Part 2: liberal religion


I usually criticize conservative religion because it represents the greatest threat, and not because, as some believe, I’m ignorant of liberal religion. As one who would like to have some form of religion in my life, but who long ago rejected the conservative faith of his childhood, I have been a Unitarian; read quite a few books by religious liberals; and was the target of my liberal sister’s proselytization efforts for decades. My most recent book by a liberal was A Religion of One’s Own by Thomas Moore (pictured), which came out this year. The first thing I did upon finding it at the library was to turn to the index and count the references to God. I was surprised to find that God only appeared on pages 14-16 of the 272-page work, but this was the part of the book that I spent the most time pondering because it represents the views of millions of religious liberals, served as a source for this post, and because I considered his other thoughts obvious.

The virtue of conservative religion is that its meaning is clear even when its illogical or has no basis in fact; its downside is that it leads to oppression. The virtue of liberal religion is that its potential for oppression is low, but on its downside, its theology is devoid of meaningful content. For example,

“Jesus walked on water,” says something, whereas,

“The best way…keeps the reality of God, but emptied of our ideas of who or what God is…” is so devoid of value that I suspect Moore of writing it without reflecting upon its implications. For to believe in a God about whom one can have no conception means to believe—without the least evidence—in a God that might be good, but then again, might be evil; a God that might be compassionate, but could just as easily be bloodthirsty; a God that might be sentient, but could be an unconscious force, and so on down the line through every conceivable characteristic, including existence, because to affirm that God exists is to hold at least one idea about “who or what God is.”

“God is in the space between sentences. God is the unspoken and the unwritten…God is a sphere whose center is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere…You look until you see nothing tangible, and that is God.” (Moore)

What is the difference between a God about whom nothing can be said—and therefore might not exist—versus atheism, and why pray to such a God (“I’ll speak to God out of extreme need”), prayer being an act that surely implies belief in a deity that is conscious, loving, powerful, omnipresent, compassionate, and fluent in human language? Just as Descartes claimed to throw out all knowledge except for a belief in his own existence, and from that one belief to completely rebuild his identity as a white European Catholic male of a certain age, height, weight, number of teeth, and so forth; I doubt Moore’s honesty when he prays to that about which he insists nothing can be known. Such contradictions are common among liberals.

Various liberal churches teach a course entitled “Living the Mystery,” in seeming unawareness that its synonym would be “Living the Ignorance,” mystery being but a euphemism for not knowing. Those who use the capitalized word believe they have a greater spiritual awareness than the rest of us, but of what does their awareness consist? I don’t know despite having tried awfully hard to find out, and my considered opinion is that it’s simply a case of the emperor having no clothes. Liberals themselves would see it as akin to Gnosticism—not that they use the word—in that, if you’re on the inside of the movement, you get it, but if you’re on the outside, it just looks like silliness.

Not every liberally religious person would agree with Moore on every point (he doesn’t identify himself as a Christian for one thing), but all share his vagueness. My sister often said to me, Your problem is that you’re stuck in the teachings of your fundamentalist childhood, and this causes you to think that either a great many things can be said about God, or else God doesn’t exist. My response was that if some universally benevolent being or force that is deserving of the title God really does exist, then surely its existence would be so obvious that none could doubt it. To simply say, as she did, that I define God as the universal impetus toward good, and my goal is to align myself with that good, strikes me as no different from secular humanism except in its unfathomable insistence on retaining the word God.

Like conservative Christianity, liberal Christianity holds to the parts of scripture it likes and disregards the rest. For example, it’s big on the story of the Good Samaritan but silent on “Put every man, woman, child, and animal, to the sword, but keep the young virgins for yourselves.” How do liberals justify this? About some things, they deny that God (however defined) really said them; others, they identify as metaphors. Fine, but how do they know what God really said, or what God’s numerous genocides, wanton murders, and other atrocities, are metaphors of. Metaphors are only useful inasmuch as they relate to things that exist in reality, but liberal Christians mostly use them to clarify other metaphors, and this makes them substitutes for reality rather than definers of reality:

“What is God?”
“God is the ground of being.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that God is the soil, and we are the seed.”
“I still don’t get it.”
“God is the substance in which we live and move and have our being.”

