Dawkins is a "Cultural Christian"
(This is a tortuous interview with Dawkins on LBC ... the interviewer being as bad as the interviewee!)
Richard Dawkins declares himself to be a “cultural Christian” and believes Christianity is a “fundamentally decent religion” that is better for society than Islam.
“I do think that we [Britain] are a culturally Christian
country. I call myself a cultural Christian. I’m not a believer but there is a
distinction between being a believing Christian and being a cultural Christian
and so, you know, I love Hymns and Christmas carols, and I sort of feel at home
in the Christian ethos. I feel that we are a Christian country in that sense.
It’s true that statistically the number of people who actually believe in
Christianity is going down, and I am happy with that, but I would not be happy
if, for example, we lost all our cathedrals and our beautiful parish churches.
It would matter if we certainly substituted any other religion, that would be
truly dreadful.”
Dawkins says he was “horrified to hear that
Ramadan is being promoted instead of Easter” and that if he had to choose between
Christianity and Islam, he would choose Christianity. For Dawkins, Christianity
seems like a “fundamentally decent religion […] in a way that Islam is not.”
When asked to elaborate on this, he claimed that there is “an active
hostility to women … and to gay people” promoted “by the Holy Books of
Islam.”
“If I had to choose between Christianity and Islam, I choose
Christianity every single time. I mean, it seems to me to be a fundamentally
decent religion in a way that I think Islam is not. …Insofar as Christianity
can be seen as a bulwark against Islam, I think it's a very good thing. And in
Africa, for example, where we have missionaries of both faiths operating, I'm
on team Christian as far as that's concerned.”
At
the end of his response, he reiterated that although he does not “believe in
the single word of the Christian faith,” seeing these a "nonsense," but added, “I like to live in a culturally
Christian country.”
This is not a new position for Dawkins. He has alluded several times to his love of choral Evensong and country churchyards and Gothic architecture - the form of English Christianity, rather than the substance.
Cultural Christian Defined
“Cultural
Christian” usually means someone who values the civilizational, artistic and
moral benefits of Christianity, but rejects its specific teachings.
Clement Attlee famously said that he respected the ethics of Christianity but
not “the mumbo-jumbo.” Alastair
Campbell counts himself a “pro-faith atheist.” “Cultural Christians” find
the supernatural claims of Christianity absurd.
So why do these prominent atheists like faith? There are perhaps two reasons which explain their fondness.
First, nostalgia. We are now in a post-Christendom period. Religious occasions such as Christmas and Easter have largely been vacated of their Christian content. These moments in time - along with some of our church buildings - have become beautiful artefacts which create nostalgia for an imagined past. A secular nation, lacking faith in anything other than its own experience and reason, is happy to selectively engage with these artefacts on its own terms. As a result, it is easier for atheists to give credit to Christianity for human rights and democracy, nice Bible stories and beautiful buildings - while leaving the vital things out.
The second reason is more serious. When people say they are sympathetic with the Christian sensibility, what they often are saying is that they take a sympathetic view of Western civilization, and that they prefer a traditional (but not too traditional) approach to culture and community life. However, history suggests there are few - if any polities - that are held together without a faith claim. Some of the most famous secular states - the United States, France, China and the Soviet Union - have had to concoct civil religions of national creeds and prophets to sustain themselves. We have ‘American Exceptionalism,’ ‘Maoism’ and ‘Leninism.’
This consequentialist view of Christianity, common among non-Christian conservatives (and among some Christian conservatives too), holds that what matters is not the truth or falsehood of Christianity but the consequences of Christian belief — i.e. that it will make people happier, make them better citizens, make them more likely to lead moral lives, etc.
Is it sustainable?
T. S. Eliot addressed this line of thinking in The Idea of a Christian Society,
in which his major points of political comparison were the totalitarian states
that were on the march in the 1930s:
What is worst of all is to advocate Christianity, not because it
is true, but because it might be beneficial. Towards the end of 1938 we
experienced a wave of revivalism which should teach us that folly is not the
prerogative of any one political party or any one religious communion, and that
hysteria is not the privilege of the uneducated.
