Monday, September 03, 2007

Comment on MT from "the nicest atheist"

**If it were conceivable that there be a patron saint of atheism, it would undoubtedly be Dan Dennett. A very humane, brilliant thinker and engaging writer, he gently demolishes the unchallenged assumptions of most religionists, while introducing his readers to a wondrous world view made even more so by its lack of a deity. Here's an excerpt from his latest comment in the Washington Post on the recent revelations of Mother Teresa's silent atheism.

Mother Teresa’s agonies of doubt are surely not all that unusual. What is unusual is that she put them in writing and now they are being revealed to the world, in spite of her explicit wish that they be destroyed. I get mail all the time from religious leaders who admit to me in private that they do not believe in God but think that the best way to continue their lives is to swallow hard and get on with their ministries, concentrating on bringing more good than evil into the lives of their parishioners and those for whom their churches provide care. I would never divulge their names without their consent, but I do wonder: How many millions of priests, pastors, rabbis, imams, nuns and monks around the world are living lives of similar duplicity? Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the outing of Mother Teresa inspired a few thousand of them to come out of the closet and acknowledge their atheism! Then it might start being obvious not only that faith in God is not a requirement for morality, but that the loss of faith in God often goads people into living more strenuously helpful lives, as seems to be the case with Mother Teresa. Of course, such honesty carries a price: you have to change your mission in a way Mother Teresa never did. She could have devoted herself more single-mindedly to helping the poor instead of trying to convert them. Perhaps it was her guilt at being unable to convert herself that drove her to work so hard to convert others to take her place among the believers.
Books by Dennet that I have read:

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