We’re always talking about atheism here, and we each willingly put ourselves into the camp of atheist/agnostic or not. But there’s another category of people out there – I would say a very large category – of what I call practical atheists. These are the people who profess a certain religious belief, but implicitly deny it by their actions.
Let’s take a test case: one Mitt Romney. Now, we know two things about him: 1) he professes to be a conservative Christian and has staked out positions (on homosexuality, for example) that are consistent with that profession; and 2) he’s filthy rich, with a fortune recently estimated at around $200 million.
Here’s where things get awkward. In the New Testament, Jesus is not that big on condemning – he says nothing about homosexuality, for example – but on the subject of wealth, he’s absolutely categorical: “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God,” he says. Or again, “But woe to you who are rich, for you have already received your comfort.” Or again, “No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.”
So what are we really to think here? Are we going to take Romney’s profession at its face value, or are we going to hold him to the standards of what Jesus unequivocally says? For myself, I don’t hesitate to peg him as a fraud. “By their fruits ye shall know them,” after all.
You’re really asking for more of a theological debate here than anything else, and it’s one we’ve had many times over. Suffice to say that no matter how that debate comes out, however, I think it’s pretty obvious that someone can be a Christian and not care about your interpretation of those passages, at least for some definition of Christian. If he believes in god, he’s not an atheist, not a “practical atheist,” or anything like that. For all we know, the God he believes in could be in fact mega-pissed that Romney is so rich, but that still doesn’t mean that Romney is a non-believer.
Atheism has nothing to do with your OP. If ignoring parts of a religion you don’t like counts as atheism, then there are no Christians in the US, only atheists. Probably most other religious followers too.
IIRC, Christ also said parents should kill their kids if they are disobedient. Does that mean Christians with living disobedient children are atheists?
Atheism means a person does not believe in a god. It does not mean a person simply isn’t blindly obedient to every little teaching of his or her professed religion. Let’s not dilute the term to meaninglessness.
I thought this would be about the (IMO) decently large amount of the population who says they are religion X but, really, just go along with the flow and aren’t church goers, don’t pay attention to their religions very much, and know the stuff in their holy books is a bunch of BS. These people could potentially be ‘deconverted’ into atheism given enough of a push or if they cared enough to delve into the subject matter.
Your OP, instead, is just weird. Why Mitt Romoney in particular? This applies to any politician. It also applies to just about any Christian because Christ said a lot of weird things and following them all is pretty difficult, taken in their totality and not cherry picked for a feel good moment. Being a Christian isn’t about doing everything Christ said, anyway.
I agree with the previous posters. In fact, I think there’s an interesting discussion to be held around where one draws the boundaries between Christians and non-Christians. For myself, I define it thusly: if you sincerely consider yourself to be a Christian, I’ll call you a Christian.
I’ve met Christians who absolutely despise this approach, because it means I consider scumbuckets like Fred Phelps to be Christian, and they can’t stand being lumped in with Phelps in this manner. I understand why they dislike it so much, but as a nonbeliever, I’m not sure how else to set up a fair definition.
I could try defining “Christian” as “a person who attempts to live their life according to the precepts described by Jesus in the New Testament.” The problem is, this definition doesn’t get much better. I think Fred Phelps believes that he is doing just that. Sure, he’s utterly delusional, but how do we weed out the delusional through such a process?
I could define “Christian” according to specific precepts: someone who tries to show love to their neighbor, for example, or even someone who believes that they ought to show love to their neighbor, could be Christian, if they’re holding these beliefs because of Jesus. The problem there is that the New Testament attributes a lot of beliefs to Jesus; which ones should be central to the defintiion? If someone does not believe in turning the other cheek, ought I not consider them a Christian? If they believe there’s nothing wrong with enjoying the acquisition of material wealth, should I not consider them a Christian? What if they believe that it’s okay to throw stones despite not being without sin?
As a nonbeliever, I don’t have any way to determine which of the beliefs is the sine qua non of Christianity. So I use a much broader definition: if you call yourself a Christian and mean it, you’re a Christian.
It’s important to put those verses about wealth into context as well. In your last example, Jesus goes on to say:
Bolding obviously mine. The argument can be made that Jesus isn’t condemning wealth per se, but the blind accumulation of it and making it the center of your life instead than God. Material goods are resources to be respected but not exalted, as in the parable of the talents where the unrighteous steward buries his talent while the good stewards invested theirs wisely and made more.
I don’t think there’s an interesting discussion. I’ve read threads similar to your post that go on for dozens of pages, which confuses me. If someone doesn’t do what Jesus said who cares? It doesn’t impact his views of the supposed Christ. If he thinks there’s some divine stuff going on with Jesus then he’s a Christian, plain and simple, even if he eats babies for breakfast.
18 If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey the voice of his father, or the voice of his mother, and that, when they have chastened him, will not hearken unto them:
19 Then shall his father and his mother lay hold on him, and bring him out unto the elders of his city, and unto the gate of his place;
20 And they shall say unto the elders of his city, This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton, and a drunkard.
21 And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die: so shalt thou put evil away from among you; and all Israel shall hear, and fear.
One wonders if it was just a cruel joke that God created things like autism, (real) ADD, and schizophrenia and then also created this commandment.
Restated by Jesus:
It certainly SEEMS like Jesus is, at the very least, sort of disgusted with the Pharisees for not following the law. I’ve heard decent interpretations that Jesus in fact doesn’t want this to continue, but it’s not like Jesus exactly mourns any of the victims of this practice before he decided “oh wait, it’s Friday? That means morality is different now!”
Every Christian I’ve ever asked has a ready response when they do something that the Bible seems to be against- that’s not what it meant, you can’t take everything literally, etc. etc. I recently saw a vanity tag on a luxury auto that said “godblsd” or some such nonsense, implying that God values ostentatious shows of wealth. The Bible (I’m told) strictly forbids women from being preists, yet there are women priests. I say either take all of it literally or none of it literally.
But that’s basically what I would say. If you’re the type of Christian who is going to say, “I believe in heaven, and I believe the Bible tells you how to get there,” but then you don’t do what the Bible quite clearly says you have to do – well, what am I supposed to think, as a disinterested observer? To me the obvious conclusion is that people don’t really believe in what they claim to believe, because they don’t act in accordance with those beliefs. They are, in a word, atheists – not self-professed atheists, obviously, but atheists to my critical eye.
Yeah, well, every time I have a question about organic chemistry, the professor seems to come up with some way to explain it away. Sounds pretty fishy, if you ask me. Therefore, all orgo is wrong.
Sal, that still just doesn’t make any sense. Even if someone is irrational and has all sorts of zany beliefs that don’t match up, none of that negates the fact that they do, in fact, believe. So what’s the point of calling them atheists? It’s just false. Being a bad believer does not make you not be a believer.
You (plural you) should probably understand that (a) Christians differ, and many of the more vical American churches aren’t very big and/or are tiny compared to global churches, and (b) Biblical emphasis it’s a peculiar American trait. The RCC for instance (Orthodox, too, I believe), are more likely to refer to St. Paul, St. Auistine, and the like for guidance. Jesus seems to have enjoyed rather prone to dramatic statements; translation and retranslation did not help. The early Church fathers, though, who knew Him best, came to understand what he meant.
It’s certainly true that one should not look at any one statement by Christ as definitive. Instead, read whole passages, look at what He himself did, and his followers, and then think about it for a while. Then you draw your conclusion.