Question:
Are atheists supporting theistic religions and their power structures by participating in anything with religious origins or components? Shouldn't atheists remove all religious and theistic influences from their experience in order to have fully atheistic, rational, and naturalistic lives?
Response:
For most atheists, simply not being religious and not participating in any overly religious rituals or activities is sufficient. For some atheists, though, there is the feeling that any connection with religion may be hypocritical and may only be serving to reinforce the assumption that religion is acceptable. They argue that it would be better to strip all religious aspects from their lives, otherwise, they can't claim to be leading truly irreligious, rational, and naturalistic lives.
It's not hard to understand why an atheist might feel this way, but there are good reasons to think that it is not only mistaken, but is in fact ultimately counterproductive. For one thing, this position sounds suspiciously spiteful and even a bit bigoted. Even if we grant all the harshest atheist criticisms of theistic religions, does this really justify removing absolutely all influences of those religions from one's life? That a belief system is irrational does not allow us to conclude that even most of what it offers is worthless, much less that it's all worthless.
Do such atheists intend to ferret out and eliminate influences from absolutely all belief systems that aren't perfectly rational, or just influences from religions? Focusing just on religion sounds bigoted because it applies a double-standard to the detriment of religion, and it sounds spiteful because it suggests a desire to repay some harm experienced in the past, not a desire to simply live a more rational life. Applying this principle broadly, however, is probably impossible because I doubt that any belief system is perfectly rational.
It is also likely impossible because religion has been a part of so much of human history, culture, and thinking:
Religious Holidays & Traditions
The most common context for atheists seeking to remove religious influences from their lives may be religious holidays and popular traditions during those holidays. Atheists can legitimately object to expectations that they should celebrate Christmas in any way simply because it's a popular holiday, especially given how it is treated as necessarily Christian. Participation in Christmas may be perceived as an expression of support for Christianity and Christian beliefs. This can unfairly and inappropriately lump all non-religious and non-Christian aspects of a holiday with the religious ones, however.
Religious Art & Music
Given the central role of religion in most cultures, it's only to be expected that much art and music will be religious in nature. This is especially true in the West where so much art and music was created for an exclusively religious role: to communicate and enhance the message of Christian churches. Should atheists ignore the works of great artists in order to avoid seeing religious images? Should atheists put their hands over their ears whenever a piece by Bach is played?
Religious Literature & Themes
An atheist determined to eliminate all religious influence from their lives will surely refuse to pay any attention to religious scripture like the Bible, but what about literature that includes religious themes, figures, and ideas? J.R.R. Tolkein included Christian themes in his novels, so is that sufficient reason for an atheist to dismiss them? There are reasons to think that the Harry Potter series is an extended Christian allegory, so is that sufficient reason to reject those stories? What about the centuries of Western literature with clear references to Christian or pagan religious beliefs? You can't discuss or even understand much of it without discussing and understanding the religious references.
Religious Naming & Dating Conventions
Everyone in the West has to deal with dates that are determined by others' religious beliefs. The year is determined by traditional Christian beliefs about when Jesus lived. The names of days and months are determined ancient Roman and Germanic religious beliefs. The date Thursday, January 12, 2007, thus references Thor, Janus, and the life of Jesus just as much as "Christmas" references Christ. If an atheist is determined to eliminate any mention of Christmas from their lives, why not be similarly motivated to eliminate any references to Thor, Janus, and Jesus from their lives? Isn't using standard religion-based dating conventions a way of reinforcing traditional assumptions and power structures about religion?
Religious Thinkers & Philosophers
Most people throughout history have been religious, and most of them have also been theists. This means that most philosophers, politicians, and other scholars have been religious theists and in most of those cases, their religious beliefs have impacted their work in some way. A person determined to remove all religious influences from their lives would find this difficult without also eliminating the influence of thinkers and scholars whose work is influenced by their religion. Should atheists ignore Martin Luther King because his political and social beliefs relied on religious as well as secular arguments? Should atheists ignore the writings of Thomas Jefferson on the separation of church & state because he was a theist — or of Roger Williams because he was motivated by religion?
You can't remove every aspect of religion without also removing all that religion has influenced, but that would mean removing so much of our human inheritance as well. Instead, we should try to maintain some critical distance between us and religious influences — and indeed all influences — that swirl around us in our cultural milieu. With that, we may take from those influences what is useful without inadvertently promoting or furthering the goals of ideologies we'd rather not associate with.
