Whenever I confront this kind of argument I am left dissatisfied. The reason is that from my perspective, I recognise I am outside the debate between faith and reason. This debate is between those who espouse their religious beliefs in way which I find hilariously stupid, and those are trying to knock some rational sense into these 'believers' in a way which would stop them from being dangerous bigots.
I have seen this debate here in Australia. The problem is that it is an argument between those who believe in banal fairytales and those seek to deny the existence of mystery. They are both wedded at the hip - the rationalists have pushed themselves to an extreme precisely because of the aggression and absurdity of those they define themselves as not being.
Instead of getting on with the task of defining a new religion that will take humanity into a meaningful future, they feel it necessary to debunk and outrage the believers.
In my view, the rationalists are the same as the believers, because their ideas sit on the surface of their being, like wind blown flotsam. Underneath they all live exactly the same - all follow the same daily ritual of being pushed and pulled by the attitudes and behaviours that permeate the 'world'. If you look closely, you will find they all have similar attitudes to family, health, friends, finance, betrayal, violence to self or those close to us, truthfulness, love and pride. I leave the madhats out of this as they are deranged.
The rationalists believe that religion creates wars. It is the 'other' that creates wars, and humans create the 'other' at the drop of a hat - no matter what nationality, religion or belief.
I wish the rationalists would stop giving lip-service to 'spiritual' experiences of awe and wonder, and apply their rationality to the two biggest questions humanity is facing.
1. We don't know everything, and we never will. So everyone should stop believing their 'view' is so 'right', and begin the process of acknowledging and pondering the consequences of the unknowable.
2. Humanity is falling into a pit of meaninglessness. A new paradigm of personal meaning has to be explored, and is being explored, but by too few. We have plenty of social meaningfulness - thanks to the huge influence of humanism and socialism upon our attitudes to those around us, who are not sharing in the material and physical wealth of our times. But when it comes to an inner meaning, we are left without guidance from rationalists and religious alike. As a friend of Julie's recently asked on Facebook - "What's the point?" Everyone was stumped for an intelligent and thought-out answer, because we all avoid that question.
I suppose the work of these rationalists is a battle which has to be fought, against the dangerous absurdity of rabid religio-beliefs. So best they lock horns. But the real issues for all of us a living beings about to die, is being left un-addressed.
