Worse Than Losing Your Faith?

[rug]

May 12, 2013 By James F. McGrath

The vigor with which some people defend their beliefs online – refusing to do basic research, offering completely unpersuasive off-the-cuff arguments, and denigrating their opponents – has long puzzled me.

Losing your faith (or, if you are an atheist, losing your lack of faith) can seem like a terrifying prospect, to be avoided at all costs.

But what most people are defending isn’t their “faith.” It is the details of their worldview, their belief system. And the fact that examining the details is considered tantamount to discarding the whole shows how closely people feel their beliefs are monitored by their community and inseparable one from another.

But if your faith as a Christian, or your identity as an atheist, means rigid adherence to a belief system, where any questioning must be avoided at all costs, then your “faith” and/or “skepticism” are really nothing of the sort. They are a culture to which you have a tribal loyalty.

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/exploringourmatrix/2013/05/worse-than-losing-your-faith.html

[hrmjustin]

1. Loosing my faith is terrifying to me.

[rug]

2. Read Mark 4:35-41.

I think I would be saddened more than anything else.

[dimbear]

3. I'm full of questioning. It's answers that are in short supply.

I'm just going with the simplest explanation until further notice.

[rug]

4. The questions never end.

[longship]

8. Thank goodness for that, rug.

Questioning can only be good. When one stops questioning one can come to a point where one assumes that they have the answers.

R&K

[LiberalAndProud]

5. I suspect that James F. McGrath writes from a believer's point of view.

It doesn't strike me as true that my irreligious views are related to tribal loyalty. I came to my unbelief through honest examination of the nature of faith, both my own and those around me. Like justin, I was terrified when I first approached the edge of the abyss, conceiving of a universe without God. Honestly though, it's not so bad on the other side. It just makes enormously more sense to me.

When my questions and objections regarding faith are met with silence, I understand why. I am open to finding a path back to belief. I just can't imagine what that path could possibly be.

[rug]

6. He's also an academic.

http://works.bepress.com/jamesmcgrath/

[LiberalAndProud]

7. Thank you.

Last edited Tue May 14, 2013, 12:30 AM - Edit history (1)

I meant to mention that I had already read his bio to find that McGrath is a Professor of Religion. Teaching and believing are not always synonymous, so I hesitated to make any assumptions.

I really have to thank him for this link, though.

http://leavingfundamentalism.wordpress.com/2013/05/13/kent-hovinds-doctorate-revealed/

[Lordquinton]

9. That last paragraph

wrong from start to finish. The two are opposites, atheism is a lack of belief, you can't loose it. And most of us aren't scared of gaining faith, if we could be shown actual evidence, then we'd be just fine with it, as we'd find out we were wrong about something and adjust our worldview as such.

But no, we don't base our whole identity around being an atheist. We still tend to say things like "thank god" because it's a cultural expression.

In conclusion: No, just... no...

[rug]

11. "We"?

You may be making his point.

[cbayer]

12. There is a tendency for some here to speak in the first person plural.

It is interesting to note and does make his point.

[Lordquinton]

13. The point I made was the content of the post

I have a tendency to try and use the vernacular of the person/people I am trying to communicate with, like religious folk tend to say "we" a lot, "We're not all like that" "We don't all think the same way" so I figured that it would help get the point across, and that people would look at the content of my post, instead of latching onto a minor, and unimportant point in an attempt to ignore what I am actually saying, and derail the discussion.

[cbayer]

14. Actually, I think you made a good point and supported the author's premise.

Nothing wrong with that.

[LostOne4Ever]

10. Hell

The concept of Hell caused me more than a few sleepless nights when I first gave up Catholicism. But it lost its sway over me a long time ago.

The fear of losing my faith itself? That was not one of my worries. It was/is about the truth. My faith was a part of me, but it never defined who I was, and my lack of faith makes an even smaller effect.