10/20/2018—Here is a great instance of how anti-religious thinking becomes second nature among secularists. In last Sunday’s New York Times, there was a review of The Faithful Spy: Dietrich Bonhoeffer and the Plot to Kill Hitler, a book by John Hendrix. The review was written by M.T. Anderson, described as an “author of books for young readers including ‘Symphony for the City of the Dead: Dmitri Shostakovich and the Siege of Leningrad.’”
Here is the key paragraph:
For young readers, one could easily play the near-miss attempts to kill Hitler as a straightforward thriller. The plots involve deception, gut-wrenching timing and concealed explosives: a bomb in a gift package, a rigged docent conducting a tour of captured Russian weaponry and an explosive briefcase spirited into the heart of Hitler’s fortress, the Wolfsschanze. But Hendrix makes the bold and surprising decision to tell it as a tale of faith.
We are talking here about the life of one of the greatest theologians of the twentieth century, who, by all accounts, opposed Hitler as an act of Christian witness, and paid for it with his life. His account of his last days in Letters and Papers from Prison is a masterpiece of religious thought, inspiring countless believers. Bonhoeffer deeply pondered growing secularism, too, and has been instrumental in religious/non-religious dialogue. In other words, he was a shining beacon of faith, courageous and thoughtful, and died a martyr to Christ.
How else could the story of Bonhoeffer’s wrenching decision to turn to political violence be told except through his faith? Whatever one thinks of his decision, his faith was the context in which that decision was made. In other words, the plot to kill Hitler can be told in many ways, but the role of Bonhoeffer in it has to be told as a tale of faith.
So, what was Anderson talking about? He doesn’t seem to mean it is odd to tell the story about Bonhoeffer’s role in the plot—and there are other conspirators of religious conscience as well. So, what is surprising about the way Hendrix tells it?
I believe Anderson just means young people don’t care about religion. But he is wrong about that. Anderson may not care about religion. His friends may not. The readers of the New York Times may not. But children are instinctively religious. They understand better than Anderson what it means to live a life of faithfulness to God. If their thoughts are child-like, they are not childish. If their simple conception of God must change as they grow, it is not the only kind of thought of childhood that must be adapted as we grow.
What is “surprising” is that no editor at the New York Times could hear how odd and silly this review sounds.
Showing posts with label Atheists and Hallowed Secularists. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Atheists and Hallowed Secularists. Show all posts
Saturday, October 20, 2018
Thursday, August 30, 2018
Needed: A New Ontology and Epistemology
8/30/2018—Now there is an accessible slogan for the 21st century. Basically, a new ontology and epistemology means a new way of thinking about what there is and what we can know. With the death of god, announced by Nietzsche in The Gay Science in 1882, the West became materialistic in what was real and sensory in how we could know things. And this is true for most people, including most religious people. And this is both how and why science became so powerful. This worldview says that matter is all that is real and we learn things only through the five senses.
This way of relating to the universe was a long time coming. David Hume, who died in 1776, a hundred years before Nietzsche’s announcement, was a key figure. But with this ontology and this epistemology, there not only cannot be any god, there cannot be any invisible thing-—justice, goodness beauty and truth become things we agree with rather than descriptions of anything real in the universe. And the universe becomes a collection of forces without meaning or purpose. You get a headline like the one last summer in the New York Times, The Universe Doesn’t Care About Your Purpose.
Religion under this worldview becomes a kind of fiction, incapable of providing knowledge about the world.
Law is dominated by this current ontology and epistemology. Even someone like Ronald Dworkin, who wanted to claim that goodness was real in some sense, felt he had to pay homage to Hume. Dworkin therefore wrote self-refuting nonsense toward the end of his life.
I thought all this was an insurmountable dilemma. That is even why I left Judaism. Its talk of God became unreal to me.
People have a hard time seeing what this has to do with President Donald Trump. But to me it is obvious that the next step in our current worldview was the death of truth. Once truth is gone as something reliable, I lose the common ground from which to reach out to my political opponents. We then have to hate each other because only winning counts.
Before, years before, there was lying and cruelty in politics, but it took place within a context of meaning and truth. Now, there is lying and cruelty within a context of chaos and chance.
What I did not realize is that the current worldview is not at all insurmountable. In fact it was surmounted by thinkers like Bernie Lonergan, Alfred North Whitehead and Martin Heidegger. Their thinking does not yet seem to have become popularized in the culture, however. American lawyers were not all lucky enough to have a teacher like Robert Taylor. Nevertheless, it will happen. In a hundred years, it will no longer be thought strange to say that the world is more than matter and not mean that there is a supernatural realm.
This way of relating to the universe was a long time coming. David Hume, who died in 1776, a hundred years before Nietzsche’s announcement, was a key figure. But with this ontology and this epistemology, there not only cannot be any god, there cannot be any invisible thing-—justice, goodness beauty and truth become things we agree with rather than descriptions of anything real in the universe. And the universe becomes a collection of forces without meaning or purpose. You get a headline like the one last summer in the New York Times, The Universe Doesn’t Care About Your Purpose.
Religion under this worldview becomes a kind of fiction, incapable of providing knowledge about the world.
Law is dominated by this current ontology and epistemology. Even someone like Ronald Dworkin, who wanted to claim that goodness was real in some sense, felt he had to pay homage to Hume. Dworkin therefore wrote self-refuting nonsense toward the end of his life.
I thought all this was an insurmountable dilemma. That is even why I left Judaism. Its talk of God became unreal to me.
People have a hard time seeing what this has to do with President Donald Trump. But to me it is obvious that the next step in our current worldview was the death of truth. Once truth is gone as something reliable, I lose the common ground from which to reach out to my political opponents. We then have to hate each other because only winning counts.
Before, years before, there was lying and cruelty in politics, but it took place within a context of meaning and truth. Now, there is lying and cruelty within a context of chaos and chance.
What I did not realize is that the current worldview is not at all insurmountable. In fact it was surmounted by thinkers like Bernie Lonergan, Alfred North Whitehead and Martin Heidegger. Their thinking does not yet seem to have become popularized in the culture, however. American lawyers were not all lucky enough to have a teacher like Robert Taylor. Nevertheless, it will happen. In a hundred years, it will no longer be thought strange to say that the world is more than matter and not mean that there is a supernatural realm.
Monday, June 18, 2018
We Don’t Live in a Post-Credal Age—Only Power Lives in a Post-Credal Age
6/18/2018--What do we do when we really smart people are blind? The question arises out of a review in the New York Review of Books by the novelist Norman Rush of a book of essays by the public intellectual, Teju Cole.
According to Rush, Cole’s essays concern “an array of thematic problems routinely confounding to the educated secular leftcentric urban readerships of today. Here are two examples among the many that Cole discusses. One: In a world that is post-credal, post-religion, and post-socialism, in what should humanism be grounded? Two: When liberal empires engage in overseas criminality, what are the responsibilities of that empire’s domestic beneficiaries—the lucky, the talented, the wealthy?”
Cole reports that he was very excited when Barack Obama was elected President. Unlike George W. Bush, Obama was a literate, educated, thoughtful man. Cole writes, “We had, once again, a reader in chief.”
