T
hough there is some debate about the
origins of the word “religion,” I am par-
tial to the sense derived from the Latin
religare (“to bind” or “to fasten”). The image
suggests that religion involves connection and
commitment — connection to something out-
side of yourself and, through the act of connec-
tion, sincere commitment to certain practices
and beliefs.
Religion, of course, encompasses more
than this single definition can capture. There
is a multiplicity of religious experience in our
world, and thousands of variations of religious
life outside the dominant religions of Christi-
anity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism and Juda-
ism. Religion is a near-universal facet of hu-
man experience and a matter of both intense
spiritual and emotional interest for individuals.
It is a subject of infinite scope, and yet each of
us occupies only a single point within its vast
domain. It is therefore with great humility that
I approach the topic, acknowledging the singu-
larity of my perspective within this labyrinth of
presuppositions about what religion really is.
Even as someone who lacks belief in a God
or gods, my perspective on religion is a matter of
sustained reflection, albeit from a different ap-
proach than that of believers. Atheists must nav-
igate a predominantly religious world, a fact that
produces as much variation within atheist life
as it does within religious life. And though I am
an atheist out of honesty to myself, the anxieties
of life and frequent plunges into cynicism stem-
ming from religious detachment have foamed
within me and produced a question I must ad-
dress: Would I be better off believing in God?
From the moment I understood myself to
be an atheist, the temptation to religion has
constantly lurked beneath my awareness, oc-
casionally elevating itself in fits of indignation.
For this, the benign presence of religion was
instrumental.
For instance, even though I had a secular
upbringing, religion was always in the back-
ground. For kindergarten, I went to a Montes-
sori school — a type of school premised on har-
nessing the natural curiosity of children in the
basement of an Episcopal church. Though I
never met him, my great-grandfather, an Angli-
can priest in central England, would have been
proud to see his great-grandson in the Ameri-
can equivalent of his denomination.
For elementary school, I went to a local
public school in my home city of Washing-
ton, D.C., which is basically as secular as you
can get. The school officials strictly followed
the First Amendment ban on school-spon-
sored religion; we never said the Pledge of
Allegiance, which posits the U.S. as “one na-
tion under God,” nor did we have religiously-
tinged Christmas assemblies. There was no
stigma attached to religion, but I did have a
sense growing up that religion was something
for the private, not the public sphere.
It was during middle school that I began
to have some more exposure to religion in
the way of bar- and bat-mitzvahs, the coming
of age ritual in Judaism. Throughout seventh
grade, I went to more than a dozen of these cel-
ebrations for friends, which meant I visited the
local temple at least as many times as my local
Episcopal church. This was not my first time
hearing Hebrew, however. For a while, both of
my next-door neighbors were Jewish. On oc-
casion, my little brother and I would be invited
to one of their houses for Friday-night Shabbat
dinner, where we would listen to the blessings.
Throughout high school, I continued to
learn about religion in my English and his-
tory courses. While we didn’t have a religious
education specifically, we did read the Gospel
of Mark and some extracts from the Old Testa-
ment of the Bible in tenth-grade English class.
I also picked up things here and there from
texts with major religious themes, especially
Gothic novels and stories like those of Charles
Dickens, William Faulkner and Nathaniel
Hawthorne, as well as Toni Morrison’s novels,
including “Beloved,” and “Song of Solomon.”
Nearing the end of my senior year, however,
I was still not an avowed atheist. The existence
of God felt like a remote possibility, but the
question itself never bothered me — at least,
not like it does now.
More than anything else, it was my first en-
counter with philosophy at the age of 17 that
presented me with the life and language of
atheism.
Just a few weeks before my high school
graduation, I read Albert Camus’s “The Strang-
er” for the first time. The ideas within the text
leaped out and spoke to me with an urgency I
had never experienced before. As I held it in
my hands, the book had the simultaneous aura
of a precious gem and a great burning flame
that threatened to swallow me up. For me, it
was an atheist revelation.
The concept at the heart of “The Stranger”
is the “absurdity” of human existence. The ab-
surd does not refer to an innate irrationality
of human nature; rather, it expresses the con-
tradiction of humanity’s search for meaning
in a universe where there is none to be found
through the faculties of science, logic, reason
and faith. Meursault, the understated protag-
onist of “The Stranger,” arrives at an under-
standing of the absurd at the end of the novel.
His reaction of revolt, rather than despair,
against this absurd condition presented to me
the most paradoxical yet attractive aspect of
Camusian thought.
It follows from Camus’s skepticism that re-
ligion cannot serve as a source of meaning. Ac-
cording to Camus, clinging onto objective truth
and divine authority is an expression of defeat,
of caving into the absurdity of existence by de-
nying it. In his view, the Christian hope for a life
in heaven is a deep error because of its diminu-
tion of existence on Earth.
W
hile the constant reminder of the
meaningless of existence can lead
to disparate ideas, to me, existen-
tialism represented a radical, life-affirming
philosophy — an approach to existence that
sparked my imagination and invited me to re-
flect on my place in an infinite universe.
In my raptures, however, there was a certain
part of Camus’s thought that I did not take to
heart; because theistic religion has served for
centuries as the principal well of meaning and
purpose, it is still deeply ingrained in the social
and spiritual life of millions. Overzealous athe-
ists threaten to run the well dry for the sake
of affirming a philosophical truth, causing a
drought of global proportions and the spiritual
suffocation of the entire religious world.
