Atheism in liberation theology

[struggle4progress]

<snip> Only an atheist can be a good Christian. This title is not merely an attention-getting device. It came out of an exchange between the atheist philosopher Ernst Bloch, who had a profound interest in the influence of the biblical message on the history of hope, and the Christian theologian Jürgen Moltmann, who was trying to uncover the core of hope in biblical revelation. Bloch said, "Only an atheist can be a good Christian," to which Moltmann replied, "But only a Christian can be a good atheist." ...

Neither belief in God nor the strength of that faith constitutes any guarantee. In truth, the important thing is precisely in which God we believe, or the object of that faith. It is also significant that the early Christians were accused of being atheists and were judged and condemned as such for refusing to believe in the ruling gods of their society ...

... When someone says, then, "I don't believe in God because I believe in humanity" or "I don't believe in God because I believe in justice," I must respond that I don't believe in that God either! Only a passionate atheist to those gods can be a true Christian.

http://www.darkfiber.com/atheisms/atheisms/miguezb.html

[politicaholic]

1. Wow, that is a wildly misguided article...

It's assuming that Atheists even give a crap about theology.

I was raised an Atheist and come from a very long line of Atheists. We understand religion's place in community, but for this author to even insinuate that our behavior is in any way a result of christianity or its teachings is basic ignorance.

I'm speaking just for myself and my family, because I can't even speak for other Atheists. This author seems to come from the perspective of most christians, "Oh, they believe in God, they just are too stubborn or too ignorant to admit it." It's as if Atheists can't be moral without God. That notion is an assault on my intelligence.

How about this. Before you post something like this please ask yourself:

Do Atheists even give a care what Atheist writers have to say about God? Look at book sales and you'll find the answer is pointedly no.

You can tell it's not an Atheist author though. He capitalized christian and not Atheist...dipshit.

[struggle4progress]

3. I think you have misunderstood the material, which I do not consider ..

an effort to sway the views of atheists and which I did not post as a remark about, or a comment directed at, anyone who self-identifies as an atheist.

It is rather part of an important twentieth century relection on exactly what "Christianity" is and what it should or could be. There is a coherent thread that runs through Bloch's assertion "Only an atheist can be a good Christian" through "G-d is dead" theology and into the liberation theology to which Bonino's text contributed.

I confess to scratching my head in perplexity wondering how you could possibly have parsed "Only an atheist can be a good Christian" into "Atheists can't be moral without G-d."

But perhaps you are almost correct to think of such theological attempts as "an assault on .. intelligence" -- though it might be more accurate to regard them as partly "assault on intellect," because certain intellectual vacuities are among the false idols that are the target of those remarks.

I do not suppose it will help you much if I explain that I have been arguing in Bible study lately that "believing in G-d" could be an entirely different thing than "Christian faith" -- and that I am apparently not the only one who regards the matter in such a light.

But, then again, I think that the commandment about "not taking the Name in vain" would, if taken seriously, eliminate much of the prevalent noisy religious nonsense.

:hi:

[Az]

6. Its actually an inversion of Pascal's Wager

Christians the behave just to get into heaven have missed the point. A moral atheist is being moral for exactly the reasons Jesus advocated (although they do not necissarily draw their inspiration from his teachings). A moral atheist is moral because they believe in the ideas they adhere to rather than a rewared basis.

And conversely the negative stereotypes attributed to atheists being greedy and selfcentered would apply to the Christians that are Christians simply to improve their position in the afterlife.

[politicaholic]

36. Good point...

and if you weigh the population of Atheists to christians (I could easily say 1 to 50,000 and that's probably under estimating), the greed and self centered stereotype is colossally skewed, unjust, and mere propaganda to cover up a blatant in-discrepancy of a large section of a whole religious sect.

Its too bad really. Christians seemed so nice a couple thousand years ago.

[Darranar]

5. No, he is making a good point about moral atheists.

Essentially, that a morally-motivated atheist is more truly Christian and more embracing of true Christian values than an immoral theist.

The idea is that if one is moral then one has gotten the essential point - morality. If one accepts morality then one accepts God (who incorporates morality) to the necessary degree, whether or not one calls it God, whether or not one considers morality to be a personal, omnipotent force, as the traditional concept of God implies.