But then over time there was the realization that this man, Barack Obama, would kill, especially in drone strikes. Maybe several hundred, maybe three thousand, including women, children and innocent young men. Cole is devasted: “How on earth did this happen to the reader in chief? What became of literature’s vaunted power to inspire empathy?”
Well I can tell you exactly what happened—-Obama lives in a post-credal age. He is too smart to be taken in by simplistic Church nonsense about the sanctity of human life. Who taught him all this—-Teju Cole and people like him.
We don’t live in a post-credal age. Cole knows that the drone hits are criminal. They are wrong. So, let’s not blather about post-anything. Let’s try to revivify morality. Simplistic, old fashioned morality. Otherwise, we are playing into the hands of power.
According to Rush, Cole’s essays concern “an array of thematic problems routinely confounding to the educated secular leftcentric urban readerships of today. Here are two examples among the many that Cole discusses. One: In a world that is post-credal, post-religion, and post-socialism, in what should humanism be grounded? Two: When liberal empires engage in overseas criminality, what are the responsibilities of that empire’s domestic beneficiaries—the lucky, the talented, the wealthy?”
Cole reports that he was very excited when Barack Obama was elected President. Unlike George W. Bush, Obama was a literate, educated, thoughtful man. Cole writes, “We had, once again, a reader in chief.”
But then over time there was the realization that this man, Barack Obama, would kill, especially in drone strikes. Maybe several hundred, maybe three thousand, including women, children and innocent young men. Cole is devasted: “How on earth did this happen to the reader in chief? What became of literature’s vaunted power to inspire empathy?”
Well I can tell you exactly what happened—-Obama lives in a post-credal age. He is too smart to be taken in by simplistic Church nonsense about the sanctity of human life. Who taught him all this—-Teju Cole and people like him.
We don’t live in a post-credal age. Cole knows that the drone hits are criminal. They are wrong. So, let’s not blather about post-anything. Let’s try to revivify morality. Simplistic, old fashioned morality. Otherwise, we are playing into the hands of power.
Friday, August 26, 2011
Rethinking Secularism or Enjoying It?
8/26/2011—Two books are out that illustrate differing approaches to secular life. One is The Joy of Secularism (Princeton), which I discussed in a prior post. That book, according to reviews (it’s coming to our library), considers how to live a fulfilled life within secularism. But the book assumes that the boundary between secularism and religion is clear, even obvious.
The second book, Rethinking Secularism (Oxford) is not so sure about this. Secularism is a something, but it is not at all clear what that something is. The bifurcation of the world between the secular and the religious is a question.
My earlier book, Hallowed Secularism, tried to show that the person who lives outside organized religious life can greatly benefit from the wisdom and teachings of the religions. There is a reason that this is true. There is, after all, only one reality. We live our lives accompanied by beliefs about that reality. We call some of those beliefs religious and some something else, perhaps scientific. But religious life and secular life are both dealing with that one reality.
I think it is not clear at all what the boundary is between the secular and the religious. In America we think it is clear because Christianity and Judaism have developed beliefs about a supernatural realm—still of course a claim about reality, about what is real—that cannot be true from a certain scientific perspective. Fair enough. But not all religions share those kinds of beliefs and some Christians and Jews struggle to make sense of them.
Conversely, some secularists are materialists, even reductionists. But this worldview cannot even account for consciousness. Not all secularists look at reality in that way.
Can a secular life be holy? That is the question. Is it a religious question or a secular one?
The second book, Rethinking Secularism (Oxford) is not so sure about this. Secularism is a something, but it is not at all clear what that something is. The bifurcation of the world between the secular and the religious is a question.
My earlier book, Hallowed Secularism, tried to show that the person who lives outside organized religious life can greatly benefit from the wisdom and teachings of the religions. There is a reason that this is true. There is, after all, only one reality. We live our lives accompanied by beliefs about that reality. We call some of those beliefs religious and some something else, perhaps scientific. But religious life and secular life are both dealing with that one reality.
I think it is not clear at all what the boundary is between the secular and the religious. In America we think it is clear because Christianity and Judaism have developed beliefs about a supernatural realm—still of course a claim about reality, about what is real—that cannot be true from a certain scientific perspective. Fair enough. But not all religions share those kinds of beliefs and some Christians and Jews struggle to make sense of them.
Conversely, some secularists are materialists, even reductionists. But this worldview cannot even account for consciousness. Not all secularists look at reality in that way.
Can a secular life be holy? That is the question. Is it a religious question or a secular one?
Friday, January 14, 2011
The Atheist Wars
Little did I suspect last Sunday, when I posted here concerning the violence of the secular that there would be a political back and forth over which “side” is responsible for the violence of the Tuscon shootings. Jared Loughner, the apparent shooter, does not seem to have been either religious or a self-proclaimed atheist. My point in the blog had to do with “secular politics,” which is what our political system is, even though of course, religious believers participate. The question for me has to do with the assumptions of political life. Are we self-interested, rational consumers or are we at least potentially something more?
But on Tuesday, Lauri Lebo weighed in on Religion Dispatches to the effect that conservative religious groups were blaming atheism for the shootings ("New Theory for Tuscon Tragedy: Blame the Atheists”). As one person put it, "‘It's actually very simple,’ [Ted] Shoebat was quoted in Special Guest’s promotion, 'When God is not in your life, evil will seek to fill the void.’"
The irony of all this is that secularists like Christopher Hitchens and Mark Lilla have argued for years that religion in politics leads to violence and the only way to have peace in political life is to strictly limit the role of religion in the public square. Lougher reminds us that When God is not in your life you may turn to violence and that when God is in your life, you may also turn to violence.
So we really should step back and not criticize the “other side” for now doing what “our side” has been doing all along. No one has a monopoly on violence. No one has yet figured out how to build a just and peaceful world.
But on Tuesday, Lauri Lebo weighed in on Religion Dispatches to the effect that conservative religious groups were blaming atheism for the shootings ("New Theory for Tuscon Tragedy: Blame the Atheists”). As one person put it, "‘It's actually very simple,’ [Ted] Shoebat was quoted in Special Guest’s promotion, 'When God is not in your life, evil will seek to fill the void.’"
The irony of all this is that secularists like Christopher Hitchens and Mark Lilla have argued for years that religion in politics leads to violence and the only way to have peace in political life is to strictly limit the role of religion in the public square. Lougher reminds us that When God is not in your life you may turn to violence and that when God is in your life, you may also turn to violence.
So we really should step back and not criticize the “other side” for now doing what “our side” has been doing all along. No one has a monopoly on violence. No one has yet figured out how to build a just and peaceful world.
Thursday, November 25, 2010
Happy Thanksgiving
11/25/2010—The Chronicle of Higher Education has a story today about Sarah Palin’s comment in her book that most college professors don’t believe in God and regard religious believers as alien and ignorant. The story refutes this, but I wonder if there is not truth to it on a deeper level.
What after all is the religious belief of most Americans, including college professors? When people say they believe in God, do they mean a personal being who intervenes in the world when requested? That is what Palin means and many educated people find that belief rather alien even if they say they do believe in God. Such a God, which is the God of the Bible only in part, contradicts the regularity of science.
