Category Archives: Atheism

We may live in a postmodern age that has abandoned absolute truth as a relic of the past, but there are still many truths that the citizens of the west know in their heart are as obvious as they are non-negotiable. First and foremost is that wonderfully optimistic, if brazenly taken-out-of context maxim from Hamlet: The most important thing of all is that we be true to ourselves. The second maxim follows, that we must always trust our feelings and do what we know will make us happy, mentally stable, and self-actualized.

Then there is that fiercely-held democratic truism that the majority is always right and the governments job is to ensure the greatest good for the greatest number. Well, they might not put it in those words, but they do expect their leaders to be practical and pragmatic, to get results. In any case, citizens expect, if not demand, constant progress that will make their lives happier, healthier, and blissfully worry-free.

They may or may not believe in God, but they know that nature runs by certain laws that cannot be altered and that scientists and doctors and researchers, precisely because they understand those laws, are to be trusted implicitly. They may or may not believe in a divine moral code, but they know nothing in that code could possibly prevent them from maximizing their pleasure and minimizing their pain. They may or may not believe in heaven, but they know it wouldnt dare impede upon the way things work on earth.

These are the verities of twenty-first-century America, both inside and outside the church, and they are rarely stated or questioned. They are simply accepted, along with the ground we walk on, the food we consume, and the air we breathe. They are part and parcel of the modernist-postmodernist worldview that is so deeply woven into our psyche that it is all but invisibleas invisible as the water is to the fish that live and move and have their being within its perpetually wet embrace.

Thankfully, Fr. Dwight Longenecker has unwoven and exposed that invisible cloak, allowing academic and lay readers alike to see not only its individual strands but how they function together to, quite literally, pull the wool over our eyes. To do so, however, Longenecker employs a more dynamic and memorable metaphor: the multi-headed mythological hydra that grew two new heads each time one of its heads was lopped off.

In Beheading Hydra: A Radical Plan for Christians in an Atheistic Age, Longenecker, a former evangelical and Anglican priest who was ordained to the Catholic priesthood in 2006 and currently pastors Our Lady of the Rosary parish in Greenville, S.C., links the swirling, interconnected heads of the modernist hydra to 16 isms that define the functionally atheistic worldview that so thoroughly pervades secular society that it has come to deceive even the elect.

The first ism out of which all the others spring is materialism: Not Madonnas material girl living in a material world, but the philosophical school that says matter is all there is, there is no separate spiritual realm, either in the universe or in ourselves. Now, many today embrace materialism while claiming to believe in God, but their claims to theism ring hollow.

If there is no heaven or hell, no angels or demons, no human soul that transcends the physical body, then there can be no God. There could be gods like those in Homer, Hesiod, and Ovid, who were born out of the same chaos (undifferentiated matter) as nature; but there cannot be a divine I Am who created the world out of nothing and dwells outside of time and space. The materialist rejects anything that is super-natural or meta-physical, and that must include the God of the Bible.

Enlightenment thinkers like Voltaire, Diderot, and Benjamin Franklin tried to find a way out of this impasseto preserve theistic respectability while adopting fully a materialistic worldviewby calling themselves Deists. But Longenecker will have none of it: Is there really any difference between a Deist and an atheist except a set of manners and the wish to assume a safe position that does not rock the Christian boat too much?

There is not, and the thinker who saw that most clearly was Friedrich Nietzsche, who saved his sharpest criticism for liberal theologians and Bible scholars who tried to have their cake and eat it too. For Nietzsche, writes Longenecker, Deists like David Strauss were hypocrites of the first degreekeeping their pulpits and paychecks, their scholarships and their chairs of theology when all along, the end point of their polite materialism had to be atheism. There was no way around it. God was dead, and they had killed Him.

Philosophical materialism can only lead, in the end, to theological atheism, but the swirling and dividing heads of the hydra do not stop there. If matter is all there is and there is no divine, transcendent Creator, then science and history will eventually morph into scientism and historicism.

Whereas medieval and renaissance scientists saw no contradiction in studying the physical world in the light of a supernatural Creator and a metaphysical realm of reality, Enlightenment scientists divided the visible from the invisible and reduced God to an unnecessary hypothesis. For them, the natural order just was, and nature changed and evolved on its own at random through a mysterious dynamism called life.

As it was in science, so was it in history. Just as life was now believed to have evolved through random processes without any kind of intelligent design or oversight, so history now moved forward with no providential plan or purpose. After all, if there is no storyteller, there can be no story.

In such a world, there can be no fixed moral code against which to measure our actions and our policies. Enter utilitarianism and pragmatism, which carry the philosophy of materialism into the social sciences. Apart from a universal code of right and wrong, decisions can only be made in accordance with secular standards of utility; apart from a Creator who has endowed each individual with essential worth and value, those standards will have no qualms about sacrificing the few for the sake of the many. In other words, the greatest good for the greatest number.

But how is one to determine what does or does not constitute utility? By appealing to the entrenched mantra of newer is better. According to the hydra heads of progressivism and utopianism, whatever brings progress and development is good, no matter the human cost. That is simply the way nature works, and it is up to us to do whatever is necessary to propel history forward, even if that calls for violent clashes between competing groups.

That is why, Longenecker explains, leftist progressives turn a blind eye to the riots, arson, threats, and violent protests of left-wing activists but clamp down on peaceful right-wing protests. The leftists see themselves as pioneers pushing for progress. The right wing are negative reactionaries who want to turn back the clock.

So much for the society that emerges, step by step, out of materialism. What of the citizens who will live in that brave new society where the dogma of relativism has done away with any dogma that might provide them the limits and boundaries they need?

The answer, of course, is that they will refuse to abide by any limits or boundaries that might prevent them from asserting their Nietzschean will to power. The goal of life is not to conform ones soul to divine and transcendent standards of virtue, but to express in unfettered fashion ones autonomous individualism. By individualism, Longenecker does not mean the pioneer and entrepreneurial spirit that helped shape America, but the proud spirit that stands alone, independent of any authority, any truth, any reality outside its own self-referencing bubble.

Since the sexual revolution, that proud spirit has manifested itself in ever-increasing demands for complete, unfettered freedom (eroticism) in the sexual realm. But it has also surfaced in the more subtle, and thus more deceptive, form of sentimentalism, which Longenecker defines as the system of decision-making or taking an action based only on ones emotions.

