In my previous couple of columns, I have explored the misconception that religion induces moral behavior. The fact that religious people are often the most ill-behaved isn’t difficult to see.
But the problem with modern religion runs much deeper. On a gut-level, the concept of God no longer carries the weight it once did, even for the most ardent believers. I am not denying that people derive solace from their religious beliefs; the problem is that science has rendered God unemployed.
Before modern science, the activities of supernatural agents — gods and spirits — were the only way people could make intellectual and emotional sense of the world. Evolution had equipped humans to survive in the world, but it had not equipped them to understand it.
This situation produced a lot of anxiety. Human beings have a deep need to make the world predictable and controllable, and cannot live with an intellectual or emotional void. The perception that reality is under the control of supernatural agents who can be influenced by religious ritual proved to be extremely evocative.
Take the now-mundane example of a storm with thunder and lightning. These were terrifying experiences for pre-modern people lacking every piece of scientific knowledge that we now have, so they invented all sorts of mythological tales to explain them.
Now, however, even the most religious show little fear of storms because they accept scientific explanations for them. God is no longer needed to explain such natural processes.
This is what I mean when I say that God has been rendered unemployed. Science has reduced God to a mere luxury for those who find a theistic belief-system meaningful. Before science, however, theism was the only way to make coherent sense of the world.
Even if we accept the nonsense that religion induces moral behavior, religion is still irrelevant for modern people because God is no longer the explosive supernatural force that it once was. God is now just an idea that some find appealing.
Consider the scenes of the Final Judgment that Michelangelo painted in the Sistine Chapel. People really thought that such horrific scenes were soon going to happen on Earth. Nowadays, however, many religious people don’t believe in the literalness of the Final Judgment.
Many believe just because their families do, or because they grew up in an area where religious belief was taken for granted. This is the worst kind of intellectual sloth, as we all have a moral obligation to question both authority and conventional wisdom.
I think we should consider the possibility that, whereas religion was crucial in centuries past in projecting a common cultural identity, it has now become obsolete.
Christian fundamentalists would say that Western civilization would be irrevocably harmed by outgrowing its religious identity. I say that religious identity was an important stage in our cultural evolution — and certainly shouldn’t be forgotten — but it was just a stage.
The problem is that the cat is already out of the bag: Religious belief has already been denuded of its power to mobilize people in common cause because it has been stripped of its intellectual credibility.
Do we really want to build our lives and our culture around an illusion?
Christopher Herrin is a graduate Religious Studies major and a columnist for the Daily Forty-Niner.
Chris,
Stick to the argument or else you just avoid the question – is there a god? It is a very simple one that only requires a one-word answer.
You cannot base the existence of the one true god on the faultiness of past religions, just like I cannot base the value of proven science on the past mistakes of scientists. Yet that is all your argument consists of, making it illogical.
In regards to holding religion under scrutiny, I am all for that. I have told you earlier Chris that I am perfectly fine in living without religion and all that comes with it. I am willing, unlike you, to act as a true atheist in living a completely secular lifestyle. Yet you are the hypocrite on this matter Chris because in a life presumably without god you insist on mankind following some moral code. There is another word for such a code – religion. This is because you cannot prove, independent of faith, that rape/child molestation/murder/stealing is wrong. Yet you insist that mankind not do these things because they disagree with your worldview, which is a result of your faith in your own moral code (yes, you live by religion whether you realize it or not; it’s a religion that makes people like you equivalent to that of a god, which is very arrogant of you). Herein we see your hypocrisy in regards to your arguments against the idea of god and religion.
Can you have laws governing a society to create order? Yes. However, you cannot have the idea of morality (good and evil; right and wrong because the nature of the issue) without religion, which is something you are supposedly against.
Even if truth destroys you, accept it.
For a California State University-Long Beach student to write that “science has rendered God unemployed” is a false conclusion. The fact is that even many of America’s elite scientists have said that they cannot explain how the world was formed from a scientific perspective. Their conclusion: God must have created the world!
god doesn”t exist because history has shown that all religions die or change, and when people no longer believe in their deities then the god no longer exist. One such example is does anyone believe in Thor anymore, do people believe in Athena, or mesuda or appolo. God is not yet become another mythology but as religion changes God will eventually become like all gods of the past; no longer relevant. allready people are relying less on god and more on logic and reason and in the future god will become just like thor; a mythology. devout christians will attack this because they are afraid of the death of their religion. Nothing can last forever and that includes religions , everything is mortal. Many people feel they need a book to give them morals when in fact it is up to them to creat their own. the best example is that the religious text of the past are no longer relevant because all the people who believed in them have been dead for thousands of years; and todays religions will follow the same path and die
So Brian, I am setting up ‘another form of faith’ if I examine the central tenets of religion in a logical manner? Does that make sense? While we’re on the subject is there anything else that we aren’t supposed to examine because it might offend somebody’s beliefs? My feeling is that anything that can’t stand up to the clear light of reason is intellectually bankrupt. I do also think that this anti-intellectualism is at the heart of the collapse of the conservative movement. It is not elitist to think logically and to hold up age-old assumptions to scrutiny. Why are you in college? Isn’t it to develop your mind?
Brian, my argument in this column is very concise and direct: the concept of god — the central concept of all religions — has been denuded of its intellectual value by science. Ancient and medieval people needed gods and spirits to make sense of the world, but we don’t. I used the example of a thunderstorm to show the way that god has been rendered unemployed and unemployable — pre-scientific people needed gods and spirits to make sense of these things, but we don’t. This is something that no religious authority has confronted, and all you seem to be doing is going into hysterics to avoid that central question. There are no gods ‘out there’ who have removed the necessity to think through life’s issues logically. As for the notion that laws lack legitimacy without a god giving them authority, that is medieval absurdity. Our laws derive their authority from our democratic process, and they are binding on us all: religious, secular, liberal and conservative. In a democracy freedoms are always balanced by responsibilities, and under any system of law we can’t just do whatever we want. Even if our laws were given authority by a god or a religion, then they are still the product of a self-interested clergy drafting those laws, which usually treat that clergy as a privileged class under the law, such as in medieval Europe or modern Iran.
