Sweet…atheism is now officially a religion

Kenneth Hynek • 25th Nov 2007 • Religion, Atheism, Religion

They have churches…and now they have Sunday school. I agree with Michelle Malkin’s comment, though…for a bunch of freethinkers, you’d think they’d have picked a more original day.

The Palo Alto Sunday family program uses music, art and discussion to encourage personal expression, intellectual curiosity and collaboration. One Sunday this fall found a dozen children up to age 6 and several parents playing percussion instruments and singing empowering anthems like I’m Unique and Unrepeatable, set to the tune of Ten Little Indians, instead of traditional Sunday-school songs like Jesus Loves Me. Rather than listen to a Bible story, the class read Stone Soup, a secular parable of a traveler who feeds a village by making a stew using one ingredient from each home.

Down the hall in the kitchen, older kids engaged in a Socratic conversation with class leader Bishop about the role persuasion plays in decision-making. He tried to get them to see that people who are coerced into renouncing their beliefs might not actually change their minds but could be acting out of self-preservation–an important lesson for young atheists who may feel pressure to say they believe in God.

I love that last sentence — it has all the rings of unintentional irony I’ve long come to expect from evangelical atheism.

Though it can hardly be called an official theory, there’s a theological discussion I’ve been party to which posits that it is the natural, genetically-driven inclination of the human person to seek after the divine; that is, human beings are naturally theistic in some way or form or fashion. Now, true faith must be gifted to us, so the human search for the supernatural leads not necessarily to Jesus but to animism and paganism, but the point is that there is built into the human person the need and capacity to seek after God.

God has, of course, designed this reality into us, because God desires that we should seek after Him and in so doing come into a share in the glory and salvation He promises.

Atheists, of course, reject this line of reasoning, but it is interesting to note that in spite of their being ardently non-theistic, they nevertheless seem to involve themselves in more and more trappings of religion, and shape both their philosophy and actions to reflect the part of their natures that they simultaneously attempt to deny.

One of the chief criticisms I hear of the argument that atheism is actually a religion is that atheists do not organize in the same way that religious believers do. Apparently, this is no longer true. So…shall we hold an election for who shall be the atheist pope? I’m thinking it should be Harris…Hitchens is too vitriolic, and Dawkins and Dennett are too “big name”. A good pope should be an underdog…like a Polish guy in a room full of Italians.

One added note of unintentional irony: I love that the kids sing “I’m unique and unrepeatable”…which is also a Christian belief.

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