What progressive theists think about atheism
Since it has come up a number of times, consider here what most progressive theists tend to believe about atheism. This response does not quite fit in the current string, so I’ll take a different go at it. Right at the beginning let’s be clear; many, if not most American church-goers are conservatives, and tend to believe that only Christians of a certain sort are “saved,” whatever that means. The religious scene in the United States tends to be dominated by these believers. While they may in these days be a majority of religionists, by no means do they represent all Christians. As I have often said, most ecumenical seminaries, denominations, Councils of Churches and progressive congregations do not fall into this fundamentalist pit. Increasingly religious progressives find common cause in a vital inter-faith dialogue. A large congregation near here has on its staff a Rabbi and an Imam. Our local interfaith seminary trains religious leaders in all three disciplines. If there is any argument within these groups, it is with a few within them that take a very conservative stance. For instance, if portions of the United Methodists Church is wrong on GLBT issues, they hear about it from the progressives within their own body—as well as from the rest of us.
Since atheism is not a religion, but the absence of one, atheists are obviously not included in any inter-faith conversations. The vital and growing “Parliament of World Religions,” has no representative from atheism, although Buddhism, Confucianism and several other “faiths” do not believe in a supreme being. Yet they call themselves and are called “religions” because they have doctrines, rituals, practices which are formally accepted by the adherents.
I have been deeply involved in all the ventures and groups listed above, and I have never heard, seen or witnessed in any verbal or written form, a criticism of either atheism or atheists. It is just not on the agenda anywhere. There has been some commentary about secularism as having a negative effect on culture, while humanism and humanistic institutions and groups are always seen as colleagues. In most cases Unitarianism, which is substantially composed of humanists, is always welcome to the conversations, and is among the groups that make the most important contribution. So-called Ethical Culture societies are largely atheistic, but they too often join the conversations.
In these ecclesial gatherings, nobody flouts a particular doctrine. The main interest lies in what various people and groups think about the issues facing society—which are the same issues facing theists and atheists alike. How a person or a group comes down on the rights of the poor, GLBTs, war and peace, economic disparity, etc., forms the basis of these conversations. There is no doctrinal litmus test, and nobody seems to care. What is important is the relationship between faith and the issues we all face.
Beyond these wide-ranging conversations, I have never seen in print, in journals books, periodicals or reports, a single word critical of atheists or atheism. It just never comes up and is on nobody’s agenda. There are, however, serious ideological confrontations with both fundamentalist religionists and philosophy’s like Randian Objectivism. It is not Rand’s atheism that is the focus of the objection, but the ethical framework out of which it operates.
These groups and persons believe that how they view issues before society flows from their religious commitments, but realize that others who have the same notions of what is good for the world, may have widely differing ways they have come to the same conclusions. Faith is not essential to any ethical stance, even while the ethical stance of many of us is in direct relationship to our faith.
None of these bodies is a debating forum with atheists. We would consider that an unproductive waste of time, and no one is interested. DU is the only place I know where this happens. We simply accept as colleagues in the struggle for human values, all those committed to those values. Faith or no faith is beside the point.
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