The Christianity expressed has been vague, the religious fervour
has been a fervour for democracy. It may engender nothing better than a
disguised and peculiarly sanctimonious nationalism, accelerating our progress
towards the paganism which we say we abhor.
To justify Christianity because it provides a foundation of
morality, instead of showing the necessity of Christian morality from the truth
of Christianity, is a very dangerous inversion; and we may reflect, that a good
deal of the attention of totalitarian states has been devoted, with a
steadiness of purpose not always found in democracies, to providing their
national life with a foundation of morality - the wrong kind perhaps, but a
good deal more of it. It is not enthusiasm, but dogma, that differentiates a
Christian from a pagan society.
As one American writer puts it:
Because of the history of Christianity in
America, many Americans have a certain set of values that come from that
Christian history - even if they don’t realize it, or don’t even consider
themselves Christians. And that is not necessarily a bad thing. We are
certainly glad that Christianity has had a “preserving” influence on our
culture that can still be felt generations later. We should be glad when people
behave morally, even if they don’t know why they are doing so.
The problem is simply that this state of things
won’t last. To believe in Christian morals, without actually believing in
Christianity, can only be sustained temporarily. Eventually, something’s got to
give. While political actions can perhaps slow the shift, it cannot stop it
completely.
Morality works best when it flows from a
transformed human heart, not when it is merely forced by external laws. That is
not to suggest external laws don’t matter. We should still make good laws and
enforce such laws. But the healthiest cultures are the ones where morality
flows naturally and internally.
We should not be content with people simply
“playing” Christian for a time, because such an approach will not last in times
of resistance and persecution. While it might be nice to have large churches
with full pews, it would be better to have smaller churches that were filled
with people who genuinely believed and understood the implications of their
faith.
I have never read anything that Richard Dawkins ever wrote except a few pages of The God Delusion, standing up in a bookshop one afternoon, when it was first published nearly twenty years ago. That brief inspection suggested that it didn't add anything of significance to Russell's Why I Am Not a Christian, written in the 1920s. I still feel reasonably confident that I'm not missing anything.
ReplyDeleteWill Dawkins end up taking the plunge and getting baptised, or formally becoming a member of one church or another? If he does, I'm sure he will be made very welcome. But if he doesn't, then that's his loss.
I was surprised how poorly argued Russell's Why I Am Not a Christian was, for a philosopher of his stature. I was expecting much more, given how the essay is treated like scripture by some atheists. But I found it a muddle of straw men and stereotypes of Christianity that suggested the author didn't really know what he was talking about. From what I've heard of Dawkins speaking, he's more of the same, so I've never bothered to plough through his books.
DeleteFor a man who supposedly prizes logic, Dawkins seems to want to have his cake and eat it. All the 'nice' bits of Christianity don't make sense if you remove the 'mumbo jumbo'. I suspect he knows this deep down, but it would take a tremendous amount of humility to embrace religion after building your life on denigrating it.
Russell is not actually considered that great a philosopher by scholars, academics and other philosophers. He was a hugely intelligent man, but was a vacuous type of person without any real heft to his character. He was a great explainer of other people's philosophy and his History of Western Philosophy is the kind of classic that every pseud has on his bookshelf, right alongside Stephen Hawking's Brief History of Time and Joyce's Ulysses. It should be no real surprise that Dawkins puts one in mind of him. More interesting is the fact that Dawkins is saying these things now, right on the heels of what is effectively an Islamic blasphemy law in Scotland. I suspect the rise of Islam has shaken Dawkins out of his snooty, snooty complacency regarding Christianity. Christians have been promised victory by Christ, which means it will happen, but public Christianity is, without question, in its death throes. Like all atheists, Dawkins assumed the death of Christianity would mean the birth of the humanist utopia he had in his own mind and which he never questioned. But, to quote Mike Tyson, everyone's got a plan until they get punched in the mouth.
DeleteIt depends which scholars one is talking to. He is certainly well regarded for his works on logic and analytic philosophy (of which he is regarded as one of the founders). As is often the case, he was not so capable when he strayed into other areas and his History is to be read with a pinch of salt.
