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The biggest problem with atheists and agnostics is that we don’t
know how to speak without sounding like ass-holes. True, books like
The God Delusion and God Is Not Great became best sellers
last year, and in many ways, atheism is more accepted than ever before.
But atheists—myself included—need to stop being so
goddamned smug about their atheism all the time. Watch any of
the dozens of clips of Christopher Hitchens denouncing God on YouTube:
He’s so insufferable—even more insufferable than Hitchens usually
is—that even the most devout unbeliever has to restrain the urge
to punch the screen. And Richard Dawkins, with his inane suggestion
that atheists refer to themselves as “brights,” is no better.
Douchebags.
Valerie Tarico’s antievangelical book The Dark Side is a
refreshing alternative. Perhaps part of the reason Tarico doesn’t come
across as a snide intellectual is that she is from an evangelical
background: “My faith had been the center of my life since I was
small,” she writes. “Evangelical Christianity was what
I fell back
on when I felt lost. It was my home.” By her own choice, Tarico went to
the evangelical Wheaton College, “a bulwark of conservative Christian
education” whose graduate school is named the Billy Graham Center.
But that’s not to say that faith came easy to her. “I remember
kneeling one night on the floor of my bedroom, crying, pleading for God
to take [my doubts] away, and then crawling into bed with some sense of
relief.” Finally, the life of faith became too much for Tarico to bear:
“Alone, one wretched evening, I swallowed a bottle of pills.” This is
not an atypical experience, of course. You can find any number of
stories like this on exchristian
.net, and it’s important to note
that Tarico’s biographical information only takes up the first few
pages of The Dark Side, to contextualize her quest.
The rest of the book is a humble and sincere exploration of the
Christian faith. Tarico is a psychologist, and she has a good
psychologist’s curiosity for symbols and untruths and true meaning. Her
quest takes her through hundreds of sources—books and websites on
both sides of the religious debate—and she determines that “the
Bible is laden with contradictions” that can be “reconciled only by
contorted logic, improbable conjecture, and leaps of faith.”
For many of these contradictions, Tarico simply had to do a close
reading of the Bible. If, as evangelicals believe, the Bible is God’s
literal word, why does it offer dueling opinions on incest,
circumcision, alcohol, graven images, and infanticide? (Not all of
these failures of internal logic happen by flipping between the New and
Old Testaments. Jesus proclaims in Matthew 5:22, “Anyone who calls
someone else a fool deserves hell,” and then, in Matthew 7:26 and
23:17, he calls people fools.)
Christianity is also inspected within its historical contexts. I
didn’t know, for example, that “for much of Christianity’s first
fourteen hundred years, homosexual behavior was seen as a minor sin
like gluttony or greed.” Others may not realize that in 1616 the
Catholic Church issued a statement that the earth revolving around the
sun was “philosophically (i.e., scientifically) foolish and absurd, and
is considered official heresy because it explicitly contradicts the
meaning of Scripture in many places.”
The book mirrors Tarico’s quest for meaning, and she proves to be a
skilled teacher—in one passage, she equates God blaming humans
for original sin with an adult blaming a child for being molested,
which is an eerily apt metaphor that sets up this beauty of a passage:
“God is an aggrieved party. His goodness has been offended by human
sin, and he is owed something, namely the death and eternal damnation
of all humans. This is the only thing that can appease him.”
But Tarico is, most importantly, never shrill. Like all worthwhile
humans, she is simply in love with the quest for knowledge. She
reaffirms that “Christianity is, to borrow a phrase, one of the world’s
great wisdom traditions.” “What if ideas are like plants?” she asks as
she explores Christianity as a self-propagating idea: “feeding us,
tempting us with practicality or beauty, but sometimes taking hold and
crowding out other ideas that might also feed, serve, and delight us?”
Tarico teaches with grace and humility, she explores the facts
responsibly and with an eager curiosity, and she mercifully applies the
Golden Rule by not belittling the people—evangelicals—for
whom this book is intended. For that reason above all, this is the
finest anti-Christian book I have ever read. 
Thank God.
