Imagine no Religion...
By
Roberto Diego
Chapter 10.
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Table of Contents
Chapter 2. Modern Cultural Paradigms
Chapter 3. The Principle of Progressive Benignity
Chapter 4. Ritual as Allegory
Chapter 6. How Does Altruism Feel?
Chapter 7. The Psychology of Collectivism
Chapter 8. The War against the Ego
Chapter 9. The Psychology of Moral Triangulation
Chapter 10. The Influence of the Enlightenment See Below
Chapter 11. A Culture in Moral Crisis Link coming soon
Chapter 12. The Tyranny of Organized Religion – Cult as Culture Link coming soon
Chapter 13. The Separation of Church and State Link coming soon
Chapter 14. Is Religion the Foundation of Society? Link coming soon
Chapter 15. Rationalism Link coming soon
Chapter 16. Cynicism and Chauvinism Link coming soon
Chapter 17. Definition of Religion Link coming soon
Chapter 18. Curing Man Link coming soon
Chapter 19. Disenfranchising Unreason Link coming soon
The disenfranchisement of religious cultural leaders Link coming soon
The disenfranchisement of the Suffering Savior paradigm Link coming soon
The disenfranchisement of the good/evil paradigm Link coming soon
The disenfranchisement of the chorus (collectivism) Link coming soon
The enfranchisement of the ego Link coming soon
The establishment of reason Link coming soon
Prologue Link coming soon
The conflict between religion and science was eloquently put on display when the Church insisted that science was merely hypothetical and that the discoveries of Galileo, Copernicus and others could not contradict the “God-given” view that the world was the center of the universe. When men began to see that scientists were bringing real knowledge of the world, such as that gained from observation and experimentation, we began to see an insistence that men be allowed to think scientifically; in other words without the interference of a religious authority. Though it was not explicit, when the process of induction started being practiced, the development of knowledge through observation and experiment caused philosophy to move away from religion.
Our ability to understand the negative consequences of religion is made more difficult because a major historical movement known as the Enlightenment (about 1650 – 1800 AD) has made us forget just how oppressive was religion in the period before the advent of the United States. The positive influence of the Enlightenment, a period when thinkers developed such ideas as man’s rights, science and economic freedom has clouded the fact that at one time religion had the power of government and during that time it imposed death and imprisonment upon anyone who opposed Church doctrine on a variety of issues. The creation of scientific societies and a belief that man could learn about the world, that what he learned meant something, led to new institutions of knowledge that competed with the superstitions of religion. Because of ideas like individual rights and the pursuit of happiness, the Enlightenment introduced self-respect and thereby weakened the moral and political powers of religion. For many decades after the Enlightenment, fewer men thought of themselves as evil and the result is that religion lost much of its power to induce guilt in people.
The only thing that religion could do in the intellectual environment inaugurated by the Enlightenment was to compromise. When new facts and new knowledge began to flood into and out of the universities, the Church had to change or become irrelevant. This compromise was the culmination of a long history of philosophical and political development that led to the birth of secular society and individualism. When the U.S. was created, the idea of a secular society of free individuals forced religion to compromise with freedom in order to stay viable. And indeed, for the first time in history, religion in America, made a concession to the rational; a concession that allowed men the rights and freedom founded by the Enlightenment. For the first time, after centuries of silencing intellectuals, imprisoning them and burning many of them at the stake, religion had no choice but to allow the separation of church and state. Its power to control officials and governments was no longer legal.
This compromise, however, did not change religion’s basic nature. Though it could no longer dominate man’s governments and thereby rule men through force, it still assumed the moral power to tell men how they should act. What was left of its message was love, hope and charity; God was merely a benevolent father figure who gave man the volition (freedom) that enabled him to choose to do good deeds. Religion lost its aura of power and infallibility and had to become just another competing institution. Though the Enlightenment freed men from the dictatorial nature of religion in the political arena, most men still accepted religion’s dominance in the areas where it exerted moral triangulation. This dominance meant that religion could appear benign while still subconsciously ruling men through that triangulation. At this point, the influence of religious cultural paradigms began to go underground.
The climax of this movement was the Constitution of the United States. Here, for the first time, a secular society was put into action and the freedom of man to explore, think and decide for himself was protected. Certainly, many of the framers of the Constitution were religious men but their intent was to separate the views of different religious influences from the lives of men as they functioned politically. It gave men the ability to go in any direction (religiously or secularly) that they chose. It outlawed religious strife by keeping religion out of government and it enabled independent thinking by means of protecting the rights of men to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The Bill of Rights solidified the victory of the independent mind and the result was capitalism, political freedom and brilliant new inventions that revolutionized living.
The Constitution forbids the advancement of religion specifically because of Europe’s history of religious wars, our witch trials at Salem and other persecutions engaged by one religious group over other religious groups. The Constitution established the idea that religion should not be part of the government in order to protect religious people as well as non-religious people from having a religion imposed upon them. My Catholic patron saint, Robert Bellarmine was one of the most cruel and vicious of the Church Fathers responsible for some of the most vile tortures including the prosecution of Galileo.
In order to continue the fight against the tyranny of religion and religious cultural paradigms, we must champion a “secular” society, one that refuses to accept the imposition of religious premises into men’s lives. A secular society is one that is based in reason, science, freedom and property rights. A secular society is a fully free capitalist society whose hallmark is that it considers any attempt to impose religion, either privately or publicly, as evil. When men learn the meaning and importance of reason in their lives, they will learn that only reason has sway in life and society, and they will begin to create a society that is positive, moral, free and affluent. Only a secular society will enable man to hold survival as his standard and establish cultural institutions that advance life, love, morality and hope.
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