I see no reason to think that vagueness, ignorance (aka Divine Mystery), and endless metaphors, constitute heightened spiritual awareness, and in every field but religion, even religious people regard them as muddled thinking and therefore as impediments to truth. I think of liberal religion as what’s left when everything has been taken from religion except the need to believe. By claiming that vagueness, ignorance, and metaphor, represent spirituality, liberals leave themselves less open to attack simply because there’s so little to attack. Talking with them is like biting the air in that you’re free to do it all day, but why would you? Maybe they can’t help it. Maybe there really is a gene that tends toward religious belief and is weak or absent in those who lack such beliefs. If so, it’s not to the blame of the one or the credit of the other, but is merely a fact, although I would consider it a regrettable fact in the case of believers and among those who, like myself, can neither believe nor escape the impulse to believe if only to cope with a life of endless pain.

I find that the only direction one like myself can go is toward liberal religion, yet I am no more welcome there than I am among conservatives because most liberals regard my unwillingness to use their terminology to prove that I’m unworthy. As Moore put it:

“Atheism tends to be nothing more than yet another too-earnest religion with the added problem of being excessively rationalistic.”

This by the same man who believes in a God about which nothing can be said. In my wide experience, most liberals regard atheists as excessively rationalistic based solely upon the fact that they are atheists (agnosticism being an acceptable alternative), it never occurring to them that the terminology might simply be different. I say this because when I get beyond the God-talk, I find little in liberal writings with which I disagree. For example, Moore’s admonitions to appreciate beauty, cherish the moment, help other people, and find depth in the commonplace, are characteristics of sensitivity and maturity rather than theism, yet he relates them to theism and believes that atheists are less than because they don’t use the word God, a word about which he himself has such reservations that, “I sometimes just use the letter G.” Why, having abandoned two of the three letters is he hell-bent on keeping the third? I know it matters to him because if it didn’t, he wouldn’t insult those who have abandoned the third, not that he thinks any more highly of people who believe in a God whose attributes are knowable:

“We need to grow out of that kind of religion….I don’t want to make little of God by pretending God is a ‘he’ pulling strings in the sky. I’d rather not use the word if it’s going to be so small and inadequate.”

Terminology is to liberals what dogma is to conservatives in that conservatives imbue words with meaning and require that the meaning be accepted, while liberals take meaning from words, and require that the words alone be embraced. Frankly, I don’t much care if liberals believe in a God whom they define as the impetus toward good, or the spirit of love, or that about which nothing can be known. So that I won’t portray myself as more tolerant than I am, I should add that I can’t begin to fathom the adoration that many of them feel toward Christ, and I find their devotion to the word God so lifeless that it troubles me in the same way that I would find it troubling if someone freeze-dried their dead cat, set it on a pillow, and insisted that everyone go along with them in pretending that it was alive. Yet, we all have our little oddities, and I wouldn’t reject them because of theirs, but they do reject me because of mine (it’s easier to be rejecting when you’re not in a tiny minority). I prefer liberal theism to conservative theism only because liberals are unlikely to openly oppress me, but their contempt for atheists is no less complete. It’s just less understandable.

21 comments:

All Consuming said...

Fascinating post. It made me consider if there actually is any liberal Christianity in the Uk, because I know there is none mentioned in the mainstream media nor represented in schools, and I am reading up about it after this.
My you have a wonderful brain Snow, no matter how long it may have taken you to write it, this is some post. X

Charles Gramlich said...

