Recently, I learned a very interesting fact. It seems that up until the 1970’s, all prominent sociologists and other social thinkers were positive, absolutely positive, that religion was on its way out and, given the steady march of progress, science, and reason, would soon fade away as everyone realized how silly the whole thing was and how they didn’t need it any more now that science had better answers and reliable miracles.

Clearly, this has not happen.

Instead, starting in the 1980’s, religion came roaring back all across the board. Religious fundamentalism caught on like wildfire, and suddenly secular governments were being overthrown all over the world by forces backed by religion.

And whether it was Falwell’s fundamentalists putting Reagan in the White House or jihadi militias kicking out the Shah of Iran, one thing was abundantly clear :

Atheism had failed. Religion was here to stay.

And why were those prominent sociologists so very wrong when it came to their predictions of religion’s end? Because once more, the liberal intelligentsia had allowed themselves to believe that through peace, love, harmony, and enlightenment, everyone would eventually see the light and become liberal intellectuals just like them.

And they did this without once glancing in the direction of the average person whom they were so sure was on the cusp of leaving the warmth ans safety of their churches for the chilly embrace of scientism and the ice cold scalpel of reason.

History says otherwise.

And just why, pray tell, did atheism fail so spectacularly to replace religion? Because it was, and still is, led by people who were raised with religion and thus still have within their psyche the structures and islands of stability such an upbringing brings, and thus were free to leave the actual dogma behind once their minds became mature enough to start questioning things.

But most people never get to that point because it requires a certain kind of certainty in one’s ability to figure things out for themselves that only occurs natively in people in the higher range of intelligence.

For everyone else, religion does the job.

And what a job! Atheism never stood a chance against the vast suite of benefits religion brings to the individual believer.

Atheism provides no comfort in times of pain and distress. It offers no sense of community, no social hub, no connection with something larger than oneself, no sense of being loved and cared for by the ultimate parent, no deeply satisfying regular group ritual which synchronizes and enhances the communal mood. It offers no deeply resonating symbols, no rich and colorful narrative filled with stories both interesting and education, no help when you are down, no counsel when you are confused. It provides neither someone to beseech when we fear powerless nor someone to thank when things go well, nor does it provide someone to blame when good triumphs over evil.

It doesn’t even provide someplace to play ping pong.

All atheism can provide is the cold comfort of knowing that you are “right” on a level so obscure as to be meaningless to the average person as it has absolutely no bearing on their everyday life.

Not everyone is a philosopher. Not everyone is inclined to worry about what is “really really” true. Most people are just trying to get through life in a way that works for them. If belief in God, their religious leader, and their church provides them all the things I listed above and more, they have no reason to change. They have no reason, in fact, to even think about it, and all public atheism and its attacks on religion does is provide the exact kind of sense of community under attack that forges such deep and strong ties between people during times of war.

You’ve given their story a villain. Congratulations.

It was true that religion was declining very slowly in the Seventies, but that trend was purely the result of the Baby Boomers rejecting the religion of their parents and seeking their own way.

But then the Boomers who had rejected bourgeoisie institutions like marriage and work got married and had kids anyway, and got old enough to feel their mortality thus start needing real answers, answers that satisfied them instead of merely glibly deflecting the issue, and atheism could not provide these answers.

At the same time, as they aged, the Boomers’ minds became less and less able to adapt to change, and that feeling that the world is spinning out of control and becoming something they could no longer recognize crept up on them, and the rebel hippies became more and more conservative as time went by.

Then the Eighties comes along and almost all of those tie-dyed revolutionaries voted Reagan (or Thatcher, or Mulroney, or..), went right back to the church of their birth or something a hell of a lot like it, and atheism’s smug and lofty predictions of its own effortless victory was revealed to be as ludicrous, unreasoned, and blatantly self-serving and short-sighted as any scrap of dogma from any of the religions it thought was ripe for the scrap pile of history.

And the same will happen with the current crop of atheist bigots and religion bashers. Just like most people don’t think they will marry and have kids when they’re young but most people actually do, the current generation of Dawkinites will swear they will never go back to church again…. and most of them will.

And this will happen over and over again until public atheism stops strengthening religion by attacking it and focuses instead on replacing religion’s many levels of benefit with someone that works as well for people.

It has always been easier to complain than act. To attack instead of consider. To join in the fun of a public hate rather than stay apart by insisting we should love and respect even those with whom we disagree.

But the entire thrust of historical humanist liberalism demands that we restrain our worse instincts and strive to be better human beings by embracing the better angels of our nature.

Atheism has failed precisely because that is one thing it cannot do : inspire humanity to be better people.

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.