In a comment on the last post, Andrea wrote:
I understand outgrowing things. I was a self proclaimed Pagan for 13 or so years. Recently after much study, therapy and self reflection I knew I had to take the plunge and drop the label. I can no longer label myself as a pagan. Doing this felt amazingly liberating. Who would have thought? Now this wasn’t necessarily a rejection of Paganism. I still find great value in many things deemed Pagan. This was just a moving forward from the need to put myself in a “box” that was stifling my growth. Now I know that this could be very offensive to some and I understand that.
The reason that I bring it up is that I am very interested in how you and Mandy came to this very different conclusion. Why Atheism?
I guess I should preface this by saying I’m only speaking for myself (deò) as I don’t want to speak for Mandy on this issue. My indication that we were “practicing atheists” in the last post was partly a joke (what kind of practice is that, exactly?), and partly not—I no longer consider myself religious, and it would be a stretch to call me “spiritual”. Why is that? Why go from a public voice for Paganism to completely non-religious? I’ve outlined the reasons for stepping away from Paganism before (see the “About” section of this website), but why not replace it with some broader or alternate religious or spiritual perspective?
I was raised Christian and my transition to Paganism was long and filled with Christian guilt. Eventually I moved through the stages… from guilt, to resentment of Christianity, to indifference toward Christianity. By the time I was publishing this podcast I had completely washed myself clean of my Christian roots—no longer feeling any association with the religion, not even on the subtlest emotional level. For this, I owe Paganism; it happened to be in the right place at the right time to get me away from Christianity.
Having subsequently dropped Paganism, the question would seem to be: why not replace it with another spiritual perspective? I submit that this is the wrong question. The question ought to be: What accounts for anyone ever taking up another belief system having dropped a previous one? I think there are probably two good reasons for holding a belief. The first is evidence. The second is training. When it comes to religious belief, we lack the first independently of the interpretations furnished by the second. “Training” could mean simply being raised in a particular religious culture. Or it could mean being brainwashed by a cult… or, less ominously, being immersed in a religious culture that eventually becomes second-nature.
When I chose Paganism, it was a radically free choice: I had no evidence for its truth, nor was I trained into it. In retrospect, I don’t think that I had a good reason for choosing Paganism. I don’t think I had a good reason for adopting those beliefs. Looking back, I wonder if I ever actually “believed” anything at all. My entire time in Paganism was dedicated to making it more palatable to the skeptic (hence most of the philosophy discussions on the show). Many Pagans are as skeptical as I was, and I think a lot of them found and enjoyed the show because of this. There are others, however, who profess a faith in the gods as strongly as Christians profess a faith in theirs. I find this interesting: These people seem to have genuine belief. But what a strange set of beliefs to choose! Pagan religious cultures haven’t been around in thousands of years in most cases, and even then they took on quite different forms. Although more and more people are being born into Pagan families, at one time in recent history everyone came to Paganism through the same radical choice as I did: Without evidence or training. There is an interesting question about why they chose Pagan beliefs… but a more preliminary question is: Is it even possible to radically choose your beliefs? Can you arbitrarily pick a set of propositions and just as arbitrarily believe them without evidence or training? Are such “beliefs” genuine beliefs? I suppose that once you have chosen a set of propositions you could eventually train yourself to genuinely believe them—especially if they come complete with a religious culture in which to immerse yourself. But what about the initial choice? This is a “fake it ’till you make it” approach to belief, and I am curious as to why people are motivated to fake it in the first place. In my case the reasons were not good ones.
You might think I’m picking on Paganism here, but the same holds for any religion. If I were to adopt any other spiritual perspective after having left Paganism, I would be faced with the same dilemma: What would motivate me to adopt another set of “beliefs” without evidence or training? In the case of Paganism, I realize now that it was its romantic tone, fantastical escapism, and promises of deep dark secrets that attracted me to it. Having realized that, I don’t agree that those are good reasons to join a religion, and I wouldn’t allow myself to do anything similar again.
So why atheism? The answer is that I simply don’t have a choice. I haven’t any proof of any other religion’s truth. Nor do I have the training in any other religion. I also will not “fake it ’till I make it” with another set of “beliefs” for the wrong reasons. The only remaining alternative is atheism.
Why not agnosticism? I was reading the blog of Colin McGinn (a famous philosopher) recently, and he wrote this:
We certainly do know that Santa Klaus does not exist, or goblins, or three-legged giants who live in the fridge; it would be daft to be “agnostic” about such questions—and even dafter to remain “open-minded” about them… We indeed don’t know everything, but some things we know quite well—and the complete falsity of religious doctrine is one of them.
I agree with him completely.
The universe is an amazing place, and I continue (as a career, even) to explore its wonders. However, I do this in a way that cannot be called religious or spiritual by any definition. Indeed, I found that trying to keep my philosophical endeavors consistent with some form of Paganism only served to hinder those philosophical endeavors. Having severed my religious allegiance I am now free to explore the wonders of the universe openly and honestly, and follow that path of inquiry wherever it goes. That path of inquiry, though, is constrained by reason and evidence. Religion, therefore, can simply play no part.



