Irreligion illustrated
Friend and freelance thinker Nathan Schneider penned a Boston Globe Ideas piece last week discussing the Templeton-funded studies that link religion and health, noting the absence of comparable studies exploring links between irreligion and health, and concluding, "Religions, we are beginning to learn, can be better understood by paying attention to what irreligion looks like."
This illustration accompanied the piece (click for larger version). It was drawn by Greg Klee, art director for the Ideas section of the Boston Globe. When Nathan asked him about his motivation, Mr. Klee replied, "My intent was to show one person is walking away from the churches and the ‘rest of society’ and to be perfectly happy doing so." In jest, he added, "Is that deep enough?"
Yes, that's precisely the message I took from the illustration. It succeeds as an unsettling image because it both pleases and irks everyone. The apparent non-religionist walking away probably enjoys thinking of himself as an irreverent loner, while the religious people probably enjoy thinking of themselves as a community. Each will be satisfied by that portrayal. But the loner might dislike that he's just walking away - towards what exactly? That's been the common critique of post-religious society: where are we going? And the religious group might dislike, even in their elegant city of spires and minerets, that only person singing is the loner. Well done, Mr. Klee.
I used to be a lot better at discussing religion. I could talk theology with both academic lingo and allusions to religious practice - all now quite happily forgotten. Richard Rubenstein's 1966 book, After Auschwitz, which I discovered on my parents' bookshelf at age 17, did more than any other work to shatter my teenaged relatively traditional theology of a present God. But unlike Rubenstein and most other "radical" theologians dating back to Nietzsche's madman, I found the "death of God" to be an utterly liberating event. God was dead, the question of why-bad-things-happen-to-good-people was a bit closer to an answer, and for the love of the world, anything was possible.
If Mr. Klee's drawing continued to the left, I'd like it to show the modern city and (somehow) empowered people.
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2 comments:
Thanks for this, Eli. I love this passage from your post:
Richard Rubenstein's 1966 book, After Auschwitz, which I discovered on my parents' bookshelf at age 17, did more than any other work to shatter my teenaged relatively traditional theology of a present God. But unlike Rubenstein and most other "radical" theologians dating back to Nietzsche's madman, I found the "death of God" to be an utterly liberating event. God was dead, the question of why-bad-things-happen-to-good-people was a bit closer to an answer, and for the love of the world, anything was possible.I very much share your sense of liberation in the death of God, but I've felt a similar liberation also in the life of God too; both repeatedly. Here's a passage from a comment I made last year on a post by Saba Mahmood at The Immanent Frame:
Secularists rejoice in the experience of liberation in secularism, and it is true, this liberation comes from a critique. It can be emotionally exhilarating, filled with the thrill of unsettling old dogmas and seeing the world with fresh eyes. I give it that.
But this is not lost on so-called religion either. Much the same exhilaration, built also on a kind of critique, is part of the experience of cradle-secularists who “find religion.” I myself was one; when I was 18 years old, I converted to Catholicism from my secular upbringing. It was a thrilling experience, a liberating one, built on a critique of how secularism had fallen short. Since, I have undergone a number of pendulum-swings back and forth between secular and religious thinking. Each move has been infused with its own form of critique and its own sense of exhilarated liberation.I can't believe Blogger doesn't accept blockquote tags in comments! WordPress is so much better:)
Agreed, blogger really ought to accept blockquote tags in comments.
I'm a little wary of the "liberation" idea working both ways, both for people leaving and coming into religion. I was raised in a religious family, but really came into it at age 15 (you see I didn't last very long). That was exciting, I remember. I felt like I was discovering something - about both the world and myself. But was it liberating? No, in fact, it was restricting! The Jews have a ton of rules to obey - sabbath day, kashrut, no adultery, etc. No sir, not liberating.
I'd guess that those who "swing" (in the religious, not sexual, sense) experience a feeling of relief as they move with the pendulum - relief from the excesses they feel from one side, relief at rejoining a crew that seems to understand those perceived excesses.
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