a compelled but reluctant unbeliever
Later, in the discussion and comments about Duncan's post, there is a discussion about the best way to characterize Wittgenstein: "religiously-inclined atheist," "non-religious theist," "spiritually-inclined agnostic." But Kelly's phrase is best. Perhaps it was somewhat ignored in that conversation because what it means is unclear. So here is my attempt at clarification.
The word “believe” in “I believe in God” has its own special grammar.
There is a kind of belief in God that can only be expressed by a kind of contradiction, a belief of which a natural expression is calling upon God and exclaiming: “There is nothing there!”—a belief in the form of unbelief (not non-belief). The existence of God strikes such an (un)believer as a special form of absence. For them, it would be a joke to say: “God doesn’t exist; and we are also out of milk.” With God it is as if one were suddenly to discover that the world has nothing to hold it together. The silence makes one deaf. And only the (un)believer’s ears can be deafened by this silence. A special kind of anxiety is involved. The contradiction compels itself on the (un)believer; it is met with reluctance.
One is not talking about God, or about belief in God, if one is not drawing the difference between ordinary forms of believing and believing in God deeply enough.