On the other hand, today at Thanksgiving tables all over America, people will give thanks for their blessings, college professors too. They will not all be thanking a being who gave us these things and might take them away. But they will all be acknowledging that we are not the authors of our own stories. We rely on many things—family, friends, luck, social forces beyond our control and also something quite mysterious that the religions sometimes call grace.
Palin is wrong that there is not common ground here between believers and nonbelievers. But who is responsible for the plausibility of her criticism? We secularists are.
So today if you do not believe in God, make sure especially to express your gratitude to everything that is for everything you have.
What after all is the religious belief of most Americans, including college professors? When people say they believe in God, do they mean a personal being who intervenes in the world when requested? That is what Palin means and many educated people find that belief rather alien even if they say they do believe in God. Such a God, which is the God of the Bible only in part, contradicts the regularity of science.
On the other hand, today at Thanksgiving tables all over America, people will give thanks for their blessings, college professors too. They will not all be thanking a being who gave us these things and might take them away. But they will all be acknowledging that we are not the authors of our own stories. We rely on many things—family, friends, luck, social forces beyond our control and also something quite mysterious that the religions sometimes call grace.
Palin is wrong that there is not common ground here between believers and nonbelievers. But who is responsible for the plausibility of her criticism? We secularists are.
So today if you do not believe in God, make sure especially to express your gratitude to everything that is for everything you have.
Saturday, November 21, 2009
The Young Don’t Read the Bible
11/21/2009—The title above is not a criticism, just an observation. I was very pleased a few weeks ago to receive an invitation to visit Indiana University of Pennsylvania to speak with students in a Philosophy of Religion Class that had read and was discussing my book, Hallowed Secularism. The course is being taught by Bill Gibson, a gifted teacher. A week ago, my wife Patt and I drove the interminable way east from Pittsburgh. (Indiana Pennsylvania must be the origin of the line, “you can’t get there from here”.) Some of the students had come back for a Saturday, which is way beyond the call of duty, and other faculty members graciously attended as well. We were impressed by the commitment of the university community to the shared intellectual life.
The students were a delight. They seemed mostly to be nonbelievers, whether churchgoers or not. That is no surprise among the young. Sometimes people go back to the religion of their youth later in life. Bill calls this the religious lockbox syndrome of college life.
What was more surprising is that most of the students seemed to have little acquaintance with the Bible, and less interest in studying it. This is both a problem for someone like me and an opportunity. It is a problem because Hallowed Secularism is a biblically oriented book. Though the book addresses other religions, it is primarily about the value of the Judeo-Christian tradition even when someone does not believe in God or other religious doctrines. If someone does not know the tradition, that is a very hard sell.
On the other hand, the opportunity is that these students are not really hostile to the Bible, because they know so little about it. They assume the Bible is violent and backward, but it is not a passionate commitment. Most of them are not like the New Atheists, living to defeat religion.
Since religion requires the continuity of a tradition, these students suggest that we may drift into secularism as a society in part out of unfamiliarity with religious sources.
How does all this square with the large numbers of students engaged in activities like campus crusades for Christ? That was even the case at Indiana. According to the students in the room, a lot of the students involved in the Crusade are like them, not really religious heretofore. They knew little about Jesus and were swept along by enthusiasm for something that seemed exciting. This may mean that one can also drift into religious enthusiasm.
The only solid foundation for secularism or religion is knowledge. Nothing else can last or be really healthy.
The students were a delight. They seemed mostly to be nonbelievers, whether churchgoers or not. That is no surprise among the young. Sometimes people go back to the religion of their youth later in life. Bill calls this the religious lockbox syndrome of college life.
What was more surprising is that most of the students seemed to have little acquaintance with the Bible, and less interest in studying it. This is both a problem for someone like me and an opportunity. It is a problem because Hallowed Secularism is a biblically oriented book. Though the book addresses other religions, it is primarily about the value of the Judeo-Christian tradition even when someone does not believe in God or other religious doctrines. If someone does not know the tradition, that is a very hard sell.
On the other hand, the opportunity is that these students are not really hostile to the Bible, because they know so little about it. They assume the Bible is violent and backward, but it is not a passionate commitment. Most of them are not like the New Atheists, living to defeat religion.
Since religion requires the continuity of a tradition, these students suggest that we may drift into secularism as a society in part out of unfamiliarity with religious sources.
How does all this square with the large numbers of students engaged in activities like campus crusades for Christ? That was even the case at Indiana. According to the students in the room, a lot of the students involved in the Crusade are like them, not really religious heretofore. They knew little about Jesus and were swept along by enthusiasm for something that seemed exciting. This may mean that one can also drift into religious enthusiasm.
The only solid foundation for secularism or religion is knowledge. Nothing else can last or be really healthy.
Friday, October 23, 2009
Why Does the New Atheism Fail?
10/23/2009--the following selection is from a manuscript that I writing that will be entitled Higher Law in the Public Square: How the Higher Law Tradition Can Resolve the Establishment Clause Crisis and Save Secularism [does anyone know a potential publisher?]. In this section, I am discussing the work of some of the New Atheists, including Victor Stenger, Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens:
*************************************************
[I]n the end, I’m not sure Stenger answers the question of how we are to live in the Godless universe. Stenger does not intend to criticize the experience of depth in human life as false or an illusion. He claims that such experiences are “purely physical” but he does not seem to mean that they are therefore any less real.
Why is it that Stenger fails? He fails for the same reason that all the New Atheist writers fail. They all deny that human beings need to “fit into some grand, cosmic scheme.” But Stenger’s one example of genuine joy and fulfillment in life is Richard Dawkins, who plainly does “fit into some grand, cosmic scheme.” Here is Stenger’s quote, from Dawkin’s book, Unweaving the Rainbow, in which Dawkins describes meaning in his life:
"Isn’t it a noble, an enlightened way of spending our brief time in the sun, to work at understanding the universe and how we have come to wake up in it? This is how I answer when I am asked—as I am surprisingly often—why I bother to get up in the mornings. To put it the other way round, isn’t it sad to go to your grave without ever wondering why you were born?"
Why you were born? That question could just as well be stated as, what grand, cosmic scheme am I a part of? Dawkins is a part of a grand cosmic scheme: humanity wakes from its preEnlightenment slumber and begins the adventure of understanding the universe through the natural sciences. It is an epic story. And it is a story that gives meaning and structure to the life of the scientist.
So does the story of John 3:16 for the believer: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” The point here is not to decide which story—the scientific or this religious one—is true. The point is to convince Stenger that a story is needed. Humanity lives from such stories and ultimately cannot live without them. Our religions teach us such stories. If secularism is to flourish, it must be able to do the same and not just for a scientific elite. Dawkins’ story is a grand one, but it would have to be greatly modified to be accessible to most of us. And, in any event, people like Stenger, who presumably would be doing the modifying, do not yet see the need to offer such a story to secularists.
*************************************************
[I]n the end, I’m not sure Stenger answers the question of how we are to live in the Godless universe. Stenger does not intend to criticize the experience of depth in human life as false or an illusion. He claims that such experiences are “purely physical” but he does not seem to mean that they are therefore any less real.
