[Oe List ...] Science/Dowd; A review of Charles Taylor's "The Secular Society"

Wed Jul 10 10:43:07 PDT 2013

Hi Herman,
I'd be interested to learn how yours and Dowd's perspective differ.
Ellie

-----Original Message-----
From: Herman Greene <hfgreenenc at gmail.com>
To: Order Ecumenical Community <oe at lists.wedgeblade.net>
Sent: Tue, Jul 9, 2013 6:45 pm
Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] A review of Charles Taylor's "The Secular Society"

David,

I would live your faith any day.

I don't mean to inject a negative energy into commenting on Michael Dowd. He stands for a position, that deserves a hearing. He certainly adheres to his creed himself. He is a personal friend though he knows we look at things differently. He and Connie stayed with us for three days in May.

So pretending we don't know who this comes from me, let me offer some writings from the blog post I referenced that may show a conflation of religion and science. And then I'll following it with things he says that hedges the matter and arguably are inconsistent with his basic stance;

First the conflation:

A Manifesto for the New Theism

A new breed of theist is emerging in nearly every denomination and religion across the globe, and many of us are grateful to the New Atheists for calling us out of the closet. Just as today's crop of bestselling unbelievers are echoing what was said a hundred years ago, New Theists are re-articulating themes that ignited liberal sensibilities of the 19th and 20th centuries.

New Theists are not believers; we're evidentialists. We value scientific, historic and cross-cultural evidence over ancient texts, religious dogma or ecclesiastical authority. We also value how an evidential worldview enriches and deepens our communion with God-Reality-Life-Universe-Mystery-Wholeness.

. . . .
New Theists view religion and religious language through an empirical, evidential, evolutionary lens, rather than through a theological or philosophical one. Indeed, an ability to distinguish subjective and objective reality -- practical truth (that which reliably produces personal wholeness and social coherence) from factual truth (that which is measurably real) -- is one of the defining characteristics of New Theists.

. . . .

Reality is our God, evidence is our scripture, integrity is our religion, and contributing toward a healthy future is our mission.

By "reality is our God" we mean that honoring and working with what is real, as evidentially and collectively discerned, and then creatively imagining what could be, is our ultimate concern and commitment.

By "evidence is our Scripture" we mean that scientific, historic and cross-cultural evidence provide a better understanding and a more authoritative map of how things are and which things matter (or what is real and what is important) than do ancient mythic writings or handed-down wisdom.

By "integrity is our religion" we mean that living in right relationship to reality and helping others and our species do the same is our great responsibility and joy.

By "contributing toward a healthy future is our mission" we mean that working with people of all backgrounds and beliefs in service of a vibrant future for planet Earth and all its gloriously diverse species is our divine calling and privilege.

Now where he hedges:

New Theists are not supernaturalists; we're naturalists. We are inspired and motivated far more by this world and this life than by promises of a future otherworld or afterlife. This does not, however, mean that we diss uplifting or transcendent experiences, or disvalue mystery. We don't. But neither do we see the mystical as divorced from the natural.

New Theists differ from traditional theists in the same way that secular Jews differ from fundamentalist Jews. Most of us do value traditional religious language and rituals, and we certainly value community. We simply no longer interpret literally any of the otherworldly or supernatural-sounding language in our scriptures, creeds and doctrines. Indeed, we interpret all mythic "night language" as one would interpret a dream: metaphorically, symbolically.

New Theists practice what might be called a "practical spirituality." Spirituality for us means the mindset, heart-space and tools that assist one in growing in integrity (i.e., in right relationship to reality) and supporting others and our species in doing the same. It also means an interpretive stance that can be counted on to deliver hope in times of confusion, solace in times of sorrow and support for handling life's inevitable challenges.
New Theists don't believe in God. We know that throughout human history the word "God" has always and everywhere been a meaning-filled interpretation, a mythic and inspiring personification of forces and realities incomprehensible in pre-scientific times.
. . . .
New Theists are religious naturalists. Crucially, we value religion and religious heritage not only as a personal preference but also for its historic role in fostering cooperation at scales far larger than our instincts alone could have achieved (also here and here).
Maybe tomorrow I'll comment on his view of the centrality of evolution . . . as understood from an emergentist perspective.

Herman

On Tue, Jul 9, 2013 at 6:19 PM, David Dunn <dmdunn1 at gmail.com> wrote:

On Jul 9, 2013, at 3:49 PM, Herman Greene <hfgreenenc at gmail.com> wrote:

Now this is an incomplete response and there is much more to be said, including some positive things about Michael's approach. By the way, in some senses I am a religious naturalist, but along the lines of process theology. See 
Reenchantment without Supernaturalism: A Process Philosophy of Religion (Cornell Studies in the Philosophy of... by David Ray Griffin (Nov 16, 2000). In the process approach there's plenty of transcendence as well as immanence, and religious knowledge is not only what can be known through the five senses and logic. There are other ways of knowing.

I think of myself as an avid scientist. What I believe is secondary and derivative of what I experience, with gratitude to the RS-I and Frank, Amy, Lyn, et al. I find myself thinking these days, "I don't believe in God, I have a God Hypothesis."

I observe in more ways than I can name a mystery, depth, and greatness in the world (and dozens of et ceteras that I'll lump under the category gracious and holy mystery) that come at me in the form of relationships and events, inside me and outside me. It's all sustaining and energizing, etc., etc.

My God hypothesis (for which read: narrative of what to expect) gives me eyes to see. My hypothesis is a narrative about trinitarian dynamics (limits, possibilities, freedom) and it has been uniformly and reliably predictive for over 40 years now. It's saved my life, one might say.

Rather than "do you believe in God?" I prefer to ask, "What are our images of God? Are they predictive of life experience? Do they give us eyes to see?" 

I toy with images of myself as contemplative or mystic or inveterate listener or ceaseless questioner. All of them, really, are about constantly, unobtrusively observing, testing my hypothesis, refining my images of the way life is, and looking again, to see if I can see more of what is there and what is real.

I think I'd better read Dowd, Griffin, and Brooks, to see what all the energy is about.

I go a bit berserk at the endless, mindless contraversy about conflict between religious belief and scientific knowledge.

David

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