Hostility to Faith - Why?

I was asked why I am so hostile to faith systems and the person who asked immediately apologized for fear of having offended me.

My response was: "I am not offended because I am in fact hostile to religion and to any system of faith, not to religious people, mind you, but to religion and faith in themselves".

And then I answered her question:

Religion (faith) hurts people:

It tells them lies about the world and it tells them lies about themselves.

It rails against what it disagrees with, using circular arguments which do not stand up to scrutiny and yet it demands respect and insulation from criticism in the free marketplace of ideas.

It hides behind an illusion of sophistication while in reality it offers, at best, sophism which justifies patently ridiculous propositions and, under its covers of theology and apologetics, offers a shield of lies which provide neither a path to understanding nor a growth in knowledge but, rather, a convenient distracting cover to persist in willful ignorance.

It frightens trusting people into compliance and it provides a forum for manipulators to practice and perfect their skills at the expense of those who trust them.

It demonizes honest inquiry and it punishes honest doubt.

It discourages thinking and it rewards flights of fantasy.

It preys upon the weak and vulnerable, offering false hope in exchange for total subservience.

It gets a free ride while the rest of us carry its weight in extra taxes, all the while insisting that its adherents support it generously with a minimum of financial accountability.

And it inserts itself in the political sphere where it seeks a privileged place to dictate the mores of society, not in accordance with the needs, wishes and desires of the populace but in accordance with its ignorant past.

So I ask you, how can one NOT be hostile to it?

 

Feeling a little cocky - so here goes! …

Occasionally, I am confronted, regarding my atheism, by folks who are not bent on winning me to their beliefs. And it is with these that I have the most interesting discussions and actually walk away with insights, about myself and others.

Normally, the position I take, the only honest one in my opinion, is that, while I have few answers to the 'big' mysteries of life, I have a mechanism to explore them and to grow in knowledge and insight and to shed erroneous notions when they appear outdated and are dysfunctional.

No honest person can claim any valid notion of absolute certainty without presenting credible or testable evidence. And, unless one can do so, one must be open to revision and correction. By definition every faith system fails this test because all faith is built on, ultimately, subjective perceptions whether they be personal or communal.

And lest I be confronted with the sophistry that I've just made an absolute statement and thus contradicted myself, be it known that I make this statement provisionally, knowing that in the long history of human experience it has never been shown to be inaccurate. I am a betting man and I am comfortable with odds like that.

So my position is simple. Human subjective experience is unreliable and there is no reason to posit anything outside of nature which transcends this subjective hurdle.

My atheism is simply the result of this observation. My worldview is built upon that and, what I've found, is that it's this implication of my atheism and not my atheism itself which thinking people find to be unsettling.

Few of us feel comfortable with an uncertain universe: one devoid of inherent meaning or purpose. But our lack of comfort with it does not change it and, at least in my opinion, is not a moral reason to deny it.

I point out that the responsibility to create personal meaning is a tremendous privilege, one not granted us by intent but only contingently by the emergence of our unique cognitive abilities. Because it is contingent it is not guaranteed nor is it of indubitable necessity.

But those of us who have grown comfortable with such a universe, have availed ourselves of limitless possibilities for meaning and happiness and freedom to grow and prosper and to impart the fruits of that to whomever we come in contact with or to savor it for ourselves as we see fit.

No other perspective can be so healthy or liberating and, in my humble opinion, will pass the test of time and true utility.

So my case for atheism is one of potential and possibility and, while it cannot claim certainty of fact, it can claim confidence of procedure and it will make trivial any other perspective by its mere demonstrability - something no other 'ism' or creed has ever or could hope to ever do.

 

LIFE UNTIL DEATH

One thing that has been clear to me since I abandoned any of the trappings of a personal religious life is that life itself has taken on a lot more color with the understanding of its sure terminal quality. Knowing (or at least not having the false assurance to the contrary) that my life is incidental, and not subject to an eschatological focus, has removed a lot of the hesitation which comes from trying to second guess the direction I should take.

I think that the firm assurance that our lives are nothing more or less than what we choose to do with the bag of tricks we find ourselves accidentally vested with, provides us with the opportunity to focus our intentions, not on the "right" path, but the path WE choose to follow.

Similarly, knowing that a mission in life is neither a guarantee nor a talisman which will ward off the non-determined day of my last breath, oddly enough, gives me the breathing room to actually live, dream and work toward realizing the future that I want - regardless of whether I actually achieve it and regardless of whether I even choose to stay the course or change course.

Life is not the anteroom of a better existence; it is not the test or the dress rehearsal. Rather, it is the only shot, the only day in the sun, the only opportunity to see, feel and share the pleasure of being and to be whatever our accidental existence permits us to shoot for. Of course, while I cannot claim this with the absolute certainty of an omniscient perspective (as if such a thing even exists), I can confidently assert that no one in all of human history has been able to put forth a single coherent argument to the contrary, i.e. an argument without special pleading or appeals to flights of fantasy or other modes of delusion , or, at least, self-deception.

And so, I am wholly confident that, when the inevitable day comes when my body no longer functions and I wink out of existence, I won't be cognizant of the things I've done nor failed to do. I won't rue the moment that I acted nor failed to act. I won't face an accounting of my failures nor a reward for my virtues.

Rather, like a candle's flame which when extinguished, simply is no more, I will pass into the eternity of oblivion, of nonbeing and non-existence.

And THAT, I find extremely comforting.