The point being made here is not that morally-motivated atheists are dishonest, it is, rather, that they reject idolatrous and barbaric concepts of God (say, a God that would truly, literally order genocide) that all too many Christians (and plenty of others) are willing to embrace.

[politicaholic]

37. You see, there's a fundamental problem here...

and I am in no way arguing, because I fully understand the concept of the article.

I'm saying that if Atheists are moral it is not religious morality, but ethical morality. To say moral Atheists are the same as moral Christians without the religion is misguided.

You see, many "moral christians" are upstanding and respected members of their community, but shelter their children, give them a singular point of view, discipline them through fear of hell and guilt, and stifle individual thought with a shroud of christian morality.

Moral Atheist are merely law bidding citizens who understand their place in the community and act accordingly (much like christians), but raise their children to respect the law of the land and understand the system and world around them in a non-judgmental and open minded manner.

Right and wrong do not equal good and evil. The fundamental difference between the two moralities.

[The Magistrate]

38. Still, Sir

As the saying goes, "It does not matter of the cat is black or white, so long as it catches mice."

From one point of view, the end result is the imprtant thing: if the behavior is good, in the sense of being beneficial to the community and its good order, the reasons behind it are of little importance. Moral codes and reasons matter, to my view, only when they enjoin on a person as moral necessity some interference with the life of another person, whatever that other person's desire or will in the matter may be. There are certainly occassions where this is necessary, but they need to be held to a minimum, particularly in a free society valuing liberty.

[Darranar]

44. Different justifications are not different reasons.

They are simply different ways of explaining why one feels obligated to undertake a certain course of action.

The fact that we have a society that (theoretically) values altruism, love, and compassion does not mean that we are any more altruistic, loving, and compassionate than a society that does not, merely that more people fake it. That is why it is a good thing to have such a society If God exists, that is why He made religion - to create such a society. If someone is altruistic, loving, and compassionate without needing to fake it, well, all the better, and He does not care what theology that person adopts. I think that is the real difference in terms of motive, and it has next to nothing to do with atheism and theism.

[The Magistrate]

45. That Is A Formulation, Sir

It is not in me to quarrel with on any fundamental level. My only caveat would be to observe that, taking the whole sweep of history, it would not be easy to press the case that religion was made to, or even operates to, create a society placing any particular value on altruism. The concept is absent from religions that have commanded the devotion of great numbers of humans over wide swathes of time. It may well be that instances of religion proclaiming, or operating towards, such a society can be produced, but pursuing this opens the field to debating the truth or falsity of particular religions, if one takes this occassional characteristic for a defining one.

[Darranar]

43. There is a difference between pragmatic morality and religious morality.

If the atheist in question is pursuing moral aims because it ultimately benefits him or her, the atheist is not really a moral atheist.

There are certainly atheists, however, who value a system of morality for its own sake (or for the sake of other principles which are ultimately moral in nature, like utilitarianism or any sort of humanist morality), and when that system of morality is compatible with the "godly" system of morality, they have accepted "God" to the necessary degree.

The ties between Marxism and Liberation Theology are a good example. Marxist atheists have a system of morality, otherwise they wouldn't care about correcting the injustices of capitalism, and certainly wouldn't sacrifice their lives in pursuit of that - as plenty of them did in Latin America. With the priests of Liberation Theology they share a compassion for the poor and the oppressed, and the desire to liberate them - not for personal gain but because they have the conviction that this is the correct course of action. Whether it is correct because God said so, or because an absolute morality says so, or because it benefits humanity, or because one thinks it is correct, is irrelevant. The justification for human decency is immaterial; what matters is its practice.

"That which is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. That is the whole of the Law, the rest is commentary." - Rabbi Hillel

[beam me up scottie]

2. Why did you pick that review?

With all of the great stuff on that website, you chose to post a review of a book that was written by a theist and just happens to be insulting to atheists.

Interesting.

I'm actually quite impressed with the site author's entries.

Like his answers to questions about atheism:

* Must an atheism actively & absolutely reject the existence of god/s to be atheism?

No. Neither daoism nor buddhism actively reject the existence of gods, and the first texts in those religions are silent on the issue of gods, yet both are considered to be atheistic religions. Atheism is living without gods, which also encompasses agnosticism as a passive form of atheism. Active and absolute rejection of gods is a positivistic belief and a tenet of militant anti-theism, not atheism.

