Category Archives: Religion and civilisation

Alone in the Universe: Is there no change of death in paradise?

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Commenting on AC Grayling’s new book, The God Argument (due to be published at the end of this month), Damon Linker in The Week, after saying, without a shred of evidence, that godlessness is not umabiguously good for human beings (it could of course be argued that nothing is “unambiguously” good for human beings), goes on to say this:

If atheism is true, it is far from being good news. Learning that we’re alone in the universe, that no one hears or answers our prayers, that humanity is entirely the product of random events, that we have no more intrinsic dignity than non-human and even non-animate clumps of matter, that we face certain annihilation in death, that our sufferings are ultimately pointless, that our lives and loves do not at all matter in a larger sense, that those who commit horrific evils and elude human punishment get away with their crimes scot free — all of this (and much more) is utterly tragic.

It’s hard to know where to begin with this rather comprehensive expression of alarm. It is not at all clear that the philosophical naturalism that underlies most modern atheism is committed to all the conclusions that Linker attributes to it, but, if we concentrate simply on the fact of our being “alone in the universe,” that is, without any supernatural friend, and that we will be neither rewarded nor punished in a life to come, there being no one except other people to listen to our appeals for help, or to acknowledge the meaningfulness of our lives, there seems to be no reason for his over-exaggerated angst. I do acknowledge, however, that the increasing tide of scientism (and biologism) is probably unhelpful in the short or long term in commending naturalism to those who are going through the symptoms of withdrawal from religious belief, and not altogether intelligible in either scientific or philosophical terms either.

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What is the real threat, individualism or collectivism?

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This post is now available in Polish translation at Racjonalista. Thanks to Malgorzata yet again!

If I seem to have been very silent over the last couple of days, that’s because I haven’t been feeling very well, and while I’m not feeling a lot better, I thought it might be worthwhile to discuss the question I ask in my title. I am thinking in particular of Margaret Somerville’s claim that the reason it is difficult to argue against assisted dying is what she calls an “intense individualism” that in her view pervades modern society. This raises a fairly important question, for it suggests that some sort of collectivism would be preferable to individualism, and this is something, I think, that we have reason to doubt.

I happen to be reading, just now, one of Elizabeth’s books, which we had discussed, but which I had not read before. The book is The First World War, by Sir Hew Strachan, who was a Brigadier in the British Army (Brigadier General in the US), and is now a Scottish military historian. The book has an interesting take on the First World War, and the reasons for fighting it, that is not often expressed. World War I is very often assumed to have been a pointless and avoidable conflict, which settled nothing of importance, when it might well be seen, instead, as the first round in a war to settle a very important question having to do with individualism and collectivism. Strachan says that

the Anglo-German antagonism became the pivot of the conflict. The polarity was best expressed in competing ideologies: liberalism and individualism against militarism and collectivism, the pursuit of mammon against the spirit of heroism. [201]

At the time the war broke out, Strachan suggests, this was much more clearly understood than it has been by later generations. But if it is seen in relation to the Second World War, the reasons for the outbreak of war in 1914 comes into sharper focus. For the Second World War may be seen (and has been long recognised by some historians to have been) an extension of the First. In fact, some historians have seen the two wars as the beginning and the end of a second Thirty Years War.

If we look at the great wars of the twentieth century in this way, we can see how the issues that were fought out on the battlefield largely underlie contemporary conflicts and competition amongst ideologies, though, this time, the antagonism is being played out between religion, on the one hand, standing for a kind of collectivism, and secularism, on the other, standing for liberalism and individualism. According to the pope, and many other religious leaders, the problem with modern society is that its focus is on the individual, and individual rights, and, according to Margaret Somerville, this makes it all but impossible to argue successfully for some of the fundamental religious values, such as the sanctity of life, because people simply cannot understand the alternative. However, what she does not seem to recognise is that, in order to argue successfully for these values, which are in essence religious and collective, she must also try to convince us that some sort of collectivism is in general more important than and preferable to liberalism and individualism. She makes no effort to do this.

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If it is so important to live according to one’s nature: Castrate the lot of them, I say!

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Available in Polish translation here. Thanks again to Malgorzata!

Here’s a picture of the Clown of the Vatican giving Christmas greetings to a room full of celibate fundamentalists who have made a new year’s resolution to oppose gay marriage with all the power supposedly vested in them by the Ruler of the Universe. Indeed, Christmas, for the pope and his henchmen has become the occasion of the most virulent anti-gay campaign ever to emanate from the frowsty halls of the Vatican. Instead of peace and joy, and the sentimentality of cribs and cowsheds and a sacred baby, we have the pope in attack mode. The overly ornate hall is meant to intimidate us, but don’t let the pictures of angels dupe you. These guys know all about realpolitik.