Perhaps not, by Tarico’s standards. But it isn’t just the reasonable Atheists who have been waiting for something like this to come along. As a staunch Christian debater, it’s more than a small setback that I cannot get the depressingly familiar stereotype of the smug, head-up-his-own-ass Atheist out of my head. I may not agree with them spiritually, but I so want to agree with them as regular people. This isn’t an easy task: Most Atheists I debate with are every bit as smug and condescending as the greats of their lack of faith. They’re discouragingly shitty people on the inside, and, seeing as they are some of the only Atheists I know besides one of my closest friends (who doesn’t help since we never talk about this anyways), I have been knowingly pissed at Atheists in the worst way.
So even if I don’t agree with Tarico in a spiritual sense, I can more than agree with her on a personal, human level, which is just the fix I need. Much thanks to the both of you.
PS Just out of curiosity, is this taking shots at all of Christianity, or, more specifically, just the small-minded, embarrassingly thick-headed literalist evangelicals?
Howdy, A: The biggest target is mainly evangelicals who are into Biblical literalism. I don’t know if I’d recommend this book to a believing Christian who didn’t want to have their faith doubted, but it’s definitely aimed at the S-M.E.T-H. L. evangelicals you described above there.
I’m a small “b” believer, but I just read and enjoyed Hitchens book “God is not great”. I didn’t find it all that smug, although there were some unnecessary snarkiness here and there that defeats the purpose of enlightening people about the true history of organized religion. I think there are more believers out there like me who don’t take Scripture literally or think clerics have a special hotline to God than people think, and we can talk about this without going all jihad-y if atheists can turn down the whole “I’m super-enlightened and you’re a retard who believes in a phoney-baloney God” rhetoric.
There is nothing an atheist can say, there is no tone an atheist can take, nor is there a debate tactic, trick, or rhetoric that comes anywhere near as smug as the person who not only assures you he/she is positive an actual, specific, god exists, but that this person also knows the exact will of this god in all circumstances.
Don’t criticize me for the exercise of my own sound legs, when you have two hind-legs of your own to stand on…if you would just throw away the crutch.
Oh what a bunch of bullshit.
Attacking “new athiests” for smugness is such a limp, reactionary dodge, and it’s double embarrassing when other nonbelievers bow and scrape and apologize and make excuses when believers feign offense to cover their shortcomings in substantive debate. Plus the whole critique is fucking vaaaaaaaague.
Hitchens is a mean old bastard and his polemics aren’t my style, but I stand with him in making atheistic existence visible.
Sorry PC, really like your writing otherwise, but this opening paragraph is unnecessarily divisive and silly.
Even so, sounds like a great book.
Bitches is bitches.
In other words, Christopher Hitchens and Beverly LaHaye are of the same ilk.
Atheists who insist that Christians are idiots because the bible contradicts itself are just as bad as the smug nasty-minded Christians who proudly tell the aforementioned Atheists that they are damned. These people (both camps) generally do damage to their own causes because (thank Jodie Foster’s daddy) we don’t choose to accept their bullshit anymore.
it’s hard to be eloquent with people who want you to burn in hell.
Thanks Paul, I’ll have to check this book out. I found “The God Delusion” to get extremely boring and repetitive about half way through. I was just like, “you’ve covered this 8 times already, move on.”
Hopefully this book stays fresh throughout.
As far as convincing evangelicals? Not gonna happen. They can only convince themselves. You could give them actual, real proof there is no god and they’d still believe, so this isn’t gonna do it.
The difference: Whereas smug Christians tell non-believers they’re “going to burn in hell,” Smug non-believers only say, “you’re wasting your time.”
There’s no damnation on the part of atheists, only nagging questions like “How do you know that?” or subtle facial expressions that beg, “ARE YOU CRAZY?”
Plus, with the never-ending oppression of atheists in American society, they deserve to be a bit cranky.
I remember two old men atheists who came to a pro-choice, clinic-defense rally. They started talking to the people there about their own agenda. I was interested for a few minutes.
That was the day I formed the conclusion that many atheists were true believers in the one and only truth, closed-minded, intolerant and judgmental, thumping their printed tracts, handing out leaflets, and trying to convert others into seeing the light.
It’s pretty funny, in a way.
If smugness is the worst charge that can be leveled against atheists as a class, then I rather think that makes them the least “sinful” of all the “religious” persuasions. Can I get an “Amen!”? 🙂
I’m fine with being smug.