************

* What is the purpose of atheism?

Atheism exists (1) as a simple observation of human existence, ie, there is no empirical demonstration of god/s, there is/are no god/s inherent to a human being prior to enculturation, old gods die, gods are constructs of human imagination and serve human purposes such as legalistic justifications, social stratification, ethical mandates and escapes, etc; and (2) as a mission - living without god/s.
This latter purpose, living without god/s, is not frequently the subject of atheistic discussion.

************

* Are the two concepts - agnosticism and atheism - mutually exclusive?

No. Consider the class and political differences between the usage of each word. Huxley created the word "agnostic" in order to have a religious handle to bandy about in his upperclass London clubs that wouldn't offend or be as confrontive as "atheist", whereas the word "atheist" has always been a political tool to alienate religious outlaws and as a revolutionary call to arms against the State.
Agnostics believe in as many gods as do atheists, and both "live without gods", leaving one to surmise that, for all practical purposes, they are effectively equivalent in all but social and philosophical usage.

************

* What is a "Dictionary Atheist"?

Many contemporary atheists, lacking a background in religious studies and without an established atheist community that instructs new atheists in phenomenology and history, seek justification for their atheistic 'faith' in simple logic and even more simplistic dictionary definitions of atheism, believing that The Dictionary is the first and final prescriber of the atheist way of being. Atheists, especially new ones, who resort to The Dictionary as an intellectual shortcut for a description of the phenomenon of atheism are called "Dictionary Atheists".
The problems with using The Dictionary to define atheism are several.
Firstly, the phenomenon of atheism cannnot be confined to particular historical or cultural forms, ie, the most accurate definition of atheism should include all historic incidents of the term. Such a definition would necessarily refer to the term "atheist" as found among and within: the great religions of the East - daoism, charwaka hinudism, and buddhism; early 'classical' Greek materialists as well as its legal use by the Attic and Roman states to execute theists like Socrates and early Christians; 18th- to 20th-century rationalists, humanists, scientists; 20th-century Christian theologians both in the Death of God movement and in Latin American liberation theology; Native American Secondly, dictionary definitions proffer 'atheism' almost exclusively as a philosophy from which atheist (and theist) neophytes habitually attempt logical assaults on what is a much broader social phenomenon. As the Atheist Web explains, "logical reasoning is not an absolute law which governs the universe" and "logic is not a set of rules which govern human behavior." There can be no logical contradiction in nature or in fact, but dictionaries rarely if ever present the natural or factual occurrences of atheism.
Thirdly, all dictionaries are limited by their desire for brevity and by the ideologies of their staff in their descriptions of any specific term. The vast majority of dictionaries in the West have had an inherent historical ideological leaning towards theism and the state, making their definitions of any word that is not supportive of these institutions suspect. (For a demonstration of these biases, compare the definitions of 'anarchism', 'atheism' and 'communism' in popular dictionaries from different time periods with their definitions by contemporary ideological supporters. Also consider the current (1999-2000) battle over the definition of the word 'marriage' in the US states of California, Hawaii and Vermont.)

Lots of good stuff there.

The site is called "religious atheisms"

"being a brief compilation of nontraditional & multicultural sources
regarding atheism according to Christianity, classical atheists,
liberation theology, and religious atheists
edited by tpkunesh"

http://www.darkfiber.com/atheisms/atheisms/index.html

Check it out.

[struggle4progress]

4. I don't consider Bonino's book insulting to atheists. If anything ..

.. it is insulting to the institutional Christianity of the Western and Northern world, in the same sense that Kierkegaard's Attack on Christendom is insulting to that institutional religion.

The objectives of liberation theologians like Bonino were, in my view, much less vacuous than some silly attack on atheism or some idiotic project of showing the superiority of Christianity to atheism: their evangelical aims were more directed at faith-as-solidarity-with-the-poor than faith-as-spouting-ideology.

Of course, you are entirely free to be insulted by whatever you choose.

[beam me up scottie]

7. Atheism is not comparable

to christianity.

The author suggests that atheists actively disbelieve in particular gods and therefore would make good christians.

