Frank Scaheffer writes in The Huffington Post [President Obama: Bad News For the New Atheists and Other Fundamentalists].
The Obama presidency is great news for almost everyone. It's bad news for some odd ideological bedfellows: the Religious Right and the so-called New Atheists.Who knew? I bet all atheists and agnostics are feeling pretty stupid right now knowing that they've been tricked by the slick-talking Obama.
Into the all or nothing culture wars, and the all or nothing wars between the so-called New Atheists and religion the election of President elect Obama reintroduces nuance. President elect Obama's ability to believe in Jesus, yet question, is going to rescue American religion in general and Christianity in particular, from the extremes.
There is no way to understand President elect Obama's victory as anything less than the start of not just a monumental political change but a spiritual revolution as well.
And what is the "nuanced" spiritual revolution going to look like?
To the New Atheists who think that with the resounding defeat of the Religious Right, we are entering a secular age, think again. Obama will block your path. He'll do it for the same reason he'll make the Religious Right's paranoid fantasies about him soon seem shamefully ridiculous. That's because President elect Obama is that rarest of all rare people: a thoughtful, compassionate and likable statesman who also is a thoughtful, compassionate and likable religious believer.Sounds like trouble. President Obama is going to block the path to a secular society. Gosh. I knew that American Presidents were leaders of the free world and the most powerful men (no women so far) on the planet but even I had no idea they were that powerful.
President-elect Obama brings another perspective to faith . It goes something like this:Ohmygod. Frank Shaeffer and Barack Obama have discovered the atheist dirty little secret. All of us atheists are flat and dull—we can't be born, get married, or die without calling upon God to help us.
How do cultures define themselves if not through ritual? In the "big moments" of life; birth, marriage, sickness, death "who" -- in the inimitable words of Ghost Busters -- "you gonna call?" As President elect Obama has said, and I paraphrase: Strip the human race of our spiritual language and what do we tell each other about hope?
As President elect Obama has pointed out, a world of all math but no poetry is not fit for human habitation. If everything feels flat and dull, stripped of mystery and meaning who will bother to do the science? Why bother, if all we're doing is serving those selfish genes for another round of meaningless propagation?
So does this faith always make "sense?" No. Because our perspective is from the inside, something like paint contemplating the painting of which it's a part. We're all in the same boat, all stuck on the same "canvas."
Does anyone actually believe this stuff?
[Hat Tip: RichardDawkins.net]
18 comments :
I live a fuller life since I've left christianity.
The only thing I left behind was the paranoia.
Is that the essence of christianity? Maybe.
Quick, someone send this dolt a copy of Unweaving the Rainbow.
Wow, just when I thought we were entering a secular age. Darn!
As President elect Obama has pointed out, a world of all math but no poetry is not fit for human habitation. If everything feels flat and dull, stripped of mystery and meaning who will bother to do the science? Why bother, if all we're doing is serving those selfish genes for another round of meaningless propagation?
Wow - three sentences and chasms of unreason to bind them, all saying so much more about the author than it could ever hope with desperate, flailing words to describe the people he aims to tar.
This is very nearly the same, dribbling rhetoric used to imply that atheists can murder and cheat as they please, which leads one to worry more about whether such an author is teetering on the brink of committing the same because they are so tethered to good behaviour only through their fear and faith.
It is not someone "nuanced" to be feared. The largest enemy is the worship of unreason; if someone is willing to look at what nature has in evidence and what their priest, pastor or shaman taught and decide largely in favour of evidence, then we can largely get along.
The other worry is that someone "nuanced" will react to accusations of impiety by becoming more pious, like the Saudi aristocracy who perhaps never had "nuance", but certainly cannot claim to in our age.
Strange, too, to equate atheists with the Religious Right when even talking about science. True, there are atheists that Do Not Doubt, but it has been my general experience that atheists are skeptics, and false confidence of being in possession of the truth is very much the province of the Religious Right.
Why does he figure that atheists would be doing any science at all?
It disturbs me that such authors are capable of such "weapons-grade projection", as I've seen it quipped. What he thinks he would do in our position shows ignorance and a revolting lack of empathy.
