An Atheist in the Pulpit

Big deal! I too am an atheist, and have stood in the pulpit as a lay preacher eleven times over the past two-and-a-half years.

I am, however, a spiritual atheist.

To think that the unquestioning belief in the absolute truthfulness of literalized mythology is the only way to be spiritual is a big mistake.

Well, he could be either honest enough to resign, or transfer his credentials to the United Church.  Not a put down, I've met UC clergy, and laity, who consider themselves 'atheist' or even 'agnostic'.  What fascinates me is how they'd interpret 'essential' agreement with the basis of Union, and what foundation do they identify for their preaching and pastoral work, but that's for another thread, I guess.

Hi joejack:

When I joined the United Church two-and-a-half years ago, I asked our minister whether I could take UC doctrine metaphorically.

"Yes," she said, "take it as metaphorically as you want."

Witch,

Thank you for an interesting article - there's a lot of meat on this bone!

Although this article concentrates on a crisis of religious belief, I have found life involves a constant reassessing of our values and beliefs in many areas of our life.

More than anything we humans love to rest easy in the belief that the world is as we see it - to be confronted with contrary information can send us into a spiral of despair. Often we will fight hard to maintain these beliefs rather than face this despair.

We feel like we're falling apart - but in reality it's our belief structure that's falling apart.

Dorothy Rowe, a psychologist, says that ultimately there is only one way to handle this dilemma successfully.

Say to yourself, "I got it wrong."

Life shows us that we get a lot of things wrong. I thought that my husband and I would share a comfortable old age together - I got it wrong.

I thought I had no faith - I got it wrong. My spirituality is now a cornerstone of my life.

It's not just in the "big" issues - in our everyday lives we get a lot wrong. We trust the wrong people. (think of how the recent duplicity on wondercafe threatened to damage the site.) We falsely accuse others - the list is endless.

It seems to me that in the end it doesn't matter if we spend a lot of our lives saying, "I got it wrong" - as long as we do it. (And what's right today may seem wrong tomorrow!).

Ultimately, a peaceful life is an authentic life.

A few words to explain this otherwise irrelevant picture might help Jae

He has found out how to copy and paste ,witch.

Yes, that's true crazyheart, I have.

Here's your cookie.

So Jae....

Are you going to share with us your thoughts behind poting that image, or do we just toss it on the "meaningless religious rhetoric" pile?

There's no stopping anyone that wants to be an athiest if that's what they want, but why does it always require an explanation of why it's a better choice than religion?

Can't one just declare that they're athiest and be done with it?

I don't think ministers are alone in this kind of scenario. People "lose the faith" in all different situations when their livelihoods are involved. I know someone who was a strong union staff representative who, a few years later, ran for a right-wing political party. I know people who have worked in health-related jobs, only to quit because they lost faith in allopathic (Western) medicine.

How do we reconcile the outer life with the inner one, especially when it's the means whereby we support ourselves and our families? It's a good question for all to consider, both within the context of religion and external to it.

I think you're missing the point of the article Waterfall. It's not about whether it's better to be an atheist or a christioan or whatever.

It's about the struggle that people who are in the ministry can go through when doubts creep in.

I mean it's all well and fine for the congregants. They can always go the the minister for reassurance when the doubts assail, but where does the minister go?

I remember clearly what it was like, in training for the Ministry, hundreds of people depending on me, wanting so much to believe like I used to. I remember the feelings of guilt when I realized I was preaching what I no longer believed. I remember th feelings of guilt when I considered leaving, and what that would do to the people who depended on me for spiritual guidance. I remember the feeling of hopelessness, of being trapped by responisbilities I no longer felt I could honestly dispatch.

Of course I was finally spared by finding my path with God. But how many ministers out there never do, and yet never leave, and have to deal daily with the guilt and doubt?

Not that I don't have doubts even today, but as a minister it's a lot different having doubts when you still believe.

One of the greatest symbols of the clash between atheist and believer in power (physical) is the story of Sparta and Athens (route word of atheist; in my vision of the evolution of WORD) that's God and idealism in a sense of a lot of Jaw'n truth, ruminating over the whole thing. Mankind is just a small portion of that 'hole thing ... something lost in the translation of old mystical books? Like "w" ... omega'd ... double nick'd ... nix'd ... the deuce as Primary number ... eve'n! Decision making and Joie incidental to fear and anger in Myer's Briggs profile ... an "X" to many that Çhi'ns in the night ... all in a word they say ...