Like we're just making space for his god.

... When someone says, then, "I don't believe in God because I believe in humanity" or "I don't believe in God because I believe in justice," I must respond that I don't believe in that God either! Only a passionate atheist to those gods can be a true Christian.
13-4

[struggle4progress]

11. Idolatry is the worship of empty things. It is, nevertheless, quite ..

.. common.

It is, in fact, so common that it generally passes un-noticed.

Neither pious nor atheistic practice prevents individuals from becoming idolators.

Anthropologists, for example, long ago noted the fetishism of so-called "primitive cultures" but many have been blind to the "commodity fetishism" practiced in our culture. Our culture has for generations sought to spread this "commodity-oriented" religion throughout the world, while simultaneously sneering at anyone who adopted a strange variant of it: many Americans have laughed at Pacific "cargo cults" without stopping to notice officially that these cults centered around Americans and American consumer products. Such cults, of course, result from active promotion of consumption-oriented idolatry among populations naive about advertising claims.

I personally do not consider that theology is about such silly questions as "Does G-d exist?" or "Should we believe in G-d?" Nor am I interested in such matters as "Is Christianity comparable to atheism?" I find such discussions utterly meaningless, no matter what side I might try to take.

I do think that everyone effectively practices some manner of religion, that the religions that most of us practice are usually idolatrous, and that we all have well-developed grab-bags of psychological tricks that we use to blind ourselves to our own idolatry.

One point, being made in the article, as I read it, is that an atheistic attitude IS an appropriate response to idolatry -- and that, in fact, it is actually the preferred response of certain Christians ...

[beam me up scottie]

13. I agree with the point made in your last paragraph.

However, I do not agree that everyone practices "some manner of religion" and that "we all have well-developed grab-bags of psychological tricks that we use to blind ourselves to our own idolatry".

[struggle4progress]

16. Nobody has ever agreed with me when I said this. At root, of course,

I have only my limited experience in dealing with people and the limited insights I bring from introspection to justify this claim.

But in my own experience of the world, I find constant reinforcement of this view -- and my reading of the so-called "masters of suspicion" (Marx, Nietzsche, Freud) has encouraged some interpretative habits that tend to dissuade me from the contrary view.

[Az]

14. Throwing the definition of religion pretty wide there

Not saying I disagree. But for clarity's sake why don't you provide your working definition of religion.

[struggle4progress]

15. No. Axiomatic systems are effective when the subject matter is ..

.. suitably circumscribed, but as the subject matter becomes broader there is no way to avoid logical paradoxes, and I consider it ridiculous to attempt to engage in some endless regress of definition here.

The point is, simply, that religion typically speaks about everything, or the purpose of everything, or the source of everything -- matters which are too ill-defined to be the subject of logical discourse.

So I don't think a definition would be helpful: what is needed, instead, is a conscience, a community, a tradition, and a praxis ...

<edit: typo>

[Az]

17. But lack of clear definitions are problematic

I could be talking about a dog but if I call it a religion you are not going to have a clue as to what I am talking about. I am not looking to nail the absolute definition of religion down here. But your statement cracks the meaning open wide enough that it is reasonable to claim we do not necissarily have a basis for communicating ideas any longer.

At least lay down some guideposts so as to give some sort of description of what you mean to imply with the word. Otherwise it has no meaning. Unless the loss of meaning and the resulting cognitive disonance is your goal.

[struggle4progress]

18. The meaning of language is determined by use, which is ..

.. conventional. Otherwise, nobody could learn language. Moreover, although you are decrying lack of precision, in fact I consider that some lack of precision is precisely what makes language useful: we have words like "dog" that apply to many different instances, some quite dissimilar, rather than a separate word for each instance.

So I really do not think definitions are as important here as usage.

You are concerned about meaningless conversation. So am I. But it is my view that a discussion on a question like "Does G-d exist?" is usually already a meaningless conversation: let me make it clear that I do not simply consider such a conversation pointless, I consider it meaningless.

Words have meanings not because of definitions but because they are tied to concrete realities: we cannot really know what is meant by words without seeing what actions accompany words. Thus, in my view, two people can utter exactly the same sentence and yet the content may be entirely different: for example, what one person says may be meaningful and what the other says may be meaningless. It is somehow related to the lives and practices that accompany the utterances.