I also failed to appreciate the gravity of
losing faith upon my first few readings of the
19th-century philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche.
In “The Gay Science,” Nietzsche writes of a
madman running into town with a lantern in
broad daylight shouting, “I seek God! I seek
God!” The scene is ridiculous, though the ap-
parent humor is a veil for the seriousness of Ni-
etzsche’s infamous announcement that “God
is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed
him.”
The “Parable of The Madman at first gave
me great reassurance as a young atheist. I
found the notion of the death of God ecstatic,
its articulation courageous on the part of its
author. I thought the death of God signified
liberation from religious fundamentalism, holy
wars and the caprice of religious influence in
politics. In other words, I believed the death of
God constitutes freedom, and freedom is the
most sublime condition of humanity. However,
to my detriment, I ignored the less satisfying
part: “How shall we, the murderers of all mur-
ders, comfort ourselves?”
***
Why would atheists need to comfort our-
selves? What, after all, is the danger of breaking
the ties that link us to God?
In my experience, disconnection works on
several broad levels. First, there is the discon-
nection from a higher power, a source of objec-
tive meaning that offers to resolve much inner
conflict. Second, there is the disconnection from
a religious community, that sentiment that one
has the support of people of shared values and
beliefs. Third, there is the disconnection from
religious tradition, the passing down of religious
teachings and practices across centuries and po-
tentially across continents.
The apparent importance of religion, its
widespread visibility and its embedding in so-
ciety can thus create feelings of alienation in
those who have never been a part of religious
life. I am not proposing that atheists lack the
same moral faculties as those who base their
ethics from scripture or oral teachings. There
is, however, a fundamental relationship be-
tween faith and self-affirmation. And in mo-
ments of distress and self-doubt, the surety of
religious life and the support of the religious
community suddenly presents itself as an at-
tractive alternative.
The moment of crisis for an atheist, then,
differs from the crisis of faith that menaces
the believer. The believer remains tethered to
God, community and tradition throughout this
crisis, whereas the atheist, generally speaking,
does not have recourse to the support of these
mooring posts.
Some atheists search for comfort in the
company of other atheists in an institutional
setting. Self-described secular congregations,
such as the Sunday Assembly, offer atheists a
chance to connect in a setting reminiscent of
the religious temples they may have left be-
hind. Similarly, online forums or discussion
boards like r/Atheism launch unbelievers into
the digital sphere, where sensitive discussions
about religion can be protected with the prom-
ise of online anonymity, or the confidence that
comes from the belief that things said on the In-
ternet have fewer consequences than things said
with the undulating breath of one’s own voice.
However, despite atheists having strong
views on religion, the prospect of promoting
atheism as a universal alternative to religion in
these settings has seemed awkward to me, like
some form of proselytization. Anything resem-
bling Atheist Church leaps out as a dangerous
contradiction, a slippery slope to be avoided
at all costs. Most believers, Christians for in-
stance, are linked by a set of positive beliefs
about God, religious observance and ethical
mores. Though there are always exceptions,
Christians by definition will agree that Jesus of
Nazareth was the son of God, the Messiah, and
that certain events — His death, descent into
Hell, resurrection and Second Coming — are of
either historical, literal or metaphorical truth.
There is, however, no doctrine of atheism,
historical or otherwise. Instead, there is an ab-
sence of doctrine — an intentional embrace of
nothingness — that is central to atheist identity.
In my view, attempts to formalize atheism into
institutions often represent an attempt to incar-
nate this nothingness. Even if the intention is to
provide a meeting place for people of like minds,
such positive establishments of atheism run the
risk of reaching the height of contradiction.
Yes, there are compelling political reasons
for atheists to organize themselves as a group;
for instance, to combat state-sponsored estab-
lishment of religion in public schools. Howev-
er, detaching oneself from God can also mean a
detachment from convictions based on objec-
tive truth, including one’s own.
And still, moments of solidarity between
atheists are important. These moments render
explicit an unavowed feeling for non-believers:
that the absence of belief presents challenges
of its own, yet these challenges can be met with
the certainty that one has been authentic with
oneself. The central realizations of atheism may
be apoint of no return; even if belief returns to
the soul, there might always remain the perma-
nently awakened spirit of doubt in the mind.
Finding community as an atheist is possible,
too, for outside of religion there are abundant
opportunities for engaging with others. To ac-
cept the abstraction of metaphysical solitude
opens the world to new possibilities of con-
nection. The relationship with God may be
attractive because of the magnitude of God’s
love. The everlasting forgiveness and peace
one hopes to receive in the afterlife are cause
for worship and celebration here on Earth. But
I have been content to find these sentiments in
the relationships I have with people, places and
sources of solace in literature, poetry and art;
music, nature, cold lakes and warm sand.
Working throughout the challenges of athe-
ist life has not been straightforward. The ab-
sence of belief, however, leaves space for other
modes of connection, and I have hardly been
alone on my path. If not religion itself, the bind-
ing spirit of religare has tied me to certain peo-
ple and passions I feel I cannot live without. As
an atheist, it is the ironic necessity of fastening
these bindings that represents the price of free-
dom. Despite its challenges, it is a freedom I
never want to give up.
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
statement
Atheism and disconnection
BY ALEXANDER SATOLA, STATEMENT CORRESPONDENT
ILLUSTRATION BY KATHERINE LEE
Wednesday, March 3, 2021 — 11