Ending the pretense of faith

Question: What should pastors do if they no longer hold the defining beliefs of their denomination? Do clergy have a moral obligation not to challenge the sincere faith of their parishioners? If this requires them to dissemble from the pulpit, doesn't this create systematic hypocrisy at the center of religion? What would you want your pastor to do with his or her personal doubts or loss of faith?

Read "Preachers who are not Believers," a study by Daniel C. Dennett and Linda LaScola of the Center for Cognitive Studies at Tufts University.

Dan Dennett's and Linda LaScola's excellent study is fascinating - and rather moving - for a number of reasons. It is clear that the pressures and obstacles confronting a pastor who has lost his beliefs are even greater than those facing the rest of us when we need to make a major career change: if the very roof over your family's head belongs to the church for which you no longer feel able to work, the practical difficulties of changing direction are very great indeed. What's more, the church is all-consuming: not just a job, not just a home, but a whole life: it is always hard to make major changes, but how much harder when those changes will entail turning your whole life upside down, losing your closest friends, losing your sense of place in a community. Bad enough for an 'ordinary' churchgoer: how much worse for a pastor. It's terribly hard, and I empathize. I empathize, too, with their desire to persuade themselves that, by staying in their roles, they are somehow contributing to the greater good: it's an all-too human thing to do when leaving is such a daunting prospect.

What's more, I think it genuinely can be argued that these people are doing some good by staying in their posts, if only through the avoidance of harm. Even though, as Dan and Linda's report points out, they are mostly avoiding seriously challenging the most extreme of their parishioners' beliefs, at least they are not reinforcing them. There is no danger of these pastors exhorting their congregations to live their lives in joyful expectation of the Rapture, or to hate atheists or gays; no danger of them abusing young children with monstrous tales of hell, no danger of them opposing the proper teaching of science in their local schools, or exhorting the sick to seek their cure in prayer and repentance rather than the more reliable methods offered by medical science. If all churches simply reinforced people's natural impulses to be good and caring, and offered them a sense of being part of a kindly and supportive community, there would be far less to object to in them.

There remains the question of integrity, and I would not want to downplay that for one moment. Personally I could not remain in a post that required me to dissemble, no matter how difficult it might be to find a way out. But the nature of religious belief is such that we might feel justified in challenging the integrity of every pastor, no matter how truly committed to the role: for each and every one of them stands in front of their congregation week after week and preaches his personal beliefs as though they were indisputably true - even though none of those beliefs is founded on anything more reliable than the pastor's subjective wishes, desires, hopes and fears. Some of them 'know' that every word of the Bible is literally true, others 'know' that it needs to be interpreted metaphorically; some 'know' that God is loving, compassionate and eager to forgive, others 'know' that he is angry, jealous and quick to punish wrong-doing; some 'know' that God has more important things to worry about than what we do - and with whom - in bed, others 'know' that sexual impurity offends him more than anything else; some 'know' that Jesus is the only way to God, others 'know' that all religions are different routes to the same destination; some 'know' that hell is a terrible fiery reality and others 'know' it is merely a metaphor. And so it continues. Those whose personalities lead them to embrace the world and other people in a spirit of openness, generosity, warmth and tolerance 'know' that God does the same. Those who lack the confidence for that and consequently see the world as a place that is threatening and evil and bad, 'know' that God sees it that way too. Not one of them has stronger objective grounds for accepting that which they accept than for rejecting that which they reject. Yet week after week they preach their own preferred version as though it were unquestionably true.

Well, we are all entitled to our different personalities and different preferences. It is the elevation of our personal preferences to the status of truth, and the exploitation of the psychological authority of the pulpit to proclaim that 'truth', that lacks integrity. At least the doubting pastors in the Dennett/LaScola report have had the integrity to acknowledge that their former beliefs had no empirical foundation and therefore could not be relied on as a guide to truth.

(At this point I will pre-empt an objection that will inevitably be popping up in many readers' minds. Is it not the case that atheists' disbelief in gods is every bit as much the product of personal preference and lack of empirical evidence as the beliefs of the religious? Well, no, it is not. Atheism is not the holding of a belief for which there is no evidence but the refusal to hold a belief for which there is no evidence. This is more than a play on words, for there is no end to the number of invented entities it would be entirely impossible to disprove, yet for which we would require some positive evidence of existence before we would be justified in believing in them.)

