richard_dawkins_-_the_god_delusion
THE GOD HYPOTHESIS 41enterprise. Rival churches compete for congregations - not least forthe fat tithes that they bring - and the competition is waged withall the aggressive hard-sell techniques of the marketplace. Whatworks for soap flakes works for God, and the result is somethingapproaching religious mania among today's less educated classes. InEngland, by contrast, religion under the aegis of the establishedchurch has become little more than a pleasant social pastime,scarcely recognizable as religious at all. This English tradition isnicely expressed by Giles Fraser, an Anglican vicar who doubles asa philosophy tutor at Oxford, writing in the Guardian. Fraser'sarticle is subtitled 'The establishment of the Church of Englandtook God out of religion, but there are risks in a more vigorousapproach to faith':There was a time when the country vicar was a staple ofthe English dramatis personae. This tea-drinking, gentleeccentric, with his polished shoes and kindly manners,represented a type of religion that didn't make nonreligiouspeople uncomfortable. He wouldn't break intoan existential sweat or press you against a wall to ask ifyou were saved, still less launch crusades from the pulpitor plant roadside bombs in the name of some higherpower. 21(Shades of Betjeman's 'Our Padre', which I quoted at the beginningof Chapter 1.) Fraser goes on to say that 'the nice country vicar ineffect inoculated vast swaths of the English against Christianity'.He ends his article by lamenting a more recent trend in the Churchof England to take religion seriously again, and his last sentence isa warning: 'the worry is that we may release the genie of Englishreligious fanaticism from the establishment box in which it hasbeen dormant for centuries'.The genie of religious fanaticism is rampant in present-dayAmerica, and the Founding Fathers would have been horrified.Whether or not it is right to embrace the paradox and blame thesecular constitution that they devised, the founders most certainlywere secularists who believed in keeping religion out of politics,and that is enough to place them firmly on the side of those who
42 THE COD DELUSI O Nobject, for example, to ostentatious displays of the TenCommandments in government-owned public places. But it istantalizing to speculate that at least some of the Founders mighthave gone beyond deism. Might they have been agnostics or evenout-and-out atheists? The following statement of Jefferson is indistinguishablefrom what we would now call agnosticism:To talk of immaterial existences is to talk of nothings. Tosay that the human soul, angels, god, are immaterial, is tosay they are nothings, or that there is no god, no angels,no soul. I cannot reason otherwise .. . without plunginginto the fathomless abyss of dreams and phantasms. I amsatisfied, and sufficiently occupied with the things whichare, without tormenting or troubling myself aboutthose which may indeed be, but of which I have noevidence.Christopher Hitchens, in his biography Thomas Jefferson: Authorof America, thinks it likely that Jefferson was an atheist, even in hisown time when it was much harder:As to whether he was an atheist, we must reserve judgmentif only because of the prudence he was compelled toobserve during his political life. But as he had written tohis nephew, Peter Carr, as early as 1787, one must not befrightened from this inquiry by any fear of itsconsequences. 'If it ends in a belief that there is no God,you will find incitements to virtue in the comfort andpleasantness you feel in this exercise, and the love ofothers which it will procure you.'I find the following advice of Jefferson, again in his letter toPeter Carr, moving:Shake off all the fears of servile prejudices, under whichweak minds are servilely crouched. Fix reason firmly inher seat, and call on her tribunal for every fact, everyopinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a
- Page 2 and 3: Also by Richard DawkinsThe Selfish
- Page 4 and 5: TRANSWORLD PUBLISHERS61-63 Uxbridge
- Page 6 and 7: ContentsPrefaceChapter 1Chapter 2Ch
- Page 8 and 9: Tread softly, because you tread onm
- Page 10 and 11: PrefaceAs a child, my wife hated he
- Page 12 and 13: PREFACE 3If you feel trapped in the
- Page 14 and 15: PREFACE 5herding cats, because they
