Understanding the New Atheism

There is a lot of buzz that goes around with regard to how some are publicly challenging the Christian faith. We have a group of writers who have been dubbed – I don't know if it's affectionately or not – the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. And so, we thought having a discussion about the types of things that they're saying, and how Christians can think about what's being said, was worth talking about.

So, Glenn, I appreciate you – or, Dr. Kreider – coming in, being a part of our podcast. And he's a Veteran of Foreign Wars, he's been with us before, so he knows the dance. Let me open with this question. Let's talk a little bit about the name, or the moniker, New Atheism. Is it new? And who exactly are we talking about?

The focus was on this group of antagonistic-to-religion writers, this of militant atheists, who began to ascend – began, actually, their writing careers as atheists, and particularly addressing the problem of religion, dated post-9/11. That the events of that day made them more bold in addressing what they see as the problem of religion, not just Christianity.

So we have this long history of religious conflict. We have the rise of terrorism, and the fear that it brings. And then you also have – several of these guys were philosophers, and others were scientists. So they're dealing with the "science versus faith" question. They're dealing with the "reason versus faith" question. You kind of bring those altogether, and you have what could be called a perfect storm.

I think some people forget that what led to the Enlightenment, and also what led to the pursuit of religious liberty, is a reaction to, in part, the religious conflicts that had taken place and devastated Europe. That caused people to say, "If this is where religion takes us, then the further we can move religion away from the political process, the better we would be." I think that's something that Christians sometimes forget when they talk about the Enlightenment.

Okay, let's turn our attention to these four. You said they come from different backgrounds, they bring different kinds of expertise to the promotion of the views that they have. So, let's go through the four, and talk about what each of them brings to the table.

So that, although it is true from our perspective – and it is true from anybody's perspective – that some of the rhetoric is harsh and dismissive and judgmental and provocative, Christians, of course, would never engage that kind of [crosstalk] _____.

And that religion, in all of its forms – he's every bit as vitriolic in his criticism of Islam, and every other religion, as he is Christianity. Religion, for him, is child abuse, it's cruel, it's heartless, and – It's one thing to dismiss religion. It's another thing to be so vitriolic in your criticism of it.

Daniel Dennett is a philosopher trained also at Oxford, and he's dealing more with philosophy of science. He's much more – maybe because he's a philosopher, but – and he looks like Santa Clause. He's much more gentle and kind in his presentation, although every bit as strident in the beliefs that he holds.

Sam Harris might be the most accessible popularizer of the group. Harris has a degree from philosophy, too, from Stanford, a Ph.D. in neuroscience from UCLA. But he writes his Letter to a Christian Nation/The End of Faith, which was published in 2004, which he started writing September 12, 2001. Watching what happened on 9/11 led him to say, "This is an issue that needs a response, that needs to be addressed." And so, for him, Christianity, and all religion, is a problem and is a danger.

The late Christopher Hitchens – died in 2011 – is a journalist and a literary critic. He is not trained in science or in philosophy, and he is the most strident. His book, God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, took a great deal of pleasure in criticizing Jerry Falwell, and then celebrated Falwell's death, when he was on a speaking tour, for that book. Has called Mother Teresa a fraud, and – He really is – he makes Dawkins [laughs] look like a nice guy. But, tragically, is no longer with us.

That leads Nietzsche to a real crisis, because he realizes the implications of the world view, he realizes the implications of what he's believing. But he realizes that life as a complete nihilist is destructive and simply doesn't work. So, there is a real sense of tragedy and sadness in Nietzsche, that God is dead, that we've killed him, "Look what you've done to God," and now we're stuck in the aftermath of this great murder.

That sadness, that disappointment, that sobriety, if you will, is not found – at least not to the same degree – in the New Atheists. If I may summarize at least these four, the New Atheists say, "There is no God. There never has been. This is good for us. And let's celebrate the freedom, let's look forward to the day when we don't have to wrestle with these questions, anymore."

It's interesting to watch the television interview where they were dubbed the four atheists, and hear them talking among themselves about whether religion ever produces anything good. Whether there is any value in any religion, anywhere, and at any time. They pretty much divided two to two. That there is nothing in any religion anywhere – Hitchens and Dawkins said – that's not found, also, outside of religion. So we don't need religion, at all.

