Backroom Poll. The (major) Religious Affiliation in Backroom...

[Kralizec]

As a belief system atheism has an extreme povety of adherents, and the recent increases are, rather like homosxuality, more to do with people being willing to finally come out of the closet than anything else.

Well, you're free to dismiss 18% as an insignificant minority, of course

In common you have a distrust of religion and the religious, a belief in Reason and Science as being incompatable with theism, and a hyper-secular attitude to government.

Not really...while some/many are indeed against continuous attempts by religious people to get their religion accomodated by the state and to enforce their values and biases in the socio-political sphere, just as many if not more are indifferent to religion in general.

Really, there's nothing that all atheists have in common except atheism as such...and of course our wickedly cool atheist handshake.

[Beskar]

Really, there's nothing that all atheists have in common except atheism as such...and of course our wickedly cool atheist handshake.

And our cool slogan'd t-shirts.

"Atheism is a non-prophet organization"

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

"I Believe in Life before Death"

"We got the fossils. We win."

"Just another:
Godles Amoral Arrgoant Depraved Devil-worshipping Baby--killing Hedonistic Paganistic Angry Evil Unnatural Freedom-hating
Atheist!"

"BELIEVE"

"READ IT
before you BELIEVE it"

etc

[Aemilius Paulus]

Skullheadhq is a Christian? Is that some sort of a joke?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Well, you're free to dismiss 18% as an insignificant minority, of course

Not really...while some/many are indeed against continuous attempts by religious people to get their religion accomodated by the state and to enforce their values and biases in the socio-political sphere, just as many if not more are indifferent to religion in general.

Really, there's nothing that all atheists have in common except atheism as such...and of course our wickedly cool atheist handshake.

18% is a very small number given the media and intellectual bias in much of the West.

As far as not believing the same things, atheists believe there is no supernatural, which is a very fundamental statement about the universe on a par with "There is a loving God". The self-identifying atheists on this forum are far more vocal than any of the religious groups about opposing the beliefs of others; as evidenced by the numbers of my regular interlocutors.

[The Wizard]

Not really, the 2005 poll: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_Europe showed that only France and the Low Countries have large numbers of atheists, and even France polls less atheists than theists. The only countries that actually poll more atheists than theists were the Czech Republic and Estonia; both former Warsar Pact countries.

So....

No, atheists do not make up "a very large" proportion of the European population.

You base yourself on the Eurobarometer poll, with its extremely vague set of questions ("spirit or life force"... what?). You would get totally different results with different questions, which makes such a poll very suspect. I mean really dude, compare the Eurobarometer to the Gallup poll's results in the same article and the problem becomes clear right away.

Also, note that I said "a very large group", out of which you made "a very large proportion", which means something different. In my book, if more than a third of any country's population is areligious (which, moreover, is a term that includes a lot more than atheism, so again please don't take my words out of context), that's a very large group, considering the fact that such vast numbers of areligiosity are unprecedented in all of human history.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

You base yourself on the Eurobarometer poll, with its extremely vague set of questions ("spirit or life force"... what?). You would get totally different results with different questions, which makes such a poll very suspect. I mean really dude, compare the Eurobarometer to the Gallup poll's results in the same article and the problem becomes clear right away.

Also, note that I said "a very large group", out of which you made "a very large proportion", which means something different. In my book, if more than a third of any country's population is areligious (which, moreover, is a term that includes a lot more than atheism, so again please don't take my words out of context), that's a very large group, considering the fact that such vast numbers of areligiosity are unprecedented in all of human history.

Try ancient Rome for areligious. Historically most people have a very vague idea about spirituality and the afterlife; they go with whatever the elite decide. What is almost unprecedented is the departure between the elite and the masses in terms of religion. Increasingly the European elite is amoral, relativistic and atheistic. It believes in nothing, save the mechanics of Science and Logic. By contrast, the masses continue to have the same vague, quasi-spiritual, relationship with the world around them.

