THE ST COLUMBA'S LECTURE
By Prof. David Fergusson
Principal, New School,
University of Edinburgh
27th August
2014
Introduction
Tonight we shall consider the recent resurgence of interest in atheism.
It has become a subject of widespread public debate over the last decade,
particularly in the English-speaking world. I shall focus on what is called
‘the new atheism’ and try to assess its significance for the church, not in a
spirit of animosity but in the hope that some patient dialogue may lead to some
benefits for people of faith as well as many who find themselves caught
somewhere in the middle between two extremes. As I’ve said before, there is a
lot of space between the Pope and Richard Dawkins and many people find
themselves occupying a portion of this ground. Here are some of the issues
which we shall consider briefly.
•
Contemporary Context
•
Historical trends
•
Contested ground
•
Some recent responses
•
People in the pews
•
Can there be a Christian atheism?
•
How should churches respond?
The four best known exponents of the new atheism (‘The Four Horsemen’)
are Hitchens, Dennett, Dawkins and Harris. But the field has been populated by
other voices in recent years, including a number of atheists and agnostics who
dispute the terms in which these protagonists have set the debate. I’ve met a
number of people in recent years, many of them scientists, who tell me that
they are atheists but not admirers of Richard Dawkins. New Atheism is often
dated from the appearance of Harris’s book ‘The End of Faith’ in 2004, so we’re
now at the 10th anniversary and it’s worth assessing its impact.
What’s new in the new atheism?
Atheism of course is not new. It goes back to the ancient world and has
been present in western societies at least since the 17th century.
There have been distinguished voices such as Bertrand Russell who espoused
atheism in the 20th century. But what is new in the new atheism?
Here are some suggestions.
It’s not the indifferent
atheism of the 1960s which regarded religion as a harmless phenomenon—a private
life-style choice which an increasing number were rejecting but perhaps
wistfully rather than passionately. New atheism has an angry and
combative tone which has not characterised all forms of atheism in the past. In
many ways, it is a post 9/11 phenomenon. Religion has not gone away and
diminished in public significance. It is resurgent in many parts of the world
and expresses itself in global politics. We see daily examples of this in our
newspapers. Much of the rhetoric makes it clear that 9/11 changed everything.
Religion would not go away or retreat into a private enclave. It requires to be
challenged in its public expression and effects. This is not unconnected with
the ways in which Islam seems to be its prime target or at least the extent to
which some of its most hostile rhetoric is reserved for Islam, especially in
the writings of Dawkins and Harris. At least one commentator has suggested that
this is what makes new atheism new – the hostility to Islam on the part of some
western intellectuals and the perceived threat to democratic culture in the
west. We also need to see atheism today as a popular movement. The new atheists
are campaigners who want to encourage their fellow citizens to come out more
assertively as atheists. Religion has been a no-go area for public criticism
but now this must change, be seen in public debates, the blogsphere, the
enthusiasm of novelists and journalists. Finally, the public role of religion
in our societies has come under scrutiny. In the past, the Christian faith was
something you opted out of, but now it is claimed it must become something to
opt into. This is apparent in debates around gay marriage, the place of
religion in schools and the wearing of the burqa in public. A strong secular
lobby wishes to eliminate or at least restrict the role of the church and other
faith bodies.
There is a London bus with the logo, “There is
probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.” It is a good example
of the popular and campaigning nature of the new atheism. You can even attend a
service of lessons and carols for the ungodly if you find that the Christmas
season is impoverished without your standard fare of worship. Richard Dawkins
reads from his own writings, proving that he has already bestowed upon them the
secular equivalent of canonical status. At least, the writers of the Bible
allowed others to reach this conclusion.
In the ancient world, the great philosophers
tended to believe in God in one form or another. But other groups emerged which
contest this, particularly the Epicureans who see life as the result of
accidental forces and not governed by divine providence. The famous poem of
Lucretius On the Nature of Things is a good example of this.