Why is it that Stenger fails? He fails for the same reason that all the New Atheist writers fail. They all deny that human beings need to “fit into some grand, cosmic scheme.” But Stenger’s one example of genuine joy and fulfillment in life is Richard Dawkins, who plainly does “fit into some grand, cosmic scheme.” Here is Stenger’s quote, from Dawkin’s book, Unweaving the Rainbow, in which Dawkins describes meaning in his life:
"Isn’t it a noble, an enlightened way of spending our brief time in the sun, to work at understanding the universe and how we have come to wake up in it? This is how I answer when I am asked—as I am surprisingly often—why I bother to get up in the mornings. To put it the other way round, isn’t it sad to go to your grave without ever wondering why you were born?"
Why you were born? That question could just as well be stated as, what grand, cosmic scheme am I a part of? Dawkins is a part of a grand cosmic scheme: humanity wakes from its preEnlightenment slumber and begins the adventure of understanding the universe through the natural sciences. It is an epic story. And it is a story that gives meaning and structure to the life of the scientist.
So does the story of John 3:16 for the believer: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” The point here is not to decide which story—the scientific or this religious one—is true. The point is to convince Stenger that a story is needed. Humanity lives from such stories and ultimately cannot live without them. Our religions teach us such stories. If secularism is to flourish, it must be able to do the same and not just for a scientific elite. Dawkins’ story is a grand one, but it would have to be greatly modified to be accessible to most of us. And, in any event, people like Stenger, who presumably would be doing the modifying, do not yet see the need to offer such a story to secularists.
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
The Growth of Secularism
4/29/2009--First, it was ARIS with its 15% statistic on the nonreligious in America. Then it was Newsweek, with its End of Christian America. Now, the New York Times on Monday, 4/27 and ReligionDispatches on 4/28, continue the growth of secularism story: Laurie Goldstein, More Atheists Shout it From the Rooftops and Ronald Aronson, 40 Million Nonbelievers in America? Aronson is the author of Living Without God.
The main point is that Americans must get used to thinking of secularists as a potential majority, not as a beleaguered minority. That will take some years, of course, but some readers will live to see it.
What does secularism need in order to form a flourishing human civilization? If not religion, what will be the framework of meaningfulness? The answer to that question is not so obvious.
The main point is that Americans must get used to thinking of secularists as a potential majority, not as a beleaguered minority. That will take some years, of course, but some readers will live to see it.
What does secularism need in order to form a flourishing human civilization? If not religion, what will be the framework of meaningfulness? The answer to that question is not so obvious.
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Reactions to the Religion Dispatches Interview
2/25/2009--Because of the reach of the online magazine Religion Dispatches, and especially once Andrew Sullivan picked up the interview on his blog, there have been a lot of reactions on the Internet to the proposal for a Hallowed Secularism. This is all being done without anyone actually reading the book, of course, but the interview seems to me a fair capsule of the overall message. The discussion that is going on is probably reflective of what will be thought when people do read the book—at least those people who can afford it.
I have noticed two trends worth mentioning. One is the incipient atheist counterattack. Obviously Hallowed Secularism represents a goal for people with genuine religious yearnings. This is in a sense what hard atheism wants to stamp out of people. Such yearnings are felt to represent a sentimental unwillingness to face the emptiness and formal meaninglessness (I mean without purpose) of existence. Since yearnings are hard to combat, this attack seems to center on my claims that values are objective and that history contains a moral center.
I am not by nature a partisan. And of course I have no interest in defending error. So, I am not inclined to respond by defense. These are matters I am hoping to open up. If the claims of this kind of atheism are made explicit, I think they will be rejected as an inadequate account of human life and cosmic reality.
Let me just say here that it seems odd to me that when science investigates the physical universe, the atheist assumes that something real is being discovered. Even though knowledge is inexact and judgments and disagreements are common, no one calls the scientific quest subjective. No one says that the scientist is simply choosing among possible accounts. No one would think one account just as good as another.
But when the matter being investigated is morality, or broadly how we should live, the atheist assumes the opposite. I see no justification for this dichotomy. People do differ in their moral commitments, although not usually as much as the atheist claims. Yet over time, that is, in history, they don’t differ very much. To take one example, humanity discovered something about chattel slavery. Absent a total discontinuity in human history, we will never go back to it. This discovery seems to me pretty similar to Newton’s discovery of the laws of motion. Morality is not a matter of choice just because it is a matter of disagreement.
The other response is the claim that Hallowed Secularism is Deism, roughly the 17th Century belief in an absent Creator God whose plan for humankind unfolds without further divine intervention. While I can see why this parallel might be claimed, I never found Deism very helpful in religious matters. On one level, Deism is too rational. There is no real place for prayer or spiritual experience. Yet these experiences are common to human beings. In an opposite sense, Deism is too theistic, too wedded to the Creator God of the Bible. If there really is no being-like God with a plan, humans are stuck with the processes of the natural universe. This is the problem of the asteroid. Most Deists would claim, I think, that it could not be God’s plan that humanity be destroyed by an asteroid. But the Hallowed Secularist believes that nature follows its own course, quite without that kind of pity. Deism was always too comfortable and reassuring to be true.
I have noticed two trends worth mentioning. One is the incipient atheist counterattack. Obviously Hallowed Secularism represents a goal for people with genuine religious yearnings. This is in a sense what hard atheism wants to stamp out of people. Such yearnings are felt to represent a sentimental unwillingness to face the emptiness and formal meaninglessness (I mean without purpose) of existence. Since yearnings are hard to combat, this attack seems to center on my claims that values are objective and that history contains a moral center.
I am not by nature a partisan. And of course I have no interest in defending error. So, I am not inclined to respond by defense. These are matters I am hoping to open up. If the claims of this kind of atheism are made explicit, I think they will be rejected as an inadequate account of human life and cosmic reality.
Let me just say here that it seems odd to me that when science investigates the physical universe, the atheist assumes that something real is being discovered. Even though knowledge is inexact and judgments and disagreements are common, no one calls the scientific quest subjective. No one says that the scientist is simply choosing among possible accounts. No one would think one account just as good as another.
But when the matter being investigated is morality, or broadly how we should live, the atheist assumes the opposite. I see no justification for this dichotomy. People do differ in their moral commitments, although not usually as much as the atheist claims. Yet over time, that is, in history, they don’t differ very much. To take one example, humanity discovered something about chattel slavery. Absent a total discontinuity in human history, we will never go back to it. This discovery seems to me pretty similar to Newton’s discovery of the laws of motion. Morality is not a matter of choice just because it is a matter of disagreement.
The other response is the claim that Hallowed Secularism is Deism, roughly the 17th Century belief in an absent Creator God whose plan for humankind unfolds without further divine intervention. While I can see why this parallel might be claimed, I never found Deism very helpful in religious matters. On one level, Deism is too rational. There is no real place for prayer or spiritual experience. Yet these experiences are common to human beings. In an opposite sense, Deism is too theistic, too wedded to the Creator God of the Bible. If there really is no being-like God with a plan, humans are stuck with the processes of the natural universe. This is the problem of the asteroid. Most Deists would claim, I think, that it could not be God’s plan that humanity be destroyed by an asteroid. But the Hallowed Secularist believes that nature follows its own course, quite without that kind of pity. Deism was always too comfortable and reassuring to be true.