FInally, religion is not a sacrosanct category off limits to rational scrutiny. Everything should be subject to logical inquiry. The fact that you have reacted so strongly leads me to believe that deep down you see these weaknesses in modern religion, but don’t want to own up to them.
For these reasons, I am very thankful that our Founding Fathers were as intelligent and prescient as they were and put up a wall betweent the state and religion.
LOL at the last comment.
One thing you’ll realize is that I admit I am a low down dirty dog. However, I look down upon elitist who are just as bad as me but try to act like they’re above it all.
Yeah, I’m full of myself. At least I admit it, and that’s what makes me better than you.
Brian C. “humble”? Now that’s funny. You’re so puffed up and full of yourself it’s literally comical.
Odd that Brian Cuaron didn’t have time to engage the liberal vs. conservative column one more time, but has plenty of time to spew all over the comment section isn’t it? Or was it just that Chris Herrin kicked his quazi-conservative butt? Me thinks the latter
I got off track on the second paragraph of my last post.
If you say there is no god then you must prove that to illustrate how religion is outdated. I have yet to see any atheist prove his atheism, which is actually another form of faith (in the belief that there is no god). Therein atheists contradict themselves.
Herrin,
Your argument is a straw man. If you want to attack religion as outdated or, in reference to your other columns, as hurtful to society then go after the central question: is there a god?
Is there Chris? Because if there is then it is likely that he/she/it may have revealed itself to us (perhaps even within one of the many “mordern” religions). Therefore, your argument against all religion because of the failure of many is irrelevent due to the validity of the one true religion, whatever it is, because that is the only religion that matters in regards to whether or not religion is outdated. Now your argument would work if it attacked only religions that have proved themselves to be illogical. Yet you attack all religions, including the one true one.
Now if you say there is no god then you’re even worse. In other columns, you say that man can have morality without god. Now Chris, who the hell are you to tell me how to live my life? You are worthless, just as I am. You are nothing more than an animal, just as I am. Therefore, you have no moral right to demand of me to live my life according to some moral constraints. Yet you do so when you say rape/murder/molestation/stealing is morally wrong. Therefore, atheist who view life from a moral viewpoint do so as one who thinks so highly of himself that he believes he has the supernatural right to demand of others to live their lives within certain constraints, thereby making the atheist equal in status to that of a god (this is the ultimate jackass).
Now if you want to say you don’t know whether or not there is a god, then you lack critical authority in regards to examining religion since you cannot even come to a conclusion about the central question.
In regards to homoexuals, no man lives unto himself (biblical reference). Therefore, homosexual couplings and their affect on society should be a concern to me, especially when they demand that the state accept their sexually depraved relationships. I would go further, but that’s an argument for another day/night.
So Brian, it’s elitist to think logically and to examine issues critically? Everything should be subjected to common sense, even religion. As for my ‘liberal/religious dogma’ about equality for homosexuals, that’s thoroughly Constitutional–the equal protection clause of our Constitution plainly says that all people are to be treated the same before the law. True, it would be new to extend that equality to homosexuals, but just a few decades ago it was new to extend it to blacks. Brian, have you thought about taking a Constitutional law class to learn about this stuff–the founding document of our nation–or maybe just reading the Constitution all the way through (it’s short)? That way you’ll know what you’re talking about. By the way, you don’t seem to be gay (nor am I) so how would it affect your life if gays had the right to marry? I don’t understand how their lifestyle is being forced on you or anyone else.
Herrin,
The problem you liberals continually run into after making these arguments is your own hypocrisy in regards to religion. You tell me to leave my religious views out of government in regards to abortion and euthanasia; on the other hand, you demand of me to accept liberal/religious dogma in regards to acceptance of homosexuals and their lifestyle (that is just one of many examples).
This is a result of the narcissim of liberals. They like to think of themselves as some advanced group of intellectuals that must declare to the world how idiotic these country bumpkin Christians are. In other words, liberals are jackasses who like to point and laugh at people they don’t think are cool enough to be in their crowd.
Herrin, you are a nobody. You are so void of any self worth that you lack the right/authority to tell me how to live my life. Yet liberals like to do just that, much like you are doing now.
Don’t worry Chris. Neither of us is great. However, only one of us is humble enough to accept that fact and declare it plainly to the public. Only by realizing your lack of your worth as an individual can you see your need of someone higher than you to logically and justly create order in this world of chaos (ie. the god of a religion).
To the second ‘Your name,’ I ‘try so hard to defend my ideas’ because I write a weekly column. I have to write about something, right? Religion is as good as any other topic. Are you threatened or bothered by what I wrote?
one question for you.
if youre so sure that God doesnt exist, then why try so hard to defend your ideas?
Christopher,
I would like to say a few things to you.
I understand that you have an issue with those who believe in God being hypocrites..It is true that people can say one thing and do another..we are humans, though that should not be an excuse to do what the Bible teaches against. But don’t let that be your view of Jesus.
The Bible says that God holds your very breath in his hand. We as humans cannot breath or let alone keep our heart beating. We cant cause the grass to grow or the sun to come up. We arnt in control of the weather or even our lives.
You are more dependent on God than you may believe and I challenge you to know Jesus personally..He can be known if you are really seeking to know Him and I guarantee that 100 percent. It has nothing to do with religion