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Why Is Religious Humanism? More Later of Emerson and James. It includes John Dewey's unfortunate waffling about the words religion and religious, of which Why Is Religious Humanism? more later. Most seriously, religious humanism includes all too much of the trendy relativism Olds indulges when he Thomas W. Flynn denies the possibility of "a privileged position from which a human being can ome years ago Paul Kurtz made the churches. That's hardly fair to the thinkers determine which construct is correct ... a Smistake of offering decaffeinated cof- who comprise humanism's equally vivid metanarrative by which to determine the fee to a roomful of humanist visitors from freethought heritage: the philosophes, validity of one narrative over another." At Europe. Few Europeans share the Paine, Ingersoll, Bennett, Bradlaugh, the best, such postmodern intemperances American passion for denatured food- early Annie Besant, J. M. Robertson, muddy thinking; at worst, they pave the stuffs; "Paul!" chided one Scandinavian. Joseph McCabe, and many others. A thor- way for humanism to be hijacked by mys- "Decaffeinated coffee? That's like reli- ough historical treatment of humanism tics, anti-intellectuals, and opponents of gious humanism." As a secular humanist I must encompass both the religious liberal science. am sometimes tempted to view religious and freethought strands of its develop- humanism that way, as little more (or less) ment, along with the way they have con- That 01' Devil Semantics than an oxymoron. Mason Olds reminds verged in the United States, Britain, India, us that this is a temptation worth resisting. and elsewhere in the years since World hen religious and secular human- On first reading his "What Is Religious War II. Wists clash, semantics is often the Humanism?" I was surprised how often Moreover, there is ample evidence that bog in which discussion founders. Does Olds and I agreed. His comments on the mixing humanism and religion benefits all this debate simply reflect a squabble reality of the natural world, the vacuity of neither humanism nor religion. Certainly over the meanings of words? Secular religious paradigms, and humans' respon- humanism has not been healthy for reli- humanists argue that by definition, non- sibility for their own welfare in an uncar- gion: the liberal Christian churches that theistic, non-transcendentalist thinkers ing universe are as lucid and powerful as most thoroughly humanized their doc- like Olds cannot be authentically reli- anything I have read on these topics. I gious. Meanwhile, religious humanists, at least those as overtly nontheistic as Olds, would be proud to hand those passages to "There is ample evidence that strive to widen the definition of religion to any inquirer as succinct expressions of the mixing humanism and religion make sure they are not left out. They may secular humanist outlook. I finished his benefits neither humanism rely on the authority of Tillich, who spoke essay wondering, "With all his monism, nor religion." naturalism, materialism, and nontheism, of "ultimate concern" and reduced God to what is there about Olds's life stance that somebody an atheist could love. Or they in any meaningful way merits the label trines are now in sharp decline. Believers may join Olds in citing Dewey's unfortu- `religious'?" flock to more demanding conservative nate effort to forge discrete definitions for Yet the difference between religious and fundamentalist denominations, seem- the words religion and religious. and secular humanism is genuine and sub- ingly because those groups make fewer In attempting this, it seems to me that stantial. I have argued elsewhere that we compromises with the world. Apparently Dewey was not advancing a coherent should openly acknowledge the gap as a opening up to the humanist worldview argument as much as he was simply giv- dividing line between two already-distinct forces religions to give up elements so ing voice to his own emotional discomfort and more or less immiscible species of essential to their functioning that they no at recognizing how far beyond any "reli- thought.* A careful reading of Olds's longer work as religions—at least, not for gion" worthy of the name his thinking had essay helps show some of the reasons long. already progressed. Dewey is neither the why. Such accommodation has also borne first nor the last great thinker to leave Not surprisingly, religious humanism bitter fruit for humanism. When Olds calls behind one misshapen idea that haunts his over-emphasizes the connection between for poets and artists to craft "a new reli- or her reputation; if Einstein could come the humanist movement and liberal gion for the living of these days," when he back, I'm sure he'd retract "God does not Christianity. In his "first stanza," Olds casually announces that the universe is play dice with the universe," a critique of presents an idiosyncratic history in which eternal (how does he know?), when