And isn't God all-inclusive? Now there's a storm in a projected mind upon the physical realm! If it isn't pysiologically balanced with love'n th'aught ... where'd we be in the pits? Just a point in a vast time ... mystically speaking ...

That's a two sided probe ...like allah gory ... bloody Light heh! Plasma-like as it circulates in the soul thing ... looking for communication ... blood breath-erin? All relationists ... questioning the whole thing as in God ... infinite ... how else would yah get to Gnome? Says so in the book ... test all things ... omi-nous (all-mindful) to some who don't even wish to start the sojourn as if wandering was evil. They just believe what they're told without question. Does a mortal know it all from a simple limited edition?

Omega'd the dae Monis chuckle ... gives light Eires ... to consumption ... a sup erse tail of soup ... primal stewing ... Gael IC Cain arising as you rheid IT! Stele Eire in some far'IC's projections, where IC is an old expression of Christ as Light ... projecting in the shadows to create something else again ... wee devil as in Roman Law ... below the emperor! But then what does a warring sort know of truth when they obliterate all such things. Who burnt all the know librries of the world ... 2000 years ago and began rewriting history as a Roman truth ... vati canus? Das a dog Maw ... roaming the ills of Roman mind!

What stood out for me in the article was this

"We spend our lives impersonating who we think others want us to be," he says. "And we end up as living impostors. So, when someone comes to me and tells me they're losing their faith, I congratulate them. You're starting to embrace your own thinking self—the essential, immutable, immortal self— as opposed to the accidental criminal you have been made to think you are."

Doubt, for Carlton Pearson, isn't a sign that one's faith is evaporating; it's just a sign that it's going underground and changing.

And so there emerges, in the literature of spiritual self-transformation, a kind of parallel canon between the religious conversions and the Dawkins-style deconversions. It is the idea of the full circle, or the nun-turned-religious scholar Karen Armstrong's so-called "spiral staircase," wherein we eventually come back around to our old spiritual position, but at a higher level, from which we see a wider landscape.

It's the story of the young Carl Jung. Growing up in Geneva, he watched his parson father become tormented by religious doubt. This made him reject conventional religious practice, but it sharpened his sense of the importance of some sort of personal spiritual quest, which he regarded as the main issue in the life of everyone over 35.

I believe there are Christian and atheist impostors - plus Buddhist, Muslim, CofFSMs, etc. etc.  People trying to fit themselves into the molds created by others, or even themselves, as to what they are to be; this is, IMHO, a "normal" human state of development.   For some that mold becomes a comfortable place to exist but for others it becomes a prison with the walls pressing in on them; or, maybe in their growth, they begin pushing out the walls.

In either scenario, something has to break and when it does pieces of oneself go flying in all directions. Depending on how absolutist one's mind was will determine how the pieces will be put back together.  I am, with the encroachment of  venerable age, coming to the conclusion that one may replace beliefs/idelogy but one does not change the level of fervency eg  'you can take the bible away from an evangelista but not the thumping'

This is a personal observation, not borne of any scientific study, but one that I have seen in certain Exs - Christians, drinkers, smokers, gamblers [insert passion of choice]:  The object of worship is replaced but the passion is not diminished.

LB

There is always an alternative to the faith we lose. Or is it the same faith under another mask?

     Graham Greene

well that is just another example of many, one must be born again to see the Kingdom of God, without being baptized in the Holy Spirit, all one truly  has is man made religion

Ahhh blackbelt.

You truly missed the point entirely,

These are the sort of people I really feel for.  When ministering to the faithful is all you know, but you no longer have faith, what the hell are you supposed to do?

I knew of Dawkins' "clergyman-retraining scholarships", but retraining for a new job is scary in your thirties - never mind for men and women in their 50s or 60s, and the scholarships can't be all that large.  Beyond that, how do you tell a widow that her husband is "going to a better place"(tm)?  How long can you deliver what you now see as lies, every Sunday, before all the lying eats away at you?