DeleteYes, Dawkins has, I think, realised that sawing off the branch upon which one is sitting isn't the brightest idea. The problem with humanism is that it only works if it steals from religion. In the absence of a transcendental imperative, niceness and ethics are a tool for the weak - this is what Nietzsche in his lucid moments realised with his 'death of God'. I don't need to be compassionate and loving if I can be powerful. What we're seeing now is the true humanist utopia (dystopia) - everybody for themselves in a race back to a Hobbesian state of nature.
The Catholic Herald has picked up on the Dawkins interview:
ReplyDeletehttps://catholicherald.co.uk/im-a-cultural-christian-declares-richard-dawkins-the-worlds-most-famous-atheist/
Remember, you read it here first 🙃
DeletePlus, it gives no commentary!
Prof Dawkins, is an adequate scientist, a good communicator, a poor historian and a bloody awful theologian and philosopher
ReplyDeleteWhen it comes to religion and faith, he knows not what he says. He is given to much publiiand believes his own hype. A bit like the rest of the atheists.
publiiand ≠ publicity añd
ReplyDeleteAtheists = new atheists
Dawkins views on transgenderism:
ReplyDeleteSex is a true binary. It all started with the evolution of anisogamy – sexual reproduction where the gametes are of two discontinuous sizes: macrogametes or eggs, and microgametes or sperm. The difference is huge. You could pack 15,000 sperm into one human egg. When two individuals jointly invest in a baby, and one invests 15,000 times as much as the other, you might say that she (see how pronouns creep in unannounced) has made a greater commitment to the partnership ...
In mammals, including humans, there are occasional intersexes. Babies can be born with ambiguous genitalia. These cases are rare. ...
But what about gender? What is gender, and how many genders are there? It is now fashionable to use “gender” for what we might call fictive sex: a person’s “gender” is the sex to which they feel that they belong, as opposed to their biological sex. In this meaning, “genders” have proliferated wildly. When I last heard, there were 83. But that was yesterday. What does “gender” actually mean? ...
In English, as in French, gender and sex align. All female animals are of feminine gender, all males are masculine, all inanimate things are neuter (with whimsical exceptions such as ships and nations, which can be feminine). Because of the perfect correlation between sex and gender in English grammar, it was natural for English speakers to adopt “gender” as a genteel euphemism for sex: “Sam is of female gender” sounded more polite than “of female sex”.
But that convention recently gave way to another one. The fashion for females to “identify as” male and for males to “identify as” female has emplaced an assertive new convention. Your genes and chromosomes may determine your sex, but your gender is whatever floats your boat: “I was assigned male at birth, but I identify as a woman.” Finally, the wheel turns full circle, and self-identification has now gone so far as to usurp even “sex”. A “woman” is defined as anyone who chooses to call herself a woman, and never mind if she has a penis and a hairy chest. And of course this entitles her to enter women’s changing rooms and athletic competitions. Why should she not? She is, after all, a woman, is she not? Deny it and you are a transphobic bigot.
High priests of postmodernism teach that lived experience and feelings trump science (which is just the mythology of a tribe of oppressive colonialists) ... In the new religion of transsexual transubstantiation, a “woman’s penis” is just an “accidental”, a mere social construct. In “whole substance” she is a woman. A trans-substantiated woman.
Those who sincerely feel themselves born in the wrong body deserve sympathy and respect ... Many of us know people who choose to identify with the sex opposite to their biological reality. It is polite and friendly to call them by the name and pronouns that they prefer. They have a right to that respect and sympathy. Their militantly vocal supporters do not have a right to commandeer our words and impose idiosyncratic redefinitions on the rest of us ... A woman is an adult human female, free of Y chromosomes.
@Jack, I suppose you're still living in Scotland. I hope you can answer a couple of questions for me about the new "hate" law. J.K. Rowling posted online a list of men who choose to describe themselves as “trans women” and in her post she insists that they really are men, not women. In response, Police Scotland explicitly stated that she has not broken the new law. Two questions:
Delete1. Is that correct so far? Is that what happened, or am I missing something?
2. Has J.K. Rowling set a legal precedent? In other words, can we now take it for granted that anybody can do what she just did, posting online “So-and-so says he is a woman but in fact he isn’t, he’s a man”? Or do lesser mortals still need to be on their guard?
