Meditations for the Humanist - Part 2 - Tolerance and DOMA

“The peak of tolerance is most readily achieved by those who are not burdened with convictions.” – Alexander Chase

An intolerant person is defined as one who “wishes others to live as the thinks they ought, and who seeks to impose his practices and beliefs upon them” (Grayling 2002, 7) True tolerance states that humanity thrives most by “permitting a variety of lifestyles to flourish, because they represent experiments from which might be learned about how to deal with the human condition” (Grayling 2002, 7-8).  Democracy has a similar aim in that a government run by the people, for the people, must include the voices and active participation of all demographics for it to flourish, especially if it is to afford the protect of minority rights. There is an inherent danger in democratic style government, namely majority oppression of minorities.

Grayling says,

Tolerance is, however, not only the centerpiece but the paradox of liberalism. For liberalism enjoins tolerance of opposing viewpoints, and allows them to have their say, leaving it to the democracy of ideas to decide which shall prevail. The result is to often the death of toleration itself, because those who live by hard principles and uncompromising views in political, moral and religious respects always, if given half a chance, silence liberals because liberalism, by its nature, threatens the hegemony they wish to impose.

Foreseeing this danger, the founders blessed us with the Bill of Rights as well as checks and balances in government. This was done in order to protect all citizens, especially minority demographics from majority oppression, including religious oppression.

The traditional republican platform has always had a foundation in states rights and a smaller federal government. The power of the federal government was seen as a threat to personal liberty.  However, when it comes to civil liberties and human rights issues, puritan morality seems to trump this age-old Republican value. This is becoming quite relevant with various contemporary social issues, especially homosexuality, marriage and the DOMA (Defense of Marriage Act). 

Traditionally marriage has been a religious ceremony, and many prefer it to remain as such. However, in this country, in this secular country, marriage is a civil right. Vermont, Connecticut and New York, which all have legalized gay marriage, now content that DOMA is a violation of states rights. They contend that the federal government has not right or authority to regulate the institution of marriage. The civil rights granted by marriage simple have nothing to do with religion, such as social security benefits, child-care tax credits, family and medical leave to take care of loved ones and COBRA health care for spouses and children. By denying a citizen these civil rights, they are thereby being denied human rights. The fourteenth Amendment to the Constitutions provides all citizens equal protection under the law. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights also speaks to this issue in its first, second and seventh articles, which says “All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law…”

DOMA is designed to prevent the legalization of same-sex marriage at the state level. The LGBTQ community is being discriminated against as they are denied this equal protection. They are being denied their civil/human rights. Once more, they are being denied this right from the Republican Party that supposedly champions personal freedom and liberty and views the Federal government as intrusive and oppressive. This is a fabulous example of how the Republican platform has lost its way. It is no longer centered around small government and states rights, but it has been hijacked by moralistic, intolerant religious fanatics who at their very core are opposed to the liberalism, pluralism and democratic ideals that America is founded upon.

I am not saying that marriage cannot be a religious ceremony. What I am saying is that in a democratic, pluralistic society, those who do not wish to be religious, those who do not want religion to have any part of their civil/human rights, shouldn’t be denied their rights because it makes religious people uncomfortable.

By providing the same rights to all citizens, society will thrive and become more cohesive and functional. Chris Kluwe, the punter for the Minnesota Vikings said, “You know what having these rights will make gays? Full-fledged American citizens just like everyone else, with the freedom to pursue happiness and all that entails. Do the civil-rights struggles of the past 200 years mean absolutely nothing…?” Chuck Norris recently said a thousand years of darkness will not ensue. And many prominent figures who claim that hurricanes and other natural disasters are Gods punishment for sanctioning equality are intolerant religious bigots who should not be tolerated, let alone be given a platform to spew their fear. Intolerance itself is merely a symptom of fear and insecurity. And this is what the Republican Party has become in my eyes, a political party based on intolerance rooted in fear and insecurity. The relevant question is….”Should the tolerant tolerate the intolerant?” And the answer is obviously no. Tolerance must protect itself. No one can force another to adopt a certain viewpoint or practice. The only coercion should be argument and honest reasoning, which is what we would expect from our government. Religious freedom does not entail the right to discriminate. Protecting minorities and civil rights is not an attack on Christianity. It is compassionate. It is based in identification with all of humanity, regardless of creed, sex, color of skin and any other label. It is based in ethics, an ethics encouraged not by religious discourse, but by secular discourse, which provides and equal footing for all. For a deeper in depth discussion please see my previous post “Tolerating the Intolerant.”