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To be quite frank, it now simply makes me angry, that a bunch of celibate men should gather together and tell the rest of the world what sexuality is for, and how people should act with respect to their nature, as though human nature were a fixed datum which cannot be varied or further defined. If the Jesus they pretend to worship were to walk into this hall, they’d have him arrested and sent packing. But the thing is that here is a room full of contradictions, every man jack of them acting contrary to his nature (or at least pretending to do so). And yet they have the unmitigated gall to define how the rest of us are to live. According to a Reuters report, the pope (along with his gang of overdressed “virgins”) is forming a coalition of religions to defend “real” marriage and to oppose the legalisation of gay marriage, and it’s high time we told this geriatric failure of a human being that we don’t think this gathering of men sworn to celibacy has anything to teach the world about sexuality or the family. About love, clearly, they have nothing to teach, the pope’s hateful “Christmas” message having gone out to all the world. You know the pope thinks he’s in trouble when the substitutes gay marriage for the manger and the holy mother and child.

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Is Religion just a matter of “deepities” or something more?

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A recent post — It really is time to tell the whole religious crew to shove it! – prompted a fairly lengthy discussion of the place of religion in cultural life. (See the comment stream.) The main focus of the post had to do with religious horrors, acts of religious believers and religious institutions which, to my mind, discredit religion so badly as to make association with or allegiance to a particular cultural expression of a religion morally dubious. Nevertheless, I have, on the other hand, and apparently contradictorily, defended the claim that, as a human creation, religion still has human value, whatever we may say of its supernatural superstructure. I have no very clear idea as to what human value this might be, but it does, it seems to me, pertain at least to structures of social interaction and networking and sensitivity to these structures that can add depth to human relationships and social projects. This is not to deny that there are other ways in which these projects can be carried out, but there is an energy involved in religious projects that is not to be simply dismissed out of hand. The fact that it can cement relationships between people of significant duration, and focus their efforts on specific goals, all within traditional structures that have perdured (sometimes) for centuries, is something which, if it does not engender admiration, at least should lead us to consider what it has to tell us about social cohesion and cooperation in common tasks.

I was led to thinking about this last night as I read a book I have had for many years yet never read. It’s a short book, by the American theologian, Gordon Kaufman, An Essay on Theological Method. He begins by expressing concern about the apparent chaos in theology:

That the contemporary theological scene has become chaotic is evident to anyone who attempts to work in theology. There appears to be no consensus on what the task of theology is or how theology is to be pursued. [1x]

Those are the book’s opening words, and the end of the first paragraph is no more encouraging:

In all this it usually remains unclear just what is the conception of theology being used by a particular writer, why he or she calls it theology rather than something else, and what methods or procedures are thought properly to characterize this theological work. [loc. cit.]

He even goes so far as to say:

Whereas in earlier generations those who called themselves theologians all in some sense “believed in God” or presupposed the reality of the God about whom they wrote, in our time even this minimal level of agreement cannot be assumed. [loc. cit.]

The problem lies mainly in the fact that there is no cultural unity within which theology can any longer be carried out, so that theology has become fissiparous instead of unitive. Theology, in fact, has traditionally been something like art, a cultural practice which depended upon common standards and responses. Once the unity of culture has been called into question, theology no longer has the cultural foundations upon which it can build. Nor do I think Kaufman has overcome this problem in his recommendations as to theological method.

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Why do you have to hunt down everyone unless you’re weak?

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Just a preface by way of explanation. I’m sorry to be so unproductive over the last few days. It is Spring here, and I have my usual spring-time allergies, but this year they are affecting me particularly seriously. When that happens, stringing words together to make a sentence, let alone a post, is a struggle. This post took longer to write than almost any other, not because of its complexity or length, but because of what might be called thought-block. Bear with me. This Spring too will pass.