This system, which privileges feeling over reason and heart over head, is just as prevalent within the church as outside it. It ultimately denies original sin, celebrating the feelings of the heart as holy and sacred and placing the blame for evil (or at least criminal) behavior on society rather than on the individual.

This Rousseau-inspired sentimentalism paved the way, in turn, for romanticism, which displaced both theology and philosophy as the arbiter of truth. Instead, the surge of inner emotions was the criteria for truth, and it was the artist, not the theologian or the philosopher, who became the high priest and guardian of truth, and this reliance on the inner light spread through every aspect of society.

Such is Longeneckers diagnosis of a dying world infected to the core by the venom of the multi-headed hydra. But does he offer a cure?

Interestingly, rather than propose a right-leaning program of direct confrontation with the heads of the hydra or a left-leaning policy of accommodating their subtle poison, he offers something approximating Rod Drehers Benedict Option. We must change ourselves, he argues, and live out that change in such a way that we will simultaneously expose the lies of the hydra and incarnate an alternative way of living.

Longenecker refers to this inner change as creative subversion. Here is how it works. Rather than fight materialism in the academy or embrace Christian consumerism, we must demonstrate to the world our refusal to absorb and imitate its cupidity by tithing generously to our church and other charities. Likewise, rather than debate atheists on television or construct our own modern versions of Deism, we must show forth our belief in an active Creator God by living lives of continuous praise and intercessory prayer.

Furthermore, we must study the Bible and Christian history, not as an end in itself but as a way of training ourselves to perceive in the seemingly random flow of events the providential hand of God. If we do that diligently and prayerfully, we will learn to see, and to teach others to see, that God was there working through historys triumphs and tragediesnever forsaking His peopleHis Holy Spirit never being spent, and that the world is always charged with Gods grandeur.

While continuing to provide food, medicine, and education to the poor and dispossessed, we must devote ourselves to evangelizing the lost. Only thus can we assert the existence and eternal significance of the human soul and its final destination.

Likewise, if we are to champion tradition over progressivism, chastity over eroticism, and community over individualism, then we must strengthen our own schools, families, and churches. Instead of complaining that we live in a world that offers freedom without restraint, let us use our radical freedom to freely choose a path of radical obedience.

[T]he poison of progressivism and the false dream of utopianism, Longenecker assures us, can be defeated, not with argument, debate, or discussion but through real action by real people who are simply rolling up their sleeves and doing what they can where they are and with what they have.

If we will commit ourselves to doing just that, we can, I believe, lay claim to a currently unfashionable -ism that is stronger than all the swirling heads of the hydra: optimism.

The rest is here:
How To Preserve A Moral Culture Through 'Creative Subversion' - The Federalist

(RNS) Byron Wratee recalls the silence among white Catholic priests after the killing of Trayvon Martin. Since then, he said, hes made a conscious decision to attend only Catholic parishes that are majority Black.

Hes remained critical of the churchs response to racism and racial justice in the aftermath of numerous police killings of Black men, but for Wratee, who grew up largely Pentecostal and converted to Catholicism 20 years ago, leaving the church is not an option.

I have a right to be in this church, he said.

While Wratee, 38, has chosen to stay in the church, he is among a generation that is broadly becoming less religious and less affiliated with the institutional church. A recent study from Pew Research Center found young Black Americans are less religious than their elders. Specifically, Black millennial (49%) and Generation Z (46%) individuals are about twice as likely as Black members of the Silent Generation (26%) to say they seldom or never attend religious services at any congregation.

The study, Faith Among Black Americans, reveals the particular difficulty the Catholic Church is having in retaining Black adults who were raised Catholic.

RELATED: Can I get an amen? Black Americans faith, religious practice detailed in Pew study

An estimated 3 million Black Americans are Catholic, but according to the study, nearly half of those raised Catholic no longer identify as Catholic (46%, compared to 39% of all Americans raised Catholic). About 1 in 5 Black adults who were raised Catholic have become unaffiliated (19%), and a quarter have become Protestant (24%).

While the Catholic Church grapples with a range of issues from patriarchal structures to a lack of LGBTQ inclusivity Wratee, who is working toward his doctorate degree in systematic theology at Boston College, said that for younger Black Americans, racism is the root cause of why theyre leaving the church.

An overwhelming 77% of Black Catholics said opposing racism is essential to their faith, according to the Pew study, which surveyed more than 8,600 Black adults.

For many Black Catholics, Wratee said, theres a fundamental belief that you cannot be a Christian and a racist. And so, he said, We have a duty to preach the gospel to our white brothers and sisters.

This is why Wratee is participating in a four-part webinar series titled, Black Catholics and the Millennial Gap. The first episode launched Nov. 8 to commemorate Black Catholic History Month and focused on racism, trauma and the Catholic Church.

The series, sponsored by the National Black Catholic Conference, will touch on Black freedom movements and Black Catholic worship, music and liturgy. It will culminate in February during Black History Month.

LaRyssa Herrington, 26, who launched the webinar series, said the critiques come from a place of love, but also from a place of desiring to be seen and recognized.

Herrington, a doctoral student in systematic theology at the University of Notre Dame, believes its too simplistic to say people arent religious because of atheism or secularism. You have to factor in the experiences of sexual and racial trauma prevalent in the church, she said.

According to the Pew report, nearly all Black adults whether religiously affiliated or not believe in God or a higher power (97%).

People arent less religious than they used to be, said Herrington, who converted to Catholicism about two years ago while pursuing her masters of divinity.I think people are tired of being mistreated.

RELATED: Study: Most Black nones believe in God or higher power, fewer pray regularly

While Herrington didnt grow up religious, she joined a Protestant evangelical Baptist church in high school, but she later sought more, wanting to be connected to something that was bigger and outside of myself. Herrington was drawn to Catholicisms sacramental life.

Praying the rosary, beginning to ask Mary for intercession was new for me and having her almost speak back in a way, said Herrington, who attends St. Augustine Parish, a historically Black Catholic church in South Bend, Indiana. Going to eucharistic adoration has meant so much to me. Its something I still do now.

She hopes the online webinars and discussions can inspire young lay Catholics, particularly Black Catholics, to consider vocations in and outside the church and realize that we are empowered.

We are leading even if we arent priests, even if we arent cardinals or bishops, she said.

