In
a previous post, I responded to an article by Nigel Barber claiming that
atheism will replace religion. Recently, Barber published another piece about the connections between quality of life and the presence of atheism. From his research, and that of others, the following are correlated with the presence of higher rates of atheism:
- Economic security
- Living in a nation with a well-developed welfare state
- Greater equality of income distribution
- Availability of psychological help and psychotropic medicines
Barber concludes:
"The reasons that churches lose ground in developed countries can be summarized in market terms. First, with better science, and with government safety nets, and smaller families, there is less fear and uncertainty in people's daily lives and hence less of a market for religion. At the same time many alternative products are being offered, such as psychotropic medicines and electronic entertainment that have fewer strings attached and that do not require slavish conformity to unscientific beliefs."
What are we to make of all of this? First, I would like to point out that the mere fact that atheism may become more predominant if and when more of the world enjoys greater levels of economic security is entirely irrelevant to whether or not some particular religion is true. That is, even if people turn to merely psychological solutions for help in times of stress or depression rather than God or religion, it does not follow that there is no God or supernatural reality. And this is the primary question we should address when considering the spiritual life: Is there in fact a supernatural reality, and if so, what is its relevance to my life?
Moreover, religious people have a ready response for the correlation between atheism and economic security. An essential element of many religious faiths is a sense of humility, which includes the realization that life is in many ways not under our control. The older I get, the more the truth of this lack of control becomes apparent. We who enjoy economic security may tend to live under the illusion that we are truly self-sufficient, but this is not the case. We are vulnerable in many ways to the harsh realities of human existence. C.S. Lewis once wrote that pain is God's megaphone to a lost and dying world. As we become able to manage our pain through psychological means, and experience less suffering because we enjoy greater economic security, it is not surprising that religion would "lose ground". However, while the wealthy citizen of a developed welfare state may not sense a need for God, what if, nonetheless, God exists?
Finally, Barber alludes to data which shows a correlation between atheism and intelligence. The implication is perhaps that religion is for those who lack intelligence, or that being a religious believer is an unintelligent position to take. I think there are sociological reasons for this correlation, and dispute the view that religious belief requires "slavish conformity to unscientific beliefs". This is true of some religious perspectives, but not all. Many atheists have a slavish conformity to scientism, which is roughly the claim that scientific knowledge is either the only kind of knowledge there is, or at least is the best kind of knowledge available to human beings. However, this very claim is not a scientific claim. Rather, it is a philosophical claim about science. Once we open the door for philosophical argumentation, we open the door to many more lines of evidence for the existence of God.
In conclusion, I find the work of Barber and others who engage in this sort of research very interesting and useful. If the intent is to show that atheism is generally correlated with or increased by the presence of economic security, then so be it. If the implication is that religion will die out as such security becomes more widespread, or even that no religion is true because of this data, then we have a case of insufficient evidence.
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