Athée Canadien
Religious Captivity
By rebekah
As I was slowly making my exit out of my lifelong connection to the Christian faith, one afternoon I remember having coffee with a friend and expressing my frustration over much of the close-mindedness and ignorance I kept encountering in the church. It was all starting to add up for me.
My friend reminded me of a scene in Yann Martel’s novel, The Life of Pi. In the book, the main character’s family were zookeepers, and one of the early chapters challenges the held belief that zoos imprison and deny freedom to the animals kept inside. The character defends the use of cages, saying that there are certain “illusions about freedom” that set people against the captivity of animals, but that having animals behind bars in zoos provides a type of security that they are unable to find in the wild.
After reminding me of this section in the book, my friend then made an analogy to many people in the church — he said, “some animals need their cages,” implying that for some in the church, having the security of bars separating you from the world (particularly metaphorical ones that dogma can supply) is more important than having the freedom to be out in the wild on their own.
Security (read: certitude) — but at such a high cost.
I remember feeling so dumbfounded by his analogy — my friend, someone who I considered intelligent and compassionate, conceded that it was better to let some in the church be kept in captivity than to set them free into the unknown. [Thinking back, I suppose it was a nice way of him telling me to shut up with my challenging questions, and just accept the mental imprisonment of some in the church.]
I thought about this past episode of my life when I read Greta Christina’s latest essay: 9/11 and the Shallow Comfort of Religion. I’ve been a years-long fan of Greta, and I think this may be my favorite essay of hers yet. In this blog post, Greta remembers her initial response to the events of September 11th, and how part of her really wished — for about four seconds — that there was a God who could make the events of that day right, whether in punishing the offenders or providing a second chance at life for the people who were brutally murdered.
But then she realized:
If I believed in God, I wouldn’t be comforted.
If I believed in God, I’d be furious. I’d want to find the biggest ladder I could, climb up to Heaven, and punch God right in the face.
The best part of her article follows — Greta is laser-sharp in pointing out many of the reasons why I rejected my faith: her conclusion, and I’m realizing now, mine too is that
… the comforts of religion are only comforting when you don’t think about them very carefully.
She then goes through a list of many caveats that religious belief offers its adherents — such as ultimate justice, eternal life, and believing that everything works out for an ultimate plan — and then deftly concludes that these beliefs are only potent when you don’t take the time to fully think them through. Because when you do think about them, and the logical extensions/implications of what these “comforts” really provide, they are not as welcoming or engaging as you initially thought.
Reading Greta’s reflections here hit me like a ton of bricks.
Over the last few weeks I’ve been thinking about the effect my “outed” atheism has had on many of the relationships I have with my friends and family who are still believers. For some, my godlessness hasn’t phased our friendship at all — but for other important relationships, I can tell that my willingness to question these religious “comforts” has caused many in my life to pull away from me. I’ve been struggling to understand why — but after reading Greta’s essay, I think I may have a better understanding.
I’m shaking up people’s religious cages. My relentless questioning of certain dogmas and pushing of buttons and boundaries is probably in part forcing some of these people I love to question their comfort, and to start to see cracks in beliefs they hold dear.
So what do I do?
Do I respect the cage?
I can’t.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t see myself as a type of animal liberator in this (extended!) zoo analogy. I’m not out there turning animals into the streets against their will — but there’s a part of me who just can’t stand on the sidelines and enjoy confinement from a distance. I just can’t. So, I rattle a couple cages now and then. And sometimes I’ll even sneak up close to a cage and will be brave enough to unlock a door and swing it open. I know that the choice of freedom isn’t one I can enforce …
but I also know I can’t be happy anymore to simply observe captivity.
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about 8 months ago
More than cages, i’ve always (well since muy own un-conversion, i guess) seen it more like magic crutches than cages. Magic crutches that somehow magically ‘prop’ them up.
That’s why people of faith have a hard time understating the rational mindset. They think people must be angry at god and do not understand that is a rational process and that once you made the realization, you cannot go back. You don’t need a crutch anymore.