I suspect Police Scotland have simply taken a policy decision that they have enough on their plate without pandering to this claptrap and the "hurties" of the trans groups. These guys were lining up waiting for the law to go into force so they could report Rowling, assuming the cops would just go full "The Sweeny's doin' ninety coz they got the word to go" on her. But there were over 4000 complaints in the first 24 hours, and half of them were against Humza Useless for his "white, white, white" speech at Holyrood. No police force can waste its time with garbage like this, so they've simply decided none if is is against this very imprecise and incomprehensible law, and that's the end of it.
DeleteOn the other hand, there are two salient features of the political left that you must always bear in mind when dealing with them. One is that they tell lies. The other is that they simply never learn. The second is the one to be concerned about here. The police are not enforcing the law because it's unenforceable and it's outrageous. You know it, I know it, the dogs in the street are barking it, the coppers are perfectly aware of it, and so is JK Rowling. None of which will have the slightest effect on the political left (see Salient Feature No 2, above.)
I think -- and no one will be happier to be wrong than me -- that they'll try to cut some weaker animal out of the herd and bring them down. It could be a blogger, although not, I think, someone like Stu Campbell at Wings Over Scotland -- he has just too big a following. It's unworthy, I know, but I'd laugh if it was someone more amenable to the left like James Kelly at Scot Goes Pop, but it could be someone like him. His online demographic doesn't have the reach of Campbell, or the funds to fight an assault, and if he published something the left could use to make an example of, his liberal credentials would mean nothing to them. For the present, I don't think the ordinary commenter on blogs like this has anything to worry about, but that could change. Stay attuned.
@ Ray
DeleteOne can still express an opinion or cite scientific evidence for or against a position. Provided one is not intending to stir up hatred or incite violence, one is not breaking the law.
3000+ complaints so far ....
Delete@HJ Yes you are right it is about incitement, but that can be in the eye of the beholder. This particularly becomes an issue with religion. For example if you were expressing an opinion about Mohammed and his sexual morality, declaring him to be a child rapist could be considered an opinion or incitement. I think this is what the left will ultimately use to force the law to be implemented by the police.
Delete@ Prof G
DeleteFair point, Clive. That would certainly inflame passions! Similarly, condemning Islam's views on infidels, women and same sex attracted folk would be an issue. Perhaps one would have to say/write that "judged by today's standards" etc ... Even then one would be skating close to the edge if it was judged your comments were intended to cause hatred or incite violence.
@Hj
DeleteA real problem here is that anything that Muslims don't like, would in their opinion be incitement, and once a court ruling has been made with regards islam in their favour, once the dam has been breached there isn't a way back and Islam would have in.very explicit terms, it's blasphemy law.
Agreed - burn a Bible = okay; burn the Quran = incitement.
DeleteI don't see me ever moving back to Scotland!
Delete@Clive - from what I understand, those statements about Muhammad would also fall foul of the proposed definition of Islamophobia that UK Labour want to bring in.
DeleteThe problem with all this is its subjectivity. What is hate? What is incitement to it? Some groups seem unable to separate criticism or mockery from hate. Suspend a crucifix in bodily fluids, and it's art. Show a cartoon of Muhammad and go into hiding. These laws will undoubtedly favour certain groups over others (even more so than existing ones), and that's a disastrous for a functioning society.
I very much suspect that Rowling's case was an example of the government not wanting to see their new law exposed to public ridicule in a fight against someone with a high profile and deep pockets. It remains to be seen if the same applies to the rest of us.
I don't know if you remember the case in Austria where someone called the non profit to be a paedofile, quoting the Koran. He ended up losing and being convicted of a hate crime .
DeleteI can't see things differently here.
And as we saw when the police went after the women who put up the 'woman: adult, human female' poster, you don't even need to use inflammatory language - mere statements of fact are enough.
DeleteThe real acid test of this law isn't going to be Rowling's comments about gender, it's going to be religious criticism. A cynic might think that the former was a smokescreen to introduce the latter.
I think it useful to remember that the law isn't about simply protecting the Trans communities right to convince itself that they aren't delusional. It's also about race, religion, gender and age
ReplyDeleteSo who do you think wanted the religion clause and why🤬
Hasn't faith always been a protected category - unlike transsexuals which is new.
