That which is special about religion
What’s Blair talking about?
“For religion to be a force for good, it must be rescued not simply from extremism, faith as a means of exclusion; but also from irrelevance, an interesting part of our history but not of our future.” Too many people saw religious faith as stark dogmatism and empty ritual, he added. “Faith is reduced to a system of strange convictions and actions that, to some, can appear far removed from the necessities and anxieties of ordinary life,” Blair said. “It is this face that gives militant secularism an easy target.”
Militant secularism yourself. We’re not the ones who resort to violence when people don’t agree with us, so don’t be so free with your adjectives, not to mention your mindless clichés. But leaving that aside – if religion is not a system of strange convictions, then what is it? I realize it has other attributes, of course (though it’s hard to specify any that universally belong to religion as such), but which ones are inherent in religion and part of its definition? If you remove all the strange convictions from a given religion, what is religious about what is left? I realize there will be something left, but what I don’t see is what is religious about that residue. It seems to me that what is left is simply a lot of stuff that can just as easily be secular, and often is – belonging, meaning, motivation, community. That appears to be the kind of thing Blair has in mind (though who knows for sure, since as always religion gets the benefit of vagueness when we are being told how wonderful it is), but he has no real right to assume that kind of thing is religious and therefore on the credit side of the ledger for religion.
He went on to argue that religion could help to advance humanity and end global poverty. One of his foundation’s aims is to bring people of faith together in pursuit of the UN’s millennium development goals, which include the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger, promoting gender equality and combating diseases.
Well sure, religion could do that. But what could it do to do those things that is religious? What is it about what religion could do to help advance humanity and end global poverty that secular or non-theist groups or organizations could not do? What particular, special, irreplaceable quality of religion is Blair talking about here? The article doesn’t say – and I have a strong suspicion that Blair didn’t either.
Why is Blair doing this in Westminster Cathedral?
Hey, that’s easy. He’s doing it there because the church is shameless when it comes to self-promotion. They may have backed the wrong horse, but, how much better can you do than nobble the fastest pony in the race?
He didn’t sound fast, did he? But the church wasn’t to know. Besides, think of the PR value. Most people won’t have read what he had to say, and fewer still will have heard it, but everyone knows Blair. It’s the star factor, of course! It’s not about truth, it’s about ratings!
I forgot to add, Ophelia: Does anyone really take Blair seriously after Iraq, and his sycophantic thing with Bush? And now this? Is he really a serious force any longer? Was he ever? I mean, really, his talk (does it really amount to that, I wonder) is so intellectually thin — sixth form stuff. Why did people take him seriously as Prime Minister? I find it hard to fathom, hearing about his rather shady history since leaving office. Isn’t New Labour a bit like Old Tory WRIT LARGE?
If I had been responsible for lying to the British public in order to foster support for an attack on another country, I like to think I’d have enough common sense to withdraw from public life and spend the rest of my time contemplating the magnitude of my misdeed.
Honestly, just how deluded is Blair that he thinks anyone has any remaining interest in his ethical, religious, or any other opinions?
Regarding your last paragraph OB, my guess is that Blair’s answer, if he was pushed, would revolve around claims that “faith” provides one with both an ethical framework and the inspiration and drive to implement the exhortations (or dictates!) of that framework.
An answer which of course would beg plenty of questions about the fundamental strength of character of the believer, about the nature of the framework informing the beliefs and actions, about the mindset of someone who requires a purported transcendent inspiration before he/she can act morally and consistently towards other human beings, and so on and so forth.
“He went on to argue that religion could help to advance humanity and end global poverty.”
Wow, “Platitudes R Us”. Mr Blair, whatever a theist can do to bring about such things, a non-theist can do too (which begs the question of why religious belief need be brought into the question at all). The key difference typically being that a non-theist does not skew either debate or action by injecting non-humanistic ethical assumptions into the proceedings that everyone else involved is then obliged to “respect” on the grounds that such assumptions are “faith” derived.
I didn’t address your key question.
“What particular, special, irreplaceable quality of religion is Blair talking about here?”
I don’t know what answer Blair would attempt to give, but having had similar discussions with theists over the years, typical answers have included claims that “faith” provides you with conviction when you are in danger of wavering, provides you with certainty when you are in doubt, and a sense of righteousness when rational analysis delivers up no such sense.
In other words, it steamrollers over those mechanisms that shield us from dogmatism.
Another answer I’ve heard on multiple occasions is “There’s no point in me trying to explain it to you, you’ll only understand if you believe”. The last time I heard this was from a Jehovah’s Witness standing on my doorstep about a year back. A Watch Tower booklet (or something similar) had been pushed through our door the previous week and I’d highlighted with marker pen the line in which the attempt to rationally prove that god existed became circular.
She and her partner both stared blankly at the highlighted section for a few moments, and then with depressing predictability explained that in fact it was not possible to prove God’s existence in a booklet and that the only way I could really understand was by making the “required” leap of faith (an unwitting acknowledgment, of course, that the booklet’s attempts at providing rational proof were both pointless and disingenuous).
But yet again, I digress…
Ah yes, just what we need in a world where the leader of the “free world” receives transmissions from Jesus telling him to go make war; two almost ethnically identical countries have nuclear missiles pointed at each other because their gods disagree; where an entire region of the world is full of would-be theocrats exhorting the youth to strap explosives to themselves; where everywhere human progress and freedom is being held back because nobody can agree just which book of desert hallucinations is the right one–more faith!
Perhaps I live a sheltered life, but I had never heard reference to ‘desert hallucinations’ before. Excellent. Thanks dzd.
Mr Blair sincerely wants to fight poverty…his own, he wants to make sure he is rolling in it and what better way of doing that than latching onto a conduit to peoples’ pockets.
Why does joining with our nations closest ally to remove a brutal,facist,genocidal dictator make Blair a sycophant Eric? and why wouldnt people take him seriously? he made the Labour party into a party that people actualy vote for rather than a large presure group doomed to never ending oposition.
Delurking for a moment to challenge the idea that Blair has changed the Labour party into a party people vote for. Labours 1997 election win was based on fewer votes than the Tories 1992 win. 2001 saw Labour pick up around the same number of votes as they did in 1987 when they were soundly beaten. The Labour party have been helped by the collapse of the Tory vote. The first past the post system and some bias in the electoral system which works against the Tories, gives a wholly misleading impression of how popular Blair and the Labour party under him, actually were.
“two almost ethnically identical countries have nuclear missiles pointed at each other because their gods disagree;”
dzd, can you elaborate on that a little? Is a common ethnicity a basis for peaceful coexistence? Is it only because of their gods?