There is much ado in some circles about a month-long advertising campaign scheduled to begin Monday. The "atheist ad", as the Huffington Post, Associated Press and others tag it poses the question: "A million New Yorkers are good without God, are you?"
The campaign, which is funded by an anonymous donor, coincides (by design or miracle) with the Tuesday release of Harvard University's Humanist Chaplain Greg Epstein's book, Good Without God: What a Billion Non-Religious People Do Believe. Epstein, who will be reading from the book at Columbia University on October 28th, describes the book briefly in this video.
As an atheist, turned agnostic, turned Christian at age 37, my response to this ad and Epstein's premise - that of pursuing good in the world without relying on or seeing guidance from God - is mixed. There are a number of people in my life who do not seek or rely upon God, yet they do good - in some cases sacrificing their lives for the good of others. I know others who claim to follow Jesus who do little more than serve themselves, their immediate families and perhaps a handful of people who happen across their path - evidence, it appears, that one can be good without God and not so good with God.
That said, I cannot deny that my experience of transitioning from non-belief to belief in a power greater than myself in addiction recovery, to an unexpected (and unsought) faith in Jesus has resulted in a transformation that may or may not be quantified using a seemingly simple, yet incredibly difficult word like "good".
My friend Becky Garrison, a religious satirist who is working on a piece about Epstein tells me that he is interested in creating a dialog across the atheist/believer divide. I hope to attend Epstein's reading with her to learn more.
So where do you land on "atheist evangelizing" and the notion of human beings being good with or without God? People from such a wide variety of traditions visit here. I'd love to hear what you think...
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I have personally submitted a response to this ad to more than fifty members of the Big Apple CoR. It can be viewed online at my website: http://increasinglearning.com/Documents/There%20Is%20None%20Good%20but%20God.pdf
@Daniel "Accordingly, I encourage anyone who can read, and would like to utilize their evolving mind, to engage with modern science rather than prehistoric myths."
Nothing wrong with science, as far as it goes.
The problem with using science to bash faith, however, is that science does not understand a) mind or b) evolving. Thus the idea of utilizing the "evolving mind" poses a problem.
This doesn't even touch on the huge problem presented by the fact that the premise of materialistic or naturalistic science is based on blind faith.
I have found that most people who go about stomping on faith with science as their cudgel have not done much inquiry in the area of science but rather have fallen prey to propaganda.
You may be the exception. You may be able to explain how naturalism escapes being blind faith. I have not found anyone who can do that -- including top physicists and mathematicians and Dawkins admirers -- but you may be the first.
Coming and Going: Thanks for the suggestion. The Triumph of Christianity does, indeed, look like an interesting read. Do you find that the agnosticism of the author to be less biased than a Christian or atheist author may have been?
Yes, because people are naturally good, people can be good without God. What I think many people miss is how much better they can be with God as a part of their lives on a daily basis. They're missing out on it usually because they've never had the chance to experience the feeling of faith. Through the power of prayer, meditation and reading of scripture, our understanding of what "really good" means comes to life. Through this relationship with God, we've become dissatisfied with simply being "good". Thanks!
My sisters believe that they can do good and do it without God, they claim to be completely satisfied with their life without God. Sometimes I pray that God would drag them through something not so good, so that they wouldn't miss it. I'm sure they would be devastated or maybe disgusted if they knew that...
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