That is exactly the reason why I can't stand and never really could stand the band...the perfect mixture of preachiness and atheism. Blah. Of course and "Closer to the Heart" was nothing more than a dressed up call to Socialism...and factor that in with Peart's comments a few years ago about how you have only 3 and half minutes for a song, so you have to make the song really good. Rush...they've never been heavy; they're not interesting; their lyrics are generic. They are a stereotypically Canadian -- pacifistic openminded tolerance with no moral compass. Yawn...
Hmmmm. I take it you're not a fan. I've come to recognize some shortcomings in their music over the years, but I still enjoy listening to many of their older tunes. I guess you could see atheism in those lyrics, or socialism in Closer to the Hear, but that's just your interpretation. Peart wrote those lyrics, and his tastes in those years ran towards Libertariansim, which is rather the opposite of socialism, as I understand it. I would agree that most of their music since Grace Under Pressure has been rather generic, but I certainly wouldn't categorize the albums A Farewell to Kings (or maybe as far back as Fly By Night) thru Moving Pictures (or maybe even Signals) as generic.
Roll the Bones had some intersting tunes, too. ps I saw the Permanent Waves tour in 1979 or '80 as a 12 year old, opened by Max Webster. They were awesome back then.