Paul Johnson: Militant Atheism and God

10.08.07, 12:00 AM ET

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Intellectual fashions come and go. The current one is militant atheism. Waves of atheism have swept the West before. One was in the mid-18th century, when the devastating Lisbon earthquake, killing some 60,000 people, shook the belief of many in the benevolence of God. Another was in the mid-19th century, when advances in geology destroyed the traditional chronology of the Old Testament, proving that Earth was much older than the 6,000-odd years the Bible allowed. A third spasm followed the First World War, when the combination of Freud's writings and Einstein's theories of relativity upset established views of the human psyche and the universe. We now seem to be in the midst of a fourth. It is prompted partly by the academic deification of Darwin and his particular theory of evolution, and partly by the revulsion against Islamic fundamentalism and its violent expression, which for some has discredited all forms of belief in God.

Whatever the explanation, books advocating an atheistic view of the universe and arguing that religion is based on delusion are being written, published and widely bought. Their arguments are echoed and amplified on television. And, for the time being at least, atheism seems to have a strong grip on the centers of higher education.

My old university, Oxford, which was founded by monks, friars and theologians nine centuries ago, was until recently regarded as a bastion of old-fashioned Christianity and, as such, was called "the house of lost causes." Today a publicly expressed belief in Christianity is likely to lower your chance of landing a job at Oxford.

Religion has become a handicap in university life, especially in certain subjects. In philosophy, for example, academics who hope for senior chairs keep mum about any faith they hold. God and promotion do not mix. And in all the sciences, young men and women with religious backgrounds are advised to jettison their Christian, Jewish or other religious baggage if they want to pursue careers in physics, chemistry or biology. The universal assumption seems to be that a belief in God fatally debars a scholar from acquiring scientific knowledge. In Britain the number of students concentrating in the sciences is on the decline, and the systematic discouragement of Christians and Jews in the science faculties will clearly increase that trend.

How Important Is This Phenomenon?

Is it a phase? Or is it the harbinger of a fundamental change in the way people see themselves and the world? Ought we to be alarmed--and ought we take action? And if so, what kind of action?

One's answers to these difficult questions are bound to be subjective. My parents were profoundly religious Catholics, who brought me up to share their beliefs. I was educated first by nuns, then by the Jesuits. I have always attended church regularly and said my prayers daily. I'm not sure the human race would survive a prolonged bout of atheism. I recall the words of the German theologian Karl Rahner: "If ever God is banished from the world so that even His image is eradicated from the human mind, we will cease to be human and become merely very clever animals--and our ultimate fate will be too horrible to contemplate."

Bear Witness

We are amazing creatures, capable of astonishingly imaginative concepts and intellectual work of ever increasing complexity. And what we have achieved in the last century--stunning though it is--is nothing compared with what we can and will surely do, as the rate of material progress accelerates. Yet it is hard to see that the human race has made, or is making, any moral progress at all. As a historian who has studied and written about all periods, from the first millennium B.C. to the present, I am perhaps more aware of this than most people.

I see no diminution in the cruelty and violence we inflict on one another, at both a personal and a state level. More people were killed by totalitarian states (all atheistic) in the 20th century than in all previous periods of history. The first few years of the 21st century have witnessed no improvement. States that practice mass murder continue to exist but are now accompanied by terrorist movements doing all within their power to acquire nuclear weapons so they can exterminate entire populations--millions, even tens and hundreds of millions.

It's hard for most of us to face such a fearful world without some kind of faith to sustain us, without a traditional formula through which to express our longings for peace and safety. I believe that religion is a central part of our civilization. But even more than that, I believe religious faith to be an indispensable element to our peace of mind and such happiness as we are capable of enjoying on this Earth.

I could not find content in a landscape whose horizon held no churches or in a civilization whose literature was purged of any reference to a divine being; whose art had blotted out the nativities, crucifixions, saints and angels; and whose music contained no intimations of immortality. And I believe the vast majority of people share such a view.

As for doing something about the militant atheism that threatens our happiness and well-being, it is in the interests of all people that those of us who enjoy religious faith should examine carefully what it has done, is doing and will do to sustain and comfort us in this harsh and difficult world. We should add up all its benefits--and then proclaim the results to the world. There will be plenty who will listen.

Paul Johnson, eminent British historian and author; Lee Kuan Yew, minister mentor of Singapore; Ernesto Zedillo, director, Yale Center for the Study of Globalization, former president of Mexico; and David Malpass, chief economist for Bear Stearns Co., Inc., rotate in writing this column. To see past Current Events columns, visit our Web site at www.forbes.com/currentevents.