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2012/09/09/160840674/states-rights-and-doma-clash-on-a-shifting-battlefield?ft=1&f=1001

Grayling, A.C. (2002). Meditations for the Humanist: Ethics for a Secular Age. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Agnostic Buddhism - Buddhism Without Beliefs

Stephen Batchelor, in his book Buddhism Without Beliefs, describes an agnostic Buddhism. He does not describe Buddhism as a religion per se but as a method. Buddhism, he says, is not so much something to believe in, but is something to do. It is an activity, a lifestyle and a practice that we can integrate into every aspect of our experience. To be a Buddhist, do you have to be someone who believes certain propositions such as the four noble truths or reincarnation? According to Batchelor, the answer is no. He says Buddhism is not particularly religious or spiritual in the usual ways we understand these terms. It is simply a way to be in the world. Rather than being focused on deities, beliefs and supernatural claims, Batchelor claims Buddhism is founded in the agnostic tradition.

T.H. Huxley first coined agnosticism in 1869. He explained it as a method “realized through the ‘rigorous application of a single principle.’” This principle has both positive and negative aspects. The positive aspect exclaims, “Follow your reason as far as it will take you.” The negative aspect asserts that one should “not pretend that conclusions are certain which are not demonstrated or demonstrable. “ An agnostic Buddhist would not regard Buddhism as a source of answers to questions of where we came from, where we are going or what happens after death. Batchelor says an agnostic Buddhist would seek knowledge in the appropriate domains such as science. As for supernatural claims and questions about the origin of the universe or what happens after death, the Buddha himself remained silent. These questions were seen as distractions, as irrelevant to our human condition, irrelevant to the reality of suffering.

Buddhism however can become a dogmatic system when we elevate the matter of fact-ness of the four noble truths to holiness. They can become propositions to believe in. (Western scholars even superimposed the term Buddhism. This label allowed Buddhism to become a creed, which could be then compared to other creeds around the world. It can be easy to reduce a tradition and a religion such as Buddhism to a list of beliefs and practices that obscures its agnostic heritage and complexity.) Supernatural questions are seen as mysteries, not problems with answers that can be solved through meditation or prayer or through belief in a set of doctrine. Arbitrary answers to supernatural questions that are not demonstrated or demonstrable are simply irrelevant.  Strategies such as prayer and beliefs in doctrine merely replace mystery with beliefs in an answer that are often clinged to with such fervor that they distract from true ethical conversation and can even cause a great deal suffering, hatred and divisiveness.

Batchelor makes an important distinction between existential confrontation and existential consolation. Most of what we understand as religion can be seen as consisting of condolatory elements such as assurances of a better afterlife. Buddhist practice can be said to start not with belief in a transcendent reality but through embracing the “anguish experience in an uncertain world.” This is the essence of the first noble truth. We must have the courage to face whatever life throws at us without recourse to supernatural claims or consolations. To accept whatever comes with equanimity, and the humility to learn from every situation. Agnosticism shifts concern away from the future life and supernatural dialogue and brings it back to the present moment. Agnosticism is not passive. Instead, it is a dialogue, an ongoing encounter and existential confrontation with the unknown and mystery of our existence. Buddhism in this way, Batchelor says, might have “more in common with godless secularism than with the bastions of [western] religion.”