I'm not sure I understand the statement about liberal religion being 'devoid of meaning." You mean devoid of certainty perhaps, but how is that devoid of meaning? Much of our scientific knowledge is devoid of certainty. We are not certain of exactly how old the universe or the earth is. We have a range of times that are most likely pretty accurate but there is no certainty. we can't even tell where an electron is within an atom with certainty. All we have is probabilities. I would argue that "certainty" is almost always actual ignorance. The most interesting discussions, and I might say the "most" meaningful, happen precisely where there is no certainty. The more certain we are of something, the less valuable the examination of it becomes. Of course, none of this indicates that there is a god, or not one. but if there is a god then I feel that we certainly don't know much about him/her/it. Questions are what we are left with.

Elephant's Child said...

Another post to get me thinking. I have had no exposure to liberal christianity (and really very little to any religion) but 'appreciate beauty, cherish the moment, help other people, and find depth in the commonplace' is certainly a shorthand for the way I try and live my life.
And I am happy to leave God out of it.
And people ARE frequently inexplicable - or I find them so.

Snowbrush said...

"It made me consider if there actually is any liberal Christianity in the Uk"

Liberal basically means non-literal, and since the UK tends to be more politically liberal than the U.S., I wouldn't be surprised by what liberal religion isn't prevalent there.

"I'm not sure I understand the statement about liberal religion being 'devoid of meaning."

Charles, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. I changed the sentence to "...its theology is devoid of meaningful content," because I in no way think that it is without any meaning.

"I am happy to leave God out of it."

My sister was right inasmuch for me to find the word God meaningful, it must point to something that is aware, and I don't believe there's anything "out there" that is aware.

kj said...

Snow, I'm sorry, I couldn't read all of this. I cannot will myself to think so deeply about something I don't often think about.

What I cull from your interest in the subject of god for me becomes looking at belief and faith. Who is wise who believes absolutely? What I believe and where my faith lies includes doubt and its possibilities

I don't understand why you analyze and write about this so much, but I think perhaps you are a theologian. I imagine you would be a fascinating college professor in this field.

Do you know of Mary Oliver, snow? I think you will find god in her view

Love
kj

Linda said...

I know quite a few Unitarians. They are intelligent, interesting, and educated. I have heard it said that "Unitarians are just a Sunday morning social club." From what I know of Unitarians, they are passionate about human rights. Some even protest, taking stances that get them arrested. They truly care about people from what I have seen.

I like the individuals I know, but their "theology" escapes me.

"Appreciate beauty and cherish the moment" are concepts introduced into our Christian thoughts by the British Romantic poets (Wordsworth, for one). The ideas we have about seeing God in a flower or a newborn were not common religious concepts before the Romantic poets. Now, the conservatives religious use these symbols to PROVE there is a God.

Conservatives accept without any reservations what they are told within their denominations that is holy, Biblical, or proof to support their beliefs. I think it is circular reasoning, but they have no problems accepting something so illogical. The also prove any point with "in the Bible it says..." I stop them there.

Liberal religion often uses existentialist philosophers to prove their point--Jean-Paul Sarte, for one. I was never sure what the "religious" point was since he did not believe in a creator.

PhilipH said...

I have no knowledge about the different classes of religion I'm glad to say. I simply know that no religion is what the world needs.

"Conservative" religion has raised its ugly head in the form of David Cameron, our Prime Minister. And he has been roundly criticised for opening his mouth on this topic.

"Labour" religion also caused much comment when Tony Blair, who is cursed with his decision to go to war with Iraq, stated that he had changed to Catholicism.

Politicians who spout religious claptrap are two-faced: they say that priests should keep out of political arguments and stick to their priestly works but politicians don't mind broadcasting their 'religious' bent.

Wouldn't surprise me if Tony Blair didn't convert to Islam at some point in the future, better to understand THEIR religion.

My daughter creates beautiful little "fairy" sculptures. I can really believe in her and her creations. They are both real.

End of.

Strayer said...

There should be no reason even for the word atheist in a rational world. You and I would not need such a word to describe unbelief, as other words that describe declared beliefs would not exist either. People would live, no eyes to some paranormal being, or lack of. Just simply live, free of all this. No need for all the words to describe each person's belief, lack of or doubt.