The first webinar episode, which explored racism and the church, launched just days after Los Angeles Archbishop Jose Gomez, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, denounced new social justice movements during a speech for the meeting of the Congress of Catholics and Public Life in Madrid. He condemned the movements as pseudo-religions that are dangerous substitutes for true religion.

RELATED: Top US Catholic bishop calls social justice movements pseudo-religion

While Gomez said the killing of George Floyd was a stark reminder that racial and economic inequality are still deeply embedded in our society, he suggested the movements that inspired demonstrations in 2020 serve as replacements for traditional Christian beliefs.

Whatever we call these movements social justice, wokeness, identity politics, intersectionality, successor ideology they claim to offer what religion provides, Gomez said.

An online petition, sponsored by Faithful America and Faith in Public Life, has called on Gomez to apologize and listen to Black Catholics. The petition garnered more than 12,000 signatures and was delivered to Gomez before U.S. Catholic bishops meet for their annual fall meeting beginning Nov. 15.

In this image taken from video, Archbishop Jos Gomez of Los Angeles, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, addresses the bodys virtual assembly on June 16, 2021. (United States Conference of Catholic Bishops via AP)

Catholic bishops and other religious leaders ought to be in the streets with racial-justice movement organizers not demeaning them, the petition reads.

The Gomez speech and the divided reactions to it underscore the complicated space Black Catholics occupy, many of whom attend predominantly white or multiracial churches.

To John Barnes, who will be leading an upcoming webinar episode, says, Black people always exist in liminal spaces. Barnes, a doctoral student in systematic theology at Fordham University, converted to Catholicism in his 30s and said he was drawn by the religions sacraments and rituals.

Theres nowhere you can go in America, really, where you can be fully affirmed unless youre going to be around a majority of Black and brown people, said Barnes, 36. The church is no different, he said.

RELATED: Play about first African American priest in the US highlights current issues

But, he said, its important to be a part of the future of the church and to honor and recognize the ancestors who paved the way for us.

If you believe the gospel is true and you are, in your heart, Catholic, youre not going to let whiteness put us out, Barnes said.

Meanwhile, for Wratee, its crucial to place a distinction between the church and Mass attendance. Black Catholics are still in the church, in that theyre still faithful and pray, Wratee said. We are the church.

Were just not going to Mass to have to listen to racist sermons from priests, Wratee said.

Link:
Amid Black exodus, young Catholics are pushing the church to address racism - Religion News Service

Some people find God in nature. Bobbie Kirkhart found atheism.

The free-thought activists anti-epiphany occurred on a lonely beach in Mazatlan, Mexico, in 1973 when she was pregnant with her first child.

She wanted to know exactly where she stood on God before she became a mom, and vowed she wouldnt stray from the sand until her beliefs were clear.

It took six hours, but eventually she concluded that the God shed grown up believing in would not allow so much suffering to flourish in the world, and therefore couldnt exist.

I came off the beach an atheist, she told the Los Angeles Times in 2009.

Over the next 40 years, Kirkhart would become the matriarch of L.A.s atheist community, serving as president of the Atheist Alliance International a nonprofit advocacy organization committed to educating the public about atheism, and Atheists United, which promotes the separation of government and religion and is dedicated to creating an atheist community in Southern California.

She lectured internationally on free thought, supported student atheist groups and an atheist summer camp for children, and mentored dozens of leaders in the movement before her death Sunday at 78 at her home in Echo Park.

She was one of the few national female leaders for the past 40 years and a trailblazer, not just as an institutional leader, but also for building connections, said Evan Clark, executive director of Atheists United. She was an international figure for free thought.

Among Kirkharts proudest achievements was providing atheists the sense of community and belonging that is more often found in religious settings.

Bobbie Kirkhart, center, wanted people without faith to have the community she remembers growing up with as a Methodist, her daughter said.

(Monica Waggoner)

She wanted people without faith to have the community she remembers growing up with as a Methodist, said her daughter, Monica Waggoner. Her legacy is the community.

Kirkhart regularly opened her six-bedroom Victorian home, known as Heretic House, free of charge for fundraisers, board retreats, holiday parties, recovery meetings and choir practices. It also served as a de facto bed and breakfast for anyone from the movement in need of a place to stay.

Even during the worst of the pandemic, Heretic House hosted as many as 10 events a month, Clark said.

Atheism was something she was serious about, but what she felt was really missing was the heart, said Waggoner, who also identifies as an atheist. Just because we dont believe in a soul doesnt mean we dont have an emotional life that needs to be nourished.

Kirkhart was born April 16, 1943, in Enid, Okla., and raised in a religious family. She grew up loving church the community, the music and even worked as a Sunday school teacher.

Her belief in God began to falter after she graduated college and started a career as a social worker for the Department of Children and Family Services in South Los Angeles in 1965. She was dismayed to learn that some of the families she served were giving money to their church, even as they struggled to feed their children.

My clients were Black and Latino women who were Gods most fervent servants, and my God was at best leaving them to very cruel elements, she said in a 2009 interview.

She considered other religions, but found they didnt make sense to her either.

Atheist organizations were harder to find before the dawn of the internet, and it wasnt until after she divorced her first husband, L.A. historian William Mason, in 1982 that Kirkhart started attending Sunday morning meetings of the newly formed Atheists United.

In those early days she kept her atheist activities away from her daughter.

I was with my dad Sunday mornings, and she didnt want to burden me with that, Waggoner said.

Eventually, Waggoner caught on. After overhearing her mom use the word atheist, she asked if thats what they were.

She said, Oh, honey, Im so tired of being nothing. Im glad were something, Waggoner said.

Kirkhart met her second husband, Harvey Tippit, through Atheists United and the two married in 1997. After her second marriage, Kirkhart had more financial resources than shed ever had before. Shed grown up poor and struggled financially as a single mom.

Top of mind was that now she could help people in a different way, Waggoner said.

Kirkhart and Tippit traveled the world, including trips to Borneo and the Galapagos. Kirkhart also spoke to atheist and humanist groups in Canada, Germany, France, Nigeria, India and Cameroon. She was a platform speaker at the first Godless Americans March in Washington, D.C., in 2002, and sat on the advisory board of the Humanist Assn. of Nepal and on the board of Camp Quest, an atheist summer camp.

