Dawkins Part II

So Stefanie loaned me Is God a Delusion, by Eric Reitan, a friend of hers. So, we're back to Dawkins. Anyway, first quote:

"Dawkins may be closer to an authentic religious faith than most fundamentalists: he is devoted to atheism because he is devoted to the truth, because he sincerely wants to believe the truth about God."

Something about those last 9 words haunts me. It feels like a beautiful and daunting invitation. I'm not sure why I don't read it as a cold, rationalistic statement. It feels like I could replace "God" with my wife's name, "because he sincerely wants to believe the truth about Jen."

Something about the idea of truth seeking has been rattling around inside me lately. Not cold, objective truth, but more something to do with courage, trust, and wholeness. A kind of dis-illusion-ment that feels more vulnerable and personal. Having the wholeness of self to ache for honest, clear experience of those around you, your self, your story, your God. It feels different than 6 years ago starting seminary. Less scary, more work.

Evangelism

I really enjoy this story. And I appreciate the kindness in Pen's telling it. The thing is, I'm not sure I entirely agree with Pen. It seems like his logic breaks down. I recall giving the same runaway truck metaphor to a friend when I was a teen, and I remember how much harm it felt like it did to the relationship.

I don't think Jesus gives a spiritual equivalent of tackling someone. There's also the tiny detail where I don't think eternal life is anywhere near the main point. How much would you have to hate someone to have been invited into being fully human, fully yourself, growing and awaking to a kind relationship with your Creator, yourself, and your neighbors, and to not extend that invitation onward?

We can't live in a diverse culture if everyone tackles everyone else in the path of their own subjective trucks. It seems like the deeper challenge is the creativity and spiritual sensitivity to dream of ways that Jesus' invitation could be both good and new for our neighbors. What is it about the Gospel that inherently offers grace and life to Pen as an atheist? I'm pretty sure it's not "concur with my theological positions and abandon your own hard-won integrity." I guess I hear this story, and I find the part where the Bible-guy is enjoying Pen and is present with him as a clear, calm, voice of kindness, and I intuitively sense the Kingdom is on the move. When the proselytizing and Bible enter the picture, it feels cold, dead, lifeless. It feels so hard to offer a packaged religious plan that isn't really just personal colonialism. My worldview is better than your worldview and I'll tackle if I have to.

Peter Rollins talks about being an enticing aroma to the world as being about arousing hunger. He points out that we particularly live in a time when people believe they are full. I wonder about evangelism as hunger-inducing, rather than feeding. I wonder about evangelism as asking, rather than telling. What would it mean to come alongside our neighbors with questions that invite them into re-imagining their understanding of themselves and God, rather than answers.

The God Delusion

Or, Evidence that Demands a Verdict, for Atheists.

I'm several chapter's into Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion, one of the handful of Atheist texts coming out to much publicity lately. In Darkins' defense, I was warned it wasn't a great book. I want to be open to critique of my theism, but I'm going to have to find it elsewhere.

Dawkins sets up the books premise by asking that we imagine a world without religion, a world with no 9-11, no crusades, no Taliban. But thus far, it doesn't feel that he's compelled by a moral revulsion to the holy war and patriarchy that seems so deeply embedded in theism (and a message that would get easy sympathy from me). He seems to be more motivated in his writing by the pathetic idiocy of anyone foolish enough to believe. His sneering contempt for religion feels driven by his contempt for stupidity and intillectual weakness, rather than his concern for the well being of the rest of us.

In all sincerity, I can't remember the last time I read a work this objectifying and stereotyping of any group of people. As a religious person, and a religious leader in particular, I feel Dawkin's loathing of me on every page, for my participation in the Taliban's suicide bombings and the Televangelists fleecing of millions. Any hope of being seen for who I am seems lost in this text.

I was struck by how the Washington Post review of God is Not Great (another book, which I have not read), applies seemlessly to Dawkin's work as well:

"Hitchens claims that some of his best friends are believers. If so, he doesn't know much about his best friends. He writes about religious people the way northern racists used to talk about "Negroes" -- with feigned knowing and a sneer. God Is Not Great assumes a childish definition of religion and then criticizes religious people for believing such foolery. But it is Hitchens who is the naïf. To read this oddly innocent book as gospel is to believe that ordinary Catholics are proud of the Inquisition..."

Dawkins' nievite about the role religion plays in the world seems best summed up by an odd editorial oversight in his introduction. While he's inviting us to imagine a world without religion, he invites us to "Imagine no Taliban to blow up ancient statues." He seems sincerely unaware of the broad implications that without religion, there would be no ancient (Buddhist in this case) statues to blow up.