An Athesist Criticizes Secular ReligionsMike Rappaport

Karl Reitz takes a different approach to the critiques of faith by people like Christopher Hitchens:

The obvious examples of secularized religions are communism,socialism, and fascism, each of which generally involves worshipping governmentby slightly different rituals or for slightly different reasons. As theseconvictions faded, faith in the welfare state, and especially environmentalprotection, has risen to take their place for reasons government should beworshipped. Environmentalist devotees claim that we will experience theapocalypse disasters, for which some people are rebuildingNoah’s Ark. These disasters can be prevented if we take the advice of prophetspeople who understand, like Al Gore. Of course, if we sin pollute a little toomuch, well, we can always buy indulgences carbon offsets.

The fundamental difference between traditional religions andthese secular religions is that secular religions promise us that perfection(heaven) is possible here, on earth, in present times. Conservatives, startingwith Eric Voegelin, have long warned against buying into these secularreligions by warning us not to . . . [try] to make what is reserved for thenext life part of the here and now.

I am atheist because I don’t believe in faith, which Ibelieve is the common dogma shared by traditional religion and secularizedreligions.

Even if the secular authors’ ire is well-justified, we arenever going to live in a world in which the vast majority of people don’t havefaith in something, whether that something is God or Government. As an atheistI feel much less threatened by someone who is willing to put off perfection byrelegating it to another place than I do by someone who thinks they can createit here and now. In other words, I think that the chance that a religion will”poison everything” is indirectly proportional to the length of timethe proponents of the religion think it will take to perfect this world.Therefore, nothing scares me more than the demagogue who promises toimmediately do just that. Without traditional religion, I think we would have alot of demagogues in this mold.