In 2004, Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, gave a lecture in which he began with an examination of “atheism”. It is his conception of what “atheism” is that is at issue. At one level, the analysis of atheism by Williams is insightful. He identifies two distinctive strands of modern atheism:
1) Protest atheism, characterised as a moral repugnance at the concept of an all-loving God who allows evil to exist in the world, or repugnance at the vindictive Old Testament tyrant (the name Dawkins springs to mind here).
2) The atheism that views religion as some sort of force for social control, as in Marxism. Here, religion is seen as diverting attention from an imagined “real” state of affairs.
Williams is identifies what might be seen as a sub-division of the first definition, one that says, without any empirical evidence, there is no justification for belief in a God. Stemming from the philosophical school of logical positivism, the intellect is merely consigned to checking that which can be checked, and dismissing all else as ‘emotive noise’.
Taken together, these three elements do give us an insight into atheist thinking – but I’m not sure that he has captured what it means to be an atheist entirely.
To take issue with the way in which he deals with what he sees as the minor strand in modern atheism, firstly. It is depicted as an apparently inexplicable “left-over” from the logical positivist project, when the system itself ‘no longer has much credibility’. Whether or not this account of the origin of this form of atheism is correct, the fact that the logical postivist school of thought lack credibility is in no way detrimental to the insight either proffered by positivism, or supported by positivism – that if there is no empirical evidence, no rational reason for believing in God, then there is equally no rational reaon for doing so. That seems to me the basis of any rational enquiry, and the conclusion one is forced to draw is critical to a significant point that the Archbishop appears to have missed.
For if the existence of God is not subject to empirical study and rational enquiry, and logic and evidence cannot be meaningfully deployed on either of the debate, then belief in God becomes a matter of faith. And at that point, a distinctive, third-type of atheism emerges: the one who simply lacks the faith in any particular version of God brought to his/her attention.
As it falls outside of that realm of rational debate, no reason is necessary or required to justify a lack of faith. When I say that it falls outside of the scope of rational debate, I mean to say that faith is non-rational, rather than irrational – the latter implying a belief – or action – that is utterly inexplicable or contrary to reason. When I say it is non-rational, it is not to preclude sincerely felt intuitions or reasons that may be offered to justify, either the act of faith, or indeed non-faith. But the argument as to whether god exists is ultimately not one that can be settled by rational discourse.
This is a key point, because a number of people of faith tend to believe that there should be reasons for not believing in their particular brand of God, and that these should be produced. I cannot emphasise how erroneous such a contention is. Non-belief does not require any more rational justification than the simple observation this simple observation – that belief in a deity is a matter of personal faith, and personal faith alone. That may not be a satisfactory response for the believer, but the problem lies with the person of faith, not the non-believer. The history of human intellectual endeavours overwhelmingly supports the contention that it belief in anything beyond that which can be rationally proven or reasonably hypothesised (in therefore falsified) is simply not an obligation or necessary to function in society. Three hundred years of modern science is testimony to that.
The idea that a belief in God is a matter of faith, and that non-belief simply arises from a lack of faith, should not come as any surprise. Yet it continually astounds me how quickly it is overlooked. The Archbishop appears to have done so. I’ve heard Christian fundamentalists (in the UK) base their key argument on this simple misunderstanding: humanity (‘mankind’ as they invariably call it) is in rebellion against God through choice – choosing to ignore the Word of God or Jesus, or whatever. The act of choosing is one that assumes a rational can in fact be made – although doesn’t guarantee this as an outcome, of course. Choosing between to Coke and Pepsi assumes that it is possible to do so; and that at least requires that both Coke and Pepsi actually exist. But in the case of God, we’ve already said that it’s an act of faith to believe he exists. The “choice framework” collapses, and it simply becomes a matter of faith or non-faith.
The Archbishop goes on that: ‘In the background is the pervasive assumption of modernity that the intellectual default position is non-religious; but what this fails to see is that non-religiousness is historically and culturally a complex of refusals directed at specific religious doctrines, rather than a pure and primitive vision invaded by religious fictions.’ This is indeed how non-belief has manifested itself in the past. Historically, non-believers – those who thought about such things at any length – were in a minority, dominated by a culture of believers. They were therefore forced to justify their lack of faith, and their ‘refusals directed at specific doctrines’ can, and perhaps should, be seen as coming from a lack of faith in the first place on top of a cultural demand that they should justify themselves. It has little or nothing to do with the ‘assumption of modernity’, which is simply the observation that if one were to grow up in a society without religion, one would not have any specific religious views: Christian or Islamic or Hindu, etc. This assumption recognises the culturally specific nature of religious beliefs, in that respect.
On a final point, Williams observes that atheism should not be seen as a system of belief, to be taught alongside religions in RE lessons in (UK) schools. (Humanism, also mentioned by Williams, is a different case, beyond this post). In this, I agree with him, but for a different reason: a simple rejection of a faith-based belief does not constitute a belief system. Oddly, this is likewise a point that trips up many a believer.
