Atheist Churches, Good or Bad Idea.

[DSeid]

Agreed that it is getting to be time to walk away from this thread.

For the last time – there is no movement to convert people to non-belief. Belief works for you? Mazel Tov! Honestly I am a little jealous. Life is a bit easier if you can believe in miracles and that you will rewarded for doing the right things. Congregations make wonderful support networks. Enjoy! It works for you and you are entitled to your belief.

I see no advantage to non-belief in a personal God who loves me and cares about me and no advantage to non-membership in a majority club.

I have no sales pitch to offer. You should not change; it works for you.

But … despite the lack of any proselytizing, despite the lack of any interest in conversion to non-belief, non-belief is rapidly growing in America.

Only between 1.5 and 4 percent of Americans admit to so-called “hard atheism,” the conviction that no higher power exists. But a much larger share of the American public (19 percent) spurns organized religion in favor of a nondefined skepticism about faith. This group, sometimes collectively labeled the “Nones,” is growing faster than any religious faith in the U.S. About two thirds of Nones say they are former believers; 24 percent are lapsed Catholics and 29 percent once identified with other Christian denominations.

So, with full recognition that atheism offers, literally, nothing, why? Why the growth of non-belief?

Is it as the article posits, a backlash against the Religious Right? I don’t think so. It’s more that belief increasingly does not offer anything more than non-belief, and for some the question is why to believe, not why to not-believe.

Go back in time with me pchaos. Before Christianity. Before monotheism or even henotheism. Why did societies need religion? What functions did these early religions serve? Three functions:

1. They provided a basis for laws. A source of the leadership’s authority.

2. They provided an explanation for the world around us. Stories that explained how the world was created, how the animals came to be, why the sun rose, the rain fell. And implied in that, some hope to influence those events – by prayer and proper sacrifices.

3. They provided a group membership that extended beyond kinships and that extended kinship loyalties to a broader group of us against them, to the mutual benefit of the us. It was part of tribal identity and helped contribute to the strength of the tribe.

Todays world:

1. Laws can exist based on truths that we hold to be self-evident without needing to evoke God or gods. “All humans are created equal.” (Yeah I changed it up some.) So on. We are still negotiating amongst different societies on the planet some exactly how universal these truths are, but keeping god(s) out of that discussion as much as possible makes it a bit less difficult.

2. Science has proven itself a better explainer of why things happen, and more importantly, more effective at predicting and controlling future events than has prayer and sacrifices. Oh sure, some still fight for the revealed truths of their religion … creationism, what evs … but mainstream America has moved on and accepts that science offers better explanations of the sun rising than does any story from any religion.

3. Here is what we are left with. The Church Social. The pies. The club membership. The being “us” not “them.” The extended family. The member of the tribe; part of the Mishpacha. The ever important granfalloons. Part of human nature that we cannot avoid and might as well embrace … but with awareness of how it can turn us darkly.

You seem to require religion for part one. Or think you do. Fine, but recognize that fewer and fewer do.

Part two should only get people mocked and marginalized. To the degree that anti-intellectualism and anti-science is fostered by faith still in this world, faith is a danger to us all.

Part three? There are other clubs to join that offer just as much pie.

So for an increasing number of people the issue is why believe, especially given that the most vocal of believers come off so silly and ignorant?

[Czarcasm]

@Marley23

This has become totally ridiculous. In another thread you said the Second Coming was a metaphor, then you said it’s getting more likely you’ll live to see it, then you said it was a metaphor again. How can you criticize atheists for not having a coherent doctrine when your own views seem to change every post?

Maybe you should ask him for his personal definition of “metaphor”.

[Razncain]

pchaos, earlier you suggested a crumbling cross for an atheist logo, and sorry I wasn’t around to comment at the time. But it did have me thinking of what Lenny Bruce had to say about the cross. Do you think it is a good symbol for Christians? Back when states were still using the electric chair, he wondered if Jesus had been killed not too long ago, would Christians be wearing little electric chairs around their necks instead of crosses?

