I find that many faithful people accuse me of being a hypocrite, and I'm not sure why. Personally, I believe my views on religion are fairly straightforward.
I think organized religion prohibits personal thinking, eliminates diversity in spirituality, inspires conflict and creates unnecessary division, despite the fact that many world religions preach the same tenets: kindness, compassion, fraternity, charity and the like.
However - and this is the big point - that does not mean that I think people of faith should not be allowed to practice. I fear many of those who choose to be unfaithful are clumped into this category of people trying to rid the world of religion.
Just as a Catholic should be allowed to practice Catholicism, so should an atheist be permitted to not practice any religion. And, just as a Catholic, Jew or Muslim should be allowed to tell another person that he or she is wrong, so should an atheist be able to tell another that he or she is wrong. It is all about reciprocity. Moderate atheists, as well as moderate faithful worshippers, do not want to eliminate other beliefs - they just feel strongly about their own.
Though there is a fundamental miscommunication between the religious and the nonreligious, I believe the key issue is how one relates religion to atheism. I believe that both religious people and atheists view the other as blind - those of a particular religion see atheists as blind to the truth, and atheists view religious people as equally blind to the truth. The thing is, there is a fundamental similarity between religion and atheism: They are both based on faith in what they perceive to be the truth.
The concept of God is inherently unconfirmed. But at the same time, one cannot disprove the existence of God either. Both atheism and religion take the leap of faith to conclude that there is - or is not - a God, based on evidence they see in the world. This, however, is not proof per se.
Part of the reason why the concept of God can't be confirmed is because God is poorly defined. After all, nobody can truly agree on what God really is. Across cultures, individuals and even time, the concept and definition of God changes dramatically. So, if this is the case, how can one know that God does or does not exist? How can one prove or disprove something when one doesn't know what it is?
It is for this reason that I am a theological non-Cognitivist. I believe that the existence of God is impossible to prove because God itself is indefinable. Human beings as a whole tend to believe that we can know everything that there is to know, but this is not always the case. That is part of the reason God changes. God often represents that which we do not understand - but if we grow in our understanding, God must change.
I believe that both atheism and religion take a blind step to stake out a claim, based entirely on faith, as to what God is. Both atheism and religion are based on faith, not fact. While I do believe that organized religion is unhealthy, I believe that firm atheism can be just as unhealthy. Spirituality should be an individual process, not a designed and manufactured practice.
I believe we should all think twice before we proclaim the existence, or inexistence, of God. We must look inside ourselves and question our very definition of God. Call me crazy, but it seems like saying "I don't know" is the most rational, and least presumptuous, outlook of all.
Dave Adams is a freshman majoring in political science and economics. He can be reached at David.Adams@tufts.edu.