I have a question. First, I’ll disclose that I’m an atheist who grew up in Catholic/Lutheran churches and later rejected the idea of a God. So, here goes:
God created Man in his own image according to Genesis. Man is inherently contradictory and hypocritical in thought – at least I am. We are not perfectly logical beings. We change our minds constantly as we work through the decisions we make in life. If Man is a reflection of God, then why should we expect God to be completely logical and not contradictory? Your answer might be, “well, God is supposed to be perfect.” But who says that perfect means completely logical. Maybe a perfect being is a being that can be contradictory — loving and cruel, judgmental and forgiving, etc., simultaneously. Perhaps this ability to hold two opposing ideas and simultaneously believe in them is a quality that Man lacks? And perhaps only through multiple authors was God capable of writing a contradictory Bible.
Like I said – I’m an atheist and this thought just popped into my head. Care to comment?
Re: And Richard Dawkins, with his inane suggestion that atheists refer to themselves as “brights,” is no better.
I am quite sure the author did not explore what “The Brights Net” really is before commenting on it.
From day one, the word Bright has referred to the Enlightenment, a time when reason and science offered a hope for humanity to move toward a better world. Never have the Brights claimed superior intelligence to supers. “Bright” refers to a worldview, not to the intelligence of individuals who hold that worldview.
The antonym of bright is not dim. The contrast is brights and supers (Daniel Dennett’s suggestion in “Breaking the Spell”).
The Brights’ Net is neither an atheist nor an anti-religious organization. It is a civil action group, working to create a level playing field for all worldviews, both naturalistic and religious.
The Brights’ Net is quite willing to cooperate with religious groups on topics of common interest, such as the separation of church and state and keeping creationism out of public schools.
Over 44,000 individuals have registered as a Bright, from 181 nations of the world. It can’t be all bad.
We invite you to visit the Brights’ website at: http://www.the-brights.net
Paul Geisert, Ph.D.
Co-director of The Brights Net
If people just did a litle investigating they would find that Jesus (God) is a myth just like Zeus or Apollo. We make this shit up so we don’t feel so small. But the truth is that we are this small and human life in comparison to the universe as a whole is just as insignificant as this comment.
In response to Turnip, god is alleged to be omnipotent and one of the qualities of an omipotent god is the ability to do anything that it is logically possible for it to do. This god is also omniscience meaning it knows anything and everything infinitely. So this god knows evetually a book will be written about him and he knows some people won’t believe it. He also knows that it will be filled with contradictions. Why would a perfect being let so many holes creep into his holy book? And further, why would a perfect being create less than perfect humans? Entertainment? Surely this god full of all information ever known does not need us to keep him busy.
Almost more infuriating than generally smug atheists are the atheists who boldly defend their right to be a-holes. They like to portray anyone who isn’t a complete jerk as some kind of milktoast atheist that doesn’t think atheism should be defended. What’s so hard to understand about the concept of expressing our disbelief without resorting to name-calling or arrogant posturing? If you’re using sound arguments, the added bitchiness is unnecessary.
Smugness can be easily misconstrued. I think it’s time for rationalists to stop coddling religious people’s feelings so much and stand up for the truth. We don’t have to purposely go out of our way to be condescending and smug, but we shouldn’t compromise one bit! Just because something has “meaning” for someone, doesn’t make it true. It’s time to accelerate our evolution and that means getting outside of our comfort zones. If somebody is spouting off some crazy religious rhetoric and passing it off like it’s the truth, we should respond appropriately… with ridicule and logic!
Faith as a virtue is very low on the totem pole of the virtues human beings aspire to. Compassion, love, honesty, responsibility, etc. etc. are much more valuable virtues to aspire to. Faith in what exactly? I’m an agnostic, but I assure you my faith is as strong or stronger than most religious people. I just have faith in things that are real! I have faith that all things unknown will be discovered. I have faith that life will turn out just fine for me and my family. I have faith in myself and in my fellow man. I have faith we can all reach our ideals. What I can’t have faith in are bronze age myths and superstitions that have no basis in reality or science whatsoever. I challenge anyone to question my faith or the real faith of agnostics or atheists.
Sorry, I like my atheism snarky.