Harris is much more willing to affirm that there are certain benefits of religion, but it's not necessary, we don't need it. And that's a major shift. The second major shift, it seems to me, is the scientific revolution, and the perception that – really, the arrogance of the scientific community – that religion is no longer necessary, God is no longer necessary. Because the answers to all the fundamental questions – Where do we come from? Why are we here? Where are we going? What difference does it make? – are all questions that science can provide the answers to.

Another thing that I'm hearing you say is that Nietzsche seemed to have an awareness and even an empathy for what was lost in a death of God, a view that the modern group lacks.

But there's another whole category of atheists that – as somebody commented after our last podcast – one of the criticisms he leveled at us, he said, "You guys _____ _____ _____ stop talking about those four guys. But they all die, they all convert to Christianity tomorrow, the problem doesn't go away." That there are a lot of atheists who are sharing the ethos of the Four Horsemen. But then there are a lot of others who are much more sober minded, much sadder about losing faith in the possibility of the existence of God.

Many of them are not militant atheists, many of them are sad. And for whatever reason – which is the third category – many of them come from former theists, they come from Christians, professing Christians.

And I wonder what that looks like in the future. That's one step away from the church. It's a very small step from there to not identifying as a person of faith, at all. And I think that's important for laying the groundwork, to understand that the phenomenon we're talking about is not merely limited to the Four Horsemen and their followers.

Their approach is very distinctive, it's very belligerent. They're the people who get the press. I mean, part of the rise of this is because it has become more socially acceptable, more popular, because there is – they have platforms and publishing. So some of that phenomenon is a cultural phenomenon.

I think the world – at least the American perception of the world – radically changed in 9/11. It's a problem of evil, and particularly the problem of fear. That, in a post-9/11 world, and in a world of threats of terrorism, people are afraid. And I think that one of the key issues here is – at least maybe to the second problem – it's the problem of religion.

As we talked earlier, that throughout human history wars have often been religious wars. In almost every war, there's been the perception that, "God's on my side. God's on our side." What seems to have happened in recent memory is that there is an increasing awareness of the conflict between a militant religion, and then the fear of conflict with another militant religion. Or the conflict between militant religion and the state. Or the conflict between militant religion and science. And it creates a culture of fear.

Where it becomes really a challenge for Christianity is that our faith in Christ doesn't really solve the problem of that conflict, and it doesn't solve the problem of fear. We live in a scary world. It's easy for us to step back and remind ourselves that the world has always been a scary place, there has always been sin and death and conflict. But it really doesn't address the issues that are particularly facing us at the present time.

So the problem of evil – and, you might say, so how does that lead to atheism? Well, that's that fundamental theological problem that people of faith have been wrestling with ever since the garden. How can there be this horrific evil? This random, unexpected evil? And of degrees, levels, and kind that has not been seen in human history, until our day. How can that exist in a world where God is good? If God is good, then why is there evil? If God is good, how can there be this kind of evil? And, if God is good and has the power and the ability to do something, why doesn't God respond? Why doesn't God do something?

It's a very small step from those questions, to say, "Since God isn't responding, since God isn't reacting, since God isn't fixing this –" and I know that that headline introduced an article that argued a different point, but the headline – this was Daily News, right?

And on this issue, quite frankly, I think it requires a great deal of honestly and humility, on our part. As I think you've heard me say before, we can't ignore that those texts are in the Scripture. We can't say, "This story didn't exist, it didn't happen." It did. But I think there are ways to – as you mentioned, accountability to a Holy God, God's longsuffering, His patience. And that the destruction, His judgment of the Israelites, follows year after year after year after year of warning and calls to repentance.

That part of the story has to be told, too. Not in any way to minimize the horror of some of these stories. I mean, the horror of a disobedient child must be taken out and stoned. And that there's little evidence that the Israelites carried that out maybe demonstrates the horror of it, and the really deep-seated hermeneutical questions, here, that we need to talk about.

And I think we need to have those conversations, instead of immediately jumping to a defensiveness, immediately jumping to a condemnation of the questioner. Actually to sit down and have conversations about how to do that.

When you think about the revulsion that people feel today, about the kind of violence that we're seeing, and the human instinct to say, "That needs to be completely gotten rid of," that's no different, in many ways. That is a statement about an evil so deep and so poisonous and so destructive that it needs to be eradicated. And those instincts are not necessarily bad instincts. So, a real discussion to be had.