-G.
about 8 months ago
I like the crutch analogy taken a step further – religion is a crutch held by someone whose leg is healed enough for them to walk on their own. Yes, the first few steps will be difficult as the muscles aren’t used to doing that kind of work, but ultimately you will be able to run only if you abandon the crutch and begin to rely on your own strength.
about 8 months ago
Some people might be angered by this essay, but I found it to be compassionate. The cage is a good analogy. I sometimes say it’s living with your head in the sand, or your head in the clouds – otherwise intellectually cutting yourself off. I just heard the statement “intelligence is over-rated” from someone yesterday, and I was appalled. I think that faith and belief are over-rated. The argument for comfort in faith that I hear is, why live your life in despair? Well, there is a time to be sad, and to grieve, and to have human emotions, but surprise, surprise, we can be happy and enjoy life too without faith – we just don’t take false methods to get there.
about 8 months ago
Analogy seems fine to me, but rattling an animals cage tends to anger them, especially if they feel safe in the cage, so I would say unless you’re invited to challenge someone’s captivity, don’t be surprised if you get poo flung at you, and many would consider teasing a caged animal to be mean and cruel…
Offered for perspective. Rattle away, if it suits you, I’ve never been an animal lover.
about 8 months ago
I probably extended my cage metaphor a little too far. That said, I’ve had my share of ‘poo’ thrown at me. For example, some of the feedback from the podcast interview I did a few weeks ago included a email where a listener defined atheism as a “morass of inconsistent, pseudo-spiritual, cold scientific Darwinism survival-of-the-fittest hedonism.”
about 8 months ago
This is the crux of the ‘atheists are mean’ issue, imo. When you are looking out from a ‘cage’ of assumptions, which essentially provide the structure of your life, unless you are looking to ‘get out’, people taking pot shots at your beliefs from outside, seem irrational and malicious. Without many changes that quote could probably be attributed to someone like Sam Harris when he talks about us postmodernists. For him, the ‘chaos’ of postmodernism is simply irrational and malicious. Of course some of it is both of those things, but so are some sciency atheists. If someone engages me, or preaches, I have no problem explaining how I think the bible can be detrimental, but I don’t attack religion… just to make myself feel better. You can’t save people from themselves, but you can help them when they ask. I treat religious people like the disabled, I guess. I would never grab someone by the wheelchair, when I think they need my help.
about 8 months ago
Hmm, which is a more detrimental way of viewing believers? For me, I see them as needing to be free (ie, in a cage). You just referred to them as disabled. Somehow I think that’s a “meaner” and far more patronizing way of considering believers and some of the effects their dogma has on them.
about 8 months ago
I don’t view disability as anything more than a matter of fact. Being disabled doesn’t imply ‘bad’ for me. Whereas, the cage/jail metaphor strikes me as implying guilt of some sort. Eh, the perils of metaphors.
But I didn’t mean to imply that believers were actually or even figuratively disabled, only that the way I treat them is similar. The one thing that annoys me about many believers is when they get all self-righteous and preachy, claiming to know what is good for me, and trying to save me. So, it annoys me when atheists do this too.
It may be that some people can benefit from a metaphorical ‘kick in the ass’, but I don’t see it as my place to do the kicking, when its more likely to get me kicked right back, and in my view, justifiably so.
about 8 months ago
I still think it’s more patronizing to think of someone in a faith system as being incapacitated in some way. But, whatever. I think I’m more passionate about speaking out against some aspects of faith because I once felt the imprisonment of it. Thankfully there’s room enough for both of our approaches in the movement.
about 8 months ago
And by the way, I once was in the cage of faith myself — which in part motivates me to want to get people out of that particular type of captivity. Sometimes a little rattling of a cage is enough to wake people up (or as Dennett would say, break the spell of faith).
I’m not out there waving the ‘atheists are mean’ flag, nor am I taking pointless pot shots to make myself feel better. As I said in the post, I’m just not content to be a bystander when it comes to some issues — I’m not going to let someone’s false sense of security censor what I think about a belief system.
about 8 months ago
I speak out, when I see an obvious gain. I’m happy to censor myself otherwise, its quite necessary in my view, in a civilized society. I don’t think my atheism is special in that regard. I find that challenging people more often causes them to dig in deeper, to defend their territory, In my experience the ‘breaking of the spell’ is the unusual case.