he quantum mechanics that generations of humanism unfolds entirely within the joins Max Otto in valuing "the life of the Christians have mistaken for proof that the father of relativity was one of them. In *Thomas W. Flynn, "The Difference a Word spirit," and, most important, when he den- the same way, I like to think that Dewey Makes," FREE INQUIRY vol. 11, no. 2, Spring igrates the power and scope of scientific 1991, pp. 46-47. inquiry, his essay reflects the thread of would have rethought trying to assign to obscurantism that has always dogged reli- the word religious a meaning so distinct Thomas W Flynn is a Senior Editor of gious humanism. The religious humanist from that attached to religion that the FREE INQUIRY. heritage includes the muddleheadedness adjectival form could no longer serve as Fall 1996 15 the cognate of the noun! Consider Olds's mysterious certainty that much when he demotes scientific inquiry Redefining religion or religious the cosmos is eternal—or the faith reli- to just another practical technique that broadly enough to encompass humanism gious humanists often express that delivers useful results under today's par- leads to other linguistic misadventures as humankind does not merely face its prob- ticular conditions. Far from being a rela- well. I would argue that we need more lems alone, but is reliably equipped to tivistic accident that works today and may words, not fewer, to demarcate distinct solve them. "Being a Humanist ... means not tomorrow, science is exactly what concepts regarding issues of religion, phi- you believe humans have the intelligence Olds says it isn't—a way of coming closer losophy, ethics, and life stance. While and imagination to solve the problems fac- to reality itself than any other method many dislike Paul Kurtz's coinage euprax- ing today's world," said a 1990 recruiting seems able to take us. Few secular human- ophy on aesthetic grounds, few dispute the mailing from the American Humanist ists are attracted by the solipsism of need for a richer, more precise vocabulary Association. Such sentiments cannot be Olds's speculations that actual reality in this sphere of discourse. Prostituting the based in experience; it is possible that must always somehow remain unknow- word religion so it can no longer be distin- human intelligence and imagination might able. Intersubjective validation lets us guished from philosophy—or, for that not suffice to overcome the problems we check each others' assumptions, breaking matter, humanism—seems to lead exactly face. Contra Olds, it it possible that the the chains of subjectivity and releasing in the wrong direction. cosmos is finite but nonetheless uncreated vast problem-solving capabilities. It is and undesigned. When religious humanists only because of the new, deeper under- Into the Minefield express this kind of faith in the unknow- standing of the universe that scientific able, they are indulging in transcendental- inquiry has lately conferred that some of ith full awareness of the risks, let ism. They interpret the "depth dimension" us at last dare to dream of dispensing with Wme attempt to offer a definition for in ways that pierces the domain of mun- the transcendent, of casting aside religion religion and religious that preserves the dane experience and pretends to draw on itself. From the day New Thought seized noun and adjective as cognates; protects the power of imagined realms knowable Annie Besant to the postmodernists of the boundaries between the domains of only by faith. Under my proposed defini- today, religious humanism historically has religion, philosophy, and ethics; and does tion, that sort of thinking is "religious" in been nontheism's soft underbelly—the minimal violence to the self-definitions of the same everyday sense that belief in God weak point at which romantic obscuran- conventionally religious people. To a or immortality is religious. Secular human- tism has sought to seduce nontheists away degree Olds sets up a straw man when he ists are distinguishable from religious from the sometimes-forbidding view of cites the traditional Western idea that "to humanists precisely by their discomfort life that science demands. be religious one must believe in God and with thinking of such character. Secular Much in religious humanism is worth- in personal immortality." Surely our defi- humanism is not a religion. while, as Olds demonstrates in his essay. nition of religion must include, say, If we define religion as preoccupation Yet, as he also demonstrates, there are Buddhists—many of whom do not accept with the transcendent, what many reli- strands in religious humanism that stand a deity and who, far from welcoming gious humanists are up to can indeed be in opposition to some of the values immortality, seek above all to terminate considered religious. What most secular regarding science and clarity of expres- their chain of reincarnations. humanists are up to clearly cannot.
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