[soc.religion.christian] A Commendation of Atheism

mls@dasys1.UUCP (Michael Siemon) (11/14/89)

I must start with a disclaimer.  Like any other Christian, I will celebrate as 
the best kind of faith that of the child who simply trusts in God, without an 
agenda and without any criterion except love -- the love of the Parent and 
the reciprocal love all of us have as children of God.  But with that prologue, 
I read with grief the characterization of a recent poster:

+ Isn't atheism essentially simply the act of being contrary,
+ i.e. the *worship* of the ungod?

Because I know that that is *not* the way of the atheist, despite mockery 
by those who have never trodden that way.  Let me try to explain to you what 
an atheist thinks and feels (and worships) out of my own past as an atheist 
unable to comprehend what Christians were trying to tell me.

As background, I spent most of my youth -- roughly from age 14 to age 30 --
rejecting my childhood "faith" and quite vociferously and determinedly an 
atheist.  That childhood faith was probably the seed from which my current 
mature faith has grown; yet the growth was out of season and happened only 
after my atheism had itself matured.

No, atheism is *not* the "worship of the ungod" -- it is a refusal to worship 
what we have learned, from God, to be unworthy of worship.  Sometimes this 
gets confused with a prideful belief in our own powers, but I truly believe 
that for the most part atheists are rejecting what they properly *should* 
reject -- hypocrisy, pride, ignorance and judgment by the powerful against 
the weak who have no voice to protest this judgment.  If the God we are 
taught about is not the God of justice and love, we *should not* worship 
him.  And it is a measure of success in our parents' teaching if we reject 
their God (as we incorrectly understand him) on the basis of the values they 
teach us (which values they learn, ultimately, from God.)

In childhood, most of us are taught a parody of the Christian faith.  We are 
given a saccharine God with pretty angels (I recall a book of sentimental 
hymns, with cute cherubim in robes that only just barely covered their 
buttocks; I am still unsure what message the artist intended to convey.  I, at 
least, was fascinated looking at the butts of angels.)  As adolescents, many 
of us attended confirmation or baptism classes, and we were urged to take 
these childhood pictures seriously.  But if we raise serious questions -- for 
example, "why isn't everything sweetness and light?" -- in our cathechism 
classes, we are told to be quiet and not bother the teachers.  Now (age 44) I 
can sympathize with the teachers; there *are* no easy answers.  But an 
earnest child deserves more than an authoritarian "shut up."  And when the 
cathechist steadfastly refuses to deal with the life the child has to lead -- 
with sex, with science, and with the unappreciated martyrdom of being 
different from everybody else -- the child "learns" that the church has 
nothing to offer but evasions of the truth.  Meanwhile, in any adequate 
school system, the child will see *many* people devoted to humble and 
self-critical presentation of historical and scientific truth.  A truth that 
says from the start, "we are not sure, but this is what it looks like, and you 
can check the results for yourself."  There is no competition; religion is 
obviously wrong.  [ Please remember that I am speaking here in "recreation" 
of my earlier self; you probably disagree with this or you would not be 
reading soc.religion.christian -- but I ask you to see yourself as the earnest 
child I was, known a few years later as "Clyde Serious" by the mockery of 
his "friends." ]

By contrast with dogmatic oppression that will not justify itself, atheism 
is a liberation into truth -- "ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall
set you free."  It is tragic that the greatest truth we have been entrusted 
with is taught to children as "believe this or else."  It is a testimony to
the image of God within us that we will not be cowed by such tactics.  And
when parents actually trust their children, brainwashing and authoritarian 
methods are not used -- and the children do not come to adulthood with a 
sense of having been betrayed by their parents.  I was not betrayed by mine, 
merely abandoned -- as they evidently had no faith at all.  This was probably 
a lucky position for me to be in; every one of my contemporaries who grew 
up in a "religious" home was destroyed by it.  I have since then encountered 
religious families that do *not* treat their children like bonsai, so I know
that my childhood sample was incomplete.  But again, you should understand
why I saw atheism as liberation.