Its not suprising atheist are smug, cold, and lonely inside. They lack the courage to identify an important aspect of humanity along with mind and body…spirit. An aspect that inspires great art and writing; show me the great art of atheist, and I will show you Michelangelo. This of course is a product of egoism and (by no admission) a lack of security. All the great men in history had a regard for God and spiritual things. All despised men forgot about God (Stalin, Hitler, Mao). GK Chesterton said “The point of opening your mouth, is to shut is on something.” Atheist shut it on emptiness and an assertion humanity is ultimately pointless….why even wake up in the morning. For God sakes.
What I want to know is, how can anybody in their right mind thumb through the 2000+ year old archaic crapola in the Bible and then think to themselves, “Yeah, that makes sense. I can relate to that”? How?
A, there’s really nothing to debate. The Bible is silly mumbo jumbo on its face. Unadulterated horseshit from a culture very distant from our own.
BTW, I’m not entirely a “discouragingly shitty [person] on the inside.”
Karl,
Wow, did you really drag out the same old, atheists are wrong because Marx, Mao, and Stalin were atheists? (Of course you know Hitler was a Catholic and wrote prolifically about his believe in God being in large part the justification of what he did.) A system of belief isn’t true or false based on what some or all the followers of that system do. The system of belief is true or false based only on the actual things believed.
Karl, you will never be respected for your ideas when your ideas are so childish. Although I’m sure you were impressed when you first heard the argument made by some con-man preacher. You probably even dropped an extra five in the basket that day, didn’t you?
You should ask what a person trying to gain when they push an argument that is quickly, easily, and demonstrably disprovable. What are you trying to gain, Karl?
Oh, and one other thing? Could you explain to me what the “spirit” is? And where does it abide? And don’t use the pathetic excuse of proof that it’s seen in the results of man’s creativity. That’s bullshit. We know creativity and “inspiration” abide in the minds of men and women. There is no need to go a step further and say that some how very special creativity comes from the spirit given by god.
And like most theists, you no nothing of history. Do a little reading about Michelangelo and you’ll realize he wasn’t the person you want to make him be. His passion was art, the Church paid him, essentially, like most every great thinker of the era, he was a humanist. He helped pull western civilization from the clutches of the dark ages. You’ve heard of the dark ages, right? The end goal of every religious dogma, complete world control.
To a certain extent, atheists who do not have the tragic and touching personal story Tarico does are bound to sound shrill. Indeed, FEEL shrill in their opinions.
There are an overwhelming number of rank hypocrisies perpetrated and expressed in public by supposedly pious people every day. It is done in groups of friends, the mainstream media, in our pop culture, and virtually every other human forum. That, and these hypocrisies go mostly unchallenged.
An atheist can only watch these displays for so long before they begin to feel personally assaulted by the absurdly self-righteous, and start sounding shrill.
Perhaps we should not let this frustration show, but how else to express the absolute ridiculousness of it all?
When a “scientist” offers the existence of an old man who lives in the clouds and created heaven and earth as the only other REASONABLE option to the evolution of life on Earth, you have to wonder when shrillness should be EXPECTED and JUSTIFIED. These scientists scoff at the idea that Aliens planted life on the planet, but find the existence of an all-powerful, capricious, and interventionist super-being to be nearly self-evident. This is only one example; the list goes on.
I don’t WANT to be cranky, because it just brings negativity into my life. But I FEEL cranky when people, like in my example, get away with saying such stupid crap in public with indignant self-righteousness. It grates. It HAS BEEN grating. It will grate.
If one is “smug” or confident in the fact that one has the ability to reason and the will to use, one rather has the right to be and no need to apologize for it. After all, the ability to reason and the clear will to do so isn’t an error for which one has to apologize. Of course, if one does not have the ability to reason or if one has the ability but refuses to use it, one doesn’t have to apologize to others for one’s disabilities or dysfunctions unless of course you use them to interfere in affairs that are none of yours.
If your stupidity is unavoidable, there are clearly many who will nurse maid you in your disability voluntarily. If your stupidity is avoidable but you do not wish to do so, in the least keep your stupidity to yourself that may harm only you and not others.
That you are uncomfortable with the intellectual confidence of some who have reason for that confidence is understandable but nonetheless irrelevant. Perhaps an attitude adjustment on your part is in order.
As a former evangelical who has pretty much moved into the agnostic to atheist camp, I find the books like The God Delusion smug but also reassuring as they strengthen my beliefs. They certainly load my guns so that I have the ammo to shoot down the next Christian I meet with rational arguments showing their contradiction and foolishness. I’ve even found that I can back people into a logical corner and we sometime part with them truly second-guessing their beliefs. I feel justified because of all the fear and prejudice within evangelical’s worldview but don’t really feel fulfilled by making the simpleminded’s life complicated.