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Maureen Dowd has an interesting piece in the New York Times for Saturday (19th May 2012). Entitled Here Comes Nobody it is an attack on the Roman Catholic Church’s growing tendency to control its message, and to marginalise those who differ. It also expresses concern over the increasingly popular political idea that public policy should be governed by the religious beliefs of elected officials and members of legislatures, a growing tendency which is going to land us in serious political trouble if we are not careful. The telltale signs are increasing. Muslims, pretending that their religion is not political, are practically everywhere insisting that Islamic principles should govern everything from finances to women’s dress, and a host of things in between, all designed to normalise Islamic oppression in democratic contexts. The Roman Catholic Church is playing exactly the same game, by condemning liberal democratic establishments as radically secular and anti-Catholic, going so far as to tell women religious in the United States where the emphasis of their ministry must lie — not in the direction of social justice, but in an emphasis on the “pro-life” agenda of the Vatican, something that is governed by rigorously orthodox teaching. The sign of weakness lies in the increasingly narrow focus of religious practice. When religions are strong they are diversified, expansive, and encompass societies. When they are weak, they become narrow, intolerant and self-centred; brand loyalty becomes a central concern, and emphasis is placed on things which arouse deep emotions. During the 18th century Enlightenment this was known, in Britain at least, as “enthusiasm,” and was shunned by people who considered themselves intellectually sophisticated, and who had felt the winds of change blowing.

Religions tend to be static, because they depend upon the loyalty of ordinary people whose lives are marked by a fair degree of stasis, and for whom change is threatening. When religions go through a period when they feel themselves at risk, they tend to shorten their defence perimeter, choosing easily identifiable features of their internal landscape to defend. This also has the virtue of making their enemies and opponents more easily identifiable. In Dowd’s essay this tendency is clearly identified.  Kathleen Sebelius, the health and human services secretary, was invited to give the commencement address at Georgetown University, which, because of her role in the insurance kerfuffle that the USCCB has made such a circus of, made her an easy target. As Dowd says:

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Persecuting Christ

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In today’s Telegraph Charles Moore has an article entitled “A Society that Persecutes Christ is heading for terrible trouble.” It is hard to imagine a thought more banal, but the article that follows measures up pretty well. First of all, it is impossible to persecute Christ. The man believed, by Christians, to have been the Christ, or Jewish Messiah, is dead, killed by the Romans, if the story be true, nearly 2000 years ago, and while he has many followers today, they are persecuted, in the main, only where Islam rules, so Moore’s quote from Ibn Khaldun, which he pairs with one from Margaret Thatcher, is more than a bit at odds with his title.

However, let’s take the quotes to start with. First, Margaret Thatcher:

Not for 2,000 years has it been possible for society to exclude or eliminate Christ from its social or political life without a terrible social or political consequence.

This is, Moore says, the opening sentence of Thatcher’s book Christianity and Conservatism, which I have not had the misfortune to read. The second quotation comes from Ibn Khaldun, the 14th century Muslim historian and philosopher of history:

Religion taught by a prophet or by a preacher of the truth is the only foundation on which to build a great and powerful empire.

– a thought which is immediately contadicted by many great empires and civilisations, not least the Roman Empire, which does not find its foundation in a prophet or preacher of the truth, supposing that any prophet or preacher has done so, but at least partly in a syncretistic willingness to assimilate conquered gods into its pantheon. But nevertheless it is well to take note of this quotation from Ibn Khaldun, since it affirms what so many people seem at pains to conceal, that Islam was an imperial power, imposing its culture and thought, however puerile and violent, on many a people whose culures, religions, and identities were systematically destroyed by Muslim violence and colonisation. This is a continuing trend, demonstrated by the few Western idiots who have joined the ranks of Islamic imperialists – whose empire and civilisation shone largely with the borrowed light of Christians, Jews, Zoroastrians, Hindus, and others, and continually regressed to the state of Arabian brigandage, violence and oppression — by giving themselves Arabic names, and bowing submissively towards Mecca and Arabia five times a day.

And while Moore is rhapsodising about the sage of Tunis, it is relevant to point out that the latest news out of Tunis, announces the conviction, in absentia (at least of one of the men), of two men, for blasphemy, for drawing caricatures of the prophet:

They were sentenced, one of them in absentia, to seven years in prison, for transgressing morality, defamation and disrupting public order.

Doubtless heeding Ibn Khaldun’s declaration that great empires are built only on the foundation of a prophet or preacher of the truth. So much for the Tunisian revolution, and all the acts of civil resistance to autocratic rule, fired, it seems, by the passionate self-immolation of a street vendor — whose sacrificial smoke rose pointlessly into the heavens. Like Egypt, all the passion for freedom seems to have ended in the replacement of personal tyranny with religous tyranny. Yet, no doubt, as Moore says, great civilisations are built on foundations such as these.

The trouble with Moore is that he actually seems to think that he has said something profound. A few days ago he was rhapsodising about the truth of religion — in opposition to Alain de Botton who considers the notion of religious truth boring, though the forms of religion as something worth borrowing from and using in the new godless state of tomorrow. In response to de Botton Moore claims that “Religion’s usefulness derives from its truth.” The troubling thing here is that he makes no effort whatsoever to show that any of the relevant religious beliefs are true.

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