[The Wizard]

Ancient Rome was anything but areligious, buddy. Before the modern era there simply wasn't any room for abandoning the idea of god(s) altogether, except amongst some isolated, well-off philosophers.

Once again, you assert that being areligious (i.e. not having a god, which means you can be anything from ignostic to atheistic to apathetic and back again) means you're amoral. That is quite a disgusting point of view to hold, friend. Thanks for calling me that. Me and all the other people here who happen to lack a religion.

In any case, you failed to reply to my comments on the validity of the Eurobarometer poll. Instead you merely assert that "the masses" in Europe are still "vaguely quasi-spiritual (sic)" (ah, so now they aren't theistic anymore are they?), without backing such a statement up. One look at a clearer poll with better questions like the Gallup one, and the continually dropping church attendance and membership rates across the West will cast doubt on any claim that (organized) religion isn't dying here, or that being areligious means you're part of a tiny minority.

[Centurion1]

Ancient Rome was anything but areligious, buddy. Before the modern era there simply wasn't any room for abandoning the idea of god(s) altogether, except amongst some isolated, well-off philosophers.

Once again, you assert that being areligious (i.e. not having a god, which means you can be anything from ignostic to atheistic to apathetic and back again) means you're amoral. That is quite a disgusting point of view to hold, friend. Thanks for calling me that. Me and all the other people here who happen to lack a religion.

I think PVC is implying that the rich and powerful people in society are often areligious and Rome is merely an example for something that very commonly occurs. Honestly, I can't argue with him. I guarantee half the powerful people in history we think of areligious were probably putting on a show. As to being amoral i don't think he intended it to come out the way it did.

[Louis VI the Fat]

18% is a very small number given the media and intellectual bias in much of the West.

18% is the number of outspoekn atheists. Not the number of non-Christians or non-believers.
Some 18% is Christian in most of North, West, and Eastern Europe. You see churches from up close on a regular basis, don't you? How many people under the age of 65 do you see? How many Westerners, how many men?
Christianity is all but gone in Northwest Europe, save for rural areas, and the old, sick, and non-Westerners. What remains, is some vague notion of spirituality that holds the mass in between in its grip.


Also, there is no intellectual bias against vague notions of spirituality, no more than there is a bias against a vague notion of faith healing medicine or flat earths.

The intellectual elite is there to lead, not to stoop down to the level of the lowest common denominator. A doctor tells you that homeopathy has no basis in science. An engineer tells you that carpets don't fly, and aeroplanes do. Geologists tell that the earth is not flat. Such is the task of the educated elite.
What we are witnessing, is a crisis in authority. From politics to doctors to scientists, the masses consider their own knowledge on par with those of the professionals.

[Centurion1]

The intellectual elite is there to lead, not to stoop down to the level of the lowest common denominator. A doctor tells you that homeopathy has no basis in science. An engineer tells you that carpets don't fly, and aeroplanes do. Geologists tell that the earth is not flat. Such is the task of the educated elite.
What we are witnessing, is a crisis in authority. From politics to doctors to scientists, the masses consider their own knowledge on par with those of the professionals.

That is a very snobbish elitist tone which makes out as all religious are imbeciles and its the job of the oh so intelligent elite to lead us. no thanks you can keep your elitism ill keep my god and guns.

[The Wizard]

I think PVC is implying that the rich and powerful people in society are often areligious and Rome is merely an example for something that very commonly occurs. Honestly, I can't argue with him. I guarantee half the powerful people in history we think of areligious were probably putting on a show. As to being amoral i don't think he intended it to come out the way it did.

No offense, but I can't quite make sense of your post. First you say you think ancient elites were areligious (tell that to the kings of Babylon or the pontifex maximus in Rome...) then you say they're putting on a show? Maybe you meant to write "as religious" instead of "areligious"?

[Centurion1]

Sorry i meant that those putting on a show of being religious when they really weren't.

I can give you plenty of popes names who were simple political animals and could care less about being in with god. And i'm catholic.

