Where once secularism and humanism were relics of a bygone religious age, its voice is important again. But pointing out the blindingly obvious need to keep faiths in their private sphere has united religious gunfire against secularists. All atheists now tend to be called “militant”, yet we seek to silence none, to burn no books, to stop no masses or Friday prayers, impose no laws, asking only free choice over sex and death. Religion deserves its say, but only proportional to its numbers. No privileges, no special protection against feeling offended.
The director of pastoral affairs in the Westminster diocese, Edmund Adamus, says Britain has become a “selfish hedonistic wasteland” of sex and secularism. He echoes the supreme arrogance of all the religious who claim there is no morality without God. Nonsense, but unlike the religious the godless claim no moral superiority. Wise humanists know that good and bad are pretty evenly distributed. Humanity has an innate moral sense, without threats of divine wrath and reward. Good and bad works are done by both the secular and the religious. But wherever the institutions of religion wield real power, they prove a force for cruelty and hypocrisy.
Atheists are good haters, they claim, but feeble compared with the religious sects. Atheists have dried-up souls, without spiritual or visionary transcendentalism. To which we say: the human imagination is all we need to hold in awe. Live in optimism without fear of judgment and death. There is enough purpose and meaning in life, love and leaving a good legacy. Oppose the danger of religious zealotry with the liberating belief that life on earth is precious because this here and now is all there is, and our destiny is in our own hands.
I genuinely feel a great deal of pity for atheists.
They have no equivalent, genuine theology as a positive expression of their belief and if they could come up with one it would sound amazingly religious. This must be a great source of their anger and frustration.
Note: If you wan’t to live your life based on whatever desire you happen to have at the moment and by whatever form of logic your human mind can fashion, fine. Don’t blame religion later.
Given the soft and genteel nature of the C of E, I always find myself perplexed by the ferocity of English secularists.
“There is enough purpose and meaning in life, love and leaving a good legacy.” Why? It’s all meaningless. You don’t exist after death so what is the point in a “good legacy”? Given that everything is driven by blind mechanics of nature to no end and no meaning why should a secularist care beyond satisfying his or her own immediate needs, wants and desires? And why should they care about anyone or anything except as they are useful to oneself?
Where Ms. Polly sees ‘sex and death’, I see love and life. I guess it all depends on the light (or darkness) you see everything by.
[blockquote]Given the soft and genteel nature of the C of E, I always find myself perplexed by the ferocity of English secularists. [/blockquote]
She teeters on the brink of final despair. Pray for her soul.
Some bio on her: “Toynbee was born on the Isle of Wight. Toynbee was the second daughter of the literary critic Philip Toynbee (by his first wife Anne), granddaughter of the historian Arnold J. Toynbee and great-great niece of philanthropist and economic historian Arnold Toynbee after whom Toynbee Hall in the East End of London is named. After attending Badminton School, a girls’ independent school in Bristol, followed by the Holland Park School, a state comprehensive school in London (she had failed the Eleven Plus examination), she won a scholarship to read history at St Anne’s College, Oxford, despite gaining only one A-level. During her gap year she worked for Amnesty International in pre-independence Rhodesia, before being expelled by the government, and she published a first novel, Leftovers, in 1966. After 18 months at Oxford, she dropped out, finding work in a factory and a burger bar and hoping to write in her spare time.”
In other words, a not very bright leftie with some distinguished wealthy ancestors, which explains how she got into (and wasted her place) at Oxford. Pretty much how the British class system works.
#3. You are right of course, but to try to convince an self-described “atheist” that much of their belief system was actually directly or indirectly influenced by Judeo-Christian values and consequently they are not really atheists. Pure atheism is an incredibly dark and nihilistic place that thankfully, few of us can actually dwell.
[blockquote] Humanity has an innate moral sense [/blockquote]
Yes, for which she perhaps needs to ask, “And just where does this come from?” She assumes there’s good and bad. So how do human beings intuitively seem to know what’s good or bad. She might benefit from the writings of a former atheist, C.S. Lewis, if, that is, she opened herself to what he had to say.
Ross
#8, she should also ask who decides what is truly moral when two human’s “innate moral senses” are at odds!
7, you do it by forcing them to confront their own worldview and live in it. You drive them into the inherent nihilism.
There is a jolly good book out called The Loser Letters which is in the vein of Screwtape Letters that is a satire of New Atheism. Our adult book discussion group is reading it, and it is a riot.
Actually, half the stuff she said could have come from scripture itself. That good and evil are pretty evenly distributed is in scripture; and it’s a misreading to think that religion is more preoccupied with sex and death than anyone else. In fact, it is precisely because human beings are always preoccupied with such that religion is important.
Gawain, *everything the devil said came from Scripture, he (she? – mustn’t be sexist) just got the order different.
If one can live without fear of judgment, then there are no guides saves one’s own wishes. The problem then becomes whether one can live without fear of judgment from one’s own conscience – or its equivalent.
If one can do that, one has achieved a lasting amorality, a state which permits everything and anything so long as it satisfies one’s whims and wishes, however transient. And one’s hates as well.
It is so common to observe that this piece, as are others like it, is one long judgment from beginning to end. Larry
Alcuin – I concede your point. However, I do think sometimes Atheists ask the hard questions we should be asking ourselves, even if their view of our faith is a patronizing caricature. Her mistake is the insinuation that without “religion,” (which is never quite defined) the problem of sex and death would disappear.
When they ask the hard questions, then we should be ready to answer – or shut up. The problem is that they rarely ask real questions, when they ask them at all. They commonly ask what they suppose to bhe rhetorical questions. And then they pontificate because of their certainty that they have hold of the truth by the right handle. The entry above is in fact as shallow as it is obvious because we are listening to a child fret and whine. L