CreekHiker / HollysFolly said...

You know Snow... You ponder God more than most of the deeply religious people I know. It makes me think you have a God...whether you realize it or not. It seems that your problem or disappointments stem more from religion... as do my own.

I was very young when I decided God could not be all the things people said (and I heard some downright evil things). I made up my mind to just live a good life. Treat people with kindness, don't hurt others, etc. Yes, I believe in God. I've seen too many wonderful things to not believe. But I've never really found that God in church. And I've certainly never found him in all those braggarts that wear their Christianity on their sleeves.

All Consuming said...

"Liberal basically means non-literal, and since the UK tends to be more politically liberal than the U.S., I wouldn't be surprised by what liberal religion isn't prevalent there. " - yes but not mainstream at all. Most of the liberals here, so far as politics and thoughts go don't tend to believe in any God at all.

Snowbrush said...

"they say that priests should keep out of political arguments and stick to their priestly works but politicians don't mind broadcasting their 'religious' bent.''

Here, politicians are expected to be religious as a prerequisite for getting elected, and many Christians are very open about wanting to be in partnership with the government. Religion is a far greater threat now than it was for most of my life, the exception being the early and mid-fifties.

"It makes me think you have a God...whether you realize it or not."

I might be able to address this if I knew more about you mean.

"I've seen too many wonderful things to not believe."

How do you reconcile a God who does wonderful things with a God who does horrible things, and is it necessary that God exist for wonderful things to happen. If you don't want to address such questions, I don't much care, so just do what would be fun for you.

"not mainstream at all. Most of the liberals here, so far as politics and thoughts go don't tend to believe in any God at all."

In regard to religion, "mainstream" here has come to mean those denominations that used to be mainstream but have been steadily losing members for decades, so much so that their churches are either closing or so low in attendance that most of the sanctuary will be empty. There's a move here away from denominations and toward what are called non-denominational mega churches. There's one in Houston with an attendance of 44,000 for the Sunday service and a yearly budget of $80-million. That's the direction things are going with younger people especially. These churches offer services that are much more emotional than those of the mainstream Methodists, Lutherans, Baptists, etc., and that's probably their greatest attraction (many young people felt that the mainstream churches had lost enthusiasm, relevance, direction, and emotional appeal). Unfortunately, the people who go to these (charismatic type) services tend to be politically conservative, and openly question the science behind things like evolution and global warming. They also tend to oppose abortion, and see war as an attractive solution to international deadlock. The danger that these groups represent is one thing that the mainstream and I agree on because a lot of the mainstream churches are now fairly liberal. It's funny to think that when I was young, older people tended to be conservative, and now it's the other way around. So much for the hopes of the sixties. We battled the old fascists only to find ourselves spending our senior years battling young fascists.

"Most of the liberals here, so far as politics and thoughts go don't tend to believe in any God at all."

Political liberals here also tend to be nonbelievers, liberal believers, or non-religious. As a rule, people who are liberal in religion tend to be liberal in politics, and people who are conservative in religion tend to be conservative in politics. It's almost never the other way.

Snowbrush said...

"I cannot will myself to think so deeply about something I don't often think about."

Well, like all things, it's clearly a matter of interest for some and not for others. For what it's worth, Peggy's eyes glaze when the subject of religion comes up, so I do understand, and I don't hold it against you.

"I don't understand why you analyze and write about this so much..."

I don't either exactly, but isn't that true of everything a person is interested in? I mean, you could tell me all about your interest in ____, but I would just bet that the interest preceded the reasons you might offer for the interest, and therefore go deeper than those reasons

"I have heard it said that "Unitarians are just a Sunday morning social club."

I think there's a lot of truth to that. I really haven't found much depth to Unitarianism. I tend to think of it as gathering place for raving extroverts who like to interrupt and talk over one another, so I tend to look forward to leaving as soon as I gracefully can.