[The Wizard]

As said, elites. Tiny, tiny elites, like those ancient Greek philosophers who rejected the idea of gods. The masses remained deeply religious. There was no chance in Hell a large portion of the population of a pre-modern society would have become areligious. That is why I said the numbers we see today (up to 90%) are absolutely unprecedented.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Ancient Rome was anything but areligious, buddy. Before the modern era there simply wasn't any room for abandoning the idea of god(s) altogether, except amongst some isolated, well-off philosophers.

I dissagree, Rome was areligious in the sense you mean, in that there was no real hold which any one religion had, and that most public religion was mostly for show. Until Christianity took over Rome was a city of apaphy really. The glut of Eastern cults (much like the modern rise of Islam) were a symptom of the general disregard for the traditional forms of religion, which by the Second Century AD fe took seriously. Look at Stoicism or Epicuranism, too of the most popular philosophical schools in Rome, both atheistic; or at best Deistic.

Once again, you assert that being areligious (i.e. not having a god, which means you can be anything from ignostic to atheistic to apathetic and back again) means you're amoral. That is quite a disgusting point of view to hold, friend. Thanks for calling me that. Me and all the other people here who happen to lack a religion.

Nope, I didn't link the two; I merely stated that the European Elite was both. I have said repeatedly that the two are not linked, and I would thank you to stop inflicting your prejudices against Christians on me. If anything, the elite are atheistic because they are amoral and relativistic, not vice versa.

In any case, you failed to reply to my comments on the validity of the Eurobarometer poll. Instead you merely assert that "the masses" in Europe are still "vaguely quasi-spiritual (sic)" (ah, so now they aren't theistic anymore are they?), without backing such a statement up. One look at a clearer poll with better questions like the Gallup one, and the continually dropping church attendance and membership rates across the West will cast doubt on any claim that (organized) religion isn't dying here, or that being areligious means you're part of a tiny minority.

Theism is an extremely vague term, at root it indicates a belief, so I haven't changed my position. If you had read the medieval priest's manuals that I have you would know that, in general, only a very small proportion of a congregation had a firm grasp of Catholic doctrine. If anything the numbers of "quality" believers have risen massively over the last 100 years or so.

As said, elites. Tiny, tiny elites, like those ancient Greek philosophers who rejected the idea of gods.

The same elites as today, really. Bear in mind, most of those philosophers, Plato, Xenophon, Aristole etc. were very well connected politically.

The masses remained deeply religious. There was no chance in Hell a large portion of the population of a pre-modern society would have become areligious. That is why I said the numbers we see today (up to 90%) are absolutely unprecedented.

Do you know anything abour pre-modern religion? About the contractural forms of non-salvationary religion, or the small uptake in salvatory religion prior to Constantine?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

18% is the number of outspoekn atheists. Not the number of non-Christians or non-believers.

I'm only talking about atheists.

Some 18% is Christian in most of North, West, and Eastern Europe.

Surely the West includes Spain? Still largely and enthusiastically Roman Catholic. In any case, 18% is just the number that attend Church regularly, so it doesn't include people like me in various stages of spiritual recovery after being savaged by an atheistic school-system.

You see churches from up close on a regular basis, don't you? How many people under the age of 65 do you see? How many Westerners, how many men?

Lots, especially at Christmas an Easter, a very good cross section of local people. The Christmas Eve before last I could not get into the Cathedral because it would have breached fire regulations.

Christianity is all but gone in Northwest Europe, save for rural areas, and the old, sick, and non-Westerners. What remains, is some vague notion of spirituality that holds the mass in between in its grip.

....and the young, and educated, finally our from under their parents thumbs.... The largest scoiety at the University of Exeter is the Evangelical Christian Union, despite their ructions with the University. Google them, they aren't exactly wholesome at the upper echelons. Their mid-day lunch bars fill the audatorium, though.

Also, there is no intellectual bias against vague notions of spirituality, no more than there is a bias against a vague notion of faith healing medicine or flat earths.

So, a definite opposition, then?