In the modern era, there is
a much greater religious diversity in Europe after the Reformation. Different
Protestant groups emerged, but alongside these more heterodox forms of
Christianity exist which slide into scepticism and atheism. This is
particularly evident in the deism which flourishes in the late 17th
century—God is reduced to a force which sets the universe in motion but simply
leaves it to run its course. In the work of our old friend David Hume, this
deism slides into something close to agnosticism. The claims of religion are
doubtful if not downright bogus, and we don’t need God as a basis for ethics or
faith for social cohesion. In the 19th century, there is the more
assertive positive atheism of Nietzsche, the German philosopher, who argues
that the death of God is a liberating moment for human beings and a release
from the servile virtues.
‘We have killed God – you
and I! We are all his murderers… The holiest and mightiest thing the world has
ever possessed has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood
from us… There was never a greater deed – and whoever is born after us will on
account of this deed belong to a higher history than all history up to now.’
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844 – 1900)
By contrast, many of the Victorians viewed the loss of faith,
particularly after Darwin, with some regret and a sense of nostalgia.
Science and Biblical criticism played an
important role for late 19th century intellectuals such as George
Eliot, John Stuart Mill and Thomas Huxley. The emergence of a professional
class of scientists resulted in the separation of science and religion, so that
the church no longer exercised such an influence in the domain of natural
science. This is how it is expressed by Matthew Arnold:
The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.
Matthew
Arnold, Dover Beach, 1867
Bertrand Russell declared on a rather positive note:
‘When you hear people in
church debasing themselves and saying that they are miserable sinners, and all
the rest of it, it seems contemptible and not worthy of self-respecting human
beings. We ought to stand up and look the world frankly in the face. We ought
to make the best we can of the world, and if it is not so good as we wish,
after all it will still be better than what these others have made of it in all
these ages. A good world needs knowledge, kindliness, and courage; it does not
need a regretful hankering after the past or a fettering of the free
intelligence by the words uttered long ago by ignorant men.’
Bertrand Russell, ‘Why I am
not a Christian’ (1927)
The Ground of the Debate
The standard philosophical arguments for God’s existence are examined
and found wanting. These arguments are now taught in the RS syllabus,
especially the first-cause and the design proofs. Dawkins and others claim that
they are entirely invalid and that we do not need the world to explain God.
Allied to this is the claim
that science can now do the explanatory work which once was done by God.
Dawkins and Dennett appeal to the force of Neo-Darwinism which they believe can
satisfactorily explain the emergence of intelligent life, ethics, art and even
religion itself. So religion is treated here like a primitive form of science
which can be discarded by the explanatory power of the natural sciences,
particularly in a post-Darwinian age. Our biological drives are the primary
form of explanation for what we believe and how we act, with the result that
material forces tend to replace supernatural ones in the explanatory process.
The Christian faith
flourished at a time when scholars believed the world to be much smaller and of
more recent origin. It had been created in 4004 BCE, with the earth at the
centre of a system that included the sun, the stars and the other planets. But
now we know that the cosmos is vast – it’s over 13 billion year old and we are
only one small planet circling one sun in a galaxy with a billions stars. And
there are billions of other galaxies out there, perhaps some with strange and
unimaginable life forms.
Critics have also pointed
to the harmful effects of religion. It is pathological in its outcomes
producing narrow-mindedness, indoctrinating children, breeding intolerance and
violence. Religion poisons everything, according to Hitchens.
Allied to this are two
further claims. We can live well without faith – a life without religion
is easily negotiated and in many ways is free from the burdens of difficult belief,
the authority of the church, and the practice of religious observance. Large
swathes of population in affluent, pluralist and democratic societies live
without adherence to a religious institution. Many of them are surprisingly
ignorant of the claims of Christianity, compared with their ancestors. Among
older people the question is often asked, ‘Do you still go to church?’
Finally, it is assumed that
once you remove the plausibility structures of religion and no longer compel
religious attendance or make people feel guilty about opting out, then people
will drift away from faith. Consider the sudden decline in church attendance
and the rising age of congregations today. At least two younger generations are
getting along fine without it, or so it is maintained.
The diagnosis and
prognosis may seem gloomy but there are other more hopeful ways of considering
the matter.