Monday, February 9, 2009
The God Fight on London Buses
2/9/2009--The Washington Post reported on Friday, 2/6, that three Christian groups are now placing ads on London buses proclaiming that God exists, in response to a “high profile atheist campaign”, now spreading around the world, casting doubt on the existence of God. This controversy illustrates both the rapid growth of secular society and the intellectual bankruptcy of a secularism that thinks denying the existence of a supernatural being is important.
In several developed countries—the United States, Canada, Britain and others—atheists have been putting ads like the following on buses: “There is probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.”
An ad like this is silly on a number of levels. Just for one thing, surely many secularists would not worry, but would be overjoyed, if there were a loving God who intended to save both the world and individuals and who resembled in his ways Jesus of Nazareth. It’s just that it’s not true.
Naturally, religious groups could not leave these ads alone. The Russian Orthodox response reads: “There is a God. BELIEVE. Don’t worry and enjoy your life.” Maybe this is witnessing to the Gospel, but I doubt it.
As the West becomes increasingly secular, this sort of thing is going to happen more often. So it is important to state every time it does that God is more than a claim about a supernatural being. As Jack Call entitled his new book, God is a Symbol of Something True. John Caputo, the radical, post-death-of-God theologian, certainly no orthodox believer, writes in the new book, After the Death of God, that we must “cultivate the resources in this name [God]…and…let ourselves be nourished by their force” (50) because this name safeguards “the irreducibility and unconditionality” of the event of justice to come. [quotes from Jeffrey Kosky’s book review in the Journal of the American Academy of Religion].
God means that something trustworthy in reality is beyond human control. That something might be the regularity of nature, the hospitality of this planet, the wise cunning of history, or the goodness embedded in our lives. Or it might be something else, or all, and more.
To say God does not exist is almost juvenile. I don’t want to claim the opposite—that God exists. I want to ask, what does exist? Dear atheist, What is real?
This atheist ad campaign is more posturing. I keep waiting for secularism to grow up and begin the hard work of building a sustainable human civilization.
In several developed countries—the United States, Canada, Britain and others—atheists have been putting ads like the following on buses: “There is probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.”
An ad like this is silly on a number of levels. Just for one thing, surely many secularists would not worry, but would be overjoyed, if there were a loving God who intended to save both the world and individuals and who resembled in his ways Jesus of Nazareth. It’s just that it’s not true.
Naturally, religious groups could not leave these ads alone. The Russian Orthodox response reads: “There is a God. BELIEVE. Don’t worry and enjoy your life.” Maybe this is witnessing to the Gospel, but I doubt it.
As the West becomes increasingly secular, this sort of thing is going to happen more often. So it is important to state every time it does that God is more than a claim about a supernatural being. As Jack Call entitled his new book, God is a Symbol of Something True. John Caputo, the radical, post-death-of-God theologian, certainly no orthodox believer, writes in the new book, After the Death of God, that we must “cultivate the resources in this name [God]…and…let ourselves be nourished by their force” (50) because this name safeguards “the irreducibility and unconditionality” of the event of justice to come. [quotes from Jeffrey Kosky’s book review in the Journal of the American Academy of Religion].
God means that something trustworthy in reality is beyond human control. That something might be the regularity of nature, the hospitality of this planet, the wise cunning of history, or the goodness embedded in our lives. Or it might be something else, or all, and more.
To say God does not exist is almost juvenile. I don’t want to claim the opposite—that God exists. I want to ask, what does exist? Dear atheist, What is real?
This atheist ad campaign is more posturing. I keep waiting for secularism to grow up and begin the hard work of building a sustainable human civilization.
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
Signs of the Struggle Over Secularism in Borders Bookstore
1/7/2009--I was recently browsing in a Borders Bookstore in Pittsburgh, in the religion section. To my surprise, I found a shelf labeled “Atheism” among the shelves of comparative religion, Islam, Judaism, Christianity and so forth.
Surely this is a new phenomenon. Ten years ago, would one have found “atheism” separately listed, let alone listed among the religion categories? (Not that I know where else atheism might go—philosophy? Self help? There is a very large section entitled “Metaphysical Studies”. But this section is not dedicated to philosophy or religion. Rather, it seems a sort of new age mysticism corner, with ghosts and tarot cards. Is this an indication of creeping American nuttiness?)
The atheism shelf is small. And it seems dedicated to the kind of reflexive anti-religious spirit exemplified by Christopher Hitchens and Sam Harris. Yet, in the midst of it, there was a book entitled The Little Book of Atheist Spirituality by the French philosopher Andre Comte-Sponville. The tone of this book is quite different. Here one finds an appreciation of the religious tradition and a willingness to explore common points of reference. This book sounds more than a little like Hallowed Secularism.
I think bookshelves like these should be called secularism, not atheism. Of course it is true that anyone who does not believe in the existence of a personal God who intervenes or at least can intervene in the universe is literally an atheist (a—not—theos—God). Yet, for the secularist who is open to spiritual reality and to the power of justice in history, the word God can function as a symbol of just such commitments. The word secularism would announce the coming contest between secularists open to the religious tradition and the atheists who simply oppose religion, usually in the name of some kind of materialism or humanism, or perhaps in the name of nothing at all.
Surely this is a new phenomenon. Ten years ago, would one have found “atheism” separately listed, let alone listed among the religion categories? (Not that I know where else atheism might go—philosophy? Self help? There is a very large section entitled “Metaphysical Studies”. But this section is not dedicated to philosophy or religion. Rather, it seems a sort of new age mysticism corner, with ghosts and tarot cards. Is this an indication of creeping American nuttiness?)
The atheism shelf is small. And it seems dedicated to the kind of reflexive anti-religious spirit exemplified by Christopher Hitchens and Sam Harris. Yet, in the midst of it, there was a book entitled The Little Book of Atheist Spirituality by the French philosopher Andre Comte-Sponville. The tone of this book is quite different. Here one finds an appreciation of the religious tradition and a willingness to explore common points of reference. This book sounds more than a little like Hallowed Secularism.
I think bookshelves like these should be called secularism, not atheism. Of course it is true that anyone who does not believe in the existence of a personal God who intervenes or at least can intervene in the universe is literally an atheist (a—not—theos—God). Yet, for the secularist who is open to spiritual reality and to the power of justice in history, the word God can function as a symbol of just such commitments. The word secularism would announce the coming contest between secularists open to the religious tradition and the atheists who simply oppose religion, usually in the name of some kind of materialism or humanism, or perhaps in the name of nothing at all.
Monday, October 27, 2008
Religulous Again
10/27/2008--Now I have seen Religulous, Bill Maher’s jeremiad against religion, and I loved it. I’m still thinking about the movie, but here are some impressions.
First, Maher is a religious seeker, in fact he may be a hallowed secularist. For all his professed atheism, he appreciates religion. He calls his doubt a luxury. If he were in a foxhole, he would be a believer and he has called upon God in the past. Maher certainly loves Jesus, who functions for him as the gold standard of human behavior and comportment. If you were a Christian, you would want all Christians to care as much for Jesus as Maher does.
