The humorist Alan Coren was told by his publisher that if he wanted to write a bestseller it should be about sport or pets. So he wrote a book called Golfing for Cats. Today I suspect his publisher would tell him to attack religion. Atheism sells.<\/p>\n
First The End of Faith by Sam Harris was a success in the US. Then came Daniel Dennett\u2019s Breaking the Spell, Richard Dawkins\u2019s The God Delusion and A. C. Grayling\u2019s Against all Gods. And now Christopher Hitchens\u2019s God is not Great is high in the charts both sides of the Atlantic.<\/p>\n
There have been, of course, various ecclesiastical ripostes, usually that atheism is itself a faith and you can have secular fundamentalists as well as religious ones. This is fine if we enjoy knockabout polemics, but if we are honest, it\u2019s not good enough.<\/p>\n
There is a story told about the 1st-century Jewish teacher Yochanan ben Zakkai. A Roman challenged him about a Jewish ritual. Pure superstition, he said. Not so, said the rabbi, and gave him an answer that made sense in terms of his questioner\u2019s beliefs. The Roman went away satisfied. But the rabbi\u2019s disciples said: \u201cYou answered him. What will you answer us?\u201d\u009d<\/p>\n
That is the real question. Atheism does not come from nowhere. Agnosticism and indifference do; people drift, religion ceases to inspire, there are other things to do. Atheism is different….<\/p>\n