P.S. Larry - why no blockquotes allowed? :)
This is unbelievably stupid, and just bad. The guy wants to write about the "New Atheists" (is there really such a thing? but that's a question that would require... shudder... some reflection!), and all he knows about them is 5 minutes of Hitchens talking on TV that he's seen one day. And he wasn't even listening.
Obama is President, therefore the Millenium is Come and I will be able to drink vats full of soy milkshakes and not gain an ounce, and all the other shite I believe in will be comprehensively shown to be True and Right, ye ignorant fools!
You had to expect a bunch of these wingnuts to come out of the woodwork now that they feel the political mood of the country is ripe for it, but whew, it sure is shake-your-head ludicrous.
this is excellent fodder for an epic XKCD comic...
I think you're missing the point. Maybe athiests don't engage in ritual with those events of life passage, but the vast majority of the human population does. I also agree with the sentiment that a world with all math and no poetry would be a very dull world indeed.
I wrote a rant about this run of the mill religiotic strawman argument but decided the best way to counter it is to point out that, in the wake of the recent death of their Grandmother, Obama and his sister seem to think that supporting rational science rather than superstition might be appropriate; "In lieu of flowers, we ask that you make a donation to any worthy organization in search of a cure for cancer"
So, by governing in a secular manner (and he obviously understands the importance of separation of church and state), Obama is going to disappoint the atheists? Schaeffer must be on drugs.
GNH says,
I also agree with the sentiment that a world with all math and no poetry would be a very dull world indeed.
I'm an atheist and I like poetry.
What's your point?
A quick example of how those religious Obama supporters are producing a 'change' in the world.
From the LA Times:
"Jeffrey Jackson of Lynwood said he struggled with how he would vote on Proposition 8. On the one hand, as a black man casting his ballot for Obama, he said he had a deep and personal reverence for civil rights. On the other, he is a Pentecostal Christian.
In the end, it was that religious faith that guided his decision. "It's straight biblical," said Jackson, 46. "It's just not right."
What's your point?
I think GNH's point was the same as Frank Shaeffer's point: Even if "faith" is faith in a non-existent God, it is better to have faith than not to have faith.
I don't know what else the point could possibly be. They sure don't give any other reasons for having "faith"!
A world where all believers were like Obama would be (if you'll pardon the expression) a helluva lot better than the one we've been living in.
The Ridger, FCD says,
A world where all believers were like Obama would be (if you'll pardon the expression) a helluva lot better than the one we've been living in.
Really? Why do you say that?
I think we would be much worse off if everyone in Europe, South America, Asia and Africa adopted the same version of Christianity as Barack Obama.
I'm much more comfortable with average Roman Catholics, Buddhists, and Hindus than I am with Rev. Wright and his church.
I think we would be much worse off if everyone in Europe, South America, Asia and Africa adopted the same version of Christianity as Barack Obama.
It might be beneficial to read what Obama says in "Audacity of Hope" regarding his religious beliefs. Two things I remember specifically are (1) something he's also mentioned in campaign speeches, that we are our brothers'/sisters' "keepers" (i.e., that we have an obligation to act for the welfare of the disadvantaged); and (2) regarding homosexuality, that one verse in Leviticus should not be interpreted to outweigh all the teachings regarding love for one's fellows, the Golden Rule, etc. He's also spoken about this during the campaign, saying America includes gays and straights alike.
OTOH, #2 above apparently only results in his supporting civil unions rather than full marriage rights for same-sex couples, a "compromise" I consider akin to the original U.S. Constitutional compromise that counted a slave as 3/5 of a person.
I also agree with the sentiment that a world with all math and no poetry would be a very dull world indeed.
People who think that math is dull are no doubt those who flunked it in high school. They should try playing with Fractint on a fast computer for 10 minutes, and see if they still think math is dull. Music also embodies a certain amount of math in its structure (and for that matter, so does poetry).
Hi Eamon,
Attacking someone personally because you disagree with their opinion is a "straw man", something viewed as lame in debate. I made the comment you quoted but in fact I have advanced degrees in math and physics and wrote a book on complex variables. So your assumption-that someone who thinks math is dull must have flunked it in high school-was pulled out of thin air. I didn't say math was dull, I agreed with the suggestion that a world *only* with math would be dull.
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