Now seeing as my degree in theology is nearing completion, you may expect that for a little light reading I would now be picking up a theological journal, a book of sermons or Calvin's Institutes. But no, I have fallen back into old habits of wandering into the local newsagents and picking up a copy of the New Scientist.
This week there is an article by Graham Lawton on "Losing our religion" (New Scientist, 3 May 2014, pp.30-35), in which he asks why this is happening and what the world might look like without religion. It feels slightly out of place within this science weekly, although there is science: the cognitive scientists and their cognitive by-product theory, and meta-analysis of studies looking for links between religion and health. You might expect in such an article for religion to be damned, and an attempt made to disproved the existence of God; yet neither of which is really done. What it does do is state some interesting facts and observations. These include the intuitive nature of religious belief, religious decline accompanies society prosperity and stability, the low likelihood of a child being religious if their parents aren't. It points out how in the aftermath of disaster, there is evidence of resurgence of religion, even in the most secular societies.
So what does this article prove or disprove? It is published in a scientific (well, popular-science) journal after all. I'm not sure it does either. It raises questions, and ones that the church cannot ignore and needs to engage with. Irreligious in society is clearly rising, but society does not seem to have lost is sense of or need for spirituality. There is a still, as Lawton states, a yearning "for a sense of community and a common moral vision". Society might be classing itself as godless, with psychologists and sociologists convinced humanity does not require God for its morality. But is not society informed by its past? Is not morality based on notions and ideas which are religiously-rooted, if not God-rooted? I am not convinced that a society can ever be truly godless, or devoid of anything that does not have connotations of faith or religion. The rise of the 'Sunday Assembly' is possibly proof it this.
So how does the church respond to this? How do you show a society that it is "doing God", when professes that it doesn't "do God"? Maybe the answer lies in what it means to be church! Hmmm...