Some anti-theists work to get people to examine their faith critically and be honest with themselves.  In this minister's case, it appears that Dawkins, Hitchens and Harris did the trick.  While it can be difficult enough to simply move from "believer" to "non-believer", especially with family or friends who would not approve, ministers would potentially have very few friends or relatives who would be supportive.  Being a believer as a condition of employment adds a level of complexity that I don't think anti-theists have considered enough.

Retraining is not just scary, it is expensive.  Most clergy aren't exactly building massive savings accounts, and very little of our training is transferrable, so we are looking at several years without income.  Who wants to sign up for that?

An Atheist In The Pulpit?  I take it as just a metaphor.  What the heck, everything else is treated as such.  Maybe Wondercafe is just a metaphor.  Maybe atheism is just a metaphor.  Maybe life is just a metaphor.  Why not, it seems to be the great cop out for practically anything.  Welcome to the 21st century.

Exactly, but what's the alternative?  Lie professionally for years until retirement?

 Interesting article, although - in my opinion - not especially newsworthy, except perhaps in "a sensationalistic" way - "gasp! a minister losing his/her faith?" To be beset by doubts is a part of the faith journey. I'd doubt the maturity of a Christian who never has any doubts about the gospel - just as I doubt the maturity of voters who simply always vote Liberal but really couldn't explain why if their life depended on it.

Pastors having doubt and losing faith is hardly new. I struggle with many things. Some overcome doubt, some are overcome by doubt. Just like any Christian. 

There is, of course, also the reverse phenomenon - I for example, as a one-time militant atheist  remember spirited debates in university with fellow students and even a couple of professors who were Christians and yet I eventually had enough doubts about the logic of atheism that I became first a theist, then a Christian, then a pastor. So it does go both ways.

It does go both ways.  These days, it just mostly goes in one.

But this isn't about a minister who doubts, it is about a minister who does not believe, and has not for some time.  What then?

Hi joejack:

Language, by its very nature, is metaphorical.

If something is metaphorically true, then it is not necessarily untrue or unreal. It only means that its truth is ineffable or inexpressible, and any expression of it metaphorical. This is not just a 21st century insight; this insight has been around since ancient times. The OT was written as midrash, and meant to be interpreted as midrash. Midrash basically is sacred metaphor.

If, as many of us think and feel,  the ultimate state of being is one of non-duality, oneness, unity or synthesis, then there is no supernatural creator God who is separate from creation. Then the universe is self-generative or self-godly.

This stance, although thoroughly spiritual, is regarded as atheism by traditionalist believers who believe in the separate, supernatural God as the only possible definition of God. That's why there are atheists behind the pulpit. I am one of them, and the traditionalist believers in our congregation don't mind.

Yes, but unbelief begins with doubt and - as I said, some overcome their doubts, some are overcome by their doubts. Does it go mostly one way? As the article notes, there are no reliable statistics. There's anecdotal evidence offered that many clergy are in this situation. Maybe. But it's anecdotal evidence, not empirical evidence. I can offer anecdotal evidence to suggest that many clergy only come to faith as adults. I know many in that situation. Which is more common? Clergy who come to faith as adults or clergy who lose faith? I don't know.

But the path for clergy who come to faith as adults is better paved.  The path for clergy who lose faith is less certain.  That's all I'm saying.

Hi, Arminius.  I tried to pay my bills with metaphorical money, but they still wanted the real deal.  The phone company has entirely no sense of humour.  But seriously, what happens when an atheist doubts his/her belief system and becomes, say, a Buddhist?  Does it carry the same sensationalism?    In the words of those famous philosophers, Simon and Garfunkel, we hear, "Still a man hears what he wants to hear And disregards the rest."

How would an atheist who becomes a Buddhist necessarily lose his or her belief system?  Wouldn't he or she only necessarily be gaining a belief system?

Atheism IS a belief system; i.e., the belief in the null set, if you will, that there is NO God.  If a person loses his/her atheism, or even agnosticism, it's no different than anyone who identifies as Christian, or Muslim, or Jew, etc. forsaking their system to become an atheist.  I see atheism as a religion evident by those involved in atheism making a point to 'identify' themselves as such.  Identity is basic to the human condition and even if someone switches horses in mid gallop, the fact is they are now riding another horse.  Why the sensationalism?