I interrupted you a bit earlier to make the point that, if the Israelites had wiped out all the Canaanites, there would be no Rahab and there would be no Jesus. So, God's grace even in the midst of His judgment is important.

And, in fact, what you see within these religions is a gradiation in which there are people who are as repulsed by what is going on in our world, today, in the name of religion, as others of other religions are. With equal passion, and in some cases with an intensity that reflects the fact that it's their religion that's being besmirched by what's being done.

But the other issue that that raises for me is that we are increasingly living in a world where you have to be incredibly naïve to believe in pluralism. To believe that every religion has the same agenda, that every religion believes the same thing. And that, somehow, we can all just get along, when every world religion claims – and, in fact, if we add atheism in to the mix, as a religious system –

You know, when you think about what makes the Sermon on the Mount particularly distinctive. What makes it particularly distinctive is not that He exhorted people to distinguish the world between those who are righteous and those who are sinners, and to treat the righteous one way and sinners another. But actually went out of His way to command that people love their enemies, and pray for them, et cetera – things like turning the cheek, et cetera.

There is this impulse not to respond out of the normal human impulse, that is central to Christian teaching. That we see in the New Testament, affirmed not just by Jesus but, really, all the way through it, in many ways. That introduces, particularly in a world of fear, a [laughs] complicating element. I don't know how else to say it.

How do you do this? How do you do this, when you're at threat? What does it mean to be open to being martyred? Those kinds of questions. Of course, the Early Church reflected this, and actually generated much sympathy for what it was that they believed, because they didn't respond, oftentimes, in kind.

He not only told us what to do, in the Sermon on the Mount and the rest of His teaching, He actually showed us. And that there's something about our response. Now, whether that response is to the threat of violence at the end of a gun, or whether that response is to the threat of violent rhetoric, I think the Christian response is not a response that is in kind. That violence is the default reaction, throughout human history.

How do we actually learn to do that? I'm gonna argue that we learn how to do that as we interact with one another – Christians don't always agree, either – and as we interact with people of other religions, and particularly atheists. That just because somebody uses strong, inflammatory rhetoric, and –

So, you hear Dawkins say things like, "God is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction, jealous and proud of it. A petty, jealous, unforgiving control freak. A vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser. A misogynist, homophobe –" Our immediate reaction – and I think it's a God-given reaction – is to be repulsed and be offended. And it takes something of the mercy and grace and love –

It takes something of the work of the Spirit, to realize that this is a man who is crated in the image of God, this is a man for whom Christ died. And, in reality, his public rhetoric is probably not much different, in kind, from the kind of private rhetoric that you and I would be prone to think. So, you know, maybe we learn how to love our enemies, to love people who are angry and fearful, by actually loving those who are close to us.

Graduates of the seminary, people who have professed faith in Christ and who have been in ministry, who reach a point, for whatever reason – I'm trying to think through the similarities of the stories that I keep hearing. And one of the similarities that I keep hearing over and over again is that, "Christianity doesn't work for me."

Now, it's easy for us to say, "But what made you think it was all about you? What made you think it was –" But, really, the stories are, "I've been taught that this is the way God is, this is the way he acts. Where was He when I was raped? Where was He when I lost my job? Where was He when the Christian organization that hired me treated me unjustly? Where –"

And so, that here is this growing group of people that are moving away from the faith, some of whom would even identify as no longer being believers – of being atheists – because of either what they've been taught about God that wasn't true. Or they've been taught that, "God always acts this way," and they found out that He doesn't. Or just the harsh reality of life in a fallen world, the real struggle for them.

And the way we respond to them has got to be compassionate and loving. I do a lot more listening than talking, when one of those is in my office.

But the flipside of this is the question, well, then, what do you do? I mean, we've talked a little bit about the tone, but the actual practicalities of what that means.

So what I'm gonna do is, I'm gonna invite you back. And we're gonna talk in a separate segment, and we're gonna concentrate on how to deal with the challenge of what New Atheism is. Because I think one of the mistakes that can be made is, we can treat it as something that can be easily dismissed. When it's clear, from the way people are reacting, that that's not how to handle it.

So, I thank you for coming in, and I thank you for being a part of The Table, today. And we look forward to having you back with us when we finish our conversation on atheism.