November 21, 2008
Societies worse off 'when they have God on their side'
Ruth Gledhill in the Times of London:
Religious belief can cause damage to a society, contributing towards high murder rates, abortion, sexual promiscuity and suicide, according to research published today.
According to the study, belief in and worship of God are not only unnecessary for a healthy society but may actually contribute to social problems.
The study counters the view of believers that religion is necessary to provide the moral and ethical foundations of a healthy society.
It compares the social peformance of relatively secular countries, such as Britain, with the US, where the majority believes in a creator rather than the theory of evolution. Many conservative evangelicals in the US consider Darwinism to be a social evil, believing that it inspires atheism and amorality.
Many liberal Christians and believers of other faiths hold that religious belief is socially beneficial, believing that it helps to lower rates of violent crime, murder, suicide, sexual promiscuity and abortion. The benefits of religious belief to a society have been described as its “spiritual capital”. But the study claims that the devotion of many in the US may actually contribute to its ills.
More here.
Posted by Abbas Raza at 05:09 PM | Permalink
Comments
It's worth looking at a recent PLoS paper Losing the Big Picture: How Religion May Control Visual Attention doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0003679
Posted by: Dave Bath | Nov 22, 2008 6:31:54 AM
And this is a new concept? Anyone paying attention can easily observe that deluded people can easily be convinced to do deplorable acts.
I think Voltaire had the best line on that one.
Posted by: Dave Ranning | Nov 22, 2008 11:19:10 AM
“The United States is almost always the most dysfunctional of the developing democracies, sometimes spectacularly so.”
Strangely, it's not easy to discuss this assertion calmly with Americans who persist in living there... (laugh)...
Posted by: Steven Augustine | Nov 22, 2008 6:21:17 PM
Hey, it ain't much, but it's home.
Posted by: Vicki Baker | Nov 22, 2008 7:53:41 PM
Funny, Vick!
Steven, I'm assuming you're an expat en route to full German citizenship, and not just an expat gloating/voting with your feet in a less than fully committed way. If you are not in the process of leaving your US citizenship formally behind, please tell me in a general way -- nothing too personal -- about those benefits of American citizenship that persuade you to hold onto it.
In the time I spent in Europe -- France and Italy, not Germany -- I met many expats who, for a wide variety of reasons, felt better tuned to the culture overseas, but who did not even think of dismantling their US citizenship. Back then, however, it was bad manners to dump on your country from abroad.
Maybe you don't mean it, but to my ear there is a superciliousness to what you write about your countrymen from time to time. I don't think that's fair, or becoming to you, when the traits you deplore are not patented by us. I imagine you know that fundamentalists tend to be poorly educated, in Waziristan as in Appalachia. The ills cited in this article do not stem from some uniquely American source, but from bad education -- the biggest open door a zealot will ever find, anywhere on earth. Unless you think Americans are stupider, natively, than the Japanese, say, what we have in this country is a failure of public education on a massive and democracy-threatening scale. This is a cause for passionate concern, not for smirking.
Posted by: Elatia Harris | Nov 22, 2008 10:05:26 PM
Government should be weak, amateurish and ridiculous. At present it fulfills only a third of the role.
-- Abbey
While I love the land I live (at least a majority of the time), I am not impressed by the government, or the conduct of my fellow citizens.
Most of them want to destroy what I love, and are superstitious sheep.
Posted by: Dave Ranning | Nov 22, 2008 11:40:20 PM
Elatia, Vick:
I *knew* that if I waved that red flag, you'd come charging... but where's CM? Is she hanging back to tease me, and, in so doing, to amplify my affection? If so, the strategy has worked! CM... CM...
