Some religious theists seem to have trouble understanding why books about atheism by atheists would be so popular recently. It is an interesting phenomenon and it is worthy of an explanation, but the confusion of some religious theists seems to go well beyond idle curiosity. Unfortunately, their concern over why atheism would be getting more popular is leading them to all sorts of wild, unjustified claims.

Tom Harpur provides a good example of this:

A generation accustomed to best-seller lists dominated by books on faith and spirituality is currently aware of towering best-sellers attacking every facet of religious practice and belief.

Source: The Star

So it's acceptable for there to be thousands of books extolling the importance and need of religious, theistic faith — which is at least an implicit criticism of secular atheism — but it's not OK to have a dozen or so books by atheists criticizing religious, theistic faith? When a privileged class is suddenly and unexpectedly faced with criticism or challenge, it's not unusual for them to react by suggesting that there is something completely inappropriate about it all. They are so accustomed to their privileges that they sincerely think it is rude for anyone to speak out against the situation.

My philosophy tutor at Oxford was an atheist and I grew to respect him in spite of the gulf between us. But, he clearly was a believer of a kind. His stance that there is no God (a-theos means literally "without God") was based every bit as much on an unprovable, non-rational intuition or faith/belief as was my own.

I can't speak for his tutor and it's entirely possible that what Tom Harpur says here is true about this one person. The problem, though, is that Harpur is clearly suggesting that what he says is true about atheists generally as well and that's just wrong. It's a popular myth that atheism is necessarily based on a faith that is analogous to or even ultimately the same as the religious faith of theists, but it's wrong. If Harpur had spent any time researching the topic, he'd have found that out.

It needs to be recognized that all atheists, including Hitchens, Dawkins and Harris, are just as fundamentalist about their position as any literalistic Christian or extremist Muslim is about their faith today. They, too, are people of faith, albeit a negative one. [emphasis added]

Now Tom Harpur is making explicit his position that all atheists have "faith," but he adds to it the claim that all atheists are "just as fundamentalist about their position as any literalist Christian or extremist Muslim." Notice that Harpur originally compared atheists generally to religious believers generally, but not all atheists are like the most literalist fundamentalists — which immediately places believers like himself in a separate, non-analogous category.

Not only does this undermine the original analogy Harpur tried to create, but it also makes believers like himself appear more reasonable than everyone else. Literalist believers are unreasonable. Atheists are all equally unreasonable. So what's reasonable? Moderate, "liberal" religion like Tom Harpur! Convenient, isn't it? Unfortunately, it's completely unfounded. Even if his deprecation of fundamentalists and atheists were accurate, that wouldn’t automatically make anyone else reasonable — it's possible for his position to be equally or more unreasonable for entirely different reasons.

What he says isn't true, though, which makes the situation even worse. Tom Harpur invests absolutely no time and effort establishing that there is anything "fundamentalist" about any particular atheists, much less "all atheists." For that, he would need to define what fundamentalism is and then establish that atheists necessarily exhibit the most essential signs and characteristics of fundamentalism. Why doesn't he do this? It might have something to do with the fact that it's just not possible.

For the believer in God today who is shaken by the current tide of atheism, there is work to do. For those with a desire to fully recognize and know the divine presence at the centre of their life, this is a clarion call to shake off a Sunday-school level faith and to read widely using both intellect and compassion to the maximum.

Well, I can certainly appreciate the sentiments being expressed here and I also suspect that it might be better if more believers adopted a similar attitude. Unfortunately, I really don't think that Tom Harpur has been following his own advice. First, his reliance on myths and falsehoods about atheism indicate he hasn't being using his intellect "to the maximum" and that he really hasn't shaken off his "Sunday-school level faith." Moreover, the sorts of ad hominems that these myths reduce to certainly aren't indicative of "compassion" at any level, much less "to the maximum."