Theological innatism is one of the main reasons why many theists find atheists abhorrent

Recently in a rather brief discussion with AV, we commented on how difference from convention is often interpreted as commentary on the convention. Specifically, how being an atheist could effectively be a “slap in the face” of some theists.

While agreeing with AV in general, I think the “slap in the face” analogy is somewhat flawed. While it may feel like a slap in the face for some theists, slaps in the face rather tend to be intentional and aggressive. While on the other hand, atheists rather don’t tend to be atheists out of some intention toward theists.

What theists think about atheists and how they may feel about atheists, may inform any decision an atheist makes about revealing that they have no belief in God(s), but it isn’t going to inform their belief in God(s). At least not in the overwhelming majority of cases (and I say “majority”, rather than “all”, simply out of open-mindedness that some atheists may use such a poor reason to inform their belief – not that I’ve ever met one that does).

I still prefer Bertrand Russell’s observation, “Conventional people are roused to fury by departure from convention, largely because they regard such departure as a criticism of themselves.”

One of the main reasons (particularly the one I have in mind) why many theists have antipathy towards atheists, or feel that atheists have wronged them (or some metaphysic) just by being atheists is a reason that is internal to them. It isn’t something even in part of the atheist condition.

This particular reason being theological innatism.

Theological innatism, like other philosophical innatisms, posits that certain ideas and beliefs are a part of the human condition from birth. This is not to be mistaken with nativism, which while inspired by innativistic notions, is scientific in nature – cognitive science. Neurology and psychology are the stuff of nativism and it is utterly materialistic in nature.

Philosophical innatism can itself be materialistic, but not scientific – just because something material is explained, doesn’t mean you can generate a falsifiable hypothesis. Philosophical innatism is ideological. Arguably parts of Freudian psychology belong in this category (the behaviours are materialy observable, the explanation non-supernatural but the claims unfalsifiable).

Theological innatism doesn’t even go that far. The ideas one is seeded with at birth (or conception, or later in childhood depending on the specific theology) are of metaphysical, not material origin.

The Flying Spaghetti Monster’s noodly appendage and all that.

Now, a naive and benevolent innativist may believe that we all have a bit of God’s will acting within us (or a belief approximating this). This in an of itself doesn’t automatically lead to antipathy for atheists.

On more than one occasion, when confronted by the fact that I’m an atheist, a theist has gone on to argue that I’m “doing the lord’s work anyway” or that the “lord still works through” me (I do charity work with Christians from time to time). It’s a little patronising, but it’s not hateful. I can tolerate and indeed live this kind of difference – it’s not particularly harmful to anyone except those with the most phenomenally thin skin and an effort is being made to tolerate an atheist.

It should also be noted, and credited, that in such situations, Russell’s observed arousal to fury is obviously missing. If there is any ego defence (other than the benign equivocation itself), it is being quashed in lieu of affection.

I still don’t think that theological innatism is meritorious however. It’s supernatural, un-falsifiable, un-parsimonious and it is to cognitive science what creationism is to biology (with the more benign innatisms correlating with the more benign “Old Earth” creationisms).

It’s also quite obviously a self-serving act of taking a conclusion and ramming it in as an a priori assumption.

There is a point where innatism becomes distinctly harmful. When a theist assumes that not only are people magically inculcated at birth with the values of their deity, but that the truth of this is self-evident to people who profess disbelief in said deity, you have a recipe for disaster.

It’s quite obvious how this view can arise in the innatist; if it is self-evident to the theological innatist and this supposedly self-evident truth is itself inculcated divinely to all people, it must be self-evident to everyone else.

So in this light, the person who disavows knowledge of God does so in the supposed knowledge of God’s existence. Simply not accepting God as a priori, is an act of deception!

This is where that vile slur “there are no atheists in foxholes” comes from. The slur that assumes that all atheists really do believe in God/Christ but only confess during periods of tribulation.

It doesn’t have to be directed at atheists either. Take the Jews. Aside from the whole deicide nonsense, Jews have been castigated by Christian anti-Semites for not accepting Christ as the son of God for well over a millennium now.

Now if one presupposes for these heretics, that confession to the truth of God’s word only comes about through tribulation and that embracing the truth of God’s word is a good and loving thing, one can see how the use of torture can be seen as a good and loving thing. This was how The Inquisition operated.

This isn’t a correlation between religion and violence, this isn’t just violence perpetrated by people who happen to be religious, this is violence as a product of religion and only of religion.

There is a continuum of aggression that can be seen as the unavoidable product of theological innatism. From the most benign patronising, a very minor aggression but still an aggression in its subversion of another’s identity, to outright maiming and killing.

If good comes of theological innatism, it is only ever as a side effect. Often the side-effect can from a utilitarian perspective, be worth the small price of the lesser aggressions. I’ll gladly put up with the occasional benign sophistry if it means we can all get along.