Posted by: Steven Augustine | Nov 23, 2008 4:56:21 AM
I'm not teasing or charging, Steven -- I actually want to know why, if the dissonance is so great, you don't cut the cord. I've known American expats who had found it so natural to be Italian that they just got absorbed, the transition from resident alien to citizen an almost seamless one. Usually, marriage propelled that. Maybe you're just comfortable precisely between, looking down on the one culture, embracing the other, fully of and for neither. If that's the case, there's nothing wrong with it, but it does tend to make your criticism look haughty and cheap. Because you have scorn to spare for a culture that no longer daily aggrieves you, and you are no longer here to keep "your pulse on the finger," so that while your readings may not be inaccurate, they are a bit like remote viewing.
Dave, people everywhere are mostly sheep in the very narrow sense that they are ruled by received ideas and don't think important things through for themselves. Remember Monty Python's Life of Brian -- "Think for yourselves!" Brian exhorts an adoring mob to do. "Tell us more!" the mob answers back. It's remarkable in Americans only because, in the presence of adequate funding, our schools fail our children, creating citizens with low critical thinking skills. It's like our infant mortality rate, where we have had the money to be first, yet are far down the list. Skewed priorities that sheeple sit still for -- do we own that, or is our participation in it merely especially ironic?
Posted by: Elatia Harris | Nov 23, 2008 11:33:07 AM
Elatia, as a ex-pat who has no idea if he's going to remain so or not, I find your vigor a little over the top. You aren't trying to imply that ex-pats who live abroad and keep their citizenship have a reduced right to criticize, right? Because such an argument would be non-nonsensical.
And indeed, Steve is right. It is hard to talk to many of my relatives about the social dysfunction of the U.S. They all would very much like to continue the traditional pose of bending over and burying their heads into the sand. Now, true, you can read arrogance into Steve's posting, but one can also see him with is tongue firmly embedded in his check. But either way, the more important truth is that he's right. Lets not shoot the messenger.
Further, the problem is much, much deeper than hicks from Appalachia. In fact, I'd say they are the least of the problem. They make up a very small percentage of the people pushing for many of the policies that exacerbate the problems Dr. Paul, in the study, discusses. My relatives on one side the family once more provide an excellent example: they are college educated, and hold high-level jobs and posts. Yet they are largely swayed by myopic religious prattle, and vote their bible. These are smart people, but they listen to Rush Limbaugh, and I long ago gave up getting through to any of them.
Now, I know you none of that will be a surprise to you. But don't be mad at a few ex-pats who occasionally point it out. Even if they are a little prissy about it.
Posted by: Cyrus Hall | Nov 23, 2008 12:13:41 PM
Elatia:
"If that's the case, there's nothing wrong with it, but it does tend to make your criticism look haughty and cheap."
Believe it or not, there's nothing wrong with "it" in *any* case. However: haughty and cheap it is! Never claimed otherwise; not the type to. My criticism is no less bang-on for all that, though, and this is what I suspect rankles most.
What I find silliest is that you think that someone who blows a vociferous rasberry at the rundown, malfunctioning HOLLYWOOD sign of American Empire automatically embraces some national "opposite". I'm put in mind of the spittle-whipping Bedsit Guardian Socialists I've argued with who seem to believe that coming out against the primitive encroachments of rural Muslim sexual apartheid in Europe is tantamount to loving your retarded Caligula GW Bush. It is not. And your false dichotomy is equally wrong (though every bit as rhetorically convenient, obviously).
My daughter is walking around with whiskers painted on her face (I go out for a walk with my old friend Nigel, who's in Berlin for the weekend, only to come home to find both my Beloved and our daughter wearing grease-pencil *cat faces*!), and she just announced to me that she "loves" a dirty old bandage we found under the living room table.
Sorry for going off-piste in that last bit... think of it as a kind of Zen koan, or the rap on your knuckles from the Roshi's whimsical stick.
Posted by: Steven Augustine | Nov 23, 2008 12:56:31 PM
Steven, for you to be the Roshi and rap my knuckles, I'd have to accept you as being in a firm position to enlighten me by confounding me, and you'd have to accept me as your subordinate who wanted that relationship with you. That's so not on, I'm sure we agree.