We must also make a distinction between ethics and morals, or more specifically ethical integrity as being distinct from moral certainty. A priori certainty about right and wrong is simply at odds with a changing and unreliable world. An ethical question should not be framed as ‘what is the right thing to do?” but “what is the compassionate thing to do?” This question can be approached with integrity but not with certainty. Likewise, agnostic Buddhism demands ethical conversation rather than moral claims based in supernatural hope and fear. This dialogue inevitably forces an encounter with our moral conditioning, which is based largely in psychological and social habit. We tend repeat the gestures of parents, authority figures, or religious texts. And while this sort of moral conditioning may arguably contribute to some aspect of social stability, it is nonetheless inadequate as a paradigm of ethical integrity. Encountering our socialized norms of morality, ethics, and supernatural claims and assumptions is precisely the type of encounter that agnosticism and Buddhism seek out. It is a creative and ongoing process that can be said to be the very basis of a genuine religious lifestyle, of genuine ethical conversation, both as individuals and collectively. Moral certainty based in supernatural claims that are not demonstrated or demonstrable, also inevitably lead to fantasies of moral superiority. As Batchelor said, “Instead of creatively participating in a contemporary culture of awakening, we confine ourselves to preserving those cultures of a vanishing past…we repeat the clichés and dogmas of other epochs.” We have seen many times how fantasies of moral certainty do not foster compassion or ethical dialogue, but usually result in arrogant, elitist and confrontational perspectives.

Our definition of religion itself is being challenged and expanded. Publishers Weekly, in reviewing Batchelor’s book said, “Buddhism is not strictly a religion, since it does not adhere to a belief in God; that the Buddha did not consider himself a mystic or savior, but a healer; and that Buddhism is less a ‘belief system’ than a personal ‘course of action’ that naturally instills morality, compassion, and inner peace in the practitioner.” The problem with this quote however is that it equates religion with theism and having a belief system. Buddhism is better said to be a nontheistic religion. After all, a tradition can be a religion even if it does not believe in a God or gods or have supernatural beliefs. Buddhism instead, can be thought of as a method. It is continuously evolving and adapting to the needs of the human condition without recourse to supernatural claims and without belief in a god or deities. Agnostic Buddhism is at its core, a confrontation and dialogue with our human condition. For further elaboration on the definition and understanding of evolving religion, see my previous post on Ken Wilber. 

Batchelor, Stephen. (2008). Buddhism Withouth Beliefs: A Contemporary Guide to Awakening. Riverhead Trade.

Humanism 101

Bam. This is the newly updated manifesto of humanistic philosophy. A few things really stand out for me. In the opening statement, it says explicitly "without supernaturalism". This may bother some people, both religiously inclined and perhaps those who would prefer the label of spiritual. Fact of the matter is, supernaturalism has no bearing whatsoever in the collective interest of society in terms of building a cohesive and ethical system in which to live. If you disagree, please argue your case. 

Humanism aspires "to the greater good of humanity". This naturally curtains any racist, sexist or other form of discrimination based on human circumstance. Religion, as well all know, is the best at excluding others based on circumstance, whether its based on skin color, gender, sex, nationality, a different idea and symbol of the divine, or even just a different name for the same or damn near similar idea of God. The in-group/out-group dynamic has no place in humanism and it does everything in its power, from the very foundation of its ethical system, even down to its name and label, to avoid any possibility of discrimination on circumstance. 

This obviously is something we can spend a lot of time talking about and dissecting. But for newbies to humanism who constantly ask me "What's that?" or "What did you say you were?" Here is your answer. Humanism 101. 

"Out of Many, One"

"Out of Many, One"

Do you agree with the assertion that "In God We Trust" both on our currency and as the de facto U.S. motto and that "Under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance was a 1950s fear response to communism? Was it an attempt at solidarity that happened to use federally sanctioned religious language? Or was it something else? Thoughts?

Nonetheless, it's a civic history lesson. Most people do not know that this religious language was not around until the 1950s. Using them as some sort of tangible example of our Christian or Deist religious heritage is completely unfounded. I personally like "Out of Many, One." This speaks more to the inherent pluralistic intent and reality of this country and of the world. And unlike "In God we Trust", or "Under God", it does not discriminate against nonbelievers, secularists, atheists, nontheists and the like.

