It's always upsetting to see people on your side underperforming, making an easy target for the opposition. Such a one is Richard Dawkins, purporting to speak for us atheists and humanists. He never leaves off. Here is his latest:
The End of Faith: Religion, Terror and the Future of Reason by Sam Harris (Free Press) is a genuinely frightening book about terrorism, and the central role played by religion in justifying and rewarding it. Others blame "extremists" who "distort" the "true" message of religion. Harris goes to the root of the problem: religion itself. Even moderate religion is a menace, because it leads us to respect and "cherish the idea that certain fantastic propositions can be believed without evidence". Why do men like Bin Laden commit their hideous cruelties? The answer is that they "actually believe what they say they believe". Read Sam Harris and wake up.And so he gets the obvious riposte from Kate Potter:
Richard Dawkins, recommending Sam Harris's The End of Faith: Religion, Terror and the Future of Reason ("Hot Reads", June 18), urges us to read the book and "wake up" to the dangers of religion as a cause of terrorism. Before Dawkins continues to flog his anti-religion hobby horse, perhaps he should wake up and read some history. The greatest "terrorists" in the last century were Hitler, Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot, all of whom were against any form of religion and slaughtered far more people than any "religious" terrorist I can think of.The point here is a simple one, even if it is about complexity. Belief systems are made up of many parts, and religious beliefs are no exception to this. Thus, as well as 'fantastic propositions... believed without evidence', much religious belief incorporates ideas about not harming the innocent, helping those in need, behaving justly, etc. Conversely, there are non-religious belief systems in which ideas about improving the world sit beside notions of discounting present suffering to achieve future (speculative) goods, or about deliberately harming the innocent, or about treating whole categories of human beings as, intrinsically, non-innocent, inferior, and so forth. One can argue for rational modes of belief without Richard Dawkins's simplistic posturings.
Here (via Clive Davis and OxBlog) is a blog, Faith and Justice, speaking for the 'religious left'. The site...
gives voice to a progressive view of religion in America. While we come from different faiths and have different ideas about what it means to be progressive, liberal or left, we share the common belief that our faith calls us to act in socially responsible ways: to care for the poor and indigent here in America and around the world; to work for freedom and justice for all; to protect the environment.See also my post about the Archbishop of Bulawayo. There are beliefs about the next world, and there's what you actually do in this world. It's time Richard Dawkins tried to get some grip on that.