There is indeed something uncompelling about taking easy shots from faraway. All I asked you to do was to examine -- for anyone reading -- the nature of the tie that (still) binds you to the US and that (still) makes US citizenship something you don't give up.
I did not live in Europe in the Bush era, but I did live there and considered, at one point, a permanent move. My thoughts turned to these issues -- maybe yours don't. I did not find a notional national opposite among the democracies of Western Europe, and my thinking was not either/or. Still, the contrasts that did occur to me were instructive -- they pertained to a gray area I'd never inhabited before.
I don't see your criticism as bang on, as you declare it, although there is accuracy in it. This is not what rankles me, when someone is interesting and accurate without agreeing with me. Years of comments here should be enough to demonstrate that, without your having to take my word for it. Of course you see your criticism as bang on -- few of us knowingly make feeble points that are way off-base. But, as with the self-appointed Roshi business, it is I, not you, who would need to accept your remarks as bang on.
Cyrus, we disagree about whether Steven is right. But I do agree with you that expats have the same rights as anyone to criticize. Be it tongue-in-cheek or trenchant and heartfelt, however, criticism from afar has a lighter molecular weight, connoting as it does low involvement and low intention to transform the problems on which one has cast a cold eye. If Steven himself has said disdain is part of his aim, well then -- he's coming through loud and clear. I just wonder about the value of it.
Posted by: Elatia Harris | Nov 23, 2008 1:56:42 PM
Friends,
Let's by all means bash America, but let's bash it for the right reasons.
It's always best to have a look at the actual study when reading about scientific findings in the popular press, and in this case the study is available online for free, and fairly short. There's actually not much to it at all, except to introduce some very sweeping generalizations based on existing demographic data. Essentially, the writer (Gregory Paul, a paleontologist, not a social scientist) establishes that the U.S. is virtually alone among Western democracies in its religiosity and its ill social health (measured mostly in terms of murder rates). From this he goes on to argue, without any supporting evidence, that the latter is a result of the former. Paul doesn't even bother to speculate what the casual connection might be
There's another way that America is virtually unique among Western democracies, and that is in its enormous wealth inequalities. The relationship between wealth disparity and violent crime has been widely studied, and Paul offers no reason why we should abandon that field of inquiry and turn our attention to religion instead.
Steven, I don't think Elatia meant to question your right to criticize your motherland. But we know from previous threads that your main criticism of America seems to be that it is populated by Dumbfucks. And that does raise the question of why you'd want to hold on to your citizenship, when by your own account things won't improve here until after you are dead.
Since America's melting pot dynamic rules out blaming its Dumbfuckery on genes, many have to turned to blaming it on memes instead, specifically on creationist memes. But if this were the case, we would have to explain why these memes are so opportunistic here, and so unsuccessful in those superior societies where Steven and Cyrus have pitched their tents. The 800 pound gorilla in the room is the economic one, of course. Max Weber will only get you so far in understanding why Americans persist in following such a horrific and irrational economic scheme. This one isn't religion's fault. In fact, the argument has been plausibly made that one explanation for the American resistance to Darwinian biology is that our society is run in such close alignment with Spencerian Social Darwinism, a tragic case of guilt by association.
We have a historical opportunity to encourage, however vainly, our government to abandon its long investment in Casino capitalism. Seizing upon a three-year old article on how it's all the Dumbfucks' fault is only going to be a distraction. Let's wait until after Obama breaks all our hearts before we start up again with the scapegoating, huh?
Posted by: Chris Schoen | Nov 23, 2008 2:34:36 PM
A very hip post-modern paleontologist who can't stand religion....aha!Its all making sense to me.I'm so glad to be alive in America where I have the freedom to practice my religion or not!
Posted by: Sumant Rawat | Nov 23, 2008 3:53:30 PM
Dear Brothers and Sisters and any hovering Dumbphuckers,
Steven, I love you, too. I hope you didn't try to declaw your family. I'm not teasing, just taking another stab at getting some work done and I will disappear soon.