Possible Replies to the New Atheists
The question of God always remains open – it is one of the big questions as almost all the great philosophers
acknowledge. The why questions cannot be answered by science – why is there a
world at all, why does it have this wonderfully complex and orderly structure,
why am I here? There are questions of a more philosophical or religious
complexion that appear to be beyond the remit of science. This is not to say
that there is anything wrong with science, only that there are other forms of
understanding that we need to live well. The use of science in the new atheism
reduces us to genes, molecules and atoms. Religion, art and morality tend to be
reduced to the effects of biological drives. But do we not want to think of
ourselves as more than that, as requiring forms of explanation that move upwards
rather than downwards. We are persons and not merely animals. The cosmos
has a mathematical beauty and a biological fruitfulness which seem vast and not
fully understood – but it evokes a sense of wonder that is not easily dispelled
by science. The size of the universe may startle and bewilder us, but it
doesn’t induce an easy atheism. Many physicists and cosmologists still think
more mystically about the universe they describe.
On the ground, most faith
communities comprise peaceful, law-abiding citizens - people that you want as
your next door neighbours. Religion produces social capital in the form of
networks of trust and friendship, charitable giving and involvement, support
for the homeless, the lonely and the anxious. This has been shown by many social-scientific
studies into the civic effect of religion. One of the problems is that no news
is good news. The stuff that goes on week in, week out in churches and other
faith communities is seldom reported or highlighted in the media.
Can a society prosper
without religion? Clearly, there are many good people who live decent and
sometimes inspiring lives without any faith commitment. We need to acknowledge
that. But can a society function indefinitely without the cohesion, motivation,
and ritual power of religion? It’s difficult to find examples of this, and
often atheism regimes have sought to capture and represent religious symbols
and ideology in ways that can be very dangerous. Some of the atheist
governments of the 20th century have been the most violent. Faith is
also practical – its nature is misconstrued by the new atheism to the point
where its ethical, emotional, and life-enhancing commitments are distorted.
It’s as much a way of life, a manner of negotiating the world, as believing in
some difficult objects.
‘We should not be surprised, therefore, if God is so rarely
encountered now. The consumer culture is one without sacrifices; easy
entertainment distracts us from our metaphysical loneliness. The rearranging of
the world as an object of appetite obscures its meaning as a gift. The defacing
of eros and the loss of rites of passage eliminate the old conception of human
life as an adventure within the community and an offering to others. It is
inevitable, therefore, that moments of sacred awe should be rare among us.’
Roger Scruton, The Face
of God (2012), 177.
It may be that religion is less plausible and appealing because of the
kind of society we have become. The religious impulse has been shut down or
suppressed so that for a time people get by pretty well without it. But maybe
this is the exception rather than the rule. Faith will re-assert itself,
perhaps through the power of art, the beauty and value of nature, or through
the experience of suffering and loss at a time of crisis for our society, or a
feeling that life on this earth is a great gift whose source is beyond matter,
or a sense that life has become impoverished without the symbols, prayers and
worship of the Christian tradition or simply the power of the story of
Jesus. Maybe it’s for this reason that attendance at cathedral worship
has increased by 30% in the last 10 years.
Recent Surveys: The ‘Spiritual But Not Religious’
The surveys now reveal an increasing number of people taking the ‘no
religion’ box. In Scotland, in the recent census it was 37%. But who are these
people we call ‘the nones’? Are they exponents of the new atheism? There is no
doubt that some are, but they seem to belong to a fairly small minority. Others
in this group regard themselves as ‘spiritual’, as believing in a creative
power, as discerning the divine within the natural world, as practising prayer
and meditation, and even as occasionally attending church services. But they do
not see themselves as committed to an institution, as paid-up members, as willing
to believe everything that a particular authority teaches. These are people who
are not secular in the sense that religion has no role in their lives, but
their expression of faith takes different forms and is quite unlike that of
their forebears up until the middle of the last century. Robert Wuthnow speaks
of seekers after spiritual experience rather than dwellers in a religious
location (After Heaven, 1998).