The intellectual elite is there to lead, not to stoop down to the level of the lowest common denominator. A doctor tells you that homeopathy has no basis in science. An engineer tells you that carpets don't fly, and aeroplanes do. Geologists tell that the earth is not flat. Such is the task of the educated elite.
What we are witnessing, is a crisis in authority. From politics to doctors to scientists, the masses consider their own knowledge on par with those of the professionals.

The ability of your culture to justify the replacement of onwe aristocracy with another, time after time, does not cease to amaze me.

The crisis of authority is due to the shunning of a class of expert as well educated as the engineer, the geologist, and perhaps even the doctor. Find a replacement for the priest and the Bishop and you will have fewer problems with your peasants.

[Beskar]

That is a very snobbish elitist tone which makes out as all religious are imbeciles and its the job of the oh so intelligent elite to lead us. no thanks you can keep your elitism ill keep my god and guns.

I bet god is glad to know that you rank him in the same importance as killing your fellow man.

So much for "love your neighbour".

[The Wizard]

I dissagree, Rome was areligious in the sense you mean, in that there was no real hold which any one religion had, and that most public religion was mostly for show. Until Christianity took over Rome was a city of apaphy really. The glut of Eastern cults (much like the modern rise of Islam) were a symptom of the general disregard for the traditional forms of religion, which by the Second Century AD fe took seriously. Look at Stoicism or Epicuranism, too of the most popular philosophical schools in Rome, both atheistic; or at best Deistic.

What exactly is areligious about the continuing and widespread worship of thousands upon thousands of deities? Just because they weren't part of the imperial cult doesn't mean Roman society was areligious. These people worshiped gods and did so quite dedicatedly, if in a way alien to Christian practice today. Why, taking your argument to its logical conclusion would indicate Hinduism is areligious (if India had a state religion, that is). Who would make such a claim?

Nope, I didn't link the two; I merely stated that the European Elite was both. I have said repeatedly that the two are not linked, and I would thank you to stop inflicting your prejudices against Christians on me. If anything, the elite are atheistic because they are amoral and relativistic, not vice versa.

What prejudices against Christians? Where did I attach what I have seen in your comments to Christians in general? And perhaps you should qualify your remarks some more, because putting amoral in the same line of adjectives as atheistic will very rapidly make you look like you're connecting the two, obviously.

Theism is an extremely vague term, at root it indicates a belief, so I haven't changed my position. If you had read the medieval priest's manuals that I have you would know that, in general, only a very small proportion of a congregation had a firm grasp of Catholic doctrine. If anything the numbers of "quality" believers have risen massively over the last 100 years or so.

the⋅ism  /ˈθiɪzəm/ [thee-iz-uhm]
–noun
1. the belief in one God as the creator and ruler of the universe, without rejection of revelation.
2. belief in the existence of a god or gods.

No-one sacrificing to Jupiter or taking part in the Bacchanalia likely rejected such ideas. I suggest you read up on your history.

The same elites as today, really. Bear in mind, most of those philosophers, Plato, Xenophon, Aristole etc. were very well connected politically.

Doesn't matter. Those elites were extremely tiny compared to the great mass of the population that was deeply devoted to the many cults of our ancestors. In fact, I'd wager a large portion of the elites were, too.

Do you know anything abour pre-modern religion? About the contractural forms of non-salvationary religion, or the small uptake in salvatory religion prior to Constantine?

Not enough, apparently, to know the terms you're using. But enough to know that a lack of belief altogether was impossible in pre-modern societies. People simply lacked the time, the resources and the education to contemplate matters and to doubt the words of priests. The closest you could get to widespread areligious sentiment in pre-modern society would be ancestor worship and related belief systems as seen in ancient Chinese religion. But that can hardly be called areligious, since it was still clearly religious in nature.

Oh, and to comment on your debate with Louis: organized religion is dying in the West, there's no way to get around it. Just because people like to go to church once or twice a year during major events doesn't change anything about that.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

What exactly is areligious about the continuing and widespread worship of thousands upon thousands of deities?