A theist can also hold to the "null set" to which you refer.  The belief-system doesn't stop being "null" on the basis of god-belief, or lack of god-belief.  It stops being "null" when one adopts a belief system.

Also, your basis for calling atheism a religion is patently ridiculous.  I identify as male; is maleness a religion?  I identify as a geologist; is geology a religion?  I identify as a Canadian.  Is Canada a religion?  The same thing could be done with you, according to the things with which you self-identify.  To just how many "religions", by your standard, do we belong?  As many religions as we have labels of self-identity, apparently!

This is not to say that an atheist can't be religious, or have a belief system.  I would venture to suggest that most atheists are religious, and do have belief systems.  But those religions and belief systems are not described by the word "atheism", and in most cases have terms of their own that would be more appropriate to use.

I don't know, but I would imagine that many clergy have doubts, and go through periods of questioning (and yes, or non-belief) as they study, grow, and develop their faith.  I don't think I would want it any other way.  I believe there is a verse in the Bible about 'better honest doubts then blind belief."  and the well known quote "Lord, I believe; help thou my unbelief." 

So a clergyperson has lost his faith.  Is he lying every time he goes into the pulpit?  Not necessarily so.  There are still many things to preach on.  Does he tell a grieving widow that her husband has 'gone to a better place'?  No!   Perhaps he encourages her to share some memories of her husband and their life together.  Perhaps he can point out the influence her husband had in the community; the new community center that he helped to build; the youth program - and he can point out how the sons are following in their father's footsteps and his legacy lives on.  Perhaps he can encourage her to share what she thinks happens after death if she is so inclined.  And he can affirm her faith, perhaps even tell her "the apostle Paul affirmed that very belief in his letter to the Romans".   And he can be very honest "we don't know what happens after death."And go on to affirm a life well lived. 

Perhaps the time will come when he will decide that he can no longer be a minister, but it might also come when he develops a stronger belief = however different it might be from when he was first ordained.

In the UCC, this may be the case.  It will not be so in other denominations.  In other deniminations, he or she will by lying through their teeth, if they want to allay suspicion and keep their jobs.  Sure, they can do it.  Even I can sound pious if I want to.

Yes, I believe you have it right Azdgari. Atheism is a religion as much as not collecting coins is a hobby.

That was stunning in its correctness.

I'd certainly agree with you on that.

So, if you suspect your minister is an atheist, or he or she admits it, and that matters to you, either find another church or stay home and watch paint dry.  Either one will be more honest, and more productive.

That actually begs another question:  If your minister has lost his or her faith, how could you tell?  Would you care?

They could probably recite their previous "faith" in their sleep, so I would guess that they could be very, very convincing in the face of the uncertainty of unemployment.

I would think that I could tell after months or years of being in relationship with him or her, of participating in worship, and in study groups, and on committees, and being sensitive to whatever he or she was willing or able to share or the faith questions he or she was facing.  But faith is pretty much a private matter and the minister might want to keep this to himself or only share with his spiritual advisor (perhaps an older, maybe retired, minister) or his rep on the M & P committee. 

In an obituary here in NB this morning it was stated that among the deceased's activities was "avoiding golf". That would be a null point ... wouldn't it? O hole in the time to think about it! Would a hole in time be like a bump in the night opposing metaphors ... anecdotes from the other's Ide?

Oh the far ranging doubts ... and the bible says to question everything (don't parsons/persons hate that one). Now everything is all, and all is omi- ... in another metaphor. If God is "all" should we question them ("all" I take is an integral plural form)? All is chaos because we don't really know for sure being in a null point of "desirous of everything" but fearful of going there  ... fear of finding Love in a hateful realm? God don't you Love the humour of "all" this thing we don't understand? It is like the mind being beyond (myth) the bodean condensation of will-heh ... looking for a place to store love temporarily while he ponders what heis created afore hand in na' word. Are words near-infinite in the continuum? Is that like God? Why didn't someone sae so? The bible did, but hoo reads it in depth? Alien life forms in neigh bore that individuals hate as m'n, a dark force in Greek as µn reflective thing ... Black Body end Idée as institutionalized in dirt ... one has to consume it to understand. There are sect ante explanations of the aforesaid ... why we have sects to a muse the Gods in meeting in deep space between them. Between two and three there's God ... don't Jah Loe vite as fal loute ... a real numbed consequence but you couln't sae it under Roman writ ... love and knowledge are stoopid in common folks (translation; pagan spin, that's English heh, 57 varieties all weaven into one) ...