Tippit died in 2006, and Kirkhart bought Heretic House three years later in Angelino Heights. Immediately she offered it up as a community space, hosting musical performances, book clubs, Atheists United meetings and allowing people in the movement to stay with her for weeks and months at a time if necessary.

She grew up with a lot of religious influence around her, and shes always been someone who sees the success of the religious model as something the atheist doesnt do enough, said Yari Schutzer, a leader of the Voices of Reason choir, which rehearsed at Heretic House. She got that house with the full intention of creating a community. It gave her a physical platform to say, This is what I mean.

As her health declined in the last decade, Kirkhart stepped back from her work on the international atheist scene and instead focused on the local community through her work with Atheists United.

The organization she joined in 1982 now has 200 dues-paying members and hosts drug and alcohol recovery groups, a hiking club, the Voices of Reason choir, and is involved in community service like food distribution and vaccine drives.

Were hosting almost 30 events a month, Clark said.

Although she was an outspoken atheist, Waggoner doesnt remember her mother having any particular enemies.

She was nonconfrontational, Waggoner said.

From Kirkharts perspective, what an individual believes is not important. Her issue was with the influence religious institutions wield and her belief that has hurt people.

In a speech to the Secular Student Alliance in 2013, Kirkhart said that an atheists devotion to free thought should be equal to or greater than a religious persons devotion to God.

She believed that as long as the majority of the nation believes in magic, there will be an assault on science that shortens lives and creates environmental disaster.

The work of atheists, she believed, was no less than to save humanity.

Our job is to provide an alternative to show that a life of unbelief can be, and usually is, fulfilling and productive, she told the students. Our job is no less than to save the world from superstitious self-destruction.

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Bobbie Kirkhart, the matriarch of atheism in L.A., dies at 78 - Los Angeles Times

Distrust of atheists is strong in the United States. The General Social Survey consistently demonstrates that as a group, Americans dislike atheists more than any other religious group. According to various studies, nearly half of the country would disapprove of their child marrying an atheist, some 40% of the public does not believe atheists share their view of American society, and only 60% of Americans would be willing to vote for an atheist in a presidential election.

There is one field, however, where atheism is often assumed: science.

People often view scientists as Godless. Some of these views may be a result of people hearing more from vocal atheist scientists such as evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins, neuroscientist Sam Harris and others who are at the vanguard of a movement known as new atheism. New atheists are not simply scientists who are convinced there is no God or gods. They couple their irreligion with an aggressive critique of religious belief as a threat to societal well-being.

These scientists espouse a frequently derisive rhetoric on religion and the religious public. Dawkins, for example, has argued that religion is a form of mental illness and one of the worlds great evils comparable to smallpox.

But such strident attitudes may not be representative of scientists in general.

A recent research study we conducted reveals that most atheist scientists in the U.S. and U.K. are not anti-religious.

Drawing on quantitative surveys with 1,293 scientists who identified as atheists, 81 in-depth qualitative interviews conducted from 2013 through 2016 and context material collected since then, we found that scientists views of religion are much more diverse than the image conveyed by new atheists.

Each of the scientists in our study selected the statement I do not believe in God when asked about their views of God and selected this choice over options including agnosticism, the view that the existence of God or the divine is unknowable.

As sociologists, we view religion as multidimensional consisting of beliefs, practices, traditions and identities and seek to understand such dimensions in the lives of atheist scientists and their views of religion.

One of our main findings is that most atheist scientists do not want to be aligned with rhetoric that condemns religious people. Although we did not specifically ask about Dawkins in interviews, scientists often brought him up.

As one biologist that we interviewed in the U.K. said of him, Well, he has gone on a crusade, basically I think that [religion] is an easy target, and I think that hes rather insensitive and hectoring.

Even atheist scientists who harbored occasional negative views of religion expressed concerns that such rhetoric is bad for science.

Not only are many atheist scientists not hostile to religion, but some think religion can also be beneficial to society; in the words of one of our respondents, you can see the benefits of going to church. Many, for example, discussed the sense of community one finds in churches. Others emphasized religious attendance as a force of good, encouraging people to act more charitably.

Indeed in the U.S., 29% of atheist scientists also say they are culturally religious. That is, despite their lack of belief in God, they routinely interact with religious individuals or organizations, such as having a religious spouse, sending their children to a religious school, or attending services themselves.

As one atheist biologist told us: I enjoy going to church for the suspension of disbelief, for the theatrical experience, for reading, for the liturgy, for the magnificent stories and the mythic quality of those stories, which is intensely spiritual. Thats a real experience.

We also found that atheist scientists and persons of faith have more in common than most people may think, such as the experience of awe and wonder. Whereas many religious individuals experience spirituality through their faith, some atheist scientists speak of their work with similar notions of awe and wonder.

These scientists talk about intangible realities that imbue wonder, motivate their work and are beyond observation realities that they call spirituality.

[This Week in Religion, a global roundup each Thursday. Sign up.]

As sociologists Penny Edgell, Joseph Gerteis and Douglas Hartmann explain, when asked about atheists on surveys, Americans are most likely imagining a theoretical person who rejects the idea of God, rather than thinking about an actual atheist they may have encountered.

Indeed, in an ideologically segregated society such as the U.S, religious and nonreligious individuals may not interact in ways that would actually inform their perspectives of one another. As a result, religious and nonreligious individuals views of one another are heavily reliant on stereotypes of each group.

Consequently, when people think about atheist scientists, it is all too easy to imagine the picture painted based on those presented in the public sphere, such as Dawkins and others, in the absence of one who inhabits their community.

What is more, it is difficult to know an atheist when you see one, especially if they are sitting down the pew from you in church, as our research indicates they might.

In an era where our lives literally depend on trust in the scientific community, telling the truth about who atheist scientists are through research on them, rather than allowing them to be represented by the loudest atheist scientist voices, is consequential.

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Many scientists are atheists, but that doesn't mean they are anti-religious - The Conversation US

Jack is a happy and energetic young boy who spends his days playing outside with his brother, Warnie, and his nights sleeping peacefully inside his parents' spacious home in Belfast, Ireland.

Life it seems couldn't be better.

But then his mother dies of cancer. And then his father a stern man grows despondent, walking drearily through each day as if life itself is not worth living.

Jack, too, becomes cynical about life. He even swears off all religion, believing the world and the universe together are a "rather regrettable institution."

