Wednesday, June 12, 2013

Imagine No Religion...

In 1971, John Lennon composed one of his more popular songs, “Imagine,” where he asked listeners to imagine a world with no heaven, hell, or religion:

“Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today...

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too...”

I recently saw an internet meme that celebrated this song asking us to imagine all the supposed  benefits of a world without religion.  This is a common cant among the so-called New Atheists who, with much noise and little sense, rail against what they see as the evils of religion, its irrationality, and the stupidity of the deluded beliver.  Against the evils of religion, the  modern heathen asks us to imagine a world with no religion, no God, no heaven, and no hell.  In doing so, they think themselves progressive, modern, and ahead of the times.  Richard Dawkins, prince of the New Atheists, along with the death of God, proclaims that: “there is at bottom no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but pointless indifference... We are machines for propagating DNA...”  He and his followers imagine themselves to be much ahead of their time.  In reality, they are at least a 100 years behind it. 

In 1882, Fredreiche Nietsche, among the first prophets of the modern God-is-dead movement, asked his readers to imagine a world without God.  He had his madmen proclaims God’s death:
                "Whither is God?" he cried; "I will tell you. We have killed him---you and I. All of us are his murderers. But how did we do this? How could we drink up the sea? Who gave us the sponge to wipe away the entire horizon?... Is not night continually closing in on us? Do we not need to light lanterns in the morning? Do we hear nothing as yet of the noise of the gravediggers who are burying God? Do we smell nothing as yet of the divine decomposition? Gods, too, decompose. God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. "How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers?
Seeing the modern world slaying God, Nietsche proclaimed the advent of moral nihilism, the destruction of all meaning and value in life.  Dawkins, in imagining a world without God, a world with no good or evil, where man was only a machine, did nothing new.  He simply argued what others had done before him.  Likewise today, there is no need for the modern man to imagine the death of God and no religion, others, besides Nietsche, have already imagined this world.

Dostoyevsky saw the growth of atheism in Russia and imagined where it would lead.  Like Nietsche, he saw a world bereft of meaning and value, right and wrong.  In The Brothers Karamazov, he proclaimed that “If there is no God, then all things are permitted.”   What Dostoyevsky saw with fear, others worked for.  Josef Stalin imagined a world with no religion.  Yet he did more than simply imagine that world, he tried to create it.  He persecuted the churches and  purged his enemies.  Stalin’s world without God was a world where all things were permitted—to him. 

John Lennon was wrong.   In a world without religion, there was plenty to kill for.  Stalin found many reasons, as did Mao and Pol Pot.  Men have scarce needed religion to supply a reason to kill; the lust for power, wealth, and even sex has always provided adequate reason. 

Yet, Lennon was also partly right.  He was wrong in claiming that a world with no religion would leave nothing to kill for, but he was right that in a world without religion there would be nothing to die for.   If man is just, as Dawkins says, a machine for propogating DNA, then why die for a fellow machine.  Nor can one die for freedom; no machine is free.  This is why tyrants have either tried to control religion or to eradicate it.  Stalin knew what he was doing.  Likewise, if there is “no purpose, no evil, no good,” then how can one die for what is right?  There is no right. 

With no religion, there would be nothing to die for.  As others have said, if a man has nothing worth dying for, he has nothing worth living for.  Hence the atheist Camus saw that the only serious question was whether or not one should commit suicide.  This is the world Lennon imagined;  but he had no need to imagine it.  Others imagined it first.  Worse, others have tried, and still try, to make such a world happen.


2 comments:

  1. Great article!! Really great points logically and effectively thought out!

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  2. Christ the Lord, your Saviour walks amongst you and is the way, is the resurrection and the life. The truth of life today is the blindness of people that have been in the Lords presence without knowledge of it. It is the lack of faith and hope that prevents them from not only seeing and believing but feeling the power of The Holy presence that makes it difficult to teach and heal as has been the Lords reason for being here among you for so long. Ignorance, distrust, dishonesty, negetivety, pain, suffering, selfishness and most of all the inability to be open to the spiritual world. People perceive the external facts and not the spiritual therefore ignoring what they cant see and not even having the faith to believe in ot the will, strength or goodness in their hearts to see or notice that the grave and divinity of saviour has touched their souls. The saviour who is as human as you are and has met many and has tryed to save them all and open up their hearts but only to be disappointed. it is seen that there are few that can be saved it is of great saddness that this is the way humanity has become judgments have been made for sometime now and there is not much time for the people to save themselves as it seems people cannot be saved.
    But the Lord holds on to faith, hope, love understanding, and most of importantly forgiveness for all. But the people can only pass judgement and be forgiven if they can take responsibility for their wrongs have understanding and forgive themselves and change. Open up your hearts love deeply, be kind and respect others, be honest and loyal, and support one another and stand up against the evils of this world and stop the suffering and pain at least within yourselves. It will be the end of existence if it has not been shown that there is enough goodness, truth and love left to grant human life worthy of continuance and The Kingdom of God must do what is best for humanity and end human existense.
    The evil, corruption and suffering cannot go on. there is not much time left people look into your souls see what is deep inside of you love yourselves because you are worthy of love, forgive one another and understand each other we are all humans we all make mistakes that's how we learn now its time to show that u have learnt the end of judgement is drawing near!!
    You are loved and you are forgiven, now it is up to you to forgive yourselves and fill your hearts with goodness?? The Saviour has had great patience and has faith in all of you your prayers are heard but it is you that needs to hear them.

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