I find it better to move conversation into policy and to get them to agree that we live in a pluralistic society and that dogma and religious law don’t have a place in American democracy. The Taliban has shown what society looks like when you push religion toward it logical political end. I’m interested in Tarico’s antievangelical book as it could lead to respectful conversation but think that the atheist worldview isn’t necessarily for everyone.
As an atheist, I can say that I’m not cold, lonely, or bitter inside. I have a lovely job and a lovely family, I get a tremendous amount of joy out of my friends and my hobbies, pets, art and music. I have a full and rewarding life and I don’t fear death. Most of all, I don’t feel like “something is missing,” which is a popular assumption.
I get angry when I am told that I’m going to hell, when I am accused of being amoral or evil, told that my children are going to hell, when other kids’ parents don’t let their kids come to my house any more. But I am not to the point yet where I can shoot it down – I just automatically defer to the pious, and I sicken myself with that.
When left with my own thoughts or talking with people I know to be like-minded, I am quite hostile towards religion and the religious. But I NEVER bring it to THEM they way they bring it to ME. While I can pride myself on my politeness, I wish I had the guts to defend myself, instead of just saying something along the lines of, “Well, I wasn’t raised in a religious household so I don’t practice religion now.” As if I can’t even think for myself.
They have no shame in letting me know exactly how they feel about my beliefs, so why do I defer? Does anyone else do that? Are we programmed that way by society? Do we just not want to get into it? Do we just have manners that other people lack? All those? Something else? What IS IT?!
If being an oppressed minority means hiding who you are for fear of being abused by the majority, then I think we atheists DEFINITELY fall into that category. So if that leads to bitchiness or smugness or any other outward negative emotion that rubs some people the wrong way, well I’d say it’s to be expected on some level.
Amy,
why did Europe arrive to a Dark Age? was it because European Christian were in some way inferior? No, the Dark Ages was a result of Black Death brought over to Italy by trade ships from China; which pretty much halted all commerce, trade, and art (for the sake of ones life). If you want a defense of “Spirit” read some of Carl Jungs work. Still, I didn’t defend Christianity, but the spirit and God or god. Actually my argument is for what I call “Lutheran-Dialecticalism.” You questioned the Spirit. So is there a mind? After all mechanical atheist would argue the mind is material and there is no such thing as ideas/idealism. And if there really is no distinct mind, there is no distinct individual with no distinct purpose. What I find even more odd is that many atheist tend to be politically left; they will cut sharply Christianity but defend at jerk the Islam in theocratic Arab nations.
I can respect someone for holding honest atheist beliefs. By that I mean one who has actually thought out why he/she is an atheist by reasonble discourse of philosophy or theology. But many choose atheism as a lazy mans way of getting a pass on the debate and dialogue about God, life, death, beginning, end. I don’t defend creationism or its cousins, but don’t tell me all atheist understand the Big Bang or evolution to certainly say ” I’m an atheist.” Most use the term to dodge the brick and mortar of religion without being intellectually honest and debating its merits regarding whatever theology.
I hate to break it to you, but no matter what nonsense either side spews, neither side is going to win. We’re all assholes, don’t think that somehow atheists are worse than us theists or that us theists are worse than atheists.
Personal assholery does not speak for the whole of a people, and assuming that an entire group of people acts one way is called stereotyping. Neither forms of bigotry are beneficial. So, both sides are incorrect when making assumptions about the other.
The question of God’s existence is undoubtedly the stupidest legitimate question that one can ask. There’s really no point in asking it at all, so if you want to see a group of people who really waste their time, look at everyone who actually argues whether theists waste their time or not.
As for the book itself, the reason why I support the book (haven’t read it) is because anything proving that not all Atheists are part of the smug stereotype is a step in the direction of neutral balance. The only problem is that it is a major debate at all.
Debating religion is borderline worthless in my opinion. There’s a small redeeming quality to it, but for the most part, it’s just a lot of anger and stereotypes. Do yourself a favor and give it up. Find your own spirituality or lack thereof, and be content with it. Talk to people about it if you want, but please, don’t waste time getting into an argument about it. If you don’t agree, just say so. Need to educate them? Educate them. But don’t throw opinion in with the facts before the opinion is due.