Second, the biggest threats to human welfare that Maher identifies—nuclear weapons and pollution—are in no sense products of religious conduct. They are products of the secular reason Maher champions. Maybe religious people are willing to blow humanity up and endanger the planet because they believe in a “last day”, but secularists have done, and are doing these things now, without such a justification. Americans actually dropped two atomic weapons. No one else has done so. Why blame religion?
Finally, for now, there is nothing in the movie about how to live. Why should we sacrifice our own interests for the sake of others? The most moving scene in the movie is the crucifixion show at the biblical theme park in Florida. Maher wants to make fun, but the power of seeing good debased by evil speaks to us despite the silliness of the setting. Maher feels it too. He just does not want to admit it.
First, Maher is a religious seeker, in fact he may be a hallowed secularist. For all his professed atheism, he appreciates religion. He calls his doubt a luxury. If he were in a foxhole, he would be a believer and he has called upon God in the past. Maher certainly loves Jesus, who functions for him as the gold standard of human behavior and comportment. If you were a Christian, you would want all Christians to care as much for Jesus as Maher does.
Second, the biggest threats to human welfare that Maher identifies—nuclear weapons and pollution—are in no sense products of religious conduct. They are products of the secular reason Maher champions. Maybe religious people are willing to blow humanity up and endanger the planet because they believe in a “last day”, but secularists have done, and are doing these things now, without such a justification. Americans actually dropped two atomic weapons. No one else has done so. Why blame religion?
Finally, for now, there is nothing in the movie about how to live. Why should we sacrifice our own interests for the sake of others? The most moving scene in the movie is the crucifixion show at the biblical theme park in Florida. Maher wants to make fun, but the power of seeing good debased by evil speaks to us despite the silliness of the setting. Maher feels it too. He just does not want to admit it.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Religulous--Are People Killing Each Other Over Religon?
10/2/2008--I saw a review of the new anti-religion documentary Religulous that seemed to suggest that people kill each other over differences in religious doctrine. The movie opens tomorrow, so I have not seen it. But Bill Maher is quoted as saying that “religion is one day going to get us all killed.”
This view that conflicts in the world today are “religious” seems to me to be mistaken as to the nature of the conflicts. When a Palestinian says, for example, “the Jews stole our land,” it may sound like a theological conflict. But it is a conflict over land. Such a statement is similar to a saying by a native American that “Europeans stole our land.” Conflicts like these are not over dogmas.
As to conflicts over dogma per se, all three monotheistic religions—Judaism, Christianity and Islam—agree that coercion can never be used to promote belief. It is not the case that Muslims are willing to kill Christians because Christians believe Jesus is God. It is true that many Muslims consider this belief a profound and horrible error. But Jews also consider this belief an error. Yet no Jews are killing Christians over it.
I don’t mean that there has not been interreligious doctrinal violence in the past. There has been. For example, the Inquisition was just such coerced conversion. But this is not our problem in the world today.
There is religious violence today, but it tends to be religious oppression of members of one’s own group. For example, Muslim women are oppressed in some Muslim countries. And there is also discrimination without violence. Gays are discriminated against in America for religious reasons, for example.
But these issues are not what Maher is pointing to. He is suggesting that the great international conflicts of our time are religious in nature. About that he is simply mistaken.
This view that conflicts in the world today are “religious” seems to me to be mistaken as to the nature of the conflicts. When a Palestinian says, for example, “the Jews stole our land,” it may sound like a theological conflict. But it is a conflict over land. Such a statement is similar to a saying by a native American that “Europeans stole our land.” Conflicts like these are not over dogmas.
As to conflicts over dogma per se, all three monotheistic religions—Judaism, Christianity and Islam—agree that coercion can never be used to promote belief. It is not the case that Muslims are willing to kill Christians because Christians believe Jesus is God. It is true that many Muslims consider this belief a profound and horrible error. But Jews also consider this belief an error. Yet no Jews are killing Christians over it.
I don’t mean that there has not been interreligious doctrinal violence in the past. There has been. For example, the Inquisition was just such coerced conversion. But this is not our problem in the world today.
There is religious violence today, but it tends to be religious oppression of members of one’s own group. For example, Muslim women are oppressed in some Muslim countries. And there is also discrimination without violence. Gays are discriminated against in America for religious reasons, for example.
But these issues are not what Maher is pointing to. He is suggesting that the great international conflicts of our time are religious in nature. About that he is simply mistaken.
Thursday, May 29, 2008
Austin Dacey: The Secular Conscience
5/29/2008--Austin Dacey, Executive Editor of the philosophy journal Philo and staff member at the Center for Inquiry, has written a very important book: The Secular Conscience (Prometheus 2008). Dacey argues in this book against the privatization of values in secularism. He argues a rather traditional objective approach to values. Thus, abortion, for example, is not simply a private matter, but a social policy to be defended or challenged on publicly stated grounds.
Dacey’s book has been praised by people such as Richard John Neuhaus, who disagree with him on almost all issues, because Dacey recognizes that morality is not mere opinion. The Secular Conscience was discussed last week by Peter Steinfels in a New York Times column. I wrote a letter to the editor concerning that column, which I share below.
The importance of Dacey’s book is that it may begin a controversy within secularism. This blog and my book, Hallowed Secularism, argue that secularism cannot go on as it has been understood. Dacey agrees with that. I argue that only religious sources can deepen secularism and render it a sustainable and healthy human alternative. Dacey strongly disagrees with that. He adopts the same kind of juvenile tone about religion that the rest of the New Atheists do, but beneath that sneering, he understands that he must create and defend a non-religious objective morality.
Whether he succeeds or not, secularism is not likely to be the same. Dacey may succeed in breaking the logjam in secularism that will create room for consideration of Hallowed Secularism.
The reason I don’t think he can succeed is that Dacey wants to maintain a very narrow naturalism as the foundation of human life. I don’t think meaning ultimately resides there. His praise for Confucianism, for example, which he calls a “humanistic ethical philosophy” omits that all Confucian judgments are rendered under “heaven”. I am not competent to say what heaven is exactly in Confucian thought, but it is not simply a human ethical category. Yet, I have a feeling that when the sneering at religion is over, Dacey and I may be quite close in our understanding of reality.
Here is the letter:
Peter Steinfels' column discussing Austin Dacey's new book, The Secular Conscience, misses the key consequence of Dacey's insistence that standards of right and wrong are objective. Dacey believes that secularism must discard moral relativism, which is a stance with which many agree. But Dacey also believes that this can be done without embracing a religious worldview. He is probably wrong about that. Secularists invented both existentialism and pragmatism in order to avoid the very claim that Dacey is now making, that values are objective. They knew better than Dacey that conceding this point will eventually destroy a certain kind of secularism and will usher in instead a secularism infused with traditional religious values. In his Riddell Lectures published as The Abolition of Man, C.S. Lewis called the doctrine of objective value "the Tao" because all traditional value systems have shared this viewpoint. Lewis was contrasting "the Tao" with the very forms of anti-religious secularism Dacey thinks he is defending. Dacey's book may mark the beginning of the end of the secular/religious split that has so marked our politics. This will be a great achievement that Dacey will not be pleased to have accomplished.