So I tried to lay down my guidelines above by reference to conscience, community, tradition, and praxis. My scientific views are related to subject-object relations; my religious views, as suggested by Buber's "I and Thou," are more related to subject-subject relations ...

[beam me up scottie]

19. You know, that's the second time you've implied that

we want to discuss whether or not god exists.

[struggle4progress]

21. I meant to imply nothing whatsoever about YOUR intents or desires ..

.. although a number of threads on theological matters here seem to disintegrate in the particular direction I indicated.

I could have given other examples of meaningless discussions; I simply chose one that reoccurs regularly in contexts like this.

[beam me up scottie]

22. Really?

Odd, I don't recall ever debating that issue on DU.

[Az]

23. Coulda sworn

Na.... must be the medication.... :crazy:

[beam me up scottie]

27. Debating whether or not someone's god exists

or not is stupid, IMO.

It's about faith, not logic.

[struggle4progress]

25. Here's a thread currently on this page:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=214&topic_id=28751&mesg_id=28751

[struggle4progress]

26. Here's a thread currently on the first page of editorials

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x166193

[beam me up scottie]

29. In both of those threads, the ops were quoting an author.

IIRC, DU atheists are usually the ones saying there is no proof either way.

On edit:

The current thread illustrates this quite clearly.

[struggle4progress]

31. As I said, I consider such discourse not pointless but meaningless. eom

[beam me up scottie]

32. That must be why you refrained from posting in them.

And this thread is meaningful?

You won't even tell Az what he's supposed to be discussing.

[struggle4progress]

35. I wouldn't dream of telling Az "what he's supposed to be discussing."

[Az]

20. You demonstrate admirably the importance of meaning

It is not my meaning to discuss whether there is a god or not. I see no reason for that issue to arise in the conversation I forsee between us.

The only point I have is that you have used a word in such a way as to render it meaningless. But it is clear from your content that you intend for it to have some meaning. I am merely trying to bridge the gap between our understanding of the word you used. What was your intent behind it? From that point we may be able to progress in some meaningful path.

We may experience the same universe but each of our perspectives is unique. As we cannot directly experience the others view we have to make some effort to communicate the ideas we have. If one suggests to another that the words they are using or the way they are using the words make no sense to them it is advisable to try to find a way to convey what it is that is meant. Or you isolate yourself from both individual and the larger identity.

[struggle4progress]

24. Here, for example, is a quote from Bonino, which shows how HE ..

.. uses certain words:

"Guevara himself had said: 'Only when Christians will have the courage to give whole-hearted revolutionary testimony will the Latin American revolution become invincible,' and he added 'because up to the present they have allowed their doctrine to be instrumentalized by the reactionaries.' This is a curious sentence, because it seems to imply that revolution is a birthright for the Christians while reaction would be a travesty (an instrumentalizing) of their doctrine. This seems far from an orthodox Marxist interpretation of Christianity ... They are saying: .. 'Guevara represents for us the world in which we live, the language we understand, the reality which is in us and around us -- we live in the world of sociopolitical reality. If you will name the name of Jesus Christ, it must be within this world.'"

Bonino was writing a quarter of a century ago, for a Latin American audience, and it may be difficult to read what he is actually saying rather than to read into his text.

But, to return to your question about meaning, this perhaps indicates how I would approach any question about what a particular theological utterance "means": I would not seek a definition; rather, looking at the context, I should attempt to discern the effects of the utterance in that context and should wonder which specific interests it served and in which direction the utterance sought to turn me.

[Az]

28. You seem to be off the topic at hand

I am trying to ascertain what you mean by the use of the word religion. Do you mean a dog? Or do you mean something else? Can you provide any guideposts to what you mean to imply by your use of the word religion? We may entirely agree. I simply cannot tell because your use of the word religion is so removed from my sense of the word religion. We need some common ground. Otherwise our dialog will be as disconnected. It will be as if you are talking to an object rather than a person. Without the meaning to your statement we cannot dialog.

[struggle4progress]

30. In my view the thread is related to a review of Bonino's book.

I have used the phrase "institutional religion" to indicate corporate-like structures associated with established practices often called "religious" by society at large.