Karl wrote above, “Don’t tell me all atheists understand the Big Bang or evolution to certainly say ‘I’m an atheist.'”
Actually, Karl, we do. And here’s a music video to prove it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxRTLlCi_…
Karl,
I’m sure youre proud of your half semester of junior college. But when asked to define, defend, or give any evidence of the “spirit” you say, “read Jung,” well, what can anyone say.
Is your other point that Christianity had nothing to do with the Dark Ages? Christ, you are quite a scholar.
I’m guessing you don’t actually know an atheist that’s past their teen years, because your description of them does little to illuminate 94% of scientists world wide that claim atheism, Agnosticism, or non-theism as their world view. But I’m sure you understand science better than those who do it for a living as well, right? Talk about smug.
And then you say most atheists believe the mind is materiel, therefor there is no such thing as an idea. Well, don’t you build the finest of straw men?
I hope you enjoy your life of confusing/impressing the teen girls down at the coffee shop. Those of us that live in the adult world chuckle at your fraudulent/vapid , so called, dialectic.
I would suggest you go back to reading fantasy novels and playing D&D because your grasp of logic is obviously pathetic and derivative. You are a product of the relatively few things you’ve read and heard, you are without thought of your own. Sorry, Chachi.
It’s to bad the small minded literalistic Christians have the biggest mouths.There are plenty of Christians who work hard at helping the unfortunate, and are not judgmental. That doesn’t mobilize the right wing political base though.
P.S. Valerie lives in Seattle.She’s my neighbor on Capitol Hill.
Amy,
no need to get hostile. But don’t assume all science needs the underpinnings of atheism, and don’t assume all Christians disagree with evolution. But to assume we are just a product of Darwinian evolution alone; otherwise why do humans have the ability to disregard their survival for the survival of a complete stranger? Why is it humans have that “voice” that tells them to for a moment not be selfish and help someone who does not share their genes or hope for survival? And a person without such a “inner voice” or moral stop light is either a sociopath or psychopath. If there is no God or spirit, then humans should not care about a complete stranger who has cancer or when someone is out of a home and hungry because they do not share our genes and as an atheist I should only look out for the survival of my own genes. Look at the relief work that a church such as Saint Marks does for those in need. I want to know about all the great atheist organizations that help those in need?
“Atheism is a disease of the sould before it becomes an error of understanding” Plato
“The religion of the atheist has a God-shaped blank at it’s heart.” H.G. Wells
Amy, no need to be hostile or personal…right. Don’t assume all of science must be on the foundation of atheism or that all Christians deny evolution. But if we are just a Darwinian product alone, and looking out for the survival of our own genes, then why care when a complete stranger has cancer or when one is out of home and hungry? In an emergency why does hear a moral “voice” or that internal stoplight that tells one to put their survival aside for a complete stranger if there is no God or spirit. If a person does not have that “inner moral voice” then they are a sociopath or psychopath. It should not matter as an atheist when someone dies or is suffering…it just happens right. Case, look at the relief work on behalf of a religious community such as Saint Marks Catherdral, but where are all the atheist organizations doing relief work?
“In view of such harmony in the cosmos which I, with my limited human mind, am able to recognize, there are yet people who say there is no God. But what really makes me angry is that they quote me for the support of such views.” Einstein
“The religion of the atheist has a God-shaped blank at it’s heart” H.G. Wells
“…But if I were asked today to formulate as concisely as possible the main cause of the ruinous revolution that swalllowed up some 60 million of our people, I coult not put it more accurately than to repeat: “Men have forgotten God; that’s why all this has happened.”
-Solzhenitzyn
“A gram of crank and a blow job, please.” The Reverend Ted Haggard
FireAimReady,
With your music video response to Karl, you SO should have Rick-Rolled him!!!
I’ve lost a lot of respect of _most_ atheists, because their views are like Ms. Tarico’s, a reaction against a certain type of Christianity. (Evangelicals, while seemingly today wield a large amount of power, historically speaking are just local upstarts.) The writer of the review & the author herself both display the attitude that religion=Christianity, and that the opposite of Christianity is atheism.
What is the opposite of a wall?