Chris, in American Fascists, Chris Hedges ties the economic disparity, unemployment, general down-and-outness malaise and, ultimately, despair, to a tendency toward believing fundamentalist religious preachers, believing Earth is 6,000 years old, believing in YEC, "End Times" and the Rapture, etc. In former Smokestack Industry locales and other high-unemployment places that now look like ghost towns, many people are susceptible to the false hope the fire and brimstone preachers are selling. However, I don't think it's a matter of education or intelligence alone. I think people seek certainty, and the certainty illusion is ever popular.
Dave and Steven, I think you both speak with a sense of contempt for the unwashed masses. Perhaps it's difficult to criticize without an edge of contempt to one's voice. However, Dave, in the Forest Tradition, didn't you learn compassion for all living beings? And wouldn't that counter a sense of revulsion or scorn when you confront today's bread and circuses? I know it's a challenge, but I don't think a call to arms or a call for Freudian purging of memes can effect positive societal transformation.
Posted by: CriticalMassI | Nov 23, 2008 4:25:36 PM
CM... CM... (snaps out of the tease-deepened trance)...
"Dave and Steven, I think you both speak with a sense of contempt for the unwashed masses."
Dunno 'bout that, Dearest. Smelling good is far from definitive proof that it isn't an asshole.
Posted by: Steven Augustine | Nov 23, 2008 5:08:58 PM
Your writing reminds me of Erica Jong's. Maybe you should seek Freudian help from Dave.
Posted by: CriticalMassI | Nov 23, 2008 5:19:57 PM
I just know I'll miss my corner of Monterey Bay, if it goes under before me. Meanwhile I shall take up my "No on H8" sign and stumble on...
Posted by: Vicki Baker | Nov 23, 2008 5:49:15 PM
Call me confused. I'm one of those dangerous End Time believers, though not a citizen of USA - and to me this leads to radically different beliefs than the weird wingnut whacko religious thing going on in USA. Jesus talked about love and tolerance...
So it's not religion, so far as I can tell. Except for the religion of the US constitution: My society weakens me, so I shall weaken the society. I shall hold my guns so I can defend my stuff from society, and society shall not restrict me from taking what is my right.
This seems very different to other democratic countries where a more co-operative ceding of rights from individual to society is used, with a different criteria for success: the overall health of society
Posted by: Grahame | Nov 23, 2008 10:09:11 PM
Elatia and Chris,
Because for decades, while NOT a citizen of the US (I am now), when I made any criticisms of American ways I was often not-so-politely asked why I don't just go home to Pakistan if I hate it so much in the US.
Sorry, but this is just a change of subject, and besides the point. I must come to Steven's defence, without even engaging any of the substance of (or taking any stance on) what he says: where one lives and what citizenship one holds is a matter of complex and contingent personal circumstances, and not something to be questioned so easily by those who happen to remain in the countries where they were born (or anyone else).
Engage Steven on what he says, not on what passport he carries.
Respectfully,
Abbas
Posted by: Abbas Raza | Nov 24, 2008 2:00:41 AM
Abbas, I couldn't agree more. I had hoped to engage Steven to write about "the tie that binds" from his own perspective as a longstanding and delighted expat who is also a critic of his country and some rankling aspects of its culture. We are all the latter in a perfectly patriotic tradition, but few of us are the former. I certainly didn't mean, "Love it or leave it," or "How dare you? You don't even live here..." I also tried to make it plain I wasn't asking Steven for anything too personal, such as "a defense of his position," which would indeed be an intrusive demand. Only for his general perspective. I am very sorry to think that Steven -- and you, and anyone else -- understood my remarks differently than they were intended. Thanks for writing to clear all this up.
Posted by: Elatia Harris | Nov 24, 2008 10:18:34 AM
Really, almost all of you take Nationalism and Patriotism way to seriously.