It wasn't religion as you or I understand it. For starters, it wasn't metaphysical or spiritual. With the exception of cults like Isis, Mitrhas, and Orpheus, worship of the Gods was about repriscosity. That means, you pray to them and they are obligated to reward you.

Just because they weren't part of the imperial cult doesn't mean Roman society was areligious.

The Imperial Cult is an excellent example of forms over actual belief. Vespasian's last words according to Suetonius? "Oh, I do believe I'm becoming a God" (i.e. dieing).

These people worshiped gods and did so quite dedicatedly, if in a way alien to Christian practice today. Why, taking your argument to its logical conclusion would indicate Hinduism is areligious (if India had a state religion, that is). Who would make such a claim?

Hinduism is somewhat different to Roman religion because of the way it involves betterment and regeneration, but the argument can still be made that it's nothing more than an excuse for kicking the Dalits.

What prejudices against Christians? Where did I attach what I have seen in your comments to Christians in general? And perhaps you should qualify your remarks some more, because putting amoral in the same line of adjectives as atheistic will very rapidly make you look like you're connecting the two, obviously.

You have attached to me the prejudice that Christians believe they are the only people who are moral; that is not something I have ever said. You see in my comments something that only one other person has accused me of in about 4 years on these forums.

the⋅ism  /ˈθiɪzəm/ [thee-iz-uhm]
–noun
1. the belief in one God as the creator and ruler of the universe, without rejection of revelation.
2. belief in the existence of a god or gods.

No-one sacrificing to Jupiter or taking part in the Bacchanalia likely rejected such ideas. I suggest you read up on your history.

From whence does this definition come? It's backwards, in any case the second (proper) definition is extremely vague.

Doesn't matter. Those elites were extremely tiny compared to the great mass of the population that was deeply devoted to the many cults of our ancestors. In fact, I'd wager a large portion of the elites were, too.

Well.... many modern elites are still quite religious. So I fail to see your point.

Not enough, apparently, to know the terms you're using. But enough to know that a lack of belief altogether was impossible in pre-modern societies. People simply lacked the time, the resources and the education to contemplate matters and to doubt the words of priests.

This reamins true today, the people pontificating on this forum are either the young and callow or the intellectual elite; no one else has the time or compunction.

Oh, and to comment on your debate with Louis: organized religion is dying in the West, there's no way to get around it. Just because people like to go to church once or twice a year during major events doesn't change anything about that.

That's a nice belief to have, but the same churches were virtually empty 20 years ago. Taking the long view, religion began to recline after two brutal wars in Europe wiped out most of two generations. No one came through that unscathed and people passed on their distrust of any ideology or strong philosophical stance (as well as their pesismism) to their children. The Holocaust didn't help.

Decline continued well into the '80's and early '90's, but around ther turn of the millenium it appears to have stopped.

As you point out, for the majority of human history the vast majority of people have had some sort of religion. To suggest this is for any reason other than because they wanted one is foolhardy, the masses have rarely been so oppressed. After the last War atheism and Reason had a go at displacing religion; they failed and succeeded only in fracturing certain parts of society and leaving the ground open for ingorance and fundamentalism.

[HoreTore]

What the last decades of atheism has succeeded in, Philipvs, is to remove the christian influences from our laws. As Christianity has lost its grip on our part of the world, there is no denying that we have gained a lot more freedom. Women are now just as welcome in the workforce as men are, homosexuals are respected instead of jailed, freedom of speech is stronger, the list goes on.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

What the last decades of atheism has succeeded in, Philipvs, is to remove the christian influences from our laws. As Christianity has lost its grip on our part of the world, there is no denying that we have gained a lot more freedom. Women are now just as welcome in the workforce as men are, homosexuals are respected instead of jailed, freedom of speech is stronger, the list goes on.

...basic civil liberties are infringed, freedom of speech is curtailed, politics is increasingly amoral....

For the sake of Gay pride and Women's lib we've lost a lot too.