Did you know that hand is like Jah in archaic Hebrew, a dead language? It is dead so perhaps we won't understand where God's hand is at present until th'y figure it out ... for they didn't know what happened either in that mindless incounter in space. Do you know anyone that thinks when immersed in a pure state of passion? If they do it isn't pure ... then some are quite imperfect ... balanced on that thin read line of relating, alchemy in the larger dimension of internalized space. Just a wee people in condensation of a meta-mour phi sized form ... id'll change once dunked! Quenching of the pyres eh ... old as Hindi traditions ... just emote in space, or is that bot?

Now if a word is not spoken, wasn't there an emotion to do so? Now if there is silence; what's goan on? I bet something somewhere is conjuring up a word in a primal mind ... Cos Moe Logical rationality ... ID's dark and you can't tell the difference between ID and IT ... an upstanding "I" with a Roman di that's ... Ð that's thick on the tongues of man often coming out as "the", Tae, Çhi, or just "X" a crossing space?

Why is silence golden? it gives "all" time to think after the expression of a Big Bang as Egos tin space makes all sorts of pieces tothe nigmaas ... thas dark mind eh? One has to know a lot of words to figure that one out in variable connections. Then man doesn't like a thinker in Roman Roués das flowering ... so perhaps it is time to retreat into the shad ows ... pæn of thinking ... sometimes expressed as Pan ... devilish flat out thing on a page ... floating as flot's em and Jet's em ... the population offspring of God ... wae dae muns!

Something like goan through the wringer ... yer back at the same spot a confused as ever ... then some learn something about the loupe, the dogmaas of It allé for amuse 'n the Gods with nonsense ... a break in th'O ... that's "c" when the light leaks through the fabric of de veil. But still man hates to know whe Rae comes from ... striking a resemblance is a reflection in Mir space eh! Hollow head is just one expression ... if yah get the words in order in your piece of space. That's all that required of yah in an isle literated form!

Hollowed hacker ... in cybers pace ... too vite to think ... therefore many mistakes in the quantum Brae in other space; we can't get eM together as a general rule ...

Is God patient, a sloe thinker ... virtuous image?

ID'll qualm to Yah eventually ... once the RIP Plays settled ...

Das ole heh, hole in physical space, as viewing from the other side ... alt Ur Nate is a term for wisdom, des alts of the earth, unravelling in the chaos weave created in the garden by sections of unthinking imbalance ... borderline minds on extreme edge is ankh eh! Brings me to tiers a Jinn! Peas 've God tue Yah ... as ceded in the end ... it'll come back at yah in the next loupe of rationale ... the gad about cha ...

Iam not surprised - in my carreer I have meet many who lost their faith and left - or lost their christology and became unitarians - or moved their theology to theapry and became therapists.  I Like steve i have meet those going the other way from atheist to theists.  But we do not have more than our experience because no real empirical studies have been made.

Now I have problems with an atheists in the pulpit in the UCC - they may not be lying but their theology sucks and they are less than aware of the problem....

Again not enough empirical evidence but emerging it seems within the progressve theological world there is a reworking of the meaning of theism- in one sense it is atheist when viewed from a supernatural view but it is a affirmation of some transcendence- when that goes the church suffers,  The atheist in the pulpit is lying and while she or he can offer other ideas of humanistic values it does not sustain.  Why turn up for that which we can get in other forms than church?

Witch I don't think I missed the point of the article, although I do admit I may have jumped ahead with my thinking in that once a person is sure that they are athiest and the doubts are removed, that one tends to use theism as the explanation.

