Arnaud’s photography may seem like they have a religious faith, but for some, I think it may be a childish holdover, clinging to something that didn’t stop their decline into drugs, prostitution, and the like, and the probability that they are forced into “accepting” religion the same way they accept any other form of material help. The feeling among many is to fake it, by acting religious just to get some form of help; after a while, it becomes mere habit without thinking, like the drugs themselves. Taking their pictures, some reluctantly, is just feeding Mr. Arnaud’s ego and avocation and making him feel better, not them, no matter how they try to slice it. It’s a bit of attention they wouldn’t get otherwise, but in the scheme of things, it’s negligible permanency in the form of photography, where people can gawk, condemn, feel better about themselves for not falling into that trap.

They aren’t a whole lot different that the people who go home to a freshly made up bed in an expensive neighborhood, spend $100 on dinner, their “brethren” who don’t even give them a thought ever. The same people who are just human, too, who commit murder, drink too much, get hooked on prescription drugs, engage in financial crimes. Except they can also be very wealthy and the pushers of false hope and pie in the sky “faith”—all the way down to the subjects of Mr. Arnaud’s photography. Well, it’s better for them, this religious “revival” that seems to take over from time to time, than people actually seeing and learning the truth, isn’t it?