There are however, significant acts of hate and deprivation of liberty that stem from this innativist continuum. The current stance of the Vatican on atheists is one of contempt. The current Pope himself has run smears against atheists, based on their entirely fictional rebellion against a God that supposedly they really know is real.

Gays get it from the Australian Christian Lobby, who argue that allowing gay marriage is oppressive to Christians. Their values supposedly being inculcated by default in the entire human population, including the authority of their God and subsequently their church(es). Clearly, any Government that would allow gay marriage is undermining the authority of the church.

Gays get it from the notion that homosexuality is unnatural and just a lifestyle choice; God wouldn’t program that into people now would he!

Theological innatism is an intolerant philosophy. It is closed in the terms used by Popper in The Open Society and Its Enemies. When theological innatism informs power structures, they as well are also necessarily closed, which makes theological innatism inappropriate for integration into secular democracies. You won’t get open government from innatism.

George Pell, not just the boss of Australian Catholic churches, but also a big-wig in the re-branded Inquisition that once used torture and murder people to love people as a function of its innatism, understandably argues for closed government – he calls it “normative democracy”. Not that Pell’s normative democracy would start killing people for their beliefs or lack thereof, but certainly to restrict practices on arbitrary grounds that a government couldn’t possibly account for.

The subversion of identity is perhaps the most pernicious aspect of theological innatism. While in some instances benign, collectively having innativists telling the stories of atheists results in a culture flooded by misrepresentations. Notably, the notion that God works through atheists anyway isn’t a particularly pervasive one.

Amongst the innativist (mis)representations, atheist identity is defined predominantly in a disparaging light.

Like a stalker starved for love, who tells themselves that the object of their contempt really does love them, many innativists obsess over atheists, telling themselves that they will come over to their way of thinking. The problem is, it is not just prominent amongst theological innativists, but it is prominent in the broader culture.

Dictionary definitions have ignored what atheists actually think in lieu of innativist slurs. “Atheists. You believe what my dictionary says you believe!” Of course, it varies by reference material what “atheist” supposedly means.

Once upon a time “atheist” simply meant someone who didn’t do what God told them to do.

Maritain wrote of atheists;

“From the first point of view, or with regard to the manner in which atheism is professed, I have already remarked that there are, in the first place, practical atheists, who believe that they believe in God but who in actual fact deny His existence by their deeds and the testimony of their behavior. Then there are pseudo-atheists, who believe that they do not believe in God but who in actual fact unconsciously believe in Him, because the God whose existence they deny is not God but something else. Finally there are absolute atheists, who really do deny the existence of the very God in Whom the believers believe — God the Creator, Savior and Father, Whose name is infinitely over and above any name we can utter. Those absolute atheists stand committed to change their entire system of values and to destroy in themselves everything that could possibly suggest the name they have rejected; they have chosen to stake their all against divine Transcendence and any vestige of Transcendence whatsoever.“

(Jaques Maritain, 1953)

All three definitions are informed by theological innantism.

The practical atheist supposedly believes in God. The pseudo-atheist is mistaken about not believing in God (how utterly patronising) and the absolute atheist deny the existence (hard atheism straw-man) and seek to destroy that in them which recognises God.

So how does Maritain demonstrate that God put something in atheists to rebel against? He doesn’t. Nor do the rest of the theological innativism crowd. They simply assume it.

Useful thing this just-assume-it meme. You can make anything true if you think that make-believe is good enough. The problem I have with this is that Maritain and people inspired by him and his like, make accusations about people’s character. It really obligates them to demonstrate and not just assume.

Conclusion

Being a closed, self-sealing ideology, conflict between theological innativist world views and other world views are intrinsically intractable. Some of the conflicts aren’t worth worrying about but others, where the common language is steered towards the misrepresentation of people’s identities (deep down atheists believe in God, homosexuality isn’t natural, the Jews revolt against Jesus who they know is their saviour etc), contribute toward a culture that marginalises, dehumanises and oppresses.

There is some carrying capacity for this of course. A society need not automatically crack down on this hate talk-think and should avoid it in all bar emergency scenarios where the intolerant innativists gain the power to enact repression.

In the interim between the extremes of theological innativist intolerance, where secular democracy is healthy, these intolerant sorts should be challenged by criticism. Prolifically. The institutions that publish and promulgate the demonization, should be challenged to validate their very existence.

Indeed, why is the Vatican even a state? (Answer: It has a treaty with the cascading faliure of democracy that is the Italian state.)

People sometimes wonder why atheists speak out. It is a disingenuous query because the people who utter it rarely ever have an inquisitive mind – rather the query is rhetorical – they are stating that atheists have nothing to complain about, and that they just fixate too much on what people practice in the privacy of their own homes (which they can do, but not always or exclusively).

Atheists do have something to complain about. They are the subject of aggression. The godless have been targets in a culture war that has gone on for ages. An intractable culture war.

A culture war, where the very minds of atheists are being claimed as part of the domain of the church. Atheists are quite right to fight back.

~ Bruce