History shows that there has never been an atheist# regime that was not horrific. There have been and are dominantly theistic regimes that are good places to live relative to the times. This is a pragmatic reason to worry about atheist# regimes. Such worry, and the fact that theism has been successful in creating decent regimes might make a rational person hope that theism is true and atheism# is false.
All things being close to equal in terms of argument, there is nothing irrational in believing what has worked (sometimes) over what has never worked.
Theists are a diverse lot and make up the groups that have done most of the doing, living, and dying in history. Theists are responsible for most of the good and the bad done in any civilization since atheists have never been more than a minority in any sizable civilization. We built civilizations and we have torn them down. We produce Saint Francis and colonialism. Unlike atheism# which is defined by a series of negatives, theism comes with diverse beliefs.
Just as I am dubious about atheism# as a guiding notion for a community, there are forms of theism that have shown themselves to be disastrous when adopted over time. I have the same worries about these forms of theism that I have about atheism#. I have chosen only Christian examples of “bad theism” so that I can see the “plank” that might be in my own eye when criticizing other Faiths or the lack of faith. Please note: I am not making an argument against the truth of these forms of theism directly. As with the case of atheism#, I hope any type of bad theism (theism@) that gets power does better this time than the other times it had power. I am justly skeptical.
I am also more fearful of theism@ since I think it accounts for more of reality, will be easier for large numbers of people to hold, and be able to easily hide next to better forms of theism. Theism@ can be spotted when one or more of these things happen.
A wholesale rejection of “secular” learning (including Greco-Roman thought and the Enlightenment) combined with forgetting that every person of faith only sees “darkly.”
Societies that narrow down to one truth have historically retarded progress and been particularly susceptible to extremes of violence. This the mark of a cult, the enclosed group that listens only to self. Some Christian fundamentalists groups refuse the classical learning that is one of the pillars of our Republic and so find themselves less fit to be citizens. (My disagreement with such groups is often not doctrinal but on the important issue of how they handle the Truth.)
If a man is sure that his religion gives him all he needs, the least that will happen is becoming a pompous ass. At worst, he will lack the balance of natural revelation (natural science) with his understanding of spiritual revelation and so misunderstand revelation. He will live as if he is or should be already in Heaven and devise Utopian schemes harmful to men as they are.
Christian philosopher and apologist John Locke helped create the justification for revolution against despotism using revelation and reason. Like the Enlightenment of which he was such a shining part, Locke was not perfect. He deserves critical appraisal on both his theology and his politics, but all Americans who value our Constitutional order and our revolution owe Locke a debt. David Hume was not a Christian and was cagey about his atheism, but his challenges to the Christian faith are valuable tools to intellectual complacency. He forces a Christian theist to examine the roots of his reasoning and that can never be bad.
When a theistic society is intent on ignoring critics, it will soon be killing them.
An elite that governs in the name of Christianity but are Christian in name only.
This is the most common situation. Much of the elite before World War I rejected traditional religion, yet used it to control the masses. There was no longer a common moral standard but a tool for manipulation. Common people respected their “betters” and believed lies they were told. Simultaneously, the elite were corrupted by the lying and the duplicity necessary to maintain the illusion of moral standards they had rejected.
Hitler himself was hostile to traditional Christianity, but used Christian language and forms to deceive many Germans. When I read Mein Kampf, the incompatibility of Hitler’s ideas to orthodox Christianity was obvious, but the shrewd politician threw in some God-talk. This appears to have soothed complacent German Christians . . . at least too many complacent German Christians.
Never again.
While opposition to Hitler was disproportionally from traditional Christians, too few resisted. Many German Christians were co-opted by a man who despised Christianity to do his evil bidding through throw away religious language or symbols. Religious people must be reminded that saying “God” or using God talk is no substitute for the reality.
There is another lesson here. Hitler used fear of the atheist# Stalin to justify the harsh nature of his rule to theists. Too often theists@ bought this false dilemma. We were not responsible for the evils that Stalin did in the name of atheism, but German Christians were too often complacent with Hitler because they feared Stalin.
I do not like the Chinese or North Korean governments. I see no evidence that anti-theists govern well, but I must never be motivated by fear to justify equal evil. You cannot defeat one evil by condoning a second.