[HoreTore]

...basic civil liberties are infringed, freedom of speech is curtailed, politics is increasingly amoral....

For the sake of Gay pride and Women's lib we've lost a lot too.

Are they now....?

yes, yes, we have our PATRIOT acts. But back in the 50's, we had our Franco's, our McCarthyism, our blasphemy trials... No, there's been a very sharp increase of freedoms these last decades, and I don't think it's a coincidence that christianity has lost its hold on society during those same decades.

[The Wizard]

...basic civil liberties are infringed, freedom of speech is curtailed, politics is increasingly amoral....

Yes, this was never the case under noble Christian governments, or before the '60s broke the back of organized religion. Oh, wait

It wasn't religion as you or I understand it. For starters, it wasn't metaphysical or spiritual. With the exception of cults like Isis, Mitrhas, and Orpheus, worship of the Gods was about repriscosity. That means, you pray to them and they are obligated to reward you.

The nature of the beastie is completely beside the point. It was religion and you are admitting that. Good.

The Imperial Cult is an excellent example of forms over actual belief. Vespasian's last words according to Suetonius? "Oh, I do believe I'm becoming a God" (i.e. dieing).

Which was what I was saying. Just because the imperial cult was a façade doesn't mean the vast majority of Romans wasn't religious.

Hinduism is somewhat different to Roman religion because of the way it involves betterment and regeneration, but the argument can still be made that it's nothing more than an excuse for kicking the Dalits.

Yeah... but by what kind of person I leave open to speculation.

From whence does this definition come? It's backwards, in any case the second (proper) definition is extremely vague.

Why, a dictionary, obviously. What's backwards about defining theism as belief in a god or gods?

Well.... many modern elites are still quite religious. So I fail to see your point.

I'm pleased we agree, then. If modern elites are still to an extent religious (which goes directly against your previous argument that the elites weren't religious at all, interestingly enough), then imagine how it was before the modern era. And that's just the elite we're talking about!

This reamins true today, the people pontificating on this forum are either the young and callow or the intellectual elite; no one else has the time or compunction.

What brings you to dismiss in between one fifth and 80% of society as "no one"? Besides, were that even the case (which, seeing the numbers, it is not), it still leaves the fact that before the modern age people definitely had no time whatsoever.

That's a nice belief to have, but the same churches were virtually empty 20 years ago. Taking the long view, religion began to recline after two brutal wars in Europe wiped out most of two generations. No one came through that unscathed and people passed on their distrust of any ideology or strong philosophical stance (as well as their pesismism) to their children. The Holocaust didn't help.

Decline continued well into the '80's and early '90's, but around ther turn of the millenium it appears to have stopped.

Thousands of churches continue to close each year and church attendance and membership continues to drop like a stone, even in the United States. By the by, the death of organized religion began during the great wave of democratization and liberalization begun in the '60s. Before that, all you had were, in some countries, anticlerical movements (like in Belgium or France). Our societies were overwhelmingly religious, with all the negative consequences that entailed (such as intense social control and little personal freedom).

As you point out, for the majority of human history the vast majority of people have had some sort of religion.

So I take it this means you take back your earlier statement that there were widespread instances of irreligion/areligiosity before modernity?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Yes, this was never the case under noble Christian governments, or before the '60s broke the back of organized religion. Oh, wait

I didn't say that, but I fail to see the advance in trading one kind of oppression for another.

The nature of the beastie is completely beside the point. It was religion and you are admitting that. Good.

actually, it's exactly the point. Before Constantine state religion was non-salvatory, and basically the equivilent of having a lucky rabbit's foot. How many of your modern "areligious" people who are not atheists are still superstitious? If you look at medieval Christians you would see they are also more "superstitious" than what you or I understand as "religious".

Modern religion speaks to a spiritual need, not a practical one; this has always been the case with Christianity in particular.

Which was what I was saying. Just because the imperial cult was a façade doesn't mean the vast majority of Romans wasn't religious.

