Why I Find All Religion Absurd and Dangerous

Since Knowles is Catholic, I'll be starting there as a premise, but the bulk of my objections are transferrable to other faiths.

I got a handful of understandably annoyed comments on my “Why we can’t ban transgenderism” post from people I assume are Catholic objecting to my characterization of Catholicism as absurd and dangerous (as equally so as any other religion). I saw people trying to figure out what I had against Catholics, with one explaining their mismanagement of their predictable pedophile priest problem (child abusers getting in any large organization getting themselves into positions of trust and responsibility for young children are foreseeable). The truth is that my statement was not rooted in any specific thing the church had done. Although, it would seem some Catholics are in serious denial about the extent of the shit that the Roman Catholic Church has gotten up to over the centuries, not the least of which has included colonizing a part of my very extended family tree and legitimizing the idea that their homeland was up for grabs because they weren’t already Catholic (‘terra nullius’ - no one’s land).

The most general reason I find the Catholic religion absurd and dangerous is that it is a religion. It is a group of faith-based beliefs that people agree to pretend to believe (I am a theological non-cognitivist and do not believe that you meaningfully believe the absurd things you claim to believe, under my very boutique understanding of what it means to ‘believe’ a claim, though that is not to say I believe you are lying) where the only way to show allegiance to the group is to also pretend to believe in the claims, and to defer to the authority structure’s interpretation of the absurd belief-claims, which are inherently unverifiable, because the beliefs are faith based. This sort of organizational structure will never not be dangerous, because there is fundamentally no logical recourse against corruption, abuse, and faith-based harm-causing, except schism, and trying to schism generally results in fighting and persecution. This problem is more significant the more state power the church holds. Defying the church’s state power, such as by existing as a non-believer minding your own business, also results in persecution, which is dangerous for the persecutee.

Look at any historically persecuted (by Catholics) group, such as ‘witches’ and Jewish people, how well the Catholic church tolerates other groups when they have any degree of state power. Churches in general, and Catholics in particular, but not especially, don’t like that you don’t want to pretend to believe what they pretend to believe - and worse, you pretend to believe things they don’t pretend to believe, threatening their coffers by offering a competing brand of absurdity to donate to, and inspiring people to have discussions about which absurdity is the best to pretend to believe, which leads some to believe it’s acceptable to question and therefore reject the absurd faith claims authority pretends to believe. In Christianity, the only unforgiveable sin is doubt - denial of the Holy Spirit.

Why do I consider the claims absurd? The claims have to be absurd, otherwise there is no way for the authority structure to identify loyalist from heretic, in-group from out-group, wolf from flock. If there was some way to come to the conclusions independent of the authority structure’s patient guidance, that is a threat to the hierarchy and group structure. The absurdity of the belief makes them unlikely to be derived independently by chance through reason or chaotic guessing. Therefore, if you meet another person who has the same absurd belief structure as you, probably, you got it from the same place, and can see them as in-group. The belief structures are then cemented by being taught in childhood and tied to unfathomable consequences, such as infinite torment.

The premise of Christianity is that we are all sinners and therefore the three-for-one-deal deity sacrificed himself to himself so he could forgive us for breaking the rules he created us lacking the capacity to understand really should not be broken. Sure, he told us, “Don’t break this rule,” but we did not know right from wrong until we broke the rule, and therefore would have no legal culpability in today’s justice system. But instead of forgiving that, the deity said kill some animals so I can smell the barbecue. So we did, until one day he says, “scratch that. I demand human meat. My son is going to go to be punished for you, for breaking this law when you were legally insane. And fortunately, because this other guy died horribly, and even though I still have to die, my sins have somehow been forgiven, because the debt is paid. When I pay a debt, it wasn’t forgiven! It was paid! I kept the receipt! I want my Jesus back. If the wages of sin is death, but my sins are forgiven, why do Christians still die? It is absurd, much like our meaty predicament on this space rock.

I am not saying that there is no value in learning these stories or pursuing these spiritual practices. Far from it. I’ve said the opposite many times, and I appreciate the religious education I was afforded as a child, and the emotional lessons it imparted through the use of this absurd belief structure, that seem to be the ultimate purpose of any mythology - imparting wisdom about the human condition. That is where all religions began, in my view, not the other way around (i.e. human condition always came before religion). But they are very dangerous when taken literally, figuratively, or unsalted. When pretense of belief in such things is enforced through state mandate, and when the keepers of the belief structure have a financial incentive and legal authority to quash dissent, foreseeable bad things predictably happen to good people.