American Christians often accept politicians who act as if they are God’s mouthpieces. I recall going to a meeting of the Republican Party where a politician, later convicted of gross impropriety, was drunk before the meeting. He careened around the room and then got up and gave an impassioned “God, Country, Family” speech. It was disgusting and sadly too few theists were sensitive to how our deepest truths were being exploited by a wicked man for his own selfish ends.
When “God talk” masks the reality of what the government is really doing and we are too complacent (too German, too American) to pay attention, then we destroy the beauty of our most sacred things as they are used by an Antichrist spirit in murder and rapine.
Hitler was no Christian, but if Christians had not been soothed by false “God talk” then Hitler would never have had power. Theists must never confuse the appearance of theism with the reality.
Christian leaders that have become totally subordinate to the political establishment.
Peter the Great was a great Tsar and also a great antiChrist: the definition of the divided man. He was not much of a Christian, but used Christianity to support his tyranny. He put the Russian church under inappropriate Tsarist control and destroyed the traditional Byzantine balance between the powers of the Emperor and the powers of the Patriarch. The radical unification of religious and political power gave too much authority to the Emperor.
When Christian leaders become the tools of the state without any freedom to dissent, bad things happen to the church and to the state. This is not the same as a “state church.” In some places (Great Britain), a state church was not incompatible with freedom because the bishops were not made creatures of the political rulers. It was still possible to dissent in Britain.
When Americans subordinate their religious ideas to any party or party program, they are doing a very bad thing.
Belief that one’s own people are “chosen” in one bad sense of “chosen.”
To be the “chosen” people in Biblical theology is to witness God to everyone through a life of love and service. A chosen man or woman is a witness to what all the nations can enjoy. Jewish people have suffered to stand as witness to God’s love and have not used their truth to oppress or murder others.
There is also nothing wrong with an honest recognition that a people is “exceptional” in human history. In 1945, the United States was the only nation with the Bomb and a fully intact military and booming wartime industrial base. The United States may have been the only nation with the power to conquer all the world, but did not do so. Americans can be proud of this fact.
What we must not do is believe that Americans are more loved by God or due moral breaks because of our “exceptional” status. God loves all humankind and has a good role for every nation. We are not exceptional in terms of being “the only one God loves” or the “one God loves the most.” Belief in this lie can lead to manifest destiny or colonialism.
There what we do to lesser nations is justified by the mere privilege of being near the Chosen. The hideous rape of the Congo by a Christian nation, Belgium, stands as a rebuke to this evil idea.
Theism and Good Government
I think theism is true and like all truth is powerful. As a result, great harm can be done and has been done in the name of the truth by wicked men. It may not surprise us that atheism# does badly with power, but it should shame us when theists@ do badly. The roots of theism@ are not over there in someone else’s faith. The roots of theism@ come whenever we believe what is contrary to reason instead of believing that faith is the hope that reason and experience make rationally probable. The roots of theism@ are a twisting of the truth that God has revealed truths to the world.
Theism@ is blasphemous, wicked, and it has polluted the world far more often than atheism. Thank God that He has never been left without a witness in any age. In every generation there have been theistic societies that have gotten it right or at least made progress toward the right. Some of these societies have been Christian and some have been of other faiths. Jesus is the only way to God, but God has also spoken to every nation, culture, and people to try to prepare them to hear the truth. No great religions are without that interior witness and so no religion has nothing to teach us. Sometimes that witness comes to us from atheists, since atheists are also created in His Image. An error in one area, even an issue as important as belief in God, does mean that person is wrong about everything.
Atheists# have never governed a state well. Theists have. This is all the more reason for rational theists not to muck up our present approach to politics. Lord Jesus Christ, son of God, have mercy on us: sinners.
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Perhaps we should pause briefly and note that the case of theism@ and atheism# are not quite parallel. If theism is true, then it should be (on the whole) better for humanity than not. Bad forms of theism undercut themselves by producing widespread and obvious wickedness.**
#By this I mean the sort of atheist (one who asserts there is no God, gods, life spirit, or supernatural) who is actively against theism (anti-theist) and actively against religion. I muster some historical evidence with qualifications here and here.
** Please exclude “close cases” from obvious wickedness. I am talking about widespread genocide driven by atheism# or theism@.
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