The discussion on patriotism adumbrates the kind of discussion that we could have on religion. It is a subject which can easily burn people's fuses. In something I posted a few weeks ago I suggested that we were heading towards "the post-religious age" (if we are not already in it). One person found the phrase felicitous another was outraged at the very thought. Maybe I should offer 'fact' instead of opinion. My only purpose here is to justify what I see as the great need for finding some other 'ideal of values' that will serve in the post-religious age to inspire individuals to behave 'nicely' towards other people.
Fact #1. The vast majority of people living in the western world today are religion-less. The most sanguine figures suggest that 16% of the people living in Great Britain consider themselves to be religious (any religion); In France it is only 14%; in Germany it is only 13%. That is to say that more than 70% of the population of the European Union do not adhere to any religious practice. As far as the rest of the world is concerned we can say that as a rule of thumb there is a kind of sliding scale: the more traditional the way of life of a country the greater the incidence of religious observance in the population. (You can use http://www.religioustolerance.org/rel_rate.htm to check out individual countries.)
Fact #2. The United States of America has probably the greatest number of religiously affiliated citizens in the western world. But even in the United States a very large number of people do not profess any religion at all. Here is a snippet from an article by Cathy Lynn Grossman in USA TODAY:
Americans almost all say religion matters, yet more people than ever are opting out. Not just out of the pews. Out from under a theological roof altogether. In 2001, more than 29.4 million Americans said they had no religion — more than double the number in 1990, and more than Methodists, Lutherans and Episcopalians all added up — according to the American Religious Identification Survey 2001.
You can use http://www.usatoday.com/graphics/news/gra/gnoreligion/flash.htm in order to check out the statistics for the state in which you live - or any other of the 50 states that interests you.
So, let's not be 'proud' and 'patriotic' about our own religious adherence. The world is moving swiftly towards non-religion. What worries me is what will happen if we don't find something that can inspire the non-religious to adopt an agreed and functioning code of ethical behaviour towards other people.
Such a code would have to be very simple and susceptible to judgement. You can't measure "love" and so forth in other people: these values, in my view, are too subjective. But whatever value we espouse the question is how do you inspire people to its observance, how do you instill it into children, how do you make people ashamed not to espouse it?
[editted to make the links work. just type them in as the url including the http:// thing. Forget the a href bit - timmy]
[Updated on: Thu, 11 September 2003 10:38] by Moderator
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