In a recent interview with Rachel Johnson of LBC News, Richard Dawkins, prominent atheist and author of “The God Delusion,” seemed to offer regret about his previous outspoken views against Christianity.
“I call myself a cultural Christian,” he said. “I’m not a believer, but there’s a distinction between being a believing Christian and being a cultural Christian. … I love hymns and Christmas carols, and I sort of feel at home in the Christian ethos. … We [in the U.K.] are a ‘Christian country’ in that sense.”
He went on to say, “If I had to choose between Christianity and Islam, I’d choose Christianity every single time. It seems to me to be a fundamentally decent religion in a way that I think Islam is not.”
Dawkins’ comments came in April after it was reported that Ramadan lights, rather than Easter decorations, were being put up on Oxford Street in London.
Since then—particularly from the migrant standpoint—it seems things have only gotten worse in the UK. Frustrations reached a tipping point recently after children were stabbed in Southport, a town in northwest England not far from Liverpool, an event that sparked protests resulting in arrests for what some have called “thought crimes,” after native Englanders expressed outrage on social media, in language the British government referred to as hate speech. This governmental response has brought charges of Orwellian-type oppression, with many claiming that the government is tougher on its own citizens than illegals.
Although late to the game, Dawkins is much more correct than he likely even knows. I’ve written before about how nature abhors a vacuum, about my belief that, because humanism isn’t deep enough to provide the necessary spiritual underpinnings to hold together the populace of a nation, society will simply find a belief system that will. This seems to be what Dawkins is responding to. All those years when he was criticizing Christianity, he evidently thought that scientism, a form of humanism, would bring a kind of peace and enlightenment that it simply was never capable of bringing.
A look at history might’ve informed him.
Take a look at ancient Rome. During a time in which the cultural religion was basically humanistic—based as it was on deities who were more or less superhumans, with enlarged personalities and extended personal power—the civilization found itself on the verge of collapse, until Constantine had the insight to adopt Christianity as the state religion, tossing a lifeline to Rome and heralding a centuries-long period of the Holy Roman Empire.
The same can be said for revolutionary-era France. After several iterations of the nouveau regime—some of which had killed priests and nuns and turned Notre Dame Cathedral into the Hall of Reason—Napolean had the good sense to bring the Church back into the national system, adding peace and continuity to a tumultuous and untenable situation.
Finally, and most recently, Vladimir Putin—most likely learning the lessons of the past and observing the problems accruing in the West—has gone against the country’s past orthodoxy, renewing and smoothing relations with the Russian national Church.
So, what are the lessons learned by these imminent figures? It is this: Christianity has outlasted all temporal societies and is likely to do so still. Put another way, if our way of life is to continue in any way resembling what it has been to this point, we must not cast aside our central, most dominant characteristic.
Sadly, it seems the West is determined to ignore this fact, despite what atheists like Richard Dawkins might say. It’s almost as though our leaders are thinking, “No, we are not going back. Others have had their time free from moral restraint, now let us have ours as well—no matter what the outcome might be.”
As I’ve said before, nature abhors a vacuum. To leave a lawn untended after a recent cutting doesn’t mean it will stay that way, but rather that, if the inattention continues, all manner of poison weeds and prickly thorns are sure to follow. Dawkins knows this.
If only our country’s leaders would learn the same.
Along with his father, Allen Keller runs a lumber business in Stevenson, Alabama. He has a Ph.D. in Creative Writing from Florida State University and an MBA from University of Virginia. He can be reached for comment at allen@kellerlumber.net.
The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the policy or position of 1819 News.
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