Atheism Is A Religion?
Atheism Is A Religion is an abandoned blog I stumbled across. It hasn’t been updated since July, 2003, and considering the quality of the one and only post I can’t say that the internet community has lost anything. This blog shouldn’t disappear forever before that one post is properly dealt with:
A well defined philosophy of life which claims an answer to the key questions of life is by definition a religion. These questions include (but are not limited to)...
This particular statement is, I must admit, an improvement over some of the nonsense I have come across. The author has the good sense to recognize that religion involves philosophical speculation about important questions surrounding human life. What he completely misses are all the other things that tend to fall within the realm of religion: rituals, sacred objects/spaces/times, scriptures, morality, etc. I find the neglect of all of these factors completely inexplicable. Most introductory texts on the study of religion will mention at least most of them, which tells me that this author didn’t attempt even a scintilla of research before trying to write.
Does God exist?
Is Jesus God?
Did Jesus rise from the dead?
Is there a supernatural reality?
Is there life after death?
Can a bread and wine transubstantiated?
So, these are the “key questions of life” that, by definition, a religion tries to answer. There may be more, but every religion necessarily attempts to deal with these questions.
Notice anything interesting about them? That’s right, three of the six are specifically and exclusive Christian in nature. Hinduism doesn’t worry about whether Jesus is God. Taoism doesn’t worry about whether Jesus rose form the dead. Druids don’t worry about whether bread and wine can be transubstantiated. Thus, according to the author of this blog, those can’t be religions. Belief systems that existed before Christianity (and hence before those questions could even exist) couldn’t possible be religions. Belief systems that lack “God” (however defined) also can’t possible be religions.
Does that make sense? No, not in the slightest. Insisting that “Can a bread and wine transubstantiated?“ is a “key question of life” which abeliefsystem must claim to answer in order to qualify as a religion is one of the most ludicrous things I’ve ever read.
By their choice to answer these questions atheists have created their own religion. It is absurd to claim that certain answers to these questions are religious, while other answers to these questions are not religious. ANYONE who answers these questions and lives their life according to these answers has chosen a religion for their life. Any philosophy which casts a vote on these issues is a religion regardless of the actual vote.
Let’s assume for the moment that this silly definition of religion actually has some value. Does it allow us to conclude that atheism is a religion? The author certainly thinks so — but here is where logic starts being twisted as well as language. To begin with, not all answers bother offering answers to those questions. After all, not all atheists in the world have even bothered to consider them. Second, not all atheists who do answer those questions will offer the same answers. What kind of religion is it when there are so many different answers and responses? At the very least the author must argue that there are numerous atheist religions rather than simply “the religion of atheism.” Third, the mere fact that someone offers answers to these questions doesn’t mean that they “live their lives” according to the answers.
Since athesim is a religion can the US government legitimately purge "religion" from itself? Does this not establish the religion of atheism as the official religion of our country? Obviously the US government must incorporate some religious icons, practices, and culture. The alternative is to force atheism upon us all as the mandatory religion of our country. And despite their claims to the contrary this is precisely their agenda. They will strive to make all religion illegal in any and all aspects of our lives. They will force us all to become atheists.
Let’s assume for the moment that not only is the above definition of religion reasonable, but also establishes that atheism is a religion. Does this allow for the above conclusions on the relationship between atheism and the government? No, not for a second. Remember that this author is thinking of atheism being a specific philosophy with specific answers to specific questions. Atheism as the mere absence of belief in god(s) might arguably be a part of the government whenever gods aren’t mentioned, but atheism as the sort of philosophy the author presumes is not a part of the government.
What support is there for saying that the government must “obviously” include some religious icons, practices, and culture into what it does? This assertion is made without the slightest support and there’s no good reason to accept the truth of it. Of course, so is the claim that atheists seek to force atheism on every and “strive to make all religion illegal in any and all aspects of our lives.” That’s practically libelous in nature, but what can be expected from someone with such a warped understanding of logic and language? One can only conclude that his or her entire view of reality is warped as well.
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Comments
you are silly, listen to the voice inside of you that tries to tell you “there is a god, i am god, the one and only and my son has died to save you” god is such a passionate lover, why would you ever want to turn from him…. i hope you find him soon and accept your own salvation instead of trying to rule over yourselves…you may not think so now, but he is all that matters-before and after, and while you where born. he loves you , now please, just try to look for his signs. you must wait in the secret, quiet place. remember, i love you with all of my strength, but he loves you MORE!!
