Secular intellectuals dismiss theology because it’s not derived from science. They are almost completely ignorant of what’s going on in the world of theology. The agenda of the new atheists is disturbing because they embrace a belief system as intolerant, chauvinistic and bigoted as that of religious fundamentalists. They talk about the most fundamentalist and extremist versions of faith, and they hold these up as though they’re the normative, central core. They miss the moral core of Judaism and Christianity, the theme of social justice, which takes those who are marginalized and brings them to the centre of society. They give us an extreme caricature of faith and religion. The new atheism is thus theologically unchallenging, consisting of breezy over-generalizations that leave out almost everything that theologians would want to highlight in their own contemporary discussions of God. A number of prominent authors and scientists have published books in the last two years advocating a new atheism.
The books, which include philosopher of science Daniel Dennett’s Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon, Richard Dawkins The God Delusion, Sam Harris The End of Faith and Letter to a Christian Nation, and Christopher Hitchens God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, have sparked controversy as they present a case for atheism while disparaging religion as being the cause for many of the world’s problems.
Basic to their viewpoint is the notion that sciences discipline of evolutionary biology is the best explanation for all living phenomena, and that includes human ethics and religion.
Four books have appeared in their wake that comment on and counter this new atheism.
Well-grounded in the philosophy of science, Georgetown University theologian John Haught attacks the validity of the methods by which he believes Dawkins, Harris, Hitchens and others have come to their new atheism.
Haught believes these new atheists are pale imitations of the great 19th- and 20th-century atheist philosophers such as Nietzsche, Camus and Sartre, who all realized the devastation the absence of religion would cause. Thinkers in the past believed it would take courage to be an atheist.
Sartre himself said atheism is an extremely cruel affair. He was implying that most people wouldn’t be able to look it squarely in the face.
An impoverished viewpoint results when these secular intellectuals dismiss theology because it’s not derived from science, Haught writes. They are almost completely ignorant of what’s going on in the world of theology. They talk about the most fundamentalist and extremist versions of faith, and they hold these up as though they’re the normative, central core. They miss the moral core of Judaism and Christianity, the theme of social justice, which takes those who are marginalized and brings them to the centre of society. They give us an extreme caricature of faith and religion.
The new atheism is thus theologically unchallenging, says Haught, consisting of breezy over-generalizations that leave out almost everything that theologians would want to highlight in their own contemporary discussions of God.
Chris Hedges, author of I Don’t Believe in Atheists, says that the agenda of the new atheists is disturbing because they embrace a belief system as intolerant, chauvinistic and bigoted as that of religious fundamentalists.
Mr. Hedges points out that in the best-selling book The End of Faith, Sam Harris demonizes Muslims. His assertion ... that the war in the former Yugoslavia was caused by religion was ridiculous, says Mr. Hedges, a journalist for The New York Times stationed in Sarajevo when it was under siege.
The new atheists, Mr. Hedges says, have found a following among people disgusted with the chauvinism, intolerance, anti-intellectualism and self-righteousness of religious fundamentalists. Mr. Hedges shares this disgust, having recently written American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America, in which he charges the Christian right with being the most frightening mass movement in American history. We dislike the same people. But we do not dislike them for the same reasons. This is not a small difference, he writes.
Believers or atheists don’t present the greatest danger, but the threat comes from those who, under the guise of religion, science or reason, imagine that we can free ourselves from the limitations of human nature and perfect the human species. There is wisdom in the notion of sin, Mr. Hedges writes, since all human beings are flawed. Sin is the acceptance that the struggle for morality is a battle that will always have to be fought.
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