In a very recent book,
Linda Mercadante, an American theologian, has conducted an in-depth set of
interviews with the Spiritual But Not Religious - SBNRs. She concludes that
they are to stay and have much to teach the church – they are seeking for a
genuine spiritual experience, they are weary of religious divisions and
conflicts, they are reluctant to become paid-up members of any organization,
they are concerned about the planet, and they want to find the resources to
create spiritual meaning and order in their lives. Yet this group of people are
in danger of the cut flower syndrome. Without roots in living traditions and
organization, they will lack the resources and nourishment that are needed to
sustain the spiritual life, and they will be unable to exercise much impact
socially. The churches, Mercadante argues, will have to learn to meet their
needs in services of worship, in assisting people to find the resources to
articulate their spiritual needs, and in bringing them together to mobilize
them socially.
‘Today’s Christians like
their ancestors, can reframe the gospel in ways that again speak to the deepest
human longings and needs. They can create alternative faith communities which
give persons a supportive context in which to live this out. And they can
develop new ways to cooperate with God’s healing work in the world.’
Linda Mercadante, Belief
without Borders: Inside the Minds of the Spiritual but not Religious, 258.
Atheism as the new cool
Atheism has become the new cool but for how long? Will another
generation emerge which sees this as shallow and inadequate, and begin a
process of recovery that draws upon the spiritual riches of our traditions. Or
are we entering a new phase in which the practice of faith belongs to a small
and increasingly detached minority? The evidence of the rest of the world of
course suggests that the established religions maintain a strong presence.
There has been significant growth of the churches to the south and in the east.
Even in China, the Christian churches are continuing to expand although numbers
are difficult to estimate. Atheism and secularism might be considered more
western in their appeal, and parochial when the wider global picture is taken
into account. Yet this fact alone does not excuse us from taking it seriously.
‘In the 1970s and 80s,
dissing Margaret Thatcher was the sure way for a funnyman (or woman) to seal
their status as a must-see; the Iron Lady always drew a laugh when portrayed
crushing her all-male Cabinet underfoot, or sneering with contempt at the hoi
polloi. Nowadays, God has stepped into the Baroness’s court shoes, and lots
of fun can be had at the expense of the great fairy in the sky. Secularism on
the comedy circuit is a crowd-pleaser; faith, a venue-clearer.’
(Frank Skinner when
interviewed by the ABC)
‘Ethnographers have noted how even within a single congregation there
can be so much diversity that it is very difficult to give an account of the
congregation’s identity without occluding exceptions and conflict or denying
the significance of its less noticed members.’
Nichols Healy,
‘Ecclesiology and Practical
Theology’ in Keeping Faith in Practice (London: SCM, 2010), James Sweeney,
Gemma Simmonds and David Lonsdale (eds.), 127 (117–130).
What
about us?
Some people view the new atheism as touching the lives only of a small
number of intellectuals but I rather doubt this. My suspicion is that it has
become troublesome for many Christian people. We should expect this, since none
of us is immune to the pressures and conditioning of social forces around us.
Research suggests that people in our congregations actually entertain a
surprisingly diverse set of beliefs. Those of us who preach tend to assume that
people believe whatever we said in our last sermon but this appears to be far
from the case.
What this means is that we
should expect people in the future to be somewhere in between the orthodox
faith of the church and the outright atheism of many of our secular
contemporaries. The line between faith and unbelief not only divides our
society but runs within each human heart. We ought to recognise this and create
churches which are sufficiently capacious to embrace a range of commitments and
to encourage safe spaces where people can explore their beliefs, difficulties
and doubts.
I suspect, though it’s only
a guess, that we will see a move back from angry atheism to a most wistful,
nostalgic sort that will eventually morph into a recovered faith on the part of
our children and grandchildren. This will not be like the faith or the
church of the 1950s but it will look very different from the over-confident,
hectoring and supercilious opinions of some secularists today. We cannot
indefinitely survive and prosper as people who believe in nothing very much.
