My goal was to only write SHORT posts. Already I'm apologizing...
Hope this one doesn't ramble too much. Like I said before, I'm not a writer.
Before Christmas I had the pleasure of sitting down to lunch with another former CRC member. It was the first time we had met and, not surprisingly, we had very similar stories—even though we may be close to a generation apart. I was glad to hear care and understanding for our CRC brothers and sisters coming from the other side to the table. As far as I can remember, nothing disparaging was vomited up to verbally kick around. And that’s probably a pretty good place to begin.
I’m no longer a believer. Neither was my lunch guest. Neither are loads of the other exCRCs I’ve met in person and online. But we all seem to squirm at the standard lines of many of the better-known atheists out there. They often fail to recognize or understand some of the nuances of what makes us human.
When we think of an atheist most of us conjure up some version of the same character. And that’s a shame. That character seems to own the atheist brand and take it past pragmatic conclusions and into a mean, arrogant place. At least that’s the perception. Many of the names we know in this sphere either explicitly or implicitly suggest that belief is just dumb. Could it be possible that these atheists—just as much as their believing counterparts—bare the stamp of their backgrounds? And here I’m talking about academia (which I love). But academics are a special kind of people. It’s truly a privileged position to have the freedom to ponder the deeper mysteries of being. The fundamentals that become belief are hardcoded into us—not directly for the purposes of belief, but for other survival-intended reasons. I’m over generalizing here surely, but I would say that Atheists (and maybe I’ll give them a capital A to differentiate them from the common unbeliever) fail to recognize the needs that average believers are trying to meet and how religion offers them a tremendous incentive to keep going.
It’s true that our modernity has led us down some stupid paths. We’ve allowed our religious instincts to be hijacked by a prosperity gospel that only has the husk of Christianity around it. Also, for some reason we care about what actors, musicians and athletes are up to. We’ve put our focus on crap as we broaden our horizons from the old way to worship. Why haven’t we put those energies to better use? Why haven’t we found fulfilment in taking that fervour and actually begun fixing the world? There’s a guy named Alain de Botton who articulated a better direction then I can. It’s from a few years ago. You can watch it here: http://www.ted.com/talks/alain_de_botton_atheism_2_0.
During our lunch the other day, my guest pointed out a casual quote from uber-Atheist, Richard Dawkins, who in the intro to someone’s podcast, says something to the effected of, “I find it difficult to imagine…” (and he goes on to say something about religious behaviour or belief). Difficult to imagine was the arresting part of that statement, and the very problem. Many of the more vocal Atheists seem to lack imagination. I believe they understand ‘why’ people believe, but they may have difficulty imagining why, in a modern world, this behaviour persists. I can tell you it’s much easier to imagine when you are able to step outside of yourself. I’m fortunate enough to straddle ‘class’ enough to enjoy a meal with factory workers one day, sipping Labatt Maximum Ice, and the next, be enjoying meal with the ‘monied’ that would cost a couple mortgage payments. Enjoying a perspective broad enough to see where each social stratum is coming from is illuminating. When you know how someone stresses about using his job at Red Lobster to provide for his growing family, then you can see how the evolutionary mechanics in his brain find his belief to be a bulwark. I’m not famous Or publicly respected. But perhaps having the public see you as an expert and believing yourself to be an expert puts a damper on introspection—the very ability to dive into oneself and understand how you arrived at your current perspective. So in that respect many unknown unbelievers have a better finger on the pulse. I will say one thing about public Atheist, Sam Harris. He has made point of looking inward and has an wonderful ability to imagine. Dawkins I’m not sure of.
Dawkins’ The Selfish Gene and The Blind Watchmaker are eye-opening by the way. Read them.
The last thing I’ll mention is ‘othering’. That’s a word I think I picked up in 2016. It just means grouping people into the in-group and the out-group. The internet is full of rascals. And some of the most bombastic are Atheists. They share a smarmy battlefield with many Christians, Jews and Muslims. A lot of vocal atheists like to single out ridiculous aspects of belief effectively ‘punching down’. Check YouTube for ‘The Amazing Atheist’ to see what I mean. I won’t link to him here, he’ll like that too much. It’s true, there are also atheists who dwell on the dangerous, abusive or restrictive attributes of religion. While I do think that these are important to fight against, this all has the effect of creating an us-vs-them dynamic. And wasn’t this one of the main complaints about religion?
Why am I writing all of this?
I suppose I want it to be known that you are not the only one who sees Atheism (the capital A kind) and immediately grumbles. If you’re starting to doubt your faith or if you’ve doubted for a while, hit me up, it doesn’t mean you’re on the path to becoming a loudmouthed snob. You’re just beginning to see the what the emperor isn’t wearing.
After that, it’s up to you what you do. Hopefully you choose good.
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