Atheist Delusions: Part 1, Introduction

In the introduction, Hart sets up what he is trying to do. It’s not to  offer a point-by-point refutation of atheist arguments, nor to  ’convert’ anybody to Christianity as such, nor is it to defend  institutional Christianity. On the contrary, says Hart…

“…my affection for institutional Christianity as a whole is rarely  more than tepid; and there are numerous forms of Christian belief  and practice for which I would be hard pressed to muster a kind  word from the depths of my heart, and the rejection of which by the  atheist or skeptic strikes me as perfectly laudable.” p x.

The purpose of the book, then, is simple to re-tell the story of how  ”…Christendom was born out of the culture of late antiquity.” p x. By why tell this story? And what does it matter to atheists anyway? Hart answers:

“…it is to call attention to the peculiar and radical nature of the new faith…how enormous a transformation of thought, sensibility, culture, morality, and spiritual imagination Christianity finally constituted in the age of pagan Rome; the liberation it offered from fatalism, cosmic despair, and the terror of occult agencies; the immense dignity it conferred upon the human person; its subversion of the cruelest aspects of pagan society…and its elevation of charity above all other virtues.” p xi

Positively, Hart will argue that Christianity’s influence on western culture has been the only thing that in the fullest sense of the term could be called a revolution. It is a movement which (in Hart’s opinion) has been more “ennobling in its moral power than any other movement of spirit, will, imagination, aspiration, or accomplishment in the history of the west.” p xi.

The relevance of this to resurgent atheism? According to Hart, modern atheism is built (at least in part) of an alternative, modernist telling of that same story. In its modernist telling, this history is the story of the triumph of critical reason over faith, of freedom over oppression, and of the tolerance of the secular state: the triumph of the “age of reason” over the “age of faith”.

Put simply: the narrative of modern atheism is: (a) there was once a powerful and productive classical culture in the west, (b) Christianity retarded that culture’s progress by leading the west into stagnant superstition and institutional cruelty. (c) Since the Renaissance and (especially) the Enlightenment (or the Age of Reason), we have discovered science and improved our society to the extent that science and reason have advanced and religion (=Christianity) have retreated.

However, contrary to this narrative, Hart will argue so called “Age of Reason” was in fact the beginning of the demise of reason’s place in the culture. And that modernism is in fact notable for its inflexible and unthinking dogmatism. And that it gives birth to religious and secular fundamentalisms. And to superstition. And that it does not deserve any particular credit for the rise of modern science. And that the nation state’s “capacity for barbarism exceeds any of the evils for which Christendom might justly be indicted”. (xii).

So, that’s where he’s going. Stay tunes for the argument itself.