There are profound differences between Christianity and other religions, and even deeper differences between religion and spirituality. So I find Ms. Tarico’s spiritual evolution to be somewhere in the adolescent stage. She’s rejected her local, small-minded religion after finding that there are contradictions in it. So she runs as far away from it as she can conceive, to atheism. However, she still is displaying the dualistic thinking of her origins, and has yet to accept nuance and subtlety.
First off, Christians have never, ever been united in their interpretations of Christ. Before it became legal, there was no codified way in which to worship. Once it became legal, the disagreements went public, and very, very violent. Within 50 years of Constantine making it the official religion of the Empire, there were riots in Constantinople, Antioch, Alexandria, (among others) where differing Christian faiths (or gangs) killed each other over whose interpretation was the ‘right’ one. That has continued to this day (although props to Northern Ireland, the most recent Christian War to end). It is quite easy to see the hole in that religion, which has always preached peace & love and has constantly acted in the exact opposite way.
Christianity is not the only religion, and religion itself is only a very small (socially-sanctioned) aspect of spirituality. Humans everywhere, throughout history, have had spiritual experiences. A spiritual experience itself is difficult to define, because they are non-verbal, they seem to be independent of the individual, yet at the same time very personal. The best definition I can offer would be “an ineffable feeling of something more.”
The curious thing is that one can have a spiritual experience and still be an atheist, agnostic or belong to a religion. All of those things are merely lenses with which to view the individual’s spiritual experiences. It is a constant in human history that people are exposed to phenomenon which is at the farthest limits of their minds to perceive. Our consciousness puts a stamp on it, using the language of images and explanations that have been drilled into since infancy. So these experiences are attributed to Vishnu or Apollo or the Archangel Gabriel or the Virgin Mary or a genii or swamp gas or thousands of different other interpretations. None of them are any more or less valid, the true value of the religious lens lies in what one does w/ the information.
I reject any and all false dichotomies. My reaction to Ms. Tarico is to congratulate her on pulling down the mask she’s been taught since childhood, and to encourage her to pull down the mask she’s worshipping now. Because the masks never end. Atheists like to congratulate themselves as seeing beyond the nonsense, but they’re still looking at another mask, another lens to view the world. Once people begin to realize that our view of reality is thermo-plastic, great things become possible.
P.S., to Karl: Your historical understanding is misinformed, to say the least. The “Dark Ages” refer to the period of the downfall of the Roman Empire in the West until the crowning of Charlemagne as Holy Roman Emperor, in the 8th C. (I’m only quoting CW, there is still debate on this point.) The Black Plague began in the mid-14th. C, and local outbreaks continued off & on for 3 more centuries. I must say this gross misunderstanding of yours has weakened considerably the arguments you make on other subjects.
This thread has officially de-railed.
Paul, I’m wondering if you’ve read “I Don’t Believe in Atheists” which is completely different from what its title suggests. The author makes the case that smug atheists and rabid evangelicals have the same underlying motivation and make the same mistaken assumptions about human nature.
What a fascinating series of comments, both thoughtful and not. I had to laugh that despite Paul’s assertion to the contrary, some readers still assumed that I (as author of this book) must be angry and lonely. If anything, I am humbled by the small delights of my family life and the qualities of people who are willing to count me among their friends. Then again, I don’t see Hitchens, Dawkins, Harris and Dennett as particularly arrogant either — more urgent, and unflinching, and refusing (because of the urgency) to give deference to beliefs that have the power to kill us all.
Just this evening, as I interviewed former Pentecostal minister Rich Lyons about his journey out of faith. We found ourselves laughing about the velvet arrogance of our former beliefs: that we, among all humans knew for sure what was real; that our instincts, hunches and emotions were the voice of God; that we were personal messengers for the power that created the galaxies and DNA code — and that He just happened to have an oh-so-human psyche. What other hubris could compare, really?
Valerie Tarico
http://www.WisdomCommons.org
Karl,
I’m sorry, but I can only be personal with yo because your ideas are a bit too quaint for me. In your little circle I’m sure an out of context quote is just the thing to bolster the faithful, but in the adult world it’s more about actual ideas, not your play-world stuff. But keep going if you wish. If only there was Viagra for the mind…maybe then you could get it up.
