Surrounded by scholars, I am silent

There are those who hate Christianity and call their hatred an all-embracing love for all religion.

G. K. Chesterton (H/T Julie)

And then there are those who believe that they are such smarty-pants as to consider that they have transcended religion

NYT: On the other hand, not all big ideas are good ideas. In fact, most big ideas are probably terrible ideas. What do you think is the single worst idea in history?

WATSON: Without question, ethical monotheism. The idea of one true god. The idea that our life and ethical conduct on earth determines how we will go in the next world. This has been responsible for most of the wars and bigotry in history.

NYT: But religion has also been responsible for investing countless lives with meaning and inner richness.

WATSON: I lead a perfectly healthy, satisfactory life without being religious. And I think more people should try it.

To which Vanderleun responds, “Oh yeah? Izzat so!”

Only the concentration of a thousand impulses towards godhead, as revealed in the natural world as one God who was within and yet without the world as it is given, enabled man with his shabby moral and intellectual abilities to find and to nurture the God that dwells as the divine spark within each soul. Should you wish to see His work in action contemplate either the lives of the Saints, the emblem and meaning of the Christ, the unfolding of evolution, or the ever ascending and never repeating double helix of DNA. If that is too demanding, talk seriously with a six year old child for an hour. See what is within their mind and heart. Mark their eyes and their still unstunted ability to wonder; their undiminished capacity to see that it all is, from alpha to omega, a miracle raised up from a mystery we are not yet equipped to solve.

Put very simply, so simply that even Mr. Watson might understand it, monotheism was an idea which, conceived or revealed, makes the world we live in today — a world in which otherwise useless, unskilled souls such as Watson live an affluent life — possible. Monotheism raises the tribe into the state and the state into the nation. It enables, over the long hard slog up from the mud, things such as redemption, charity, and global supply chains. In the long run monotheism even enables blighted souls such as those of Watson and his ilk to smarm and BS their way through life to the faint applause of moral midgets without vision or imagination. It even enables him, through the effort of thousands of years of souls whose lives and morals and works were built around and by monotheism, to kick back in his recliner and advise others to try his life without religion.

Monotheism brings us, over oceans of time, mountains of effort and selfless sacrifice, a life lived apart from the grunts and toil of the peasant. Monotheism enables our entire system of laws and freedom and democracy; it is the foundation beneath the entire edifice of Judeo-Christian civilization. Without monotheism, ignorant and unquestioned statements such as Watson’s would be quite literally ‘unthinkable.’ Without monotheism, Watson himself would not exist. His strain of DNA would have long since perished childless building yet another brick ziggurat to Mardukor Zababa in some dust choked suburb of Babylon; unwept, unburied, unremembered. Like so many other charlatans who style themselves as “historians” in this age of stunted intellectuals and scholars ignorant of their subject, Watson simply does not know what he is talking about. And he is more than willing to share the nothing that he knows.

Without the towering and profound impact of monotheism in the history of the world, a statement such as Watson’s “I lead a perfectly healthy, satisfactory life without being religious. And I think more people should try it” would simply cause the impish god of Hubris to impale him on a very sharp stake. On second thought, that god wouldn’t have to work that hard. There’d be plenty of priests around to give Watson a leg up.

Neo-neocon adds her own thoughts to the mix

What is going on here, besides the fact that Watson considers himself to be both an atheist and a fine fellow, and conveniently ignores the underpinnings of the society of which he is a member, and the fruits of which he enjoys? Well, although Watson shows himself in the short but decidedly unsweet Times interview to be both elitist and arrogant, my guess is that he’s not quite as dumb as he sounds.

What I believe is actually lurking somewhere in the background of Watson’s murky thoughts is a different but tangentially related idea, once that is worth discussing. That thought is the following: religions which teach that (1) they are not just the answer, but the only answer, and (2) this answer is the only one for everyone on earth, and (3) this answer must be spread not just by proselytizing but also by violence, if necessary, and (4) great rewards in the afterlife will be bestowed on those who spread that religion through violence–such religions are indeed responsible for a great deal of suffering on earth, past and present.

Right now, however, the list of religions that fit that description is rather short. In fact, the only one I know of happens to be Islam–but ’tis enough; will serve.

IF THAT IS NOT ENOUGH, I offer you Fightin’ Words at the Center of the Universe as the blogosphere takes on Prof. Jeffrey Hart and his contentions regarding The Conservative Mind as a Work in Progress. With such folk as Professor Bainbridge, and Ramesh Ponnuru commenting, you don’t need to hear anything outta me.