{"id":685,"date":"2010-10-14T17:36:00","date_gmt":"2010-10-14T17:36:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theatheistrabbi\/2010\/10\/religious-liberals-defending-religious-creeps.html"},"modified":"2010-10-14T17:36:00","modified_gmt":"2010-10-14T17:36:00","slug":"religious-liberals-defending-religious-creeps","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theatheistrabbi\/2010\/10\/religious-liberals-defending-religious-creeps.html","title":{"rendered":"Religious Liberals Defending Religious Creeps"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>
Rabbi Eric Yoffie is president of the Union for Reform Judaism.\u00a0 Today he chimed in on the debate about religion in America<\/a>. \u00a0<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
Now Rabbi Yoffie and the vast majority of Reform Jews are among the most decent, tolerant and open-minded of all religious people.\u00a0 This is why it puzzles me that he would write a column defending religion from press coverage that is \u201celitist, condescending and wrong.\u201d<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
America is by far the most religious of the industrialized democracies. \u2026Americans believe in God, send their children to Sunday school, and seek out the holy far more than others in the developed world. More Americans will attend a house of worship this week than will attend football games this season.<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
What exactly is the point of this statement?\u00a0 Every poll taken indicates that upwards of half of all Americans are young earth creationists.\u00a0 Is it \u201celitist, condescending and wrong\u201d to point that out?<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
\u2026[R]eligion does an exceedingly fine job in promoting good behavior. As Robert Putnam and David Campbell demonstrate in their just-published \u201cAmerican Grace,\u201d religious Americans make better neighbors than non-religious Americans by virtually every index. They are more generous, more trustworthy and more civically active.<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
I haven\u2019t read \u201cAmerican Grace,\u201d but there is an enormous amount of research that shows that atheists, agnostics and other non-theists are just as nice people.\u00a0 As for being civically active, I would remind Rabbi Yoffie that much of the civic activity in which they are engaged violates almost every position taken by the Reform movement.\u00a0 As for non-theists, he notes:<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
Some Americans may resist theological language; they may speak of connecting with the sacred, creating holy community or giving expression to the spiritual dimension of life, but they are still speaking of an encounter with God.<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
Hold your horses right there, Rabbi!\u00a0 I strongly believe in celebrating the human spirit of creativity, love, community and so forth.\u00a0 Please don\u2019t tell me I am speaking of an encounter with God.\u00a0 What is the point of this?\u00a0 I guess he knows as well as I do that a very large percentage of Reform Jews and their rabbis are \u201ccloset humanists.\u201d\u00a0 How convenient to file them under religion and, worse, to group them with that majority of Americans who are religious.<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
Toward the end of his column, after acknowledging that Reform Judaism is committed to reason, he pulls back from the love-fest:<\/span><\/div>\n
\n\n
American religion has its share of dolts, doofuses and extremists. And inevitably, extremism is highlighted by a 24-hour news cycle that gives unwarranted attention to tiny religious groups that have learned how to command media attention.\u00a0<\/span><\/div>\n
\n
News flash, Rabbi, the Catholic Church, home of the homophobe, pedophile and misogynist, is not a \u201ctiny religious group.\u201d \u00a0Nor is the right wing evangelical movement.\u00a0 Moderate and liberal movements like Reform Judaism really are tiny religious groups. \u00a0<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
I\u2019ve often said that my main complaint about the religious left is that it provides cover for its older, larger and more obnoxious sibling.\u00a0 Here\u2019s a perfect example:<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
[T]here is no room for doubt:\u00a0 religion is a great asset for our country, one of those things that makes America great.<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
Pretending this is true, for reasons beyond my understanding, does not make it so. \u00a0Most religion is destructive.\u00a0 Even a well-meaning Reform rabbi should be able to understand that.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rabbi Eric Yoffie is president of the Union for Reform Judaism.\u00a0 Today he chimed in on the debate about religion in America. \u00a0 Now Rabbi Yoffie and the vast majority of Reform Jews are among the most decent, tolerant and open-minded of all religious people.\u00a0 This is why it puzzles me that he would write […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2281,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[24,25],"class_list":["post-685","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blogentries","tag-liberal-judaism","tag-liberal-religions-and-theologies"],"yoast_head":"\nReligious Liberals Defending Religious Creeps<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Rabbi Eric Yoffie is president of the Union for Reform Judaism.\u00a0 Today he chimed in on the debate about religion in America. \u00a0 Now Rabbi Yoffie and the\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theatheistrabbi\/2010\/10\/religious-liberals-defending-religious-creeps.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Religious Liberals Defending Religious Creeps\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Rabbi Eric Yoffie is president of the Union for Reform Judaism.\u00a0 Today he chimed in on the debate about religion in America. \u00a0 Now Rabbi Yoffie and the\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theatheistrabbi\/2010\/10\/religious-liberals-defending-religious-creeps.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Atheist Rabbi\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-10-14T17:36:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jeffrey L. 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