DeleteYeah, that's a puzzler all right.
Delete@Bell, with regards targeting a blogger, my understanding was that Wings over Scotland and the SNP have had a big falling out. Do you not think the SNP might use an opportunity to target him? I agree with what you've said, but that's behaving in a rational, intelligent manner. The SNP seem to have forgotten what this is?
Delete"Hasn't faith always been a protected category - unlike transsexuals which is new."
DeleteBlairs hate law certainly was but that's relatively recent. Prior it wasn't faith but Christianity that was protected
I also don't know if Blairs law covered the UK or just England?
No, I don't think the SNP will go after Stu Campbell. He's hugely influential, but what's more important, he has an amazing ability to raise a lot of money in a hurry. He recently put out a fundraiser to pay for legal advice, seeking £5000 for an advocate's opinion on the new law. He raised it within hours, and at present, it stands at over 12,000. If the SNP did target him, I don't think it's an exaggeration to think he'd have enough in a day to pay for a team of top advocates in Scotland for a year. He's just too big to mess with. Laws like this are to intimidate the little guy. When the opinion came in, Campbell threw down the gauntlet to Police Scotland
Delete...we also do so to place Police Scotland on notice that anything published by Wings Over Scotland is done in the light of the greatest possible care having been taken to ensure compliance with the law, and that in such a context any future attempt/s to improperly interfere with our rights of free expression under Article 10 of the European Convention On Human Rights (ECHR) will be viewed with regard to pursuing the maximum available recourse for wrongful restriction of our lawful activities.
We have both funds and the will to pursue such action.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/a-thousand-paper-cranes/#more-142127
I rather like it here despite the SNP. Then I live in a quiet town in a beautiful part of Dumfriesshire that is relatively untouched by the madness in the world. It's socially conservative and has a strong community spirit.
DeleteMy Scottish ancestors came from a couple of places near you, Castle Douglas and Kirkpatrick Durham in what was then Kirkcudbrightshire.
Delete@HJ Socially conservative? Your whole town will. Be charged with a hate crime 😂
Delete@Bell
DeleteI suppose the only thing I would say, the financial risk won't be the SNP's but the tax payers. But you're probably right.
@ Ray,
DeleteYes, I remember you sharing this on the Cranmer site. I know both places well. Some folk still use Kirkcudbrightshire. What led you to Brazil?
In connection with my work I moved backwards and forwards between London and São Paulo several times, first in the sixties, then again in the seventies, and finally in the eighties.
DeleteFootball player - then coach?
Delete@Jack, are you planning to post anything about Dignitatis Infinita? The Catholic Herald focuses on what it says about gender theory:
ReplyDeletehttps://catholicherald.co.uk/vatican-condemns-gender-theory-in-new-doctrinal-document/?swcfpc=1
I am - in time. Looks like a solid declaration!
DeleteFeel free to make comment here, Ray.
Russell Said this:
ReplyDelete“The root of the matter (if we want a stable world) is a very simple and old-fashioned thing, a thing so simple that I am almost ashamed to mention it, for fear of the derisive smile with which wise cynics will greet my words. The thing I mean — please forgive me for mentioning it — is love, Christian love, or compassion. If you feel this, you have a motive for existence, a guide in action, a reason for courage, an imperative necessity for intellectual honesty. If you feel this, you have all that anybody should need in the way of religion. Although you may not find happiness, you will never know the despair of those whose life is aimless and void of purpose, for there is always something that you can do to diminish the awful sum of human misery." - Bertrand Russell in "The Impact of Science on Society" (1951) Ch. 6 : "Science and Values"
Of course that did not make him a Christian - people may have similar/the same ethics but not be Christian.
Hello Des. It’s a long shot, but I have an idea we may have met before. There was a commenter at Cranmer’s who identified as a snail or a typographic escargot, something like @/”
DeleteCould it be our good friend @/?
DeleteI regret to announce that one of Mr. (or Ms. or Mx.) Cargot's kin met their maker in a bucket of rainwater overnight. He was reverently returned to the grass from which he came, and later eaten by a blackbird.
DeleteAlso, reflecting on Des' comment, I realised that some of the people I've met who've shown the most Christian love (by which I mean genuine love, not simply adhering to a code of ethics) have been non-Christians.
