freeinfidel

It’s a common accusation by believers, who feel threatened by non-believers, that atheism is ‘just a religion too’. So is it? Well, not by any sensible definition…

But let’s look at that accusation first. You have to admit, it’s very funny. Basically, it’s saying, “Well, you’re just as bad as we are”. Beyond the hilarity, let’s see if there’s any truth in it.

There’s a problem because defining ‘religion’ is a notoriously slippery task. However, the miscellaneous faithful over at Religious Tolerance think they have a handle on it. Their definition is:

“Religion is any specific system of belief about deity, often involving rituals, a code of ethics, a philosophy of life, and a worldview.”

They go on to say that, “A worldview is a set of basic, foundational beliefs concerning deity, humanity and the rest of the universe.” And they further explain that:

“We also include Agnosticism, Atheism, Humanism, Ethical Culture etc. as religions, because they also contain a ‘belief about deity’. Their belief is that they do not know whether a deity exists, or they have no knowledge of God, or they sincerely believe that God does not exist.”

Hmm. Not very convincing, is it?

In the first part, you might just say that they are bending over backwards to be as fair and inclusive as possible. After all, the site is about discussing all religions and promoting none in particular. One might suggest that that effectively neuters the entire discussion because religions are largely (or completely) immutable of themselves and incompatible with each other, so there is no real space for genuine discussion to take place. And in its efforts to be nice, the site’s definition goes too far, becoming almost meaningless.

Do atheists really have a ‘belief about deity’? Isn’t that rather overstating the case? In the context of religion, I would argue that ‘belief’ needs to be qualified somewhat. I would argue that ’system of belief’ might be a better description, in that ‘belief’ in this context is something that guides or demands certain behaviour and shapes other beliefs. Atheism simply states. ‘there’s no god’ and moves on. It doesn’t, in and of itself, engage in any other debate. Do people who disbelieve in the Loch Ness Monster qualify as religious? What about people who don’t believe in Santa? Just because atheism touches the matter of god doesn’t mean it is religious.

Atheism does not have rituals, nor does it have a code of ethics or a philosophy of life, per se. Atheists, as individuals, do have codes of ethics, they do have philosophical viewpoints and worldviews. But these are not contained within atheism, they are layered on top. There is no single, definable atheistic worldview or set of ethics. Some specific ethical or philosophical positions might be informed, or made possible by, an assumption of the non-existence of god. But being an atheist does not presuppose that you adopt any one of these ethics or philosophies. So you cannot label a set of ethics as ‘atheism’ (though being atheistic may form part of the basis for them). That’s why we have other labels, such as secular humanism, which go beyond the basic premise of atheism and build a more detailed ethical or philosophical framework.

The whole ‘belief about deity’ bit is semantic scrabbling in a desperate attempt to include atheism among religious beliefs. It is poor logic.

So what is religion?

It seems to me that any definition of religion must touch on the matter of faith in the supernatural. Buddhism, for example, is in a weird position here. There are many flavours of Buddhism. Some could easily be categorised as simple philosophies: they give you a particular perspective on the world, on other people and on yourself. But others (perhaps most) demand that you accept the existence of spiritual forces (as yet undetected by any scientific method). This act of faith pushes those forms of Buddhism firmly into the realm of religion.

Like I said, I assume Religious Tolerance’s definition was concocted in a spirit of inclusiveness. The site is generally very interesting and informative. But by trying to label atheism as a religion, they have, I’m afraid, displayed a terrible prejudice.

The more paranoid among us might see an ulterior motive: aside from dragging atheism (and, by association, ‘beliefs’ like science) into the woolly realm of unverifiable supposition currently inhabited by religion, it also makes atheism vulnerable to other, even more insupportable accusations. One such can be found in the Pope’s recent encyclical (though ’round robin’ would be a more appropriate term, the rate at which the Roman Catholic church is shrinking). You know, the one about Hitler and Stalin murdering millions ‘in the name of atheism’.

As silly and ignorant as this assertion may be, it does have something in common with Religious Tolerance’s misconception about the nature of atheism. It treats it as a complete and homogeneous system. But as we’ve seen, atheism is actually just a general concept that underlies other philosophies.

Religious Tolerance would have been on firmer ground calling, say, Spiritual Humanism a religion. That’s the term it uses itself. This movement does have a set of ethics, it has a credo, it has (and actively promotes) ceremonies and rituals. And it is atheistic.

But attacking atheism is as vague as attacking theism - the two are as equivalent as they are antithetical. One does not blame the Inquisition on the muslims or jews, or even the Church of England, Mormons or Baptists, even though they are all every bit as theist as the Roman Catholics (in fact, they even share the same god, more or less). We atheists might assert that all theist religions are a problem, and that religion leads inevitably to outrageous and unconscionable acts like 9/11. But when it comes to analysing the causes of, and assigning the blame for, individual acts or programmes, it is intellectually and logically absurd not to recognise the importance of specific movements and ideologies. In the case of Stalinism and Nazism, while their characteristics included anti-religious fervour and acts of religious suppression, it’s clear that these were fueled by political and racist agendas, and that any notion of atheism was incidental. And we can’t discount the influence of religion in the early formation of those ideologies, especially the anti-semitic element, which clearly has a religious component.

Atheism, then, is not a religion. It is simply a denial of the conditions that give rise to religion. And thus it is mankind’s best defence against the dangers of faith.

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