The very fact that we can even ask the question whether clergy have a moral obligation not to challenge the sincere faith of their parishioners is hugely revealing about the nature of faith itself. Does a geography teacher have a moral obligation not to challenge the sincere belief of his pupils that Spain is a country in Africa? Does the fact that the pupils have a concept of Spain at all matter more than that they have the correct one? Does a medical doctor have a moral obligation not to challenge her patient's sincere belief that cigarettes won't damage his health? Does the fact that the patient acknowledges the existence of health at all suffice? Of course not. But for some reason when it comes to religion, there is a general feeling that it doesn't really matter what people believe, provided they believe something, and that this belief, no matter how ill-founded, must be cherished and protected at all costs. What clearer evidence could there be that religious faith is not particularly interested in truth? And, that being so, does it really matter what the man in the pulpit does or does not believe?

That said, I dislike pretense of any kind, and I would hope it wouldn't be too long before the pastors in this report have the courage to break away altogether and make a completely new life for themselves, a life that doesn't require them to conceal their true thoughts from anyone. But when it comes to honesty and integrity, I would say they have already travelled considerably further than most of their colleagues: these pastors, at least, have begun the important process of being honest with themselves.

By Paula Kirby | March 19, 2010; 1:39 PM ET Save & Share:
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Beautiful post, I really love when someone puts in words what I’ve been trying to say.

But no matter how well thought an argument or comment can be, religion has nothing to do with reasoning. As much as can be told about manipulation of the masses or illogical thinking, believers will believe and will ridiculously protect this belief.

For these pastors to have decided to confront themselves is already huge. More than what can be expected from hypocritical clergy who may not believe but keep running the herd to keep the cash flow.

Posted by: Bios | March 22, 2010 11:08 PM
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As you say, Paula, "these pastors, at least, have begun the important process of being honest with themselves." But theyhave not even begun the process of being honest with other people, and that's a pretty serious problem.

But they should not be so concerned. If my experience is anything to go by, people in the churches are more than ready to hear the truth about biblical and theological change. They may not be ready to hear the atheist message, but many of them have responded to voices like Jack Spong's or Marcus Borg, Dominic Crossan or Robert Funk. There's no reason for these thinking clergy to remain silent. They should teach the people they serve what they know. Some people will reject it for sure, but I think they would be surprised at the number of people who would welcome an thoughtful introduction to modern biblical and theological study. And it can be done from the pulpit too. I understand their reluctance, but they owe it to themselves and to their parishioners to be honest about what they have come to know. Of course, if they have stepped outside the realm of faith altogether - and the boundaries here are indistinct - perhaps they need to admit this to themselves, and find something else to do.

Just a short response to the Ahmadi peaceful Muslim:

Perhaps what these pastors believe is not based on the truth, but, I'm sorry to have to tell you this, neither is Islam. The Qu'ran is just as full of questionable passages as the Bible, and sometimes outright untruth. Much of it is unlovely and arrogant. Some is not peaceful at all, but divisive and belligerent towards those who do not share its beliefs. Muslims have as long a way to go as these pastors have already gone. It's a long journey. Best to begin now.

Posted by: Greywizard | March 21, 2010 5:49 PM
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I was likewise moved by the Dennett and LaScola piece. I was a non-believing Christian for many years and, when I finally acknowledged that I was part of the problem, I found it a challenge to extricate myself gracefully. I can't imagine what it would be like for clergy.

I found it telling that none of the pastors mentioned how they deal with questioning youth and others who share struggles with belief. I'm sure that's a serious moral dilemma.

Posted by: kpidcoc | March 21, 2010 3:19 PM
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The hardest thing they have to face is that fact that their church does damage to society. It's been said for many generations that teaching children dogma ruins their minds. Every preacher's worst nightmare is realizing not only should they leave the church, they should fight it's influence, for the good of humanity.

Posted by: JoeRamone | March 20, 2010 9:39 PM
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Hi friends

I quote from the article:

“These pastors, at least, have begun the important process of being honest with themselves”

I agree that these pastors have admitted an obvious fact; that what they preach is not based on truth. This open admission of the pastors if carried to its logical conclusions must entail the reform of the Christians faith in face of the Skepticism- taking place vacated by the Christian faith. And fortunately it is not difficult to do so. It should not be difficult to find out as to what Jesus and Mary believed in and what they never believed in but the Church ascribed it to them. What Jesus, Mary and the OTBible Prophets believed in was reasonable, rational and logical; with a little thought that could be ascertained and refreshed.

Jesus and Mary were devoted Jews; followers of Moses and OTBible or Torah and the Prophets. They could never deviate from their faith. So much so that Jesus was ready and in fact he was put on the Cross; but he did not waiver. He stood by the reasonable faith he had.

One has just to see as to what was Jesus’ and Mary’s belief in terms of the OTBible. The extra teachings later added or invented are just to be expunged being worthless additions and untrue witnessing.

The reformation is ready and it will be fine. Christians already believe in the OTBible; so the reformation would be within their belief system and not outside of it.

Paula Kirby

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Ending the pretense of faith

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