Dacey’s book has been praised by people such as Richard John Neuhaus, who disagree with him on almost all issues, because Dacey recognizes that morality is not mere opinion. The Secular Conscience was discussed last week by Peter Steinfels in a New York Times column. I wrote a letter to the editor concerning that column, which I share below.
The importance of Dacey’s book is that it may begin a controversy within secularism. This blog and my book, Hallowed Secularism, argue that secularism cannot go on as it has been understood. Dacey agrees with that. I argue that only religious sources can deepen secularism and render it a sustainable and healthy human alternative. Dacey strongly disagrees with that. He adopts the same kind of juvenile tone about religion that the rest of the New Atheists do, but beneath that sneering, he understands that he must create and defend a non-religious objective morality.
Whether he succeeds or not, secularism is not likely to be the same. Dacey may succeed in breaking the logjam in secularism that will create room for consideration of Hallowed Secularism.
The reason I don’t think he can succeed is that Dacey wants to maintain a very narrow naturalism as the foundation of human life. I don’t think meaning ultimately resides there. His praise for Confucianism, for example, which he calls a “humanistic ethical philosophy” omits that all Confucian judgments are rendered under “heaven”. I am not competent to say what heaven is exactly in Confucian thought, but it is not simply a human ethical category. Yet, I have a feeling that when the sneering at religion is over, Dacey and I may be quite close in our understanding of reality.
Here is the letter:
Peter Steinfels' column discussing Austin Dacey's new book, The Secular Conscience, misses the key consequence of Dacey's insistence that standards of right and wrong are objective. Dacey believes that secularism must discard moral relativism, which is a stance with which many agree. But Dacey also believes that this can be done without embracing a religious worldview. He is probably wrong about that. Secularists invented both existentialism and pragmatism in order to avoid the very claim that Dacey is now making, that values are objective. They knew better than Dacey that conceding this point will eventually destroy a certain kind of secularism and will usher in instead a secularism infused with traditional religious values. In his Riddell Lectures published as The Abolition of Man, C.S. Lewis called the doctrine of objective value "the Tao" because all traditional value systems have shared this viewpoint. Lewis was contrasting "the Tao" with the very forms of anti-religious secularism Dacey thinks he is defending. Dacey's book may mark the beginning of the end of the secular/religious split that has so marked our politics. This will be a great achievement that Dacey will not be pleased to have accomplished.
Saturday, September 29, 2007
Hallowed Secularism Constitution Day Address
9/29/2007--On Thursday, September 27, 2007, I delivered the inaugural Widener Law Review Constitution Day Address at Widener Law School in Wilmington, Deleware. The title of the talk was The Myth of the Great Separation and the Future of Secularism. The talk addressed the recent work of Mark Lilla and argued that there cannot be genuine political life in a democracy without a foundation of transcendent values. The liberal effort to create a government that is neutral with regard to the good life is impossible. This has implications for the separation of church and state. While organizational and even monetary separation is possible, no separation can ultimately exist between what Lilla calls political theology and political life.
Lilla assumes that secularism must be atheistic and he further assumes that atheism can sustain a healthy politics. Lilla’s argument is quite different from that of someone who holds that meaning can be developed independently of religion. That is clearly true, but when it occurs, the result is essentially Hallowed Secularism, that is, a secularism open to humankind’s deepest questions. Lilla wants such questions banned from politics, in the name of peace. This is why LIlla relies so heavily on Thomas Hobbes. But this is the peace of the grave, not the peace of democratic life.
I want to thank the Widener Law Review for the opportunity to give this address and I especially wish to thank Widener Law School Professor Alan Garfield, whose formal response to the address took issue with much that I have been saying on this blog and gave me a great deal to think about. I believe the talk and subsequent exchange will soon be available on the Widener Law Review website: http://www.widenerlawreview.org/
Lilla assumes that secularism must be atheistic and he further assumes that atheism can sustain a healthy politics. Lilla’s argument is quite different from that of someone who holds that meaning can be developed independently of religion. That is clearly true, but when it occurs, the result is essentially Hallowed Secularism, that is, a secularism open to humankind’s deepest questions. Lilla wants such questions banned from politics, in the name of peace. This is why LIlla relies so heavily on Thomas Hobbes. But this is the peace of the grave, not the peace of democratic life.
I want to thank the Widener Law Review for the opportunity to give this address and I especially wish to thank Widener Law School Professor Alan Garfield, whose formal response to the address took issue with much that I have been saying on this blog and gave me a great deal to think about. I believe the talk and subsequent exchange will soon be available on the Widener Law Review website: http://www.widenerlawreview.org/
Saturday, September 15, 2007
Katha Pollitt and Hallowed Secularism
9/14/2007--The secular counter-attack in the political sphere continues. Here are two quotes from Katha Pollitt in The Nation’s 9/24/2007 issue:
“It's one thing to show respect for religious belief in the context of social tolerance in a pluralistic society--freedom of speech, separation of church and state, live and let live--but when Christians make faith a matter of public policy, it becomes hard to explain why nonbelievers should be deferential. If I wanted to live in a theocracy, I would move to Tehran.
It's fine with me if a candidate believes in God. Unlike some militant atheists, I don't think it matters for public policy that Obama believes Christ absolves his sins, or that Hillary Clinton hopes God has time to help her pass up dessert. We all believe weird things.”
There are several things wrong with Pollitt’s formulations. For one, theocracy is not an outcome but a process. Iran is a theocracy because clerics get to veto the popular will. But the outcome of a democratic process is democracy and nothing else. So, if a majority of Americans vote to outlaw gay marriage because God says so, that is not, strictly speaking, theocracy, but democracy. Pollitt presumes to judge the motives of voters and to proscribe religious motives. But she does not have the right to outlaw motives.
Of course, Pollitt is right that in the public square bad policy proposals are fair game. No one should be deferential because their political opponents are religious. But there is a difference between opposing a policy on its merits and opposing it because it represents theocracy. We should be deferential to the motives of anyone. Martin Luther King’s proposals should not have been dismissed simply because he thought he was doing God’s will.
Pollitt is also wrong in saying that faith doesn’t matter to public policy. Of course it does. George Bush grandiosity is closely tied to his belief that he is following God’s will, for example. Therefore, we had better find out what kind of faith candidates for public office have.
As for the crack about believing weird things, I hope it is not weird to believe that God wills slaves to be freed. That is what the Old Testament claims. Our Religions make many claims about reality. Many of those claims are directly related to questions of public policy. One such belief is that nations are inherently untrustworthy worshipers of power. I wish we had kept that in mind before we invaded Iraq.
“It's one thing to show respect for religious belief in the context of social tolerance in a pluralistic society--freedom of speech, separation of church and state, live and let live--but when Christians make faith a matter of public policy, it becomes hard to explain why nonbelievers should be deferential. If I wanted to live in a theocracy, I would move to Tehran.
It's fine with me if a candidate believes in God. Unlike some militant atheists, I don't think it matters for public policy that Obama believes Christ absolves his sins, or that Hillary Clinton hopes God has time to help her pass up dessert. We all believe weird things.”
