Question: What is a better alternative to religious solace?
Dennett: Well, I think that the community and the loving and the care that you can get from religion are very good things of course and if only there were more pure sect or groups that provided not only the good works but also the community I think that would be a good thing. I’ve been talking with various people about the need to provide that structure in sect or organizations and I think it’s possible and I think we should work at it because you’re absolutely right. People sometimes when there’s nobody around to love you and take care of you. It’s great to have a group that you can be welcome into.
Question: What kinds of structures should atheists build?
Dennett: Well, I suppose the simplest answer is it will be good if there were and there are already churches that are dogmas and in fact more and more churches downplay dogma to the point of evaporation and concentrate on providing draft to sort of community of care, mutual care and helping the world and so I think it’s entirely possible that churches will evolve into sort of cribless organizations that do a lot of good work and that would be wonderful.
Discuss
karen mcgady on March 31, 2009, 9:50 PM
Have you checked out Unitarian Universalists (UU)? Some UUs are secular humanists, some are atheists, some are deists, some are Christians, many do not really fit into any one catagory. “UUism” is rooted in Christianity and transcendentalism, though by no means does that limit what UUs are today. There is no dogma or creedal test and each congregation is run by the congregants. The one thing that runs through most of the UU congregations out there is the belief that all life has worth and deserves to be treated with dignity and respect. Perhaps this is the community you are looking for?
rabbit killer on July 4, 2009, 2:48 AM
I went to UU’s for a while before I moved away. They did an okay job, but I felt it was a bit contrived. I know, all rituals were made up by someone at sometime. I am remmebering a dedication of an infant child to the church community and the child was blessed with the four elements.
I think a community needs to address several rites that are universall or very common to all humans:
fertility
birth
presentation to the community/naming
childhood to adulthood transition
marriage
death rites/funerary
periodic weekly meetings(?)
Overall, I am glad to see another non-bitter atheist who concedes the value of religious institutions. We do need something as supernatural belief inevitably withers.
Mark Szlazak on July 28, 2009, 12:39 AM
How about this wedding dance rite. I don’t know if it’s common to all humans but it isn’t religious and looks like a lot of fun.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-94JhLEiN0
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