Sorry, there is no such voice inside of me. What does this have to do with the topic of this post?
are you sure? you may not hear it now or understand the reality of why you are here, but you do have a purpose-one taht is to help other’s find the knowlede of the fact that there is a god. this is completely related to the subject because all of us are god’s children whether we know it to be true or not. are you an atheist or agnostic? i’d like to see youe full view on life…i am curious.i can also tell you mine (the rest of it and how i came to belive it-i haven’t always been a christian) if you are willing
in a sense, you are correct that there isn’t really any religion, but there is a god, please allow me to explain.
Atheism is a religion. The idea is based upon a faith that there is no God. This is a hypothesis that cannot be proven or disproven, a faith, just like the other reigions of the world.
If you had read the post before commenting, you’d have noticed that every claim you make here was proven false already.
Atheism is a religion in the same way that not playing football is a sport.
Atheism a religion? I would say Atheism is the OPPOSITE of religion, or perhaps more correctly the opposite of FAITH.
An A-theist simply means “no gods”…and that is a very logical way of looking at life, since the only “evidence” of gods are things we don’t know. In fact, chalking ANYTHING up to gods is just another way of saying “we don’t know.”
Frankly, the more we learn and know, the less NEED there is for a god. And just because I don’t know, there is NO reason to claim that as a “proof” of god.
God = Ignorance
Atheism is a religion in the same way that not playing football is a sport. — Todd on December 12, 2008 at 3:57 pm
Heh.
“Atheism is a religion in the same way that not playing football is a sport. — Todd on December 12, 2008 at 3:57 pm”
I have also heard:
“If Atheism is a religion, then ‘bald’ is a hair color.”
As far as voices speaking in your head goes, my favorite is this:
“I hear voices, and they don’t like you!”
or
“You’re just jealous because the voices only speak to ME!”
“Since athesim is a religion can the US government legitimately purge “religion” from itself? Does this not establish the religion of atheism as the official religion of our country?”
This is exactly why some theists want to redefine atheism as a religion. It’s also why some theists want to redefine science as a religion. They’re trying to make unequal things equal so they can claim religious persecution if they don’t get to make their religious rules into civil law, or to teach creation “science” alongside or instead of real science.
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Eric says: “The idea [atheism] is based upon a faith that there is no God.”
Faith — belief without evidence and/or despite evidence to the contrary — has nothing to do with atheism. It doesn’t take faith to believe that there are no leprechauns simply because we cannot prove that they don’t exist. The same thing goes for gods. In the absence of evidence, the default position is that a thing does not exist.
Nothing real requires faith.
Faith is a belief without verifiable evidence.
Atheism is a belief because of verifiable evidence.
Voices from within is clinical evidence indicating schizophrenia.
tomedgar@halenet.com.au
Atheism a religion?
Hum..
Played at the limits a few times.
During a Philosophy of Religion class 25 years ago, sorry dating my self
found that by appling propositional calculus to the classical proofs for the existence of ‘god’, that they all suffered from the pesky problem of being false. While there might be a proof somewhere in the universe still waiting to be discovered, or we just don’d know about it, it appeared that we might not be able to settle the issue by argument or proof, dang.
Using a similar process for the core propositions for the positivitists, found that a similar problem seems to show up, but here the issue seems to rest on whether there exist objects that offer no means of proof.
Think this might indicate something that could be called an ‘evidence hole’ where we can’t lift the skirts of reality very far to see what’s behind. The more we try the hole remains.
Leaping into ‘certainty’, crossing the hole boundary, might lead us into dishonestry. I can understand how believers wish certainty, but wonder what the costs are to us as individuals and as a culture.
While I tend to crave certainty, I have become reasonably happy with approximations and pesky logic stop signs. Think I have become annoying to some.
In the absence of a ‘god’ in atheism, think the ‘religion’ point seems mute. I think honesty should be a moral or ethical value, this seems to be a common shared value for most religions, and could be a good debate point..;o)
Wow, this article hooked a few crazy Jezuz-lovers. Best line goes to Troll #1 Katie, with “god is such a passionate lover”. Is that creepy or what? Is this the sort of line that motivates preachers and priests to molest children? Yuck!
I wonder if Katie knows you can get professional help if there are voices in your head that you don’t think are yours.