Wanted: A Theology of Atheism

By Molly Worthen

Sam Harris’s 2004 best-seller, “The End of Faith,” compared religion to mental illness and dismissed even religious moderates as dupes of a “dilution of Iron Age philosophy.” More recently he’s gotten interested in promoting science as a universal moral guide. This proposal is an old one. The 19th-century French philosopher Auguste Comte and the American intellectuals Walter Lippmann and John Dewey all wrote that moral progress depended on the scientific method.

Morality depends on “the totality of facts that relate to human well-being, and our knowledge of it grows the more we learn about ourselves, in fields ranging from molecular biology to economics,” Mr. Harris told me. He has stressed the special role of his own field, cognitive science. Every discovery about the brain’s experience of pleasure and suffering has implications for how we should treat other humans. Moral philosophy is really an “undeveloped branch of science” whose laws apply in Peoria just as they do in the Punjab.

Pragmatist philosophers like Philip Kitcher offer a different approach to the question of atheist morality, one based on “the sense that ethical life grows out of our origins, the circumstances under which our ancestors lived, and it’s a work in progress,” he said. In the pragmatist tradition, science is useful, but ethical claims are not objective scientific facts. They are only “true” if they seem to “work” in real life.

“Successful experiments” — the trial and error of weighing self-interest against the needs of the community — “built the human conscience,” Mr. Kitcher wrote in his 2014 book, “Life After Faith.”

“People and societies may balance valuable things in different ways,” he told me. “A certain kind of pluralism is O.K.. But that’s a long way from moral relativism. A bedrock of ethical truth emerges and remains stable.”

The average nonbeliever may know even less about his tradition’s intellectual debates than the average Christian does — because its institutions, like Sunday Assembly, tend to be tiny, relatively new and allergic to anything that resembles dogma. But nonbelievers should pay attention. Atheism, like any ideological position, has political and moral consequences. As nonbelievers become a more self-conscious subculture, as they seek to elect their own to high office and refute the fear that a post-Christian America will slide into moral anarchy, they will need every idea their tradition offers them.

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Here's a passage I really like from Peter Rollins' theology book "How (Not) To Speak Of God". It's a discussion of the role of doubt in Christianity, which I would say isn't looked at in a positive light. When Christians see other Christians start to falter in commitment, it's usually seen as something 'from the devil' or, generally, bad news. Rollins writes from a different perspective, one where doubt is seen in a positive light as something that can reinforce faith. Here you go:

A/theology does not deny the existence of revelation but rather affirms the idea that revelation is in no way opposed to concealment, but rather has concealment built into its very heart. In order to express this approach, we must engage in a type of fractured discourse as evidenced by Jesus in the opening words of the Lord's Prayer. Here we read that Jesus taugh his disciples to pray by beginning with the words: 'Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.' Here God is named 'Father', yet immediately the prayer acknowledges that this name is 'hallowed'. We we are thus informed that the name is holy and set apart, operating in a way that is other than we imagine, transcending all earthly names and escaping our attempts at definition. God is simultaneously both named and unnamed, reminding us that our understanding of fatherhood is profoundly affected by our cultural embeddedness. This becomes clear as we consider how the idea of fatherhood differs between cultures existing at the same time and within cultures at different times. Indeed, even the most fundamental statements, such as 'God is love', need to be deconstructed in this way, for while we can all agree that believers affirm the central idea that God is love, if we were to ask a dozen Christians from around the world to write an essay on what this means, there would be a wide diversity of thought. While we may say that God is love, we must acknowledge that God is also hallowed, and thus my understanding of love will be inadequate.

Yet an objection can be raised that this perspective fundamentally undermines the Christian faith, for if God cannot be adequately grasped, then how can we know for sure that what is grasping us is God? It is argued that if the emerging community follows this line of thinking, then it will ultimately find itself hacking away at the tree under which it shelters, for surely everything is radically undermined  by the uncertainty that ensues from the idea of God as [inconceivable].

The problem with this objection is not that its main insight concerning the introduction of doubt is incorrect but rather that it fundamentally misunderstands the role of that doubt within religion. In contrast to the moder view that religious doubt is something to reject, fear or merely tolerate, doubt not only can be seen as an inevitable aspect of our humanity but also can be celebrated as a vital part of faith. Doubt has often been disparaged, or merely tolerated, because it is seen as leading to an inert state of undecidability in which nothing can be believed or acted upon. Yet in reality it is only in the midst of undecidability that real decisions can be made.

For instance, take the example of two people getting married with the firm conviction that the union will last as long as they both live. In this state of obvious delusion no real decision needs to be made. The future is believed to be so certain that the decision to marry requires no decision at all. Yet if two people understand that their relationship will face various hardships, that the future is uncertain and that there are no guarantees, then, far from preventing a decision, this is the very point when a real decision needs to be made. The vows of marriage are not so much affirmations of what one believes will take place but rather promises that one will work towards ensuring that it will indeed happen. To decide for marriage knowing that all manner of things may conspire against the union is to make a truly daring and authentic decision - the only type of decision worth of the name. Here we can see that doubt provides the context out of which real decision occurs and real love is tested, for love will say 'yes' regardless of uncertainty. A love that requires contracts and absolute assurance in order to act is no love at all.

Find the book here.