Religion for Atheists: A Non-Believer's Guide to the Uses of Religion by Alain de Botton Page A
Authors: Alain de Botton
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carbonated drink. But adults are apparently sensible and self-controlled enough not to alter their values or consumption patterns simply on account of an unceasing array of artfully created messages which reach them from every side and medium at all times of day and night.
However, this distinction between child and adult is suspiciously convenient to commercial interests. In truth, we are all fragile in our commitments and suffer from a weakness of will in relation to the siren calls of advertising, an ill-tempered three-year-old entranced by the sight of a farmyard play set with inflatable dog kennel as much as a forty-two-year-old captivated by the possibilities of a barbecue set with added tongs and hotplate.
3.
Atheists tend to pity the inhabitants of religiously dominated societies for the extent of the propaganda they have to endure, but this is to overlook secular societiesâ equally powerful and continuous calls to prayer. A libertarian state truly worthy of the name would try to redress the balance of messages that reach its citizens away from the merely commercial and towards a holistic conception of flourishing. True to the ambitions ofGiottoâs frescoes, these new messages would render vivid to us the many noble ways of behaving that we currently admire so much and so blithely ignore.
We simply will not care for very long about the higher values when all we are given to convince us of their worth is an occasional reminder in a modestly selling, largely ignored book of essays by a so-called philosopher â while, in the city beyond, the superlative talents of the globeâs advertising agencies perform their phantasmagorical alchemy and set our every sensory fibre alight in the name of a new kind of cleaning product or savoury snack.
We donât only need reminders of the advantages of savoury snacks. ( illustration credit 3.5 )
If we tend to think so often about lemon-scented floor polish or cracked black pepper crisps, but relatively little about endurance or justice, the fault is not merely our own. It is also that these two cardinal virtues are not generally in a position to become clients of Young & Rubicam.
iii. Role Models
1.
While paying attention to the messages in its public spaces, Christianity also wisely recognizes the extent to which our concepts of good and bad are shaped by the people we spend time with. It knows that we are dangerously permeable with regard to our social circle, all too apt to internalize and mimic othersâ attitudes and behaviour. Simultaneously, it accepts that the particular company we keep is largely a result of haphazard forces, a peculiar cast of characters drawn from our childhood, schooling, community and work. Among the few hundred people we regularly encounter, not very many are likely to be the sorts of exceptional individuals who exhaust our imagination with their good qualities, who strengthen our soul and whose voices we want consciously to adopt to bolster our best impulses.
2.
The paucity of paragons helps to explain why Catholicism sets before its believers some two and a half thousand of the greatest, most virtuous human beings who, it feels, have ever lived. Thesesaints are each in their different ways exemplars of qualities we should hope to nurture in ourselves.St Joseph, for instance, may teach us how to cope calmly with the pressures of a young family and how to face the trials of the workplace with a modest and uncomplaining temper. There are moments when we may want to break down and sob in the company ofSt Jude, patron saint of lost causes, whose gentle manner can grant us comfort without any need to find immediate solutions or even hope. At times of anxiety, we could turn to St Philip Neri, who would never underplay our problems or humiliate us but would know how to tease out our sense of the absurd and make us laugh therapeutically at our condition. We might find it particularly consoling to guess at how the imperturbable St
However, this distinction between child and adult is suspiciously convenient to commercial interests. In truth, we are all fragile in our commitments and suffer from a weakness of will in relation to the siren calls of advertising, an ill-tempered three-year-old entranced by the sight of a farmyard play set with inflatable dog kennel as much as a forty-two-year-old captivated by the possibilities of a barbecue set with added tongs and hotplate.
3.
Atheists tend to pity the inhabitants of religiously dominated societies for the extent of the propaganda they have to endure, but this is to overlook secular societiesâ equally powerful and continuous calls to prayer. A libertarian state truly worthy of the name would try to redress the balance of messages that reach its citizens away from the merely commercial and towards a holistic conception of flourishing. True to the ambitions ofGiottoâs frescoes, these new messages would render vivid to us the many noble ways of behaving that we currently admire so much and so blithely ignore.
We simply will not care for very long about the higher values when all we are given to convince us of their worth is an occasional reminder in a modestly selling, largely ignored book of essays by a so-called philosopher â while, in the city beyond, the superlative talents of the globeâs advertising agencies perform their phantasmagorical alchemy and set our every sensory fibre alight in the name of a new kind of cleaning product or savoury snack.
We donât only need reminders of the advantages of savoury snacks. ( illustration credit 3.5 )
If we tend to think so often about lemon-scented floor polish or cracked black pepper crisps, but relatively little about endurance or justice, the fault is not merely our own. It is also that these two cardinal virtues are not generally in a position to become clients of Young & Rubicam.
iii. Role Models
1.
While paying attention to the messages in its public spaces, Christianity also wisely recognizes the extent to which our concepts of good and bad are shaped by the people we spend time with. It knows that we are dangerously permeable with regard to our social circle, all too apt to internalize and mimic othersâ attitudes and behaviour. Simultaneously, it accepts that the particular company we keep is largely a result of haphazard forces, a peculiar cast of characters drawn from our childhood, schooling, community and work. Among the few hundred people we regularly encounter, not very many are likely to be the sorts of exceptional individuals who exhaust our imagination with their good qualities, who strengthen our soul and whose voices we want consciously to adopt to bolster our best impulses.
2.
The paucity of paragons helps to explain why Catholicism sets before its believers some two and a half thousand of the greatest, most virtuous human beings who, it feels, have ever lived. Thesesaints are each in their different ways exemplars of qualities we should hope to nurture in ourselves.St Joseph, for instance, may teach us how to cope calmly with the pressures of a young family and how to face the trials of the workplace with a modest and uncomplaining temper. There are moments when we may want to break down and sob in the company ofSt Jude, patron saint of lost causes, whose gentle manner can grant us comfort without any need to find immediate solutions or even hope. At times of anxiety, we could turn to St Philip Neri, who would never underplay our problems or humiliate us but would know how to tease out our sense of the absurd and make us laugh therapeutically at our condition. We might find it particularly consoling to guess at how the imperturbable St
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