My atheism, and that of most of my Christian and Jewish contemporaries of 
the 60s (my formative decade, from age 15 to age 25) was an expression of 
some of the highest of Christian values -- a love of truth, an unwillingness 
to boast of spiritual excellences particularly when these were not evident 
in the fruits of action, a refusal to conspire in perpetuating evil, a love
of our fellows extending beyond the bounds of a narrow church "fellowship."  
And I only became a Christian when I came to realize that those values were 
truly to be found most abundantly in Christian fellowship, and not in lonely 
isolation that tended towards self-pity rather than to the openness that God 
has demanded of us in requiring that we love one another.

Therefore, I ask of you: love the atheist, your neighbor.  For he is yourself.  And more important, he is Christ your brother.

-- 
Michael L. Siemon		Hell is a different pain, for there is despair.
...!cucard!dasys1!mls		But of all pains that lead to salvation, this
				is the most pain: to see thy beloved suffer.
			    				-- Julian of Norwich

[Speaking as someone who has taught youth, let me say that in all
fairness it is not always the teachers who are responsible.  Many
teenagers (and indeed many adults) are not willing to engage in the
kind of reflection about themselves and about life that is necessary
in order for them to make sense of theology.  This doesn't mean they
never will be.  But they aren't ready yet.  I've heard a serious
proposal that Christian education should cease between the ages of 12
and 18, because people in this age group generally aren't ready to
approach things as an adult, but are far enough along to reject a
non-adult approach.  I would hope we could come up with a better
answer than this, but I am sympathetic with the basic point being
made.  I taught junior high kids for a number of years.  I made every
effort not to simply indoctrinate.  However some of them weren't ready
for much else.  When they finally are ready, their memories of their
experience may not be very different than yours.  --clh]

mls@cbnewsm.ATT.COM (mike.siemon) (11/15/89)

our moderator comments, on religious teaching of adolescents:

> a proposal that Christian education should cease between the ages of
> 12 and 18, because people in this age group generally aren't ready
> to approach things as an adult, but are far enough along to reject
> a non-adult approach.

With a certain reservation, this is close to my sense of things.  If
children have been taught with honesty, they should be "cut loose" of
any churchly leading-strings.  Adolescents are discovering themselves,
and can't really work on the relation of that "self" to God until it
has assumed some more or less stable form.  (This is not a denial of
their continuing search for God, but in order to "love our neighbors
as ourselves" it is the spiritual task of this age to learn what one's
self *is* and learn that it is lovable.)

The reservation is implicit in the proposal, I think: in not thrusting
"the answers" on them, in withdrawing from active "teaching," the church
must assume a *reactive* model of spiritual direction.  Be role models,
aides, to troubled youth and they will learn far more from you than you
could possible put in a lesson plan.  Like younger children, adolescents
are *very* willing to learn by following examples -- but they need the
sense that *they* are choosing the examples, and that they have to work
at this, it isn't just handed to them.  (And if you think about *this*
for a little bit, it may give a new perspective on God's gift of grace,
and the need for a free choice out of our will.)
-- 
Michael L. Siemon		"O stand, stand at the window,
...!cucard!dasys1!mls		    As the tears scald and start;
...!att!sfbat!mls		 You shall love your crooked neighbor
standard disclaimer	    	    With your crooked heart."

horton@b11.ingr.com (Mac Horton) (11/24/89)

	I am obliged to praise this lovely little essay of Michael
Siemon's. 

	It seems that Christians sometimes forget that Jesus Christ *is*
the truth.  If that is so, then anyone who is devoted to truth is,
whether he knows it or not, devoted to Christ in at least one of His
aspects.  And insofar as he is in touch with any truth, he is in touch
with Christ.  I would rather talk to an atheist who is devoted to truth
than to a Christian who is willing to countenance falsehood in order to
advance the Gospel.

	It is no doubt true in some cases that an atheist is in willful
rebellion.  But it seems foolish (at best) for any of us to presume to
know that.

--
Mac Horton @ Intergraph	| horton@ingr.COM  |  ..uunet!ingr!horton
--
			Love hurts.
				--Holland, Dozier, and Holland