They were superstitious, not religious. The multiplicity of Gods served a practical rather than a moral or spiritual purpose. The number of people who were religious in the modern sense was probably lower than today, percentage-wise, if anything.

Yeah... but by what kind of person I leave open to speculation.

Well, I say it has been so used in the past.

Why, a dictionary, obviously. What's backwards about defining theism as belief in a god or gods?

Backwards in that definition 2 should have been definition 1. As to where is came from "a dictionary" means nothing. Dictionary of Englich? Of Philosophy? Of Theology?

I'm pleased we agree, then. If modern elites are still to an extent religious (which goes directly against your previous argument that the elites weren't religious at all, interestingly enough), then imagine how it was before the modern era. And that's just the elite we're talking about!

Broadly speaking the modern elite are, I believe, as I first described them. One only has to look at the corruption and lack of direction in the EU to see this. However, saying that a "tiny, tiny" number were irreligious in the past is as relevent as saying a tiny, tiny number are religious today. The point is that this elite is not the first elite to be this way.

What brings you to dismiss in between one fifth and 80% of society as "no one"? Besides, were that even the case (which, seeing the numbers, it is not), it still leaves the fact that before the modern age people definitely had no time whatsoever.

80%? 80% are what, not sure what's out there? That's pretty understandable when the 10-20% with the time to ponder the question mostly don't bother.

Thousands of churches continue to close each year and church attendance and membership continues to drop like a stone, even in the United States. By the by, the death of organized religion began during the great wave of democratization and liberalization begun in the '60s. Before that, all you had were, in some countries, anticlerical movements (like in Belgium or France). Our societies were overwhelmingly religious, with all the negative consequences that entailed (such as intense social control and little personal freedom).

Maybe I'm biased because my country has been more religiously liberal for longer. Regardless, we have one or two new Churches open each year in this city, and I have yet to see one close.

So I take it this means you take back your earlier statement that there were widespread instances of irreligion/areligiosity before modernity?

No, because this is not the first period of "irreligion" as you term it, and it's as likely to last as the others. I would have thought it was apparent that all previous periods of secularism failed spectacularly.

[Centurion1]

I bet god is glad to know that you rank him in the same importance as killing your fellow man.

So much for "love your neighbour".

I'm sure God appreciates the fact that i acknowledge his existence and do not believe others who believe him are unintelligent and misinformed, not to mention incapable of understanding science and reason.

Plus the comment was simple US political rhetoric.

[Louis VI the Fat]

That is a very snobbish elitist tone which makes out as all religious are imbeciles and its the job of the oh so intelligent elite to lead us. no thanks you can keep your elitism ill keep my god and guns.

You can keep your guns, plus all of your gods, chant healing and talking bushes.

In return, I want my right to snobbishly look down on the anti-intellectualism that is sweeping our societies. Not all statements are equal. The refusal to consider all statements equal is not bias, but the very task of the elites - whatever their subject.

Even faith is subject to a crisis in authority. Me, I'd rather people listened to a priest than their Tibetan chant healer. The church is mistrusted for very much the same reasons as the politician, the doctor, or the biologist.
I am waiting for the day passengers in an airplane will demand a referendum about how to land the plane, insisting the pilot is an elitist snob: 'who are you to assume you know better, eh? Think you are better than us?'

[Centurion1]

Maybe if he said with a sneer, it does't matter what we are doing im more intelligent than you by the simple fact i went to flight school.

[Rhyfelwyr]

I think people sometimes struggle to shake off the modern world view when viewing the world of the past.

For a start, there is this idea that organised religion was somehow a brutal source of social oppression. When they see a hierarhical church and a flock of simple followers, they presume the church elite must rule govern the peoples' lives, as if twelfth century England was somehow capable of the same levels of socia control as the totalitarian regimes of the 20th century. As PVC said, people in medieval times and before were simply supersitious. How could they know anything about Christianity when the services weren't even in a language they could understand?! Nope, Christianity in this time did not govern the peoples' every move. Heck, church attendance was pretty low until the early modern era,

Christianity didn't come to play any sort of serious role in the lives of the ordinary peasant (besides a few quasi-pagan festivals) until maybe the sixteenth century. It's not a coincidence that this is the time when the Reformation kicks off, as soon as the feudal order is breaking down, and new classes are emerging in the urban centres. It was these classes that made religion the social force we know it to be today. It was only after the Reformation that the ordinary person became aware of what the Bible taught, and as a result (alongside other factors) we start to see the rise of a more puritanical form of religion that really influences the lives of the ordinary person.