Amy,
I made a mistake in regard to the Dark Age, but more that I was less specific. I had brought up Michelangelo as a spiritual inspiration of art versus art drawn from atheistic or humanistic world view. You state he helped to bring Europe out of the Dark Age. But there was indeed some period in the 14 century of inquiry, art, trade and commerce which was halted by Black Death and also the Little Ice Age which created a minor dark age. Michelangelo came after this. I have made my own personal inquiries into atheism, other forms of theism or poly. I have also had the experience of living in Iraq for two years. But I suppose that those of us who have some gravitation to a supernatural entitiy whoever he, she, or it may be are seen as simple. But the exchange of blogs has shown here that atheist can be as mean spirited or uninviting as their Evangelical counterparts; for which I am not. Rome could be seen as a hallmark of thought prior to the state to vatican exchange entering the Dark Age. But so called enlightened also used man and animals for bloodsport on a mass scale, while the church stopped it. It is also a wonder as to how Francis Collins the former head of Human Genome Project and atheist to become a Theist and stated scientific discoveries are “opportunities to worship.” He describes his own theism as Theistic Evolution. Read The Dawkins Delusion?…by Alister McGrath a former molecular biologist now a theologian.
What exactly is Ms Tarico’s sense of urgency in regards to religion? I would say we live in a much more civil time than previously. I could argue that during WWII or with Stalinism there may be a sense of urgency on the part of the religiously sane to battle atheism for which Stalin, Hitler and Benito who are members. There is indeed argument that Atheism at its endpoint can be just as militant as religious groups can be militant. What is the addend? Politics. But sense of urgency? I feel much more confident in defending this country against a group of 2nd rate thugs of Islam, versus a massive force of Atheist under the banner of Communism. The argument has turned into the fundamentalist arguing the fundamentalist. Why do atheist feel the need to keep battle this argument when by now God or god should be dead. Has not science suppposedly killed god by this point. But one thing will always remain true: nations with only one religion or no religion are unjust and not free. The only free nations are those with a number of religious bodies interacting.
Two cents from a man who loves Jesus…
I have not read Tarico’s book but from some of the quotes in your article I can see that she is badly misinformed on some of her subject matter. That aside, I just wanted to say that as someone who believes in Jesus Christ we are not all the same. And people (like many evangelicals) who twist scripture to justify their hatred and selfishness are an embarassment and sore spot for the rest of us.
So you’re saying that the evangelicals know how to talk to anybody (at all) without sounding like assholes? Atheists can afford to be a tad smug – we haven’t burned or drowned “witches” and sundry other “infidels”, nor started Crusades or other global meddling missions to “save unbelievers” and “spread the good word”, (or, as the zealots of another faith do, beheaded people on television,) and in spite of being among the subjects of Christians’ (and others) millennial-long persecutions, have not condemned those who believe such things to the psychiatric institutions they may well belong.
I am of the opinion that Atheists and non-Atheists alike have the ability to be abrasive in the vocalization of their views.
That said, there are views on both sides that make it impossible to avoid some sort of conflict. After all, one can not be both an Atheist and hold to a religion at the same time, these are opposites.
Both sides can, perhaps, get along with those who don’t take their beliefs on religion very seriously, or who simply don’t emphasize it in their lives, but they can’t exactly share their views without coming off as arrogant.
I think the real question is, how do you deal with arrogance? How should people deal with views COMPLETELY contrary to ones own, when there can be no compromise?
To myself, an atheist, Dawkins doesn’t sound all that conceited. And when he approaches that tone I wind up simply feeling that he’s just stating the brutal truth. A non-Atheist doesn’t see it the same way.
Additionally, I think Atheists have a lot of trouble when talking to believers because a believers justifications for why they believe can, and do, often simply shift when they are confronted with facts that attack their beliefs. They can rely on the idea that all those other, more ignorant, believers just have it wrong. An Atheists only defense is to be on the attack, because their own beliefs are simple and clear by comparison.
It’s like there is this big fluffy cloud called religion and Atheism is this tiny and hard little pebble. If you throw the pebble at the fog, it just kind of shifts to another area.
But the fog will never break the pebble, either.
Karl – sense of urgency? Because a black being elected president is seen as historic, and yet is 100 times more likely than the election of an avowed atheist in this “free nation”.
To be polite, or avoid the inevitable save thyself harangue, most of us simply nod and keep our mouth shut. I think it is great that many are saying “No more – the celestial emporer wears no clothes”.