"There should be no reason even for the word atheist in a rational world. You and I would not need such a word to describe unbelief"

True or not, I've heard it said that in Scandinavia there are no atheist organizations because there are so many atheists that they don't see the point in organizing. Here, they don't get together to talk about atheism but to find support and friendship among people who aren't going to hate and/or try to convert them. They also get together to oppose religious oppression, so I can see how, if these reasons were lacking, there would be no atheist groups here either because it's not, in itself, a great thing to build a group around.

Rob-bear said...

I'm always fascinated by your assumptions, Snow. Reading your rants is always an interesting adventure.

In the context of a faith that has regularly been far too dogmatic, and hence often wrong, I find the focus on the mystery of God to be thoughtful and refreshing. (I know I risk the potential of being declared a heretic by some of the religious, but I'll take my chances.) I contend that God, indeed, begins in mystery and ends in community. (I won't waste our time in trying to explain it to you.)

There is one puzzle.

“What is God?”
“God is the ground of being.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that God is the soil, and we are the seed.”
“I still don’t get it.”
“God is the substance in which we live and move and have our being.”

Actually, you are smart enough to get it. You can't fool this Bear.

Blessings and Bear hugs!


Snowbrush said...

"Actually, you are smart enough to get it. You can't fool this Bear."

I consider you remarkably condescending. As for the statement, "God is the substance in which we live and move and have our being," unless you believe that God is a physical entity with uniform physical properties, to speak of God as a substance (within which we exist no less), is to speak metaphorically. It is to say that God is "like" a substance, but how God is like a substance, or what kind of a substance God is like, is neither stated nor evident.

The Tusk said...

Please see Dr. Stephen Ross on psilocybin .

Snowbrush said...

"Please see Dr. Stephen Ross on psilocybin."

Why?

I grew up in Mississippi where psilocybin mushrooms grew in every cow patty, but for reasons unknown to myself, no one of my acquaintance knew what they were--and I hung-out with the kind of people who would have known had anyone known--until the 1970s when I was in my twenties. I smoked them once and drank them in Kool-aid once and found them delightful, but I didn't have enough to have full-out hallucinations, but I did have enough to put me in a state of altered reality in which colors were more radiant and reality seemed exquisitely mysterious--as opposed to terrifyingly mysterious, a state that I have often achieved both with and without drugs.

rhymeswithplague said...

"to speak of God as a substance (within which we exist no less), is to speak metaphorically."

That's true.

"It is to say that God is "like" a substance..."

That's not true. Using "like" or "as" in a comparison makes it a simile, not a metaphor.

St. Paul's words "in Him we live and move and have our being" have always reminded me of (a) a fish in the ocean or (b) a bird in the sky. We are the fish or the bird; God is the ocean or the sky. The comparison also works with humans and oxygen in the atmosphere (we are in God) and also in our lungs (God is in us). I concede that comparisons have their limits.

I reached the foregoing conclusions without benefit of any psilocybin mushrooms.

I guess my sabbatical was rather short-lived.

Practical Parsimony said...

A simile is a metaphor, but not all metaphors are similes.

CreekHiker / HollysFolly said...

"I might be able to address this if I knew more about you mean."

Snow, you seem to have a very clear code for your life. You strike me as a kind man. You go out of your way to do things for others; you are kind to animals. And I think, like me, you probably feel more at one with the Universe (I would call that God) when you are outside in nature or creating in the many ways you do: building, working, growing, cooking, etc. Those things bring me a calmness and peace to face the world.

There are many religions and many versions of God... I'm just saying that while God may not be some mystical being to you that maybe you have something that guides you.

"How do you reconcile a God who does wonderful things with a God who does horrible things, and is it necessary that God exist for wonderful things to happen. If you don't want to address such questions, I don't much care, so just do what would be fun for you."

I don't believe God causes good things anymore than bad things... People do that. What I was referring to as wonderful things are the visitations from departed loved ones....sometime decades after they've passed. You may call it a dream, but to me it was REAL. I once asked an aunt who was about to pass to visit...and she did before I even knew she was dead.

