I know I don’t sound exactly like an atheist. It certainly confuses the Jehova’s Witnesses who occasionally come to my door. But I am.
“I do not think we have seen that an atheist society cannot maintain any morality”
I don’t mean to say that some atheists can’t maintain morality, only that an atheistic society tends to drift, and usually downwards. While we see that in theistic societies as well, I personally think that such drifts are directly attributable to the extent to which members of such a society are losing their faith. It is one thing to go to church. It is quite another to truly believe in the moral principles of a religion, and to practice them. That is a direct matter of faith, which atheists of course do not have.
“It is quite possible that the world can have a prosperous, stable, and morally sound society founded on atheistic principles.”
Well, okay. But based upon which, exactly, atheistic principles? There is no particular principle that I can think of that might be intrinsically common to or directly attributable to atheism.
“And let’s not confuse the discussion by lumping atheism together with every other belief system.”
If anything, I’d call atheism a lack of belief system. And I’m not trying to make an argument against atheism. I’d have to argue against myself to do that. I only argue that a theistic society provides a better society in which to live, for an atheist such as myself. Less bad things, generally, to put up with and more checks and balances to keep my own standards up.
I would argue against a religious state, for that can be oppressive. Our constitution prohibits that at the federal level, which gives me the benefit of being able to openly be atheist and still benefit from the high moral base of American theism. Pity that the latter is giving way to liberalism at an alarming rate.
I’ve never been oppressed by religion in the USA. However, I’ve been terribly oppressed by liberalism. I can tell the door to door missionaries to get lost, but liberals use the state to steal both my treasure and my liberty. They’ve managed to bypass the constitution quite handily to that effect. A national prayer day is the least of my worries.
wgflyer,
Okay, atheism is not generally thought of as a belief system. But I think it is, because a person who lacks belief in God would not bother to call themself an “atheist” unless they had some reason to do so. Atheism is the belief that not believing in God is something to embrace and identify with.
Atheistic principles are principles which reject notions of divine authority or intervention.
A society can be democratic and capitalistic and reject all notions of divine authority and intervention. They can regard authority as a man-made issue, as a matter of man-made laws and politics. They can regard morality as something which is concerned with this life, with how human beings live and work together.
We don’t need religious books or leaders to tell us how to live. In fact, I think even some of the most religious of us tend to look skeptically upon religious texts and leaders, even within their own faith.
We can think for ourselves. About morality, about politics, about life. We don’t need religious authority to tell us how to be good people. We feel it and we negotiate it together, as civilized human beings.
An atheistic society, as I see it, is one that regards human beings as responsible for their own morality and culture. It regards human beings as responsible for their own lives.
It’s all about responsibility.
For atheists, the National Prayer Day is part of a bigger picture which involves funneling tax dollars towards religious institutions and providing a state-sponsored shield which protects religious authority from criticism.
Again, it’s about responsibility. We want to be able to subject religious institutions to the same controls and criticisms we apply to everything else. That is what it means to live in a free society.