At 14, he turns his back on Christianity.

In high school and college, he embraces atheism.

He is as he later says as "non-moral as a human creature could be."

God, though, has other plans for Jack.

Jack better known as C.S. Lewis is the subject of the new film The Most Reluctant Convert, which follows Lewis from his childhood, to his teenage years, to his time at Oxford as a young adult, when he converts to Christianity and becomes a world-famous apologist. (The film's subtitle is "The Untold Story of C.S. Lewis.)

Here are three things you should know about the film:

The movie is based on an award-winning stage play starring Max McLean, who as in the film plays a middle-aged Lewis who is looking back on his childhood and conversion. But while the stage play stars McLean in a solo role, the film features him alongside numerous actors in what is a combination of narration and drama.

Like Ebenezer Scrooge traveling back in time to see his early life, the middle-aged Lewis (played by McLean) travels back in time to his childhood, teen and young adult years, where he walks the same streets and visits the same houses and classrooms of his younger self oftentimes mere feet away from the younger Lewis.

It's a brilliant method of filmmaking that is as entertaining as it is educational and inspiring. The movie was directed by Norman Stone, who also helmed The Narnia Code (2009) and C.S. Lewis: Beyond Narnia (2005). Stone won an International Emmy and a BAFTA Award for Shadowlands, the 1986 film about Lewis' relationship with his wife, Joy Davidman.

It was filmed in 18 locations in and around Oxford, England, where Lewis attended and later taught. The fragrance of history nearly teems from the screen.

McLean carries much of the film's weight, but he's not the only impressive actor. Nicholas Ralph (All Creatures Great and Small), who plays Lewis as a young adult, and Tom Glenister (Vera, Doc Martin), who plays J.R.R. Tolkien, also stand out. Eddie Ray Martin, a young actor who plays Lewis as a child in his debut theatrical role, is solid, too.

McLean is a well-known actor who is known as much for his rich, baritone voice as his face. He narrated The Listener's Bible an audio version of Scripture that is widely available on the Internet. (It's so relaxing that I often use it to help my children unwind at night.) He is the founder and artistic director of the Fellowship for Performing Arts, a New York-based company that produces film and theatre from a Christian worldview. He also adapted for the stage The Screwtape Letters, The Great Divorce, Genesis and Mark's Gospel.

It has been said that the 18th-century preacher George Whitefield had such a captivating voice that he could pronounce one word "Mesopotamia" and make people weep. Perhaps McLean's voice is the 21st-century version of that.

"This story has a remarkable ability to engage audiences regardless of their religious belief," McLean said. "Lewis applied his formidable and self-deprecating wit to engage audiences about his own trying and painful experiences."

The Most Reluctant Convert is an inspiring tale about an atheist who was consumed by intellect he believed Christianity was one "mythology among many" became the greatest defender of the faith of the 21st century.

Lewis was drawn by the Holy Spirit, yes, but God used friends and intellectual giants alike to persuade him with Lewis kicking and screaming each step of the way.

Doubts about his atheism were sparked when a college friend, Owen Barfield, switched from materialism to theism. Lewis tried talking "sense" into his friend, but to no avail. Lewis was further impacted by such Christian authors as George MacDonald and G. K. Chesterton men who wrote honestly about the "roughness and density of life" that, Lewis said, secular-minded authors lacked.

Two Christian intellects, J.R.R. Tolkien and Hugo Dyson, helped Lewis clear the final hurdles. At the time, Lewis said he believed in a supernatural being but not the personal God of Christianity. Jesus was a good moral teacher, Lewis argued, yet not the Savior of the world.

Tolkien was having none of it.

"Either this man was and is the Son of God, or else he is a liar, a lunatic or a fraud," Tolkien told Lewis. "But all this patronizing nonsense about him being some great moral teacher, it's not an option to us, nor was it intended to be."

The Most Reluctant Convertis part-biopic, part-apologetics crash course, and part-evangelistic tool. It's the story of how a God-hater was transformed into a God-worshipper. Yes, you may already know much of Lewis' story, but you haven't seen it told like this. The Most Reluctant Convertis one of the best films of the year.

Learn more atCSLewisMovie.com

The Most Reluctant Convert is unrated but should be treated as a PG film. Content warnings: We see Lewis drink in a pub and smoke a pipe. We hear two coarse words (both d--nit). We hear Lewis discuss "sexual temptation" and "lust," although the film contains no sexuality. Lewis also discusses how his hospital roommate had a "furious affair" with the nurse. We hear them laugh but see nothing.

Entertainment rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Family-friendly rating: 4 out of 5 stars.

Photo courtesy: A1 Productions

Michael Foust has covered the intersection of faith and news for 20 years. His stories have appeared in Baptist Press,Christianity Today, The Christian Post, theLeaf-Chronicle,the Toronto Star andthe Knoxville News-Sentinel.

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3 Things to Know about The Most Reluctant Convert: The Untold Story of CS Lewis - Crosswalk.com

Atheists living in 13 countries risk being condemned to death, just for their beliefs (or non-belief) according to a new, comprehensive report from theInternational Humanist and Ethical Unionout on Tuesday.All 13 countries identified by the study are Muslim majority.

The countries that impose these penalties are Afghanistan, Iran, Malaysia, Maldives, Mauritania, Nigeria, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, United Arab Emirates and Yemen.With the exception of Pakistan, those countries all allow for capital punishment againstapostasy, i.e., the renunciation of a particular religion. Pakistan, meanwhile, imposes the death penalty for blasphemy, which can obviously include disbelief in God.

The study's interactive map gives a good, broad, overview of which countries punish apostasy and blasphemy by death (black), with prison time (red), or place legal restrictions on (non-)religious speech and thought (yellow):

The report is a more comprehensive version of a similar study released last year that identified just seven countries where atheists faced capital punishment, only half of this year's total. It alsofound much more widespread discrimination against atheists around the world. "Our results show that the overwhelming majority of countries fail to respect the rights of atheistsand freethinkers," the study explains, noting that laws in some countries prevent atheists from marrying, attending public school, participating as a citizen, holding public office, or just existing at all. The authors, citing a Gallup study, estimate that about 13 percent of the world's population is atheist, while 23 percent identify as simply "not religious."