I have also used the word "religion" to describe aspects of worship, including fetishism (in the anthropological sense), such as the effective worship of consumer goods common in our society and its image reflected in Pacific cargo cults, and I have tried to suggest a more general attitude of "bowing down," as people may effectively (knowingly or otherwise) "bow down" to idols or perhaps may "bow down" (metaphorically or physically) without the obvious delusion associated with idol worship.

I could similarly, I suppose, show you usages of words like "sacred" or "theology" somewhat associated with "religion," but I suspect your insistence on definition rather than usage will prove nonproductive.

I must admit to being confused by your alleged perplexity about whether "religion" means "dog," since it doesn't seem to me that the replacement of "religion" by "dog" in any of my text above would suggest interchangeability of meaning.

I have tried to provide some conceptual guidelines to matters related to religion in my usage, including some blather about conscience etc, a reference to Buber's writing, and a quote from Bonino.

[Az]

33. The entire point of this particular branch of this thread

has been focused on this statement of yours:

I do think that everyone effectively practices some manner of religion, that the religions that most of us practice are usually idolatrous, and that we all have well-developed grab-bags of psychological tricks that we use to blind ourselves to our own idolatry.

The clarity of this idea is dependent on what you mean by religion. I am just trying to ascertain what you are implying religion means in this context. I am using the dog reference to show how throwing a word to wide can render it meaningless.

Thats it. What does religion in the context of the above mean in your usage?

[struggle4progress]

34. As I just said in #28:

"I have also used the word 'religion' to describe aspects of worship, including fetishism (in the anthropological sense), such as the effective worship of consumer goods common in our society and its image reflected in Pacific cargo cults, and I have tried to suggest a more general attitude of 'bowing down,' as people may effectively (knowingly or otherwise) 'bow down' to idols or perhaps may 'bow down' (metaphorically or physically) without the obvious delusion associated with idol worship."

In further illustrating this usage, I would be inclined to explicitly reference specific praxis as evidence of 'bowing down': the free market, for example, appears to be an object of worshipful reverence by some of its devotees. It is not simply verbal production or even conscious awareness that determines whether a particular is the object of religious (perhaps idolatrous) devotion: it is the attitude in life as lived at that concrete moment towards the object.

By now, I have provided quite a number of examples of my usage ...

[Zhade]

39. Az is 'insisting' on knowing the defintion behind your usage of the word.

At least, that's what I'm reading.

[struggle4progress]

40. Clearly. And I am insisting that practice is more important than words ..

.. and that the meaning of words is correspondingly best understood from their usage rather than from "definitions" ...

[Zhade]

41. Um, okay.

Just don't be surprised if you confuse people.

I kind of get where you're coming from, because it has been successfully argued (in the largest thread I've ever started) that the dictionary definition of atheist is wrong as it applies to us atheists, but it is confusing when we mean different than what people expect us to mean.

[struggle4progress]

42. Since I consider many discussions on this topic are meaningless, ..

.. I like to tell myself that I am not really confusing people but merely helping them to notice how confused they have been without having been aware of it ... :D

[Az]

8. I don't see it as necissarily insulting

In fact I suspect its more of a dig at theists. The individuals are commenting on the fact that moral atheists are moral because they truly believe in being moral. Not that they draw their inspiration for morality from some particular dogma.

And conversely Christians that are moral out of concern of salvation are moral for greedy self serving reasons. Exactly contrary to what Jesus seemed to be trying to teach. This fits the prejudicial stereotype associtated with atheists at the time and thus the comments are prodding both the stereortype and selfrigtheous Christians.

[beam me up scottie]

9. I specified which comment I found insulting.

The author did make some valid points but that does not justify his implication that atheists pick and choose which gods to refuse.

[Az]

10. I see what you are saying

I dismissed that statement in my mind as it was too twisted in on itself. I suspect the lead part of the article was the intended focus of the OP though.

Eh... not my most observant right now, dealing with a migraine. Bleh.

[beam me up scottie]

12. You have my sympathy.

I'm getting migraines more frequently myself.

Meds only take the edge off, unfortunately.

When you're free of it, check out the author's site.

There's some really interesting stuff there for both believers and non.


The term "Dictionary Atheist" is SO accurate, it's spooky.