And this brings me on to the other point people misapply due to their modern biases - this rise in religion was far from being directed by elites, but at the same time it wasn't anti-intellectual. The elites were the old Catholic nobles who wanted to keep their subjects stupid and superstitious (except the Jesuits.. but don't get me started on the Jesuits!), whereas it was the rising class of artisans, merchants, and lower gentry that brought a much more strict and life-governing form of reliigon, more the kind we know today.

But just because they weren't the elites doesn't mean they were anti-intellectual, far from it. Instead, there was an almost populist idea of educating the masses - giving them the word and lifting them out of their superstitious and oppressed state. And this is why you have your ordinary peasant Scot reading advanced theology on par with anything of the enlightenment thinkers of the 18th century. Although I'll admit, that's a far cry from the situation today where fundamentalists spend their time looking up YEC vidoes on youtube.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

I think people sometimes struggle to shake off the modern world view when viewing the world of the past.

For a start, there is this idea that organised religion was somehow a brutal source of social oppression. When they see a hierarhical church and a flock of simple followers, they presume the church elite must rule govern the peoples' lives, as if twelfth century England was somehow capable of the same levels of socia control as the totalitarian regimes of the 20th century. As PVC said, people in medieval times and before were simply supersitious. How could they know anything about Christianity when the services weren't even in a language they could understand?! Nope, Christianity in this time did not govern the peoples' every move. Heck, church attendance was pretty low until the early modern era,

Christianity didn't come to play any sort of serious role in the lives of the ordinary peasant (besides a few quasi-pagan festivals) until maybe the sixteenth century. It's not a coincidence that this is the time when the Reformation kicks off, as soon as the feudal order is breaking down, and new classes are emerging in the urban centres. It was these classes that made religion the social force we know it to be today. It was only after the Reformation that the ordinary person became aware of what the Bible taught, and as a result (alongside other factors) we start to see the rise of a more puritanical form of religion that really influences the lives of the ordinary person.

And this brings me on to the other point people misapply due to their modern biases - this rise in religion was far from being directed by elites, but at the same time it wasn't anti-intellectual. The elites were the old Catholic nobles who wanted to keep their subjects stupid and superstitious (except the Jesuits.. but don't get me started on the Jesuits!), whereas it was the rising class of artisans, merchants, and lower gentry that brought a much more strict and life-governing form of reliigon, more the kind we know today.

But just because they weren't the elites doesn't mean they were anti-intellectual, far from it. Instead, there was an almost populist idea of educating the masses - giving them the word and lifting them out of their superstitious and oppressed state. And this is why you have your ordinary peasant Scot reading advanced theology on par with anything of the enlightenment thinkers of the 18th century. Although I'll admit, that's a far cry from the situation today where fundamentalists spend their time looking up YEC vidoes on youtube.

I think you're overstating the case somewhat, but I agree generally. Don't forget that sermons were always conducted in the vernacular, not to mention the Creeds, the Beatitides, etc.

[Kralizec]

Broadly speaking the modern elite are, I believe, as I first described them. One only has to look at the corruption and lack of direction in the EU to see this.

Surely this is a textbook example of the True Scotsman fallacy. If a politician is corrupt, he's obviously not a real christian

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Surely this is a textbook example of the True Scotsman fallacy. If a politician is corrupt, he's obviously not a real christian

Oh come on, if I said, "no true pacifist would kill someone", you wouldn't argue. No one obedient to God's Will is corrupt; definately.

Whether there's such a thing as "a good Christian" is another question entirely.