Although not on the list of 13, Bangladesh receives some special attention in the report as a particular low-light. Several non-religious and atheist bloggers and journalists in the country have faced death threats and harassment this yearin the wake of a series of government prosecutions for blasphemy. One blogger, Ahmed Rajib Haider,was murdered with a machete outside of his home. The report also incorporates assessment of general free speech protections in each country. Russia earned significant criticism in part because of its anti-LGBT "propaganda" laws. And North Korea, an aggressively secular state, received the report's lowest rating of "Grave Violations."

Because of the U.S.'s strong constitutional free speech protections and lack of an official state religion, the country fared moderately well in the report, earning a "mostly satisfactory" rating. But the IHEU had some cautionary notes on how atheists are actually treated in the U.S., criticizing "a range of laws that limit therole of atheists in regards to public duties, or else entangle the government with religion to thedegree that being religious is equated with being an American, and vice versa." Those laws include constitutional provisions still on the books in seven states (Arkansas,Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas) barring atheists from holding public office. The authors add:

While there is some legalremedy for clear religious discrimination by the government, it can often go unchallenged insituations where it is difficult, or personally disadvantageous or hazardous, to take a stand againstauthority, for example in prisons, the military, and even some administrative contexts.

So, which countries earned a somewhat elusive "free and equal" rating from the IHEU? The best-ranked countries included Jamaica, Uruguay, Japan, Taiwan, and Belgium.

This article is from the archive of our partner The Wire.

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There Are 13 Countries Where Atheism Is Punishable by ...

The idea of American exceptionalism has become so dubious that much of its modern usage is merely sarcastic. But when it comes to religion, Americans really are exceptional. No rich country prays nearly as much as the U.S, and no country that prays as much as the U.S. is nearly as rich.

Americas unique synthesis of wealth and worship has puzzled international observers and foiled their grandest theories of a global secular takeover. In the late 19th century, an array of celebrity philosophersthe likes of Friedrich Nietzsche, Karl Marx, and Sigmund Freudproclaimed the death of God, and predicted that atheism would follow scientific discovery and modernity in the West, sure as smoke follows fire.

Stubbornly pious Americans threw a wrench in the secularization thesis. Deep into the 20th century, more than nine in 10 Americans said they believed in God and belonged to an organized religion, with the great majority of them calling themselves Christian. That number held steadythrough the sexual-revolution 60s, through the rootless and anxious 70s, and through the greed is good 80s.

Read: Elite failure has brought Americans to the edge of an existential crisis

But in the early 1990s, the historical tether between American identity and faith snapped. Religious non-affiliation in the U.S. started to riseand rise, and rise. By the early 2000s, the share of Americans who said they didnt associate with any established religion (also known as nones) had doubled. By the 2010s, this grab bag of atheists, agnostics, and spiritual dabblers had tripled in size.

History does not often give the satisfaction of a sudden and lasting turning point. History tends to unfold in messy cyclesactions and reactions, revolutions and counterrevolutionsand even semipermanent changes are subtle and glacial. But the rise of religious non-affiliation in America looks like one of those rare historical moments that is neither slow, nor subtle, nor cyclical. You might call it exceptional.

The obvious question for anybody who spends at least two seconds looking at the graph above is: What the hell happened around 1990?

According to Christian Smith, a sociology and religion professor at the University of Notre Dame, Americas nonreligious lurch has mostly been the result of three historical events: the association of the Republican Party with the Christian right, the end of the Cold War, and 9/11.

This story begins with the rise of the religious right in the 1970s. Alarmed by the spread of secular cultureincluding but not limited to the sexual revolution, the Roe v. Wade decision, the nationalization of no-fault divorce laws, and Bob Jones University losing its tax-exempt status over its ban on interracial datingChristians became more politically active. The GOP welcomed them with open arms. The party, which was becoming more dependent on its exurban-white base, needed a grassroots strategy and a policy platform. Within the next decade, the religious rightincluding Ralph Reeds Christian Coalition, James Dobsons Focus on the Family, and Jerry Falwells Moral Majorityhad become fundraising and organizing juggernauts for the Republican Party. In 1980, the GOP social platform was a facsimile of conservative Christian views on sexuality, abortion, and school prayer.

Read: Evangelical fear elected Trump

The marriage between the religious and political right delivered Reagan, Bush, and countless state and local victories. But it disgusted liberal Democrats, especially those with weak connections to the Church. It also shocked the conscience of moderates, who preferred a wide berth between their faith and their politics. Smith said its possible that young liberals and loosely affiliated Christians first registered their aversion to the Christian right in the early 1990s, after a decade of observing its powerful role in conservative politics.

Second, it may have felt unpatriotic to confess ones ambivalence toward God while the U.S. was locked in a geopolitical showdown with a godless Evil Empire. In 1991, however, the Cold War ended. As the U.S.S.R. dissolved, so did atheisms association with Americas nemesis. After that, nones could be forthright about their religious indifference, without worrying that it made them sound like Soviet apologists.

Third, Americas next geopolitical foe wasnt a godless state. It was a God-fearing, stateless movement: radical Islamic terrorism. A series of bombings and attempted bombings in the 1990s by fundamentalist organizations such as al-Qaeda culminated in the 9/11 attacks. It would be a terrible oversimplification to suggest that the fall of the Twin Towers encouraged millions to leave their church, Smith said. But over time, al-Qaeda became a useful referent for atheists who wanted to argue that all religions were inherently destructive.

Meanwhile, during George W. Bushs presidency, Christianitys association with unpopular Republican policies drove more young liberals and moderates away from both the party and the Church. New Atheists, such as Christopher Hitchens and Sam Harris, became intellectual celebrities; the 2006 best seller American Theocracy argued that evangelicals in the Republican coalition were staging a quiet coup that would plunge the country into disarray and financial ruin. Throughout the Bush presidency, liberal votersespecially white liberal voters detached from organized religion in ever-higher numbers.

Religion has lost its halo effect in the past three decades, not because science drove God from the public square, but rather because politics did. In the 21st century, not religious has become a specific American identityone that distinguishes secular, liberal whites from the conservative, evangelical right.

Other social forces, which have little to do with geopolitics or partisanship, have played a key role in the rise of the nones.