- Page 16 and 17: PREFACE 7Free Inquiry, especially,
- Page 18 and 19: A D E E P L Y R E L I G I O U S N O
- Page 20 and 21: A DEEPLY RELIGIOUS N O N - B E L I
- Page 22 and 23: A D E E P L Y R E L I G I O U S N O
- Page 24 and 25: A D E E PLY R E L I G I O U S N O N
- Page 26 and 27: A D E E P L Y R E L I G I O U S N O
- Page 28 and 29: A D E E P L Y RE L 1 G I O U S N O
- Page 30 and 31: A D E E P L Y R E L I G I O U S N O
- Page 32 and 33: A DEEPLY R E L I G I O U S N O N -
- Page 34 and 35: A D E E P L Y R E L I G I O U S N O
- Page 36 and 37: THE GOD HYPOTHESIS 31The God of the
- Page 38 and 39: T H E G O D H Y P O T II E S I S 33
- Page 40 and 41: T II E G O D H Y P O T H E S 1 S 35
- Page 42 and 43: T H E G O D H Y P O T H E S I S 37M
- Page 44 and 45: THE GOD HYPOTHESIS 39although it ha
- Page 48 and 49: THE GOD HYPOTHESIS 43God; because,
- Page 50 and 51: THE GOD HYPOTHESIS 45Anecdotes of s
- Page 52 and 53: THE GOD HYPOTHESIS 47Carl Sagan was
- Page 54 and 55: THE GOD HYPOTHESIS 49Huxley was not
- Page 56 and 57: T H E G O D H Y P O T H E SIS 51can
- Page 58 and 59: T H E G O D H Y P O T H E SIS 53in
- Page 60 and 61: THE GOD HYPOTHESIS 55McGrath goes o
- Page 62 and 63: THE GOD HYPOTHESIS 57the Cambridge
- Page 64 and 65: THE GOD HYPOTHESIS 59unequivocally
- Page 66 and 67: THE GOD HYPOTHESIS 61non-interventi
- Page 68 and 69: T H E G O D H Y P O T H E S I S 63s
- Page 70 and 71: THE GOD HYPOTHESIS 65Another typica
- Page 72 and 73: T H E G O D H Y P O THESIS 67NOMA -
- Page 74 and 75: T H E G O D II Y P O T H E S I S 69
- Page 76 and 77: THE GOD HYPOTHESIS 71longer based o
- Page 78 and 79: THE GOD HYPOTHESIS 73advanced techn
- Page 80 and 81: A R G U M E N T S F O R G O D ' S E
- Page 82 and 83: A R G U M E N T S F O R G O D ' S E
- Page 84 and 85: A R G U M E N T S F O R G O D ' S E
- Page 86 and 87: A R G U M E N T S F O R G O D ' S E
- Page 88 and 89: A R G U M E N T S F O R G O D ' S E
- Page 90 and 91: A R G U M E N T S F O R G O D ' S E
- Page 92 and 93: A R G U M E N T S F O R G O D ' S E
- Page 94 and 95: A R G U M ENTS F O R G O D ' S E X
THE GOD HYPOTHESIS 41
enterprise. Rival churches compete for congregations - not least for
the fat tithes that they bring - and the competition is waged with
all the aggressive hard-sell techniques of the marketplace. What
works for soap flakes works for God, and the result is something
approaching religious mania among today's less educated classes. In
England, by contrast, religion under the aegis of the established
church has become little more than a pleasant social pastime,
scarcely recognizable as religious at all. This English tradition is
nicely expressed by Giles Fraser, an Anglican vicar who doubles as
a philosophy tutor at Oxford, writing in the Guardian. Fraser's
article is subtitled 'The establishment of the Church of England
took God out of religion, but there are risks in a more vigorous
approach to faith':
There was a time when the country vicar was a staple of
the English dramatis personae. This tea-drinking, gentle
eccentric, with his polished shoes and kindly manners,
represented a type of religion that didn't make nonreligious
people uncomfortable. He wouldn't break into
an existential sweat or press you against a wall to ask if
you were saved, still less launch crusades from the pulpit
or plant roadside bombs in the name of some higher
power. 21
(Shades of Betjeman's 'Our Padre', which I quoted at the beginning
of Chapter 1.) Fraser goes on to say that 'the nice country vicar in
effect inoculated vast swaths of the English against Christianity'.
He ends his article by lamenting a more recent trend in the Church
of England to take religion seriously again, and his last sentence is
a warning: 'the worry is that we may release the genie of English
religious fanaticism from the establishment box in which it has
been dormant for centuries'.
The genie of religious fanaticism is rampant in present-day
America, and the Founding Fathers would have been horrified.
Whether or not it is right to embrace the paradox and blame the
secular constitution that they devised, the founders most certainly
were secularists who believed in keeping religion out of politics,
and that is enough to place them firmly on the side of those who
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