I also possess a rosary that I 100% believe was a gift from Jesus... Long and convoluted story. And I couldn't even tell anyone about it for YEARS after it happened. My best friend died as a child, revived and tells the most amazing story I've ever heard about the afterlife. She couldn't even tell her parents for a decade and it was only then they told her she had died!

I've had too many of those kinds of experiences that make me believe in God / the afterlife. However, that does not make me want to be a part of any religious organization!

Snowbrush said...

"And I think, like me, you probably feel more at one with the Universe (I would call that God) when you are outside in nature or creating in the many ways you do: building, working, growing, cooking, etc. Those things bring me a calmness and peace to face the world."

This is all true. When I'm active and outdoors, I'm mostly at peace, and I'm certainly in less pain. When the pain--and the weather--is such that I can't enjoy being outdoors, my view of life goes into the toilet.

"I'm just saying that while God may not be some mystical being to you that maybe you have something that guides you."

That gave me something to think about. I know that with the Quakers, when one feels led to do something by the "Inner Light," he or she might bring it up with others--or even with the meeting as a whole--to see if they think the "leading" is for real, especially when the leading is in a direction that's severe in some way (for example, if one felt led to be a missionary in a dangerous place, or to leave one's family and live in a cave). In other words, even with them, there's a lack of certainty about when they're being led and when they're not, yet most of them believe, as you do, in a guiding force that is at least capable of leading them. I don't believe in such a force, so I'm left with my conscience, my intellect, my emotions, my upbringing, and the influence of other people and of society as a whole. I can but think that if I did believe in a guiding force, I would find life easier, but I can't believe in order to find life easier, although it seems to me that this exactly the reason that most people do believe.

"I don't believe God causes good things anymore than bad things... People do that."

This brings up for me the question of what attributes are necessary in order to qualify as God. If whatever you call God is powerless or remote, I wouldn't call it God. As for people causing good and bad, there is certainly a lot of good and bad that isn't caused by people, or at least not by the people who are on the receiving end, as when someone is killed by a drunk driver. For God to have the power to prevent tragedy but to not do so, would make God, in my mind, into a demon. In other words, I would hold God to the same standards that I hold people. If I watched a baby being drowned and did nothing, I would deserve hatred, and so would I hate such a God. On the other hand, if God saw a baby being drowned and was unable to prevent it, then such a being would be unworthy, in my mind, of being called God. Of course, some might say that God's ways are not our ways, that he has a higher plan, etc. (as when one's home and family is blown away by a tornado, yet the survivor calls it a miracle that he or she survived), but I see no evidence for such a belief.

Snowbrush said...

"I've had too many of those kinds of experiences that make me believe in God / the afterlife."

After I responded, I got to pondering your last sentence (I loved your comment). Such experiences as you've had are obviously meaningful to you, but, even if I had such experiences, I'm not sure they would be meaningful to me. Of course, I don't even know what all your experiences were, but I do know that I have so many significant problems with the possibility that there exists a divine entity that it would take something truly extraordinary for me to be swayed toward belief. Maybe if a voice came from the heavens and spoke to everyone on earth at once, that would do it, but I can't imagine believing on the basis of strange and seemingly miraculous occurrences because my unbelief is so strong that I think I would explain them as being coincidences, or delusions, or phenomena that at least have a natural explanation even if I can't identify that explanation. I think it was on the next post after this one that someone suggested that I look into psilocybin, presumably (I thought) as an avenue to God. Well, I've had quite a few drug-induced hallucinations, and in one of them, I saw demons. I mean, vividly. They kept springing into my face, and all I could do was sit there trembling and too scared to speak, but I didn't come away from the experience believing in demons. Understand here that I'm not trying to make you see things my way, but simply to tell you how I see them, my atheism being really quite profound, at least inasmuch as God is defined as a supernatural entity of infinite power and wisdom. If God is defined in some other way, well, I might not be an atheist at all in the vocabulary of the person doing the defining. It's simply that I personally wouldn't use the word God.