Recent work on congregational studies and ecclesiology
has pointed to the ways in which our Christian communities harbour a surprising
variety of theological opinions. Those of us who are clergy may have only a
little insight into what our people really believe. House-group discussions
often reveal a range of heterodox views that can be quite surprising for those
who assume that traditional confessional identities are assumed by the rank and
file membership. This may confirm the notion that many Christian congregations
are actually to the left theologically of their clergy leaders, probably
reversing the position we were in for much of the 20th century.
Brian Mountford’s recent study is a compilation of conversations which points
to the range of questions, doubts and gradations of belief represented by those
in and around the churches today.[1] Similarly, Nicholas Healy points to the
plurality of ways of thinking and living as Christians which recent
congregational studies have revealed. ‘Ethnographers have noted how even within
a single congregation there can be so much diversity that it is very difficult
to give an account of the congregation’s identity without occluding exceptions
and conflict or denying the significance of its less noticed members.’[2]
This raises the further question of whether
something akin to a Christian form of atheism may flourish in the future. Given
the religious supermarket of contemporary pluralist societies we should not be
surprised to see this emerging. Some literature is now beginning to appear
which offers this mediating position for those who cannot accept a traditional
belief system but who yet value the language, liturgy and beauty of worship and
the civic contribution of faith communities. Sir Martin Rees, recent winner of
the Templeton Prize, describes himself in this context as a tribal Anglican.
His ancestral links to a faith he does not himself espouse ensure that he
continues to identify with Anglican worship and church life, at least in a nominal
way. Jane Shaw has written that they are many people in the churches ‘who don’t
believe what they ‘ought’ to believe, but need and want to be there for a whole
host of reasons, not least a desire for connectedness with other human being.
They ‘belong without believing’ and they are a significant part of our
worshipping communities.’[3]
Others have sought to develop this
theologically with arguments about the regulative function of prayer,
sacraments, and divine command. We find this both on the part of those who are
declared atheists, but also amongst those who do not inhabit a clearly
delineated intellectual position.[4] Much of this may appeal to those who are
dissatisfied with materialism or scientism but unable to assent to traditional
patterns of orthodoxy. Perhaps the boundaries of the church need to be
sufficiently capacious and indeterminate to allow for this range of commitment
and interpretation within its walls. There are many who hear echoes of an older
faith which continues to resonate if distantly with their deepest longings. In
his exploration of Christian atheism, Mountford notes the resonance for many of
Carol Ann Duffy’s poem on prayer
Some days, although we
cannot pray, a prayer
utters itself. So a woman
will lift her head from the sieve of her hands and stare
at the minims sung by a
tree, a sudden gift.
Some nights, although we
are faithless, the truth enters our hearts, that small familiar pain;
then a man will stand
stock-still, hearing his youth
in the distant Latin of a
train.
Pray for us now. Grade 1
piano scales console the lodger looking out across
a Midlands town. Then dusk,
and someone calls a child’s name as though they named their loss.
Darkness outside. Inside
the radio’s prayer –
Rockall. Malin. Dogger.
Finisterre.
‘Prayer’, Carol Ann Duffy
Carol Ann Duffy’s poem is in this twilight zone between faith and
unbelief. It looks backwards at an older faith but finds echoes of it in the
world around us. Is this a form of reawakening? Perhaps we may conclude with
the question of Rabbi Sacks: ‘Why did God create atheists?’ he answered ‘To
stop us believing too much in the wrong thing.’
Former Chief Rabbi Sir
Jonathan Sacks.
Footnotes
1
Brian Mountford, Christian Atheist: Belonging without Believing (
Winchester, O-Books, 2011).
2
Nicholas Healy, ‘Ecclesiology and Practical Theology’ in Keeping Faith in
Practice (London: SCM, 2010), James Sweeney, Gemma Simmonds and David
Lonsdale (eds.), 127 (117–130).
3 Quoted
in Brian Mountford, ibid., 8. The poem is published in her collection Mean
Time (London: Anvil, 1993).
4 Alain
de Botton’s Religion for Atheists: A Non-Believer’s Guide to the Uses of
Religion (London: Hamish Hamilton, 2012) is an attempt find sense in
religious practice for atheists. However, it differs from the position I am
seeking to delineate here in its confident assertion of unbelief.
