Does America Need More Atheists?

An opinion piece on the October 3 website of the Washington Post caught my eye and captured my attention. It was by WaPo’s contributing columnist Kate Cohen and titled “America doesn’t need more God. It needs more atheists.” 

Kate Cohen is a mother, an atheist, and an author. Her book, We of Little Faith: Why I Stopped Pretending to Believe (and Maybe You Should To), which was also published on Oct. 3, states that being a mother led her to “come out” as an atheist.

Cohen was raised Jewish and married a Jew in a Jewish wedding—but she explains that she never really believed “in that jealous, capricious, and cruel Old Testament God” (p. 12). But she never identified herself as an atheist until she began rearing her children.

In her book, Kate tells how she vowed to teach her children “what I truly thought about everything,” and she “did not let them decide for themselves,” for she strongly believed that “passing on one’s preference for reason, evidence, and honesty…is the truly moral choice” (pp. 13, 14).

Kate was born and reared in Virginia. She graduated from Dartmouth University and married in 1997. She is now in her late 40s, but I was unable to find out how old her children are. They are probably young adults now and it would be interesting to know how they have turned out.*¹

There are positive aspects of Kate Cohen and her book that should be recognized. She is honest in identifying who she is rather than seeking (any longer) to keep her lack of religious faith closeted. And she encourages others to be honest also as intimated in her book’s subtitle.

Even though I have spent most of my life seeking to help people become God-believers, I think those who don’t believe in God should be able to identify themselves openly rather than pretending to be and to believe, what they are not and do not. Honesty, indeed, is the best policy.

Further, Cohen seeks to remove the stigma from those who identify as atheists. She writes, “Like atheism, homosexuality is a difference that can be hidden. Sociologists call it a Concealable Stigmatized Identity” (p. 221), but she claims that that stigma is disappearing more rapidly for LGBTQ people than for atheists.

But as a God-believer—and because I am a God-believer—I certainly think that people need to be respected/accepted regardless of their religious faith or lack thereof. After all, that is what freedom of religion means.

There are also highly questionable aspects of Cohen’s book. While there are some nuanced places, she gives the impression that all atheists are largely the same, and “good,” whereas all who believe in God/religion are also largely the same, and “bad.” (See, for example, p. 228).

In strongly encouraging people who do not believe in God to affirm their atheism, she writes,

If you need a reason to let people know that you don’t believe moral authority derives from a Supreme Being, then I offer you no less than making America a safer, smarter, more just, and more compassionate country.*²

It is because of that belief that the WaPo article was titled “America doesn’t need more God It Needs More Atheists.”

On the previous page, she asserts, “…peel back the layers of discrimination against LGBTQ people and you find religion.”

She further contends that “control over women’s bodies,” as well as “school-library book bans, and even the backlash against acknowledging the racist underpinnings of our nation are motivated by religion.”

To such charges, I can only say “Yes, but….” Yes, there are Christians who are exactly such as Kate mentioned. But, there are Christians who are against discrimination and control as much as she is. And regarding climate change, note what Pope Francis said about in his 10/4 “apostolic exhortation.”*³

Moreover, if truth were known, my guess is that there is a large percentage of atheists who support discrimination and control as well as the (mostly) conservative evangelical Christians she uses as her foil.

So, no, Ms. Cohen, America doesn’t need less God and more atheists. It needs more intellectually honest and intelligent atheists (or whatever) as well as intellectually honest and intelligent God-believers to work together to make our society more compassionate and more just for all.

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*¹ In her book, Cohen says that her children are “engaged, informed, and savvy citizens” (p. 227).

*² These words are in a paragraph that begins with her saying that “anti-atheist sentiment is not a matter of life and death in America. But transphobia is, sexual violence against women is, forced birth is, climate change is, and global pandemics are” (p. 230).

*³ I wrote about this in some detail in my Oct. 13 blog post (see here).

 

Demythologizing Santa (and Christmas?)

Naomi, my seven-year-old granddaughter, believes in Santa Claus, as do many children her age. My son Ken, wonders what to say to Naomi about Santa. Other members of the Seat family have shared ideas and insights about the Santa Claus “myth.”

Marian, my twenty-six-year-old granddaughter shared the “Yes, Virginia, There Is a Santa Claus” webpage from Newseum. Back in 1897, eight-year-old Virginia O’Hanlon asked about the reality of Santa in a letter to the editor of The Sun, a New York City newspaper (published from 1833-1950). 

The response to Virginia’s letter, printed as an unsigned editorial, was written by veteran newsman Francis Pharcellus Church. It has become the most reprinted newspaper editorial in history.

In his response Church wrote, “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy.” 

We adults know that the popular belief, like Naomi’s, in Santa Claus is a type of myth. And we recognize that Church’s editorial was a type of demythologization of the Santa story. (Actually, he was somewhat misleading and not entirely truthful in what he wrote to Virginia.)

But what about it? Is the Christmas story about the birth of Jesus much the same as what children are told about Santa? To hear some scholars tell it, there is not much more truth in one story than the other. 

Many New Testament scholars agree that Jesus was not really born in Bethlehem. Nor was the visit of the Magi factual either, so, obviously, there was no actual guiding star. For a long time, “enlightened” people have also rejected the literal story of the Virgin Birth.

And now some theologians are rejecting the idea of God as an “objective” Being, so all the talk about Jesus being sent by God or being Immanuel, God with us, is not literally true either.

Further, with the growing emphasis on religious pluralism, the idea of Jesus being divine, a Savior for all the world, is being increasingly rejected also.

So, according to these “enlightened” ones, the stories that have been told about Christmas are all only mythical. The Christmas Christ “exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist,” but no more as a real person than Santa Claus.

(Of course, there really was a historical person in the fourth century who came to be known as Saint Nicholas. So, too, most will acknowledge that there was a real person named Jesus of Nazareth. But both, it is claimed, are far different from the stories told about them now.)

But what does all this say about being intellectually honest? Are people being duplicitous in telling the Christmas stories—to their children or to themselves—while knowing all along that they are only mythical and not factual?

I am currently working on a book, whose subtitle will likely be Christian Faith and Intellectual Honesty. The first emphasis is that Christians (as well as others) should be as intellectually honest as possible. Lying, duplicity, or pretending myths or outright falsehoods are factual are practices that should be opposed and rejected as much as possible.

But while acknowledging that there are, no doubt, mythical aspects to the traditional Christmas story, I believe it is really true that “God was in Christ, reconciling the world” to God and to one another.

That is why I believe Christmas can be celebrated honestly. And that is why I can also truthfully wish each of you a Merry Christmas!