When literacy died, so had history. - Walter Tevis

Bryce thought for a minute. Then he laughed at his situation: using a Martian, in a bar, for a confessor. But perhaps it was appropriate.

"Is there a God?" I said. "I mean, are you in touch, telepathically, with any kind of God?"
"No. I'm not in touch with anything like that. As far as I know, there is no God."
"Oh," I said.
"It doesn't bother you," the voice said. "You may think it does; but it doesn't. You're really on your own. You've been learning that."

"I'm like everybody else. This kind of living ain't much better than being dead." He laughed again, shaking his head from side to side. "And it ain't much better on the outside, to tell the truth. No real work to do, except the same kind of crap you do in here. At the Worker Dormitories they told us, 'Labor fulfills.' Horseshit."