[Czarcasm]

@razncain

pchaos, earlier you suggested a crumbling cross for an atheist logo, and sorry I wasn’t around to comment at the time. But it did have me thinking of what Lenny Bruce had to say about the cross. Do you think it is a good symbol for Christians? Back when states were still using the electric chair, he wondered if Jesus had been killed not too long ago, would Christians be wearing little electric chairs around their necks instead of crosses?

Or going back to an example I’ve used many times, if Jesus had been hung would there be a little noose on a chain around your neck? Would you call it something like “The Circle Of Life” or whatever the Latin eqivalent is?

[QuickSilver]

Quit imposing your quaint little world view on how atheists are supposed to behave. We don’t eat at the same fucking restaurant for the same reason most of us don’t feel the need to be identified by a common symbol or ritual or belief or book or boogieman up in the sky. We don’t all order off the same goddamn menu, okay? None of this is sinking in, is it.

I have a question for you pchaos. When we’re all fed up with trying to reason with you, do you win?

[Gyrate]

@pchaos

Atheists are no more than 8% of the U.S. population.

That’s the US. In the UK, which actually has a state Church, the percentage of the population reporting “no religion” runs between 25-50%, depending on which survey you look at, and the non-religious are growing in number every year.

[pchaos]

@Marley23

This has become totally ridiculous. In another thread you said the Second Coming was a metaphor, then you said it’s getting more likely you’ll live to see it, then you said it was a metaphor again. How can you criticize atheists for not having a coherent doctrine when your own views seem to change every post?

Ahhh…you’re starting to figure out that consistency is not one of my strong points.

But to me it makes perfect sense. Metaphorically speaking, the Second Coming will occur in my lifetime. However in response to Human Action, the actual Second Coming when Jesus will appear in all his glory. I don’t expect that to happen in my lifetime.

[Gyrate]

And that makes perfect sense to you?

[QuickSilver]

@pchaos

Ahhh…you’re starting to figure out that consistency is not one of my strong points.

Neither is intellectual capacity.

[Marley23]

@pchaos

Ahhh…you’re starting to figure out that consistency is not one of my strong points.

Understatement obviously is.

It’s kind of remarkable that you have the gall to criticize other people for not having fully formed doctrines when you can’t decide what you believe from moment to moment. To make matters worse, their views are often much better fleshed out than yours are and you just fail to understand them. That takes considerable nerve.

[Czarcasm]

@pchaos

Ahhh…you’re starting to figure out that consistency is not one of my strong points.

But to me it makes perfect sense. Metaphorically speaking, the Second Coming will occur in my lifetime. However in response to Human Action, the actual Second Coming when Jesus will appear in all his glory. I don’t expect that to happen in my lifetime.

Y’all remember what I said about asking for his definition of “metaphor”?

[DSeid]

pchaos, you do understand that the best sales pitch for non-belief comes from contact with people like you?

[Cyros]

@Gyrate

And that makes perfect sense to you?

Well, it is logical and rational. I mean, when my metaphor is out to dinner the monkey cage shines in the plate.

[pchaos]

I’m not here to proselytize…I seem to have heard that somewhere.

[Telemark]

@pchaos

I’m not here to proselytize…I seem to have heard that somewhere.

But this is the Great Debates forum, and you don’t seem to be interested in an honest debate either. Why are you here?

[Czarcasm]

@pchaos

I’m not here to proselytize…I seem to have heard that somewhere.

Then why are you here?

[DSeid]

It is also the place for witnessing … if you feel you must.

Not quite the same thing.

And I think he is attempting to do the latter. Sort of.

[Great_Antibob]

Well, if he’s trying to set up some kind of equivalence between Christianity and atheism, he’s failing badly.

[pchaos]

@Czarcasm

Then why are you here?

Initially, I thought atheism was interesting because I had experimented with Marxist thought at Cal. At one time, I thought that “religion was the opiate of the masses.”

But so far, atheism has turned out to be a little disappointing because it is really at the beginning stages of pulling itself together.

[x-ray_vision]

@pchaos

But so far, atheism has turned out to be a little disappointing because it is really at the beginning stages of pulling itself together.

Being without a belief in the existence of gods is at the beginning stages of pulling itself together? How are you defining “atheism” this time?