I'm sure the blackbird was appreciative of the meal.
DeleteDignitas Infinita has this to say on love:
"The glorious Christ will judge by the love of neighbour that consists in ministering to the hungry, the thirsty, the stranger, the naked, the sick, and the imprisoned, with whom he identifies (cf. Mt. 25:34-36). For Jesus, the good done to every human being, regardless of the ties of blood or religion, is the single criterion of judgment. The apostle Paul affirms that every Christian must live according to the requirements of dignity and respect for the rights of all people (cf. Rom. 13:8-10) according to the new commandment of love (cf. 1 Cor. 13:1-13)."
Not sure it's the "sole criteria" - love of God comes first and finds expression in love of others. But, arguably, whether you know God in a religious sense or not, you can't have one without the other.
More appreciative than I'd have been! Most of my regular birds seem to be without their wives/life partners, so I assume they're on the nest now and the extra protein will be a help. They're definitely getting through the food I put out.
DeleteI think the example of the Scriptures and the saints is that (true) love of others is love of God, because when we love 'the least of these', we love Christ and the angels, who often come to us in disguise. At the very least, nobody can love God if they don't love their neighbour - the love of one's neighbour comes first and is the litmus test (1 Jn 4:20).
I'm sure that there are people who are full of the love of God, but don't recognise it as such because the God whom has been preached to them is not a god of love. They wouldn't call themselves Christian, but I wonder if Jesus would. And vice versa.
Great discusion, chaps - Bell's quote from Squeeze's "Cool for Cats" was certainly an unexpected bonus! - and Gadjo wonders why he has been absent from this blog for so long (not to mention why he feels compelled to talk about himself in the third-person when here).
ReplyDeleteDawkins is foolish for the reasons already given by others here - and don't forget that in his time he has actively called for the mocking of Christians. One could recommend Frank Turek's "Stealing from God" and other books about such cognative disonance.
(If anybody's remotely interested - No? OK - Gadjo has recently been in Blighty and on a bit of a pilgrimage to sites of ancient British Christianity, specifically in North Wales, including the unique pilgrimage destination of St. Winefride's Well). Best wishes to all.
Welcome back Gadjo. Hope you enjoyed your trip to Britain. HJ visited St. Winefride's Well some years ago.
DeleteHi Jack. Yes, Gadjo's trip to North Wales was a great success. He was in the (cold) waters at St. Winefride's Well, along with 2 others. It's an amazing place, even if one doesn't fully sign up to its curative powers, not least for its architectural magnificence, and it was the only such site to have continued despite Henry VIII. He also visited one of the many St. Mary's Wells in the area, once famous but now a complete ruin and accessible only by kind permission of the farmer on whose land it now lies.
DeleteAh, well HJ went in early August and although somewhat crowded the waters was warm and welcoming! Yes, both Henry and Elizabeth took full advantage of its income generating power from the donation by pilgrims.
DeleteI've ridden there a couple of times, it's a lovely part of the country with some nice roads. There's a small church in the village as well, if I remember correctly, where I went to a vigil Mass on a Saturday evening when I visited.
DeleteIn general, the pre-Reformation holy sites - and even the pre-Christian ones with their attendant folk lore - seem to have survived better in the Celtic nations than in England.
Hi Jack,
DeleteThe young Irish man who was in there with me (doing 3 circuits of the pool, as appears to be the custom) seemed to be regarding it as a penance... but at least he was in, and 'on message' :-)
Hi Lain,
Good to hear from you - hope you read this. Yes, although I know Snowdonia well, it was my first time in that part of Wales... uncharacteristically lush and easy walking... and indeed most of the folk there seemed to be English ex-pats'! This was also my first real foray into pre-reformation sites if worship; I was able to tell my post-reformation brethren that this kinda WAS Christianity back then, whether one liked or believed in the details or not.
The notoriously privacy-deprived Mr & Mrs Sussex are in the news yet again today, this time because — according to The Spectator — young Henry has now opted to list the United States as his primary country of residence, rather than the United Kingdom.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.spectator.co.uk/article/prince-harry-ditches-uk-as-primary-residence/