The Church is just one of many social institutionsincluding banks, Congress, and the policethat have lost public trust in an age of elite failure. But scandals in the Catholic Church have accelerated its particularly rapid loss of moral stature. According to Pew research, 13 percent of Americans today self-identify as former Catholics, and many of them leave organized religion altogether. And as the ranks of the nones have swelled, its become more socially acceptable for casual or rare churchgoers to tell pollsters that they dont particularly identify with any faith. Its also become easier for nones to meet, marry, and raise children who grow up without any real religious attachment.

Nor does Smith rule out the familiar antagonists of capitalism and the internet in explaining the popularity of non-affiliation. The former has made life more precarious, and the latter has made it easier for anxious individuals to build their own spiritualities from ideas and practices they find online, he said, such as Buddhist meditation guides and atheist Reddit boards.

Most important has been the dramatic changes in the American family. The past half century has dealt a series of body blows to American marriage. Divorce rates spiked in the 70s through the 90s, following the state-by-state spread of no-fault divorce laws. Just as divorce rates stabilized, the marriage rate started to plummet in the 80s, due to both the decline of marriage within the working class and delayed marriage among college-educated couples.

Read: The not-so-great reason divorce rates are declining

Theres historically been this package: Get married, go to church or temple, have kids, send them to Sunday school, Smith said. But just as stable families make stable congregations, family instability can destabilize the Church. Divorced individuals, single parents, and children of divorce or single-parent households are all more likely to detach over time from their congregations.

Finally, the phenomenon of delayed adulthood might be another subtle contributor. More Americans, especially college graduates in big metro areas, are putting off marriage and childbearing until their 30s, and are using their 20s to establish a career, date around, and enjoy being young and single in a city. By the time they settle down, they have established a routinework, brunch, gym, date, drink, footballthat leaves little room for weekly Mass. They know who they are by 30, and they dont feel like they need a church to tell them, Smith said.

The rise of the nones shows no signs of slowing down. In fact, the religious identity that seems to be doing the best job at both retaining old members and attracting new ones is the newfangled American religion of Nothing Much at All.

Does the rise of the nones matter?

Lets first consider the possibility that it doesnt. As Americas youth have slipped away from organized religion, they havent quite fallen into wickedness. If anything, todays young people are uniquely conscientiousless likely to fight, drink, use hard drugs, or have premarital sex than previous generations. They might not be able to quote from the Book of Matthew, but their economic and social politicswhich insist on protections for the politically meek and the historically persecutedarent so far from a certain reading of the beatitudes.

But the liberal politics of young people brings us to the first big reason to care about rising non-affiliation. A gap has opened up between Americas two political parties. In a twist of fate, the Christian right entered politics to save religion, only to make the Christian-Republican nexus unacceptable to millions of young peoplethus accelerating the countrys turn against religion.

Although it would be wrong to call Democrats a secular party (older black voters are highly religious and dependably vote Democratic), the left today has a higher share of religiously unaffiliated voters than anytime in modern history. At the same time, the average religiosity of white Christian Republicans has gone up, according to Robert P. Jones, the CEO of the polling firm PRRI and the author of The End of White Christian America. Evangelicals feel so embattled that theyve turned to a deeply immoral and authoritarian champion to protect themeven if it means rendering unto an American Caesar whatever the hell he wants. American politics is at risk of becoming a war of religiosity versus secularism by proxy, where both sides see the other as a catastrophic political force that must be destroyed at all costs.

The deeper question is whether the sudden loss of religion has social consequences for Americans who opt out. Secular Americans, who are familiar with the ways that traditional faiths have betrayed modern liberalism, may not have examined how organized religion has historically offered solutions to their modern existential anxieties.

Making friends as an adult without a weekly congregation is hard. Establishing a weekend routine to soothe Sunday-afternoon nerves is hard. Reconciling the overwhelming sense of lifes importance with the universes ostensible indifference to human suffering is hard.

Although belief in God is no panacea for these problems, religion is more than a theism. It is a bundle: a theory of the world, a community, a social identity, a means of finding peace and purpose, and a weekly routine. Those, like me, who have largely rejected this package deal, often find themselves shopping la carte for meaning, community, and routine to fill a faith-shaped void. Their politics is a religion. Their work is a religion. Their spin class is a church. And not looking at their phone for several consecutive hours is a Sabbath.

American nones may well build successful secular systems of belief, purpose, and community. But imagine what a devout believer might think: Millions of Americans have abandoned religion, only to re-create it everywhere they look.

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How America Lost Its Religion - The Atlantic

Studies have found that both atheists and agnostics are surprisingly knowledgable about a variety of religions. Which begs the commonly asked question: what is the difference between someone who defines themselves as atheist and a professedagnostic?

There is a key distinction. An atheist doesnt believe in a god or divinebeing. The word originates with the Greek atheos, which is built from the roots a-(without) andtheos(a god). Atheism is the doctrine or belief that there is no god.

However, an agnostic neither believes nor disbelieves in a god or religious doctrine. Agnostics assert that its impossible for human beings to know anything about how the universe was created and whether or not divine beings exist.

Agnosticism was coined by biologist T.H. Huxley and comes from the Greek gnstos, which means unknown or unknowable.

For example:

To complicate matters, atheists and agnostics are often confused with theists and deists.A theist is the opposite of an atheist. Theists believe in the existence of a god or gods.

Like a theist, a deist believes in God. But a deist believes that while God created the universe, natural laws determine how the universe plays out.

Deists are often connected to Isaac Newtons clockwork universe theory, which compares the universe to a clock that has been wound up and set in motion by God but is governed by the laws of science.

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Religious or not, you likely say goodbye on a daily basis. But were you aware of the words holy history?

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Atheism vs Agnosticism: What's the Difference ...

By Leah MarieAnn Klett, Christian Post Editor | Wednesday, October 27, 2021Eric Metaxas | The Christian Post/Sonny Hong

Eric Metaxas believes that culture is at a paradigm-shifting moment, with science and archeology increasingly pointing to the existence of God and those opposed to Christianity arent going to like it."

We've all lived at a time when not only is the trend that science is pointing us away from God, but we've been living for over 100 years with the narrative that says, science is fundamentally at odds with faith, that reason is at odds with religion, the Christian author, speaker and conservative radio host told The Christian Post.

The one thing everybody kept saying science is leading us away from religion. Ironically, in the last 50 years, precisely the opposite has happened. Science is leading us to God. It's big news."

In his latest book, Is Atheism Dead? Metaxas uncovers new evidence and arguments against the idea of a Creatorless universe. He draws on the insights of top scientists and five scientific discoveries to prove that atheism is untenable.