But given that, I certainly do understand the doubts that being a theist can present. It would be a concern who one should talk to when faced with doubts. Should one surround themself with atheists to support their new doubts or theists to redirect ones thinking? Or both? This is a connundrum for a minister isn't it because how would they even be able to take this to God if they doubt the existence of such? Or possibly it's not God they're doubting but the religion they have held dear for so long and it's really just a rejection of the interpretation of the church they represent.

I know lots of people in lots of lines of work who simply show up, do the minimum required, and go home.  Lots of people don't like their jobs, and simply go through the motions.  Clergy can, of course, do the same.

I'm not arguing that they should, but it is certainly doable.  For many, it will depend what their own set of choices are - do I lose my house, or put up with faking it, hoping to find a way out next year, or the year after?  Do I have time to deal with professional crises when I'm caring for my fragile and aging parents, or do I put that on the backburner for now?

We see it all the time in people entering the ministry - for whatever reason, either because they didn't feel welcomed, or they just didn't have a call, they started life in some other profession.  Then when they started to feel that they belonged in ministry, it was too late.  They had kids, and parents, and bills.  And so we have an epidemic of people entering ministry in their late 50s, with a decade or less left before retirement.  Why would exiting ministry be any different?

Should it be?  Sure.  But the world is hardly an ideal place.  You're right, the alternative is to lie professionally, but that is a fairly common choice in many fields.

In any line of work, people can burn out or rust out.  When I administered a drug prevention and assessment program in the late 1980's, I ran across a gentleman, living on the street, with a highly developed vocabulary.  He'd been a successful engineer who lost interest, started drinking, got divorced, and soon ended up on the street.  With any person, and especially with men, there are three areas of life that are important: identity, purpose and direction.  Being a clergyperson becomes a part of one's 'identity' to the point where, even if they no longer believe, it's still a part of how they perceive themselves.  It's hard for some people to 're-define' themselves.  Due to health, I had to give up my career.  My wife's health deteriorated both physically and mentally to the point where she wanted a divorce, and later died of a brain aneurism.  My sons are grown up and gone.  I can no longer work, and I'm kinda stuck.  I had to redefine who I am, seek out a new purpose in life, and establish a new direction.  It wasn't easy; in fact, it's sort of a toss of the dice.  Other former associates weren't so lucky.  One guy worked himself into a heart attack and died because of his crisis.  Another guy went back to school at the age of 40+ and became a lawyer.  Perhaps churches should consider establishing a program, or have some kind of liason, who helps people rediscover who they are rather than letting them continue just to 'survive'.    Do you stay in there and 'go through the motions' or do you seek new life and boldly go where you haven't gone before? (man I gotta lay off the Star Trek reruns.)

Matt nicely put

Hi joejack:

As Azdgari said, some of us speculate that God is the null set: the nothing that became everything and is everything.

Atheism, of course, is, like all religions, an ideology.

Yes, indeed, why the sensationalism?

Perhaps I'm looking at this from the wrong end of the telescope.  Why don't I start up an atheist club online.  Yes, for a mere $150 per year you get an official Atheist Club membership card, and free online newsletters and a chance to have me as your personal friend.  Now, assuming 4% of the population (conservatively, in many areas of the world it is much higher than that) are atheist, and I could sell 10% of that 4% on the idea, that's 0.4% of the population.  Now, let's round down the population of the USA to 300,000,000 times .004 times $150 per year, I could gross easily $180,000,000 per annum off the US market alone.  Wow, thanks for that inspiration.

That's it Joe Jack ... real life is all about money!

Can you imagine anything else?

If not perhaps it is a dead end street made of yellow brick!

Could there be anything beyond this brick enclosure that oppresses us keeps us from getting out into the larger being? In AA if you do not accept that there is something bigger than thou ... the option is that you might as well give into the self-induced additions! If you can't see that your going nowhere ... you can't get around the bend in space ...

Why be Christian? Why be a member of a Christian Church? It just makes no sense. This is such self centered egotism. Faith isn't about self. It's about 2 things. Does anyone remember the Great Commandment?

Wow, another person who thinks that their version of Christianity is the only "true" one, and all other versions of Christianity are heretical.....

What're the odds?

ROFLMAO

hes all over the map ,i really have'nt a cue what hes ranting about,