The National Day of Reason

This past May 3^rd was the 59^th annual National Day of Prayer (NDP). The National Day of Reason (NDR) started in 2003 in response to the NDP. Because of these two competing and contradictory days, there has been a lot of media attention and coverage of the so-called “culture wars.” The clash of the religious right and the nonbelievers (includes atheists, agnostics, non-theist and secular humanists) continues to rage and has been particularly charged lately in this past election cycle.

It is not news to anyone that we are in the midst of a culture war. I however, do not like to call it a culture war. I call it for what it actually is: a religious war. I label it in this way because the issues of this “culture war” are religious in nature! They are defined by religion, and fought with its corresponding passion and sense of urgency and arrogance. These issues revolve around but are in no way limited to: prayer in public schools, public display of religious symbols such as the ten commandments, homosexuality and domestic partnerships and their corresponding civil rights, abortion, birth control and the so-called evolution/creationism debate. The conversation however, underneath these surface manifestations, has deeper foundations. It is based in a struggle for power and influence in the public square. It goes so deep as to touch on subtle assumptions about human nature and the basis of human morality. In order to stay focused and avoid these complications, however interesting and necessary to discuss they are, I will stick to the surface manifestations, discussing this debate between the NDP and the NDR with only slight injections of their deeper complications.

Lets start with the NDP, then move to the NDR and finish with various voices on both sides on the debate.

All of the information I have gathered is directly from the NDP website: www.nationaldayofprayer.org. The NDP was enacted to “encourage personal repentance and righteousness in the culture.” It is observed in respect of “all people, regardless of gender, race, socio-economic status or creed.” Throughout the website, particularly on the sites “about” and “mission” pages, scriptures are listed as reason and justification for this day. They quote Romans 12, Matthew 18, Deuteronomy 6, Proverbs 14, Psalm 133, First Timothy 2 and Mark 12 among many others. But the NDP is not an exclusively Christian event. They claim, “This government-proclaimed day is offered to all American, regardless of religion, to celebrate their faith through prayer. However the efforts of the NDP Task Force are executed specifically in accordance with its Judeo-Christian beliefs.” This day is centered on public acknowledgment of “the need for personal repentance and prayer…”

On their website, they make the common claim from the religious right that the United States is a Christian nation, or at least was “birthed in prayer and in reverence for the God of the Bible.” This is used as a justification for having a federally recognized day of prayer.

The NDP has also received criticism that they are affiliated with Focus on the Family and Family Talk. They deny this claim, saying “Though Mrs. Dobson [chairman of the NDP] is married to Focus on the Family and Family Talk founder Dr. James Dobson, the NDP Task Force is a separate organizations. It was housed at the Focus on the Family headquarters from 1991 to 2009 and is currently located at an independent office in Colorado Spring, CO. Its business affairs have always remained separate and Focus on the Family was compensated fro services rendered. However, between 1991 and 1993, Focus on the Family did provide grants in support of the NDP Task Force. Since then, the Task Force has been completely self-supported.” If you are not familiar with Focus on the Family, Family Talk and Dr. James Dobson, then I suggest you do some research or crawl out of the cave you have been living in. I will not discuss it here past the fact that Focus on the Family advocates for prayer in public schools, is anti-gay in every respect, pro-life, anti-pornography, any pre-marital and extramarital sexual activity and is highly political in nature (Dobson met or spoke with George W. Bush, during his presidency, almost weekly). This should not be surprising that the NDP is an intimate reflection of the religious right and their agenda for dominance in public life. As they say, “Since 1952, the NDP has been a powerful reminder of our need to kneel before God’s throne in the public sphere.”

The National Day of Reason (NDR) started in 2003 as a response to the “persistent threat to religious liberty posed by government intrusion into the private sphere of worship.” One of the fundamental points of opposition of these two groups can be summed up thusly: That religion and religious liberty and freedom is a private affair. It has no place in public policy