There are several things wrong with Pollitt’s formulations. For one, theocracy is not an outcome but a process. Iran is a theocracy because clerics get to veto the popular will. But the outcome of a democratic process is democracy and nothing else. So, if a majority of Americans vote to outlaw gay marriage because God says so, that is not, strictly speaking, theocracy, but democracy. Pollitt presumes to judge the motives of voters and to proscribe religious motives. But she does not have the right to outlaw motives.
Of course, Pollitt is right that in the public square bad policy proposals are fair game. No one should be deferential because their political opponents are religious. But there is a difference between opposing a policy on its merits and opposing it because it represents theocracy. We should be deferential to the motives of anyone. Martin Luther King’s proposals should not have been dismissed simply because he thought he was doing God’s will.
Pollitt is also wrong in saying that faith doesn’t matter to public policy. Of course it does. George Bush grandiosity is closely tied to his belief that he is following God’s will, for example. Therefore, we had better find out what kind of faith candidates for public office have.
As for the crack about believing weird things, I hope it is not weird to believe that God wills slaves to be freed. That is what the Old Testament claims. Our Religions make many claims about reality. Many of those claims are directly related to questions of public policy. One such belief is that nations are inherently untrustworthy worshipers of power. I wish we had kept that in mind before we invaded Iraq.
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Mark Lilla and Hallowed Secularism
Last Sunday (8/19), Mark Lilla, professor of the humanities at Columbia University, wrote the lead article for the New York Times Magazine, on the topic of religion and public life. He called the American system “the Great Separation”. His self-congratulatory thesis was that while America limits politics to eminently political issues, some people in the world—read Muslims—have regressed to the 16th century wars of religion, which center around God and salvation, which are, apparently, not eminently political issues. I was so angry with the article that I wrote the following letter to the New York Times. Since I have never had any luck getting a letter published in the New York Times, I am reproducing it here:
To the Editor:
It is rare for a well-known scholar to write an article for the New York Times at once arrogant and incoherent. But Mark Lilla managed it. (The Great Separation 8/19). Lillas thesis is that in America we have chosen to limit politics to secular topics in order to eliminate religious strife.
First, who is this we? Both Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson, the author of the wall of separation metaphor, saw the conflict over slavery as Gods judgment for national injustice. Did these two just not get the secular message?
Second, what makes the secular nature of politics a matter of choice? Global warming is a political issue. But human greed destroying Gods creation is also a religious issue. You dont get to decide ahead of time that politics excludes religion.
Finally who says religion is a unique force for violence? It was unconvincing for Lilla to suggest that WWI and WWII were in any sense religiously based wars. They were not. Nor was the Cold War, which really did threaten the apocalypse Lilla wrongly attributes to religion. Nor was the disastrous American invasion of Iraq about religion. That war was either about spreading democracy or getting cheap oil. Maybe secularists should press for a separation between imperialism and politics rather than between religion and politics.
To the Editor:
It is rare for a well-known scholar to write an article for the New York Times at once arrogant and incoherent. But Mark Lilla managed it. (The Great Separation 8/19). Lillas thesis is that in America we have chosen to limit politics to secular topics in order to eliminate religious strife.
First, who is this we? Both Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson, the author of the wall of separation metaphor, saw the conflict over slavery as Gods judgment for national injustice. Did these two just not get the secular message?
Second, what makes the secular nature of politics a matter of choice? Global warming is a political issue. But human greed destroying Gods creation is also a religious issue. You dont get to decide ahead of time that politics excludes religion.
Finally who says religion is a unique force for violence? It was unconvincing for Lilla to suggest that WWI and WWII were in any sense religiously based wars. They were not. Nor was the Cold War, which really did threaten the apocalypse Lilla wrongly attributes to religion. Nor was the disastrous American invasion of Iraq about religion. That war was either about spreading democracy or getting cheap oil. Maybe secularists should press for a separation between imperialism and politics rather than between religion and politics.
Saturday, August 11, 2007
Theists, Atheists and Hallowed Secularists
8/11/2007--There is an object lesson in definitions of secularism from the Reconstructionist Jewish Prayer Book. The founder of Reconstructionism, Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan, could not state precisely and consistently what he meant by God. Mostly, he seemed to follow John Dewey in a naturalistic approach: God is the power that allows for goodness, which means that God is a referent for what men do. This is close to what Dewey stated in A Common Faith. At other times, critics have said, Kaplan attached ontological status to God, that is, some reality outside man. The matter is controversial to this day.
On the other hand, the Reconstructionist movement had no trouble amending the traditional Amidah prayer to remove the praise of God as having power to resurrect the dead. The language in the Amidah probably had nothing to do with the then-new Jesus movement, but rather reflected the growing authority of Pharisaic/Rabbinic Judaism after the destruction of the Second Temple and that group’s endorsement of the concept of resurrection. Indeed, without entering into the question of whether Jesus was resurrected, the familiarity of Jews with the concept of resurrection came from the Pharisaic endorsement of that form of eternal life. They taught that when the Jewish Messiah came, the dead would rise.
So, Reconstructionism had no trouble rejecting any existence after death, but could not say who or what God is.
This suggests that life-after-death is a key to understanding secularism while definitions of God may prove elusive. So, let me suggest the following: a theist, which would include traditional members of the religions of the Book—Jews, Christians and Muslims—and no doubt others, accept some continuance of existence after death and see something outside man that corresponds to the word, God. There remain many differences about what the word God means. Atheists reject both life after death and deny that anything at all could correspond to the usage of the word God. Hallowed Secularists, then, agree with Atheists about life after death, but agree with theists to some extent about God. The distinctions about God are deep and important, but I begin to think that life after death might be a more significant distinction.
The reader should note that the early Hebrews did not have a clear conception of life after death. Judaism developed such conceptions much later.
On the other hand, the Reconstructionist movement had no trouble amending the traditional Amidah prayer to remove the praise of God as having power to resurrect the dead. The language in the Amidah probably had nothing to do with the then-new Jesus movement, but rather reflected the growing authority of Pharisaic/Rabbinic Judaism after the destruction of the Second Temple and that group’s endorsement of the concept of resurrection. Indeed, without entering into the question of whether Jesus was resurrected, the familiarity of Jews with the concept of resurrection came from the Pharisaic endorsement of that form of eternal life. They taught that when the Jewish Messiah came, the dead would rise.
So, Reconstructionism had no trouble rejecting any existence after death, but could not say who or what God is.
This suggests that life-after-death is a key to understanding secularism while definitions of God may prove elusive. So, let me suggest the following: a theist, which would include traditional members of the religions of the Book—Jews, Christians and Muslims—and no doubt others, accept some continuance of existence after death and see something outside man that corresponds to the word, God. There remain many differences about what the word God means. Atheists reject both life after death and deny that anything at all could correspond to the usage of the word God. Hallowed Secularists, then, agree with Atheists about life after death, but agree with theists to some extent about God. The distinctions about God are deep and important, but I begin to think that life after death might be a more significant distinction.
The reader should note that the early Hebrews did not have a clear conception of life after death. Judaism developed such conceptions much later.
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