Deluded: An Individual Response To Richard Dawkins

'The God Delusion'; an already infamous book that is as loved as it is hated, as revered as it is scorned.

I have just finished reading it. I know, it makes very odd reading material for a Catholic during Lent. But I am not afraid of having my faith challenged and questioned and I am certainly not afraid of Richard Dawkins, who has become a sort of religious bogey man in recent years. Last year I watched the documentary on which this book was based, "The Root of All Evil?" and found that it made little impression on me. Being an extension of this work, I wanted to read the book. Unluckily for Dawkins the book has had about the same effect as the film. That is, virtually none.

It would naturally be entirely fruitless for me to attempt any kind of meaningful defence for the existence of God from a scientific standing. Scientifically Dawkins can out-do the best of them, I wouldn't even know where to begin.

But crucially, after reading The God Delusion, it strikes me that Dawkins doesn't actually care that much whether people believe in God or not. At least, not people like you or I, the average weekly church-goer who gets on with his or her life in relative peace with the rest of society. He outlines in the preface that the book is meant to 'convert', he hopes religious people reading it will come to reject their faith and embrace his upbeat, cheerful "isn't the earth just beautiful" brand of fundamental atheism. But he must be painfully aware that the private thoughts and beliefs of individuals he has never met have nothing to do with him, nor do they affect his life. No, I do not accept that this book is aiming to persuade people to an atheistic mindset, despite what he claims. It's primary motivation in my view is to demonstrate that religious belief is harmful to society and the world at large and that religious belief should have no place in government, education or any institutional operation one could name. His purpose in writing is to eradicate conspicuous religious behaviour, the sort that permits people to baptize their children, or educate them in a faith school. Since it is impossible to believe that he cares a fig for what individuals actually think, feel or do in private (in fact he is at pains to point out that he doesn't care what people get up to in private, although his context for saying as much was a defence for the right of all people to "enjoy their sex life..provided they harm no one") , we can only conclude that what he is actually advocating is the demotion of religion to the status of an underground movement; marginalised and placed on the mere fringes of society. His dominant argument therefore is that any religion harms not just it's believers but other communities and most especially children. Events like that of 9/11 naturally lend themselves extremely well to this argument and the abuse scandals in the Catholic church are of course noted, almost with glee (and certainly with more than a hint of crass humour). He does however 'kindly' point out that it is "unfair to single out the Catholics" since every religion is guilty of indoctrination, intimidation and abuse of it's young in his opinion.

He even goes so far as to say that it is abusive to refer to a child according to the religious persuasion of their parents...there is, he writes, no such thing as a "Christian child" or a "Muslim child" or a "Catholic child", just as there is no such thing as a "Conservative child" or a "Republican child". By that reckoning, he is himself a victim of an abusive childhood, given that he was raised an Anglican.

Indeed, in Dawkin's world there can be no redeeming feature of religious life. Even poor Mother Teresa of Calcutta is branded "hypocritical and sanctimonious" and unworthy of her Nobel Peace Prize after she publicly stated during her acceptance speech that the biggest threat to peace was abortion.* You know of Mother Teresa of course, the same woman who declared that she would adopt, love and look after any and all unwanted children, no matter their race, religion or background. Yes indeed, what a hypocrite...

It would of course be foolhardy for any religious person to attempt to claim that the actions of religious men and women are beyond the pale. There is no counter-argument in the face of the devastation caused by suicide bombings, sexual abuse and centuries of religious wars.

But what Dawkins is calling for, namely the removal of religion from the public life of society is in itself an abuse of the basic human rights of individuals and communities. That no religion has a right to impose it's beliefs and ideals on another sector or community goes without saying. Or at least it should go without saying. But the "solution" as proposed by Dawkins and those of a similarly militant, fundamentalist atheistic persuasion equally strips people of a fundamental right.

Decades of religious oppression in Soviet Russia demonstrate the truth of this, in ugly fashion. Religion was stricken from the history books, churches were destroyed, children were indoctrinated in schools and clergy and lay people alike were murdered, tortured and imprisoned for practising their beliefs. But crucially, despite years of crushing, violent oppression, religious belief was not and could not be eradicated in Russian society. Children were secretly baptized, families secretly prayed together, priests still secretly celebrated Masses for the faithful. And in the aftermath of the collapse of the USSR, religious life resumed publicly with increased zeal and vigour.

Religion, or faith, has been inherent in almost every culture and every society since time immemorial. And not, as Dawkins would have us believe, because man is unable to understand the true nature of the world around him. Science has opened up space and shrunk the earth...we can travel to all corners of the globe and we have left no stone unturned. We have literally been to the moon and back. And after it all, we still believe.

Faith can not be eradicated. Scientific advancement can not extinguish it. Man can not crush it.

Dawkins mission of conversion and universal atheism is doomed to be reconciled to the intellectual scrap heap. Where human life abounds, faith in the divine abounds.

So he's welcome to call me deluded if he wants to. I'll even defend his right to do so. But wishing for a world without faith and trying to make it happen? That's really nuts.



*Dawkins pointedly fails to provide the entire quotation from that speech, which is: "And this (abortion) is what is the greatest destroyer of peace today. Because if a mother can kill her own child - what is left for me to kill you and you kill me - there is nothing between".

PS - Thanks for reminding me about "The Whisperers" Dad!