Atheists and Their Beliefs
Like Twain, Gandhi, and Einstein, Chesterton is misquoted almost as often as he is quoted accurately. One of my favorites is the statement that once people stop believing in God, they will believe in anything. This quote is actually a reinterpretation of a line from a Father Brown short story: “It’s the first effect of not believing in God that you lose your common sense.”
Some recent headlines brought this quote to mind, starting with a recent article at The Atlantic, titled “Atheists Are Sometimes More Religious Than Christians.” Like many Internet headlines, this one promises more than it delivers. Citing research from Pew, the article goes on to compare religion and irreligion in America and Western Europe: “Americans are deeply religious people—and atheists are no exception. Western Europeans are deeply secular people—and Christians are no exception.”
The author, Sigar Samuel, offers no real insights into atheists as a stand-alone set, and confuses the specific with the general. “Researchers found that American ‘nones’—those who identify as atheist, agnostic, or nothing in particular—are more religious than European nones,” she writes. “The notion that religiously unaffiliated people can be religious at all may seem contradictory, but if you disaffiliate from organized religion it does not necessarily mean you’ve sworn off belief in God, say, or prayer.”
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