I am genuinely more excited about this book and about getting the information in this book out to people than I have ever been about any book I have written, the New York native told CP.

One archeological discovery Metaxas said particularly intrigued him was the reported discovery of the biblical Sodom. Some scientists have speculated that a city known as Tall El-Hammam was destroyed by a meteor and could actually be the site of Sodom, the ancient biblical city destroyed for its wickedness.

Most believers, and definitely most non-believers, don't know this information, and it's because we live in a media echo chamber that tends to filter out this kind of information. By the grace of God, I've been able to stumble on this stuff," he said.

Metaxas explained that the title of his latest book is based on the 1966 Time magazine article that provocatively asked Is God Dead?

Maybe the logical question in 1966 was, Is God dead? But the logical question, now that science itself is pointing to the existence of God, which sounds crazy but it's true, and nobody knows it maybe now's the time to write a book with the title, Is Atheism Dead?

Based on his research, Metaxas stressed that science, archaeology, and history dont just support Christianity they also undermine atheism.

This idea that data and science are at odds the biggest news is that not only is that not true, there are two things that follow, Metaxas explained. The second is, according to John Lennox ... it is actually atheism that is incompatible with science, which is a dramatic statement. The third thing, which nobody seems to know, but it's true, is that Christian faith led to modern science this is a historical fact; this is not some Christian gloss on history.

Science lately ... is discovering things about our universe, about the Earth, about human life, about cellular life that looks so fine-tuned, so perfectly calibrated that even atheists are being shaken. That's the one thing that they don't know quite how to handle it, he added.

The more advanced science gets, the more it points to the idea that there had to be a Creator who created the universe, Metaxas said, citing, for example, the complexity of water and plate tectonics.

Every believer needs to understand how freakish it is. I mean, for you to study science, the more you look, the more you just think, I almost can't bear this. The evidence of God is just everywhere I look, including things like water and erosion, he said. It makes you realize God is even more amazing than any of us could ever dream.

Metaxas expressed concern that some Christians today buy into a secular narrative that says its possible to believe in Jesus and the Bible until Scripture seems to contradict science.

That's not the kind of belief God is interested in, he stressed. He doesn't tell you to believe in something that is not true to the bottom. He is truth either Jesus rose from the dead bodily or He didn't. Either what the Bible says is true or it isn't. Either the Lord created the universe and every detail in it or [He] didn't. "

He added: "This idea that we would sort of put ... our faith as Christians kind of in a corner, we're participating in the marginalization of our faith. Our faith is supposed to touch everything: science, math, history. We need to be much bolder in saying, If this is true, it is true everywhere.

The Bonhoeffer,Amazing Graceand Martin Lutherauthor acknowledged that though science and archeology increasingly prove the existence of God, there will always be naysayers who refuse to acknowledge such truth.

I think in these last days, as things unravel around the world, God is shining His light brighter and brighter; He's allowing us to discover things via science and via archaeology it simply gets harder and harder to deny Him, Metaxas said. God will just keep pushing out this evidence .. but at the end of the day, it's got to be the Holy Spirit.

Though Is Atheism Dead was written for anyone eager to learn "with an open mind," it was primarily written for the Church, Metaxas said a Church he believes desperately needs to wake up.

In my Bonhoeffer book I deal with this the Church was slow to wake up, he contended. And that is a model of what not to do. If we do not wake up and fight and a lot of Christians have bad theology that says, Oh, I don't think I'm supposed to fight' not only is that not biblical, that's demonic. God pulled us to fight evil. He calls us to fight on our knees in prayer, but He also calls us to fight in all kinds of other ways.

Part of the reason I wrote this book also is to say to people, Hey, this is not a philosophy. Our faith is not a truth this is truth. And God is giving this to us so that we can be emboldened.'"

Metaxas said he believes God is going to turn things around but His Church has to fight and be armed with information.

On the science thing ... I'm thinking, tell me where I'm missing something here? I know I'm not, because I got all this information from scientists. So people are gaslighting us, that Christians have their weird views. It is nonsense. We have to be bold, we have to know what we believe, and we have to act. And, if you don't do it for yourself, do it for your kids and your grandkids.

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Eric Metaxas on why atheism is 'incompatible' with science, why the Church must 'wake up' and 'fight' - The Christian Post

"Is Jesus Lord or is Caesar king?," Delano Squires asked Thursday on "Tucker Carlson Tonight," cutting to the heart of the parents vs. government debate that has set off a political firestorm at school board meetings nationwide.

"The question is, Is Jesus Lord or is Caesar king?," the "Fearless" contributor wondered. "And really, what we're seeing play out isthat tension between two competing authorities. [W]hat you see in Virginia, in New York City, in the upper northwest is school systems asserting authority that they do not rightfully have. Our children are not theirs."

ERIC METAXAS: IS ATHEISM THE ENEMY OF FREEDOM? HERE'S HOW RETREATING FROM FAITH MAKES US LESS FREE

Squires' pithy summary of the crux of the matter comes amid recent Fox News polling showing that Republican Virginia gubernatorial candidate Glenn Youngkin leads Democratic candidate Terry McAuliffe 53% to 45%. Only a few weeks ago, the numbers were almost opposite with McAuliffe in the lead. Youngkin's surge follows McAuliffe's admission in a Sept. 28 debate, "I dont think parents should be telling schools what they should teach."

Squires said he thinks that "most regular parents" realize the government "does not own their children." Instead, he said there is a "narcissistic classroom cosplay that involves two groups in the elite, privileged class: White liberals seeking absolution for sins that they didn't commit; and Black liberals seeking empathy for injustices that they didn't endure."

Squires framed teachers calling themselves "liberators and de-colonizers" as an act of narcissism.

The "bigger issue," he said, is the "struggle between our rights as individuals and the government's rightful authority." That boils down to a religious struggle, "particularly for Christian parents" like himself who have taken their children out of public schools to homeschool them.

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Squires stood for parents' rights and mothers he dubbed "mama bears" resisting "race essentialism" and "radical gender theory." He also admonished fathers to do the same, "because for too long, fathers have taken a backseat when it comes to the education of their children."

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Delano Squires hammers McAuliffe on 'Tucker Carlson Tonight': 'Schools asserting authority they do not have' - Fox News