Atheist, A New Reformation

Atheism - A New Reformation

In 1517, Martin Luther nailed his declaration onto the doors of the All Saints Church, and thus was begun the Protestant Reformation and the eventual overthrow of the established Catholic Church order.

Prior to this, the Catholic Church essentially ran the world, either overtly or from behind the scenes.  The power of the bishops and the Pope was virtually unquestionable.  They alone held the keys to knowledge -- the scriptures, and thereby the salvation of your soul.  To question the church was to question god himself.

This old world order was eventually overthrown through one simple act, birthed by a new invention the printing press, which printed the first copies of the bible for the general public.  It was this new information that fueled the reformation.  Once the public was able to examine the scriptures for themselves, they immediately saw that the church had kept many things secret from them and that things were not as they seemed.  The established order of access to god only through the priest and the church’s hierarchy was then in question and began to crumble.

The ensuing 150 years were one bloody war after another as the people struggled to become free from the church, and the church struggled to maintain its hold on power.  One thing was absolute; once knowledge had escaped the clutches of the few, that genie could not be put back into the bottle.

While the church may have changed, it certainly did not go away.  It continues to make the claim of authority on issues of morality, holds power behind the scenes, and makes every attempt to direct the course of humanity and the sciences. 

Today, once again, humanity finds itself dealing with Religion run amok.  Holy wars are wreaking havoc on the planet, and because of faith-based hate, huge populations are living in fear – whether it is fear of what will happen to them at the hands of the religious police, or fear of stepping on an airplane to go on a simple business trip.  With so many “hotspots” across the globe, so many battles in the name of god, the time has come for philosophical change.

Across America, the voice of reason is being heard as Atheism comes to the forefront.  A bold new reformation is upon us, as once again a new challenge is nailed to the doors of the church by persons such as Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, and Sam Harris.

It is knowledge that again challenges the church.  Knowledge brought to us by rapidly emerging scientific advances, greater understanding of humanity and the mind, and promulgated by – you guessed it – the internet.  Just like Martin Luther and others, humanity now has access to far greater stores of information and begins to see the world in a new light, a light which illuminates the fallacies and the failures of religion.  Where the church once claimed exclusive rights to morality and the understanding of the human condition, many are finding this claim unjustified.  Morality is a choice, one that humanity has developed on its own without the need of a god created by goat herders and mystics.  Morality and the human condition are far more complicated and diverse than the simplistic battles between one version of good and another version of good, while each calls the other evil.

Advances in science have shown no evidence – none whatsoever – of a god behind the process of life; rather, a complex pattern of energy, self balancing, which gave birth to and evolved into life as we know it.  Furthermore, research into consciousness shows us that our minds and our universe are indeed more vast, to paraphrase Hamlet’s remark to Horatio, “than are dreamt of in our philosophy.”  We find no god, and that is okay. Because what we have found is life, evolving and expanding, with our future bright and shinning, held not in the hand of a mythic being, but in the simple hands of humanity.

Atheism is the rejection of the old concepts of god(s).  Atheism does not propose to offer only cold hard science with no heart as is often the accusation.  Rather, the expansion of human consciousness, the acceptance of what we are and our world is, so that we all may grow and prosper.  Humanity will, as always, make its mistakes as it will also find its moral footing.  Compassion, kindness, beauty and the arts will find greater freedom when not chained to prehistoric gods and demigods who punish humanity for what it thinks.

So, as we enter this new reformation, this new understanding of who we are as individuals and as a species, perhaps we can avoid the pitfalls of the past; the slaughters over doctrine and faith.  Perhaps humanity can take different baby steps towards a greater understanding of ourselves, a brighter future, and our own new reformation.