My friend is a good and honest man, sincere in his zeal to find truth. Perhaps a bit too zealous, for I fear that he is trapped in modernist assumptions about truth (assumptions that go back to Plato). But as we talked, we looked at how the many atheists seem to have two messages:
Religion is flawed;
We should be really, really angry about this!
The first message strikes me as good and valuable. Even though religion is notoriously resistant to criticism, any perspective that shines light on its failings can only help to further the cause of truth (not to mention goodness and beauty). While I may not share all of atheism’s critique of Christianity, as a Christian who sincerely endeavors to love God with all my heart, mind and strength, I owe it to myself to have as accurate an understanding of my faith as possible — including an understanding of how others see (and disagree) with it.
But it’s the second part of the message that leaves me cold. There’s a level on which choosing to react to religion with anger, rage, hatred, or any other strong passion is simply to give religion power over our lives. And since the main beef of the atheists seems to be that religion seeks to expand its power over people, allowing it to trigger strong passion is, ironically, to play into its hands. The atheist who is consumed with anger and hatred toward faith is, in a very real sense, in hell. Not a hell of divine punishment so much as a hell of his own making. And that, it seems to me, is pretty much useless.