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dcnovice -> RE: Why Atheism Scares People (5/16/2012 4:39:05 PM)
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quote:
I do agree that the function of many religious groups is to function as community. And that part of the attraction for people is less the "god" aspect than the community aspect.
However, there is one thing to consider. What would you say about a country club that only admitted white Protestants? Or only whites? Or only straight people? While I don't dispute that religious communities operate as helpful, useful communities, the fact is that belonging to them is based on accepting their religious viewpoint. And if one doesn't accept their viewpoint, one can never be part of their club. So the very idea of religious community comes from an "us" vs. "them" attitude that I categorically reject.
My being atheist has left me in some ways outside of the religious community within which I grew up. It is harder for me to have the sense of religious community that my parents did by being part of a religious group. But I have found my own ways of being part of a community - and it is just community defined in ways other than religion (e.g., non-religious organizations, school organizations, neighborhood organizations, political organizations, charitable organizations, etc.) And I feel that these communities suit me better - they are more diverse. And for me, as someone who feels people are just people, I prefer to be part of communities that reflect the diversity that humankind has across religions, ethnicity, race, sexual orientation, etc., etc.
Ah, the joys, perils, and paradoxes of community! I once designed a retreat on this topic, drawing on the Harry Potter books. We had a great time, and I met one of my dearest friends that weekend.
In terms of religious community, I can only offer my own experience. After leaving behind my childhood Catholicism (poor fit for this gay man, though others seem to manage it), I've had the good fortune to belong to two life-enriching spiritual communities, one Episcopal and the other Unitarian. Both congregations are remarkably liberal (which will surprise no one who reads my posts), and members in each place would probably be more adept at welcoming an atheist than a fundamentalist. The Unitarian community, in fact, includes people who specifically identify themselves as nontheists. How typical either congregation is of the larger "religious" whole, I don't know. Perhaps not very.
In terms of demographics, I've been repeatedly struck by how church is the most diverse community in my life. DC, alas, still has an appalling amount of de facto segregation, with the result that my workplace, apartment building, and neighborhood are populated largely with people who look like me. Church, in contrast, draws what the Book of Common Prayer calls "all sorts and conditions" of folk--black and white, gay and straight, married and single, native-born and foreign-born. Church also includes children and old folks, whom I don't often see elsewhere.
I do agree that the "us vs. them" mindset can be dangerous, sometimes fatally. Far too much brutality, we all know, has been perpetrated in the name of religion. And, as Stalin and Mao made clear, nontheists can fall prey to that binary thinking too.
That said, I do think that one of the paradoxes of community is that any commonality short of Homo sapiens is going to raise the question of who's in and who's out. Focusing a group on a particular subset can have its merits. One of my cousins found incredible solace, a few years back, in a support group for cancer survivors; ditto for a friend in a (church-sponsored) community for people with HIV. Several friends chose all-women colleges because of the opportunity to see women in leadership roles and to avoid the white noise of male-female tensions. Political and advocacy groups gather folks whose commitment to a shared mindset--and desire to see it as the basis of public policy--can easily rival a church's. On a lighter note, even the "us vs. them" mindset can bring joy, as for sports fans. My own Long Island-based family divides into Yankees and Mets fans who regularly and lovingly spar with one another, though we all unite behind any team that plays Boston.
I'll end with a favorite sentence from the BCP, which makes a request quite different from what might expect of a stereotypical religious community: "Enrich our lives by ever-widening circles of fellowship, and show us your presence in those who differ most from us, until our knowledge of your love is made perfect in our love for all your children."
Amen.
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