While never one of my strong suits, I find it poisonous, and often worse than racism, sexism, and their ilk.
The last time I checked, I was a Earthling.
Posted by: Dave Ranning | Nov 24, 2008 10:24:43 AM
What's absurd about all this is that most of the thread has flowed from my original comment, which consisted only of:
***“The United States is almost always the most dysfunctional of the developing democracies, sometimes spectacularly so.”
Strangely, it's not easy to discuss this assertion calmly with Americans who persist in living there... (laugh)...***
Prescient comment, eh?
As to Elatia's most recent comment (above): a marvel of spin! It's pretty clear, I should think, by now, to Elatia, CM, Vick, Dave, Chris and perhaps a few others (all over the net) what my "general perspective" is. To reiterate: I'm with Boswell, quoting Johnson, about "patriotism" and "scoundrels".
Note that "scoundrel" only goes into effect with that "last refuge" trigger. Everything is on a continuum.
Posted by: Steven Augustine | Nov 24, 2008 11:12:36 AM
Dave, I agree.
"You talk to me of nationality, language, religion. I shall try to fly by those nets"
James Joyce, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.
Posted by: Jared | Nov 24, 2008 11:20:26 AM
"We are all the latter in a perfectly patriotic tradition..."
Elatia, you really should learn to be a little more circumspect about flinging that "we all" around. You're free to indulge in it, of course, but all you're doing is wracking up a record number of misses.
Flags, for me, are tacky at best, sometimes nauseating, and often a serious warning. You'll be waving yours without me.
Posted by: Steven Augustine | Nov 24, 2008 11:33:00 AM
Abbas,
I was, like Elatia, not trying to play the Love it Or Leave It card. "Why don't you just go back to XYZ" is a rhetorical question, usually meant as a dissent-quashing shibboleth. My question to Steven was sincere, not a litmus test. It is extremely pertinent in this discussion that Steven doesn't criticize American policies, but American character (or more specifically, that he sees the former as inevitably arising out of the latter.) In that he appears to believe that nothing constructive can be done to reform the society he is a citizen of, the question arises (out of curiosity, not snark): is there another society for him that might be a better fit? The fact that he has not yet renounced his US citizenship might indicate that membership in the land of Dumbfucks might after all have its privileges.
I don't want to take away Steven's citizenship--and conversely if he did become a naturalized German I wouldn't consider his right to criticize his former country to be at all diminished. And to return for a moment to issues, I absolutely agree that "The United States is almost always the most dysfunctional of the developing democracies, sometimes spectacularly so."
Steven doesn't owe Elatia, or I, or anyone, a justification for his choice of home. But he should be aware that his criticisms lack a certain heft, not because they issue from so many miles away, but because they exist outside the realm of consequences. It's easy to write off problems as insoluble, but it's not much of a contribution to an intelligent conversation.
Posted by: Chris Schoen | Nov 24, 2008 12:18:44 PM
Steven, I think I have failed utterly on this thread, and others, to bring you from the level of personal spin and anecdote to the realm of the substantive. Not that I am the Queen of the Substantive, I just find it less lite. As you observe, readers here are probably familiar with your attitude, but that's different from your introducing issues that, while none too personal, might make for more illumination than attitude usually provides. So what I've been doing is asking for something that may not be forthcoming, and that's fine: when the ball is in your court, you get to do anything you want with it that others will put up with. Please don't interpret that as meaning I accuse you of lacking for substance; I am talking only about choices you appear to make here, not about the man in full. Be who you are -- it's the Socratic lesson and you seem like you have learned it very well.
Posted by: Elatia Harris | Nov 24, 2008 12:35:56 PM
Elatia:
Considering the tone and depth of my original (one-sentence) comment on the article, I can only assume that your choosing to "engage" with *me*, rather than with the substance of the long-ish article this thread is putatively concerned with, relates to something too deep within the mysterious folds of your id for you to either face, or (on the chance you've faced it) care to explain it in public.
If you're not interested in the original article, why even post on this thread?
Posted by: Steven Augustine | Nov 24, 2008 12:56:26 PM
Chris:
"The fact that he has not yet renounced his US citizenship might indicate that membership in the land of Dumbfucks might after all have its privileges."
I'm sure that having a Mafia chieftan for a father has its privileges, too; wouldn't expect anyone to walk around with a t-shirt proclaiming the fact.
"I don't want to take away Steven's citizenship--and conversely if he did become a naturalized German I wouldn't consider his right to criticize his former country to be at all diminished."
Don't take this the wrong way, but: I couldn't give half an ant's nipple if you *did*.
Posted by: Steven Augustine | Nov 24, 2008 1:01:57 PM
"Ubi bene, ibi patria" -fine. My beef with Steven is not his lack of patriotism, but his lack of street-fightin' spirit. You want to escape to the nice quiet suburbs, fine, but don't get all snooty about it.
Posted by: Vicki Baker | Nov 24, 2008 1:06:55 PM
Honey, it's over. My id wants to move on from interacting with you -- although it appreciates being asked after -- and my ego is sneaking a glance at its wristwatch. As for my super-ego, it's in I-told-you-so mode. So if you are still in this relationship, then you are in it all alone.
Posted by: Elatia Harris | Nov 24, 2008 1:08:33 PM
Also Chris, thanks for the attempt to point out correlation != causation.
Posted by: Vicki Baker | Nov 24, 2008 1:09:28 PM
"Honey, it's over. My id wants to move on from interacting with you..."
FABulous
Posted by: Steven Augustine | Nov 24, 2008 1:11:15 PM
Dave says: "Really, almost all of you take Nationalism and Patriotism way to seriously. While never one of my strong suits, I find it poisonous, and often worse than racism, sexism, and their ilk."
That's so fair-minded of you, Dave. And yet you see religion "as a symptom of mental dysfunction, caused by malignant memes gnawing their way through believers' brains."
Indulging in Freudian crazyism seems to be your favorite way of trying to de-legitimate people, if not dehumanize them, the same way people are dehumanized through "racism, sexism and their ilk."
Lots of chuckling here over street people deemed wacko at the same time this site erects shrines to the memory of David Foster Wallace, whose work apparently saved him from taking on the stigmatized status of run-of-the-mill depressives who were never honored by the MacArthur Foundation.
Maybe sophisticated new brain meme extrusion methods will supplant primitive lobotomies, so that all enlightened people of the world will then become atheists. Dawkins, Dennett and Harris think the world would be better off without religion. If only they could team up with Ray Kurzweil to tweak those pesky delusion-generating memes -- or genes.
Posted by: CriticalMassI | Nov 24, 2008 1:23:58 PM
Oh, gosh, I missed the flame war when I was writing my post. Maybe someone can turn it into a book. The Group or something.
Steven, when are you going to learn to play well with others?
Posted by: CriticalMassI | Nov 24, 2008 1:27:48 PM
CM:
I'm not a kid, my dear old friend. One of the unimprovable pleasures of adulthood is speaking my mind... and doing it well enough to frazzle such comformists, bluenoses, busybodies, reflex gainsayers, control-freaks, unreflective pseudo-Socratics, junior-logic interns and demagogue-manqués as Fate steers in my path.
It all started with an unprepared Scientologist in 1979... (screen goes dream-woozy with flashback)...
Posted by: Steven Augustine | Nov 24, 2008 1:47:49 PM
Steven,
I guess I should write LOL or make little faces so you know when I'm kidding. ;-) You know, the plays well with others T-shirts, runs with scissors T-shirts.
If this site gave awards, you might win one for World's Close-to-Best Insult. ;-)
More anon,
CM
Posted by: CriticalMassI | Nov 24, 2008 2:08:18 PM
Later, Baby...
Posted by: Steven Augustine | Nov 24, 2008 2:17:56 PM
Well, that was a experiment in equanimity---
Let's try it on something else, not pillars that, when removed, leave people screaming in a fetal position, and unable to get out of the cave and see what things actually look like (sorry Plato, but it is the best thing you ever wrote, the rest is only minimally inspired, and dealing with "truth")
Posted by: Dave Ranning | Nov 24, 2008 3:30:05 PM
Elatia - we agree more than we disagree, as normal. Thanks for clarifying your position vis-a-vis citizenship and criticism.
Chris - feel free not to lump me in with Steve. I merely defend his right to criticize and have his criticism taken seriously. Now, I have a hard time finding a very solid thesis in his comments past the first post, but if he comes up with one, it should be taken as seriously as anyone else's. All that said, I generally agree with you that the core problem is not religion, but economics. Indeed, I'll make a bet that one of the long term (20 years+) results of universal health care will be a decline of evangelicalism, and religion in general, in the States. Anyone have 50 USD they want to lose two decades from now?
But that doesn't mean religion isn't a filler of the social cracks (canyons) that exist in the U.S. The historical role of religion in the last few centuries has been to provide social support and comfort where there is a lack. It's not all religion's only role, of course, but when humans feel pressured, they have historically turned to mass religion. Sadly, this can have (as has in the U.S.) a reinforcing effect on the very symptoms that drive people to the pews in the first place.
Standard disclaimer applies: yes, I understand that religion was critical in some of the most progressive movements in the U.S. of the 20th century. I understand that there is much good that comes from those who act out of religious faith. But I would also argue that those same movements would have taken place in a more secular society. And much good comes from those who try to limit their beliefs to the more rational side of things too.
Posted by: Cyrus Hall | Nov 24, 2008 3:42:36 PM
"Religion is poison"
--Mao
That should bring some interesting responses!
metta (google it)
Dave
Posted by: Dave Ranning | Nov 24, 2008 4:55:52 PM
Dave, The snakes in the cave, not to be mistaken for a pit, don't talk. They meow!
oakglasses
Cat Snakes courtesy of April. Thank you, April.
Posted by: CriticalMassI | Nov 24, 2008 5:00:00 PM
Cyrus,here's one idea about religious belief in the US that I've been mulling over. In the US, "conservatives" aren't really about conserving anything solid - not the environment, or historic buildings, or traditional ways of raising and preparing food, or much of anything. I think this makes people cling more tightly to intangible "values."
Whereas in Europe, there's more of a consensus on preserving the tangible continuity with the past, even to the extent of supporting the established church, though not very many people are bothered to actually attend.
So in the US, religious is the main way many people feel a sense of historical continuity in their daily lives, even though ways of worshipping and the political concerns of denominations do change.
Posted by: Vicki Baker | Nov 24, 2008 5:28:57 PM
Some of today's news from Jeff Sharlet:
therevealer
therevealer
Posted by: CriticalMassI | Nov 24, 2008 8:04:35 PM
CM-
Very cool cat-snakes!
Posted by: Dave Ranning | Nov 25, 2008 1:18:49 AM
Vicki-
I've often had that thought myself. I think it fits nicely with the idea that functioning social structures can reduce religiosity, as they too offer a unified sense of history and social scope. But certainly more would need to be done.
Where I live in Switzerland there are regular secular festivals (often related to religious antecedents) that bring the community together over the course of a weekend, or even a whole week. These seem to serve an extremely important role in providing points of continuity. I certainly enjoy them. :-)
Yet the last time the churches has much of anyone in them was when the Pope died. Most everyone is Catholic (I live in the south), but almost no one takes it very seriously. As far as I can tell, our local Catholic League chapter is much more an old white mens political club than a meaningful religious movement. Issues such as stem cells still come up, and the church throws its weight around, but with each passing year its influence shrinks.
Cheers,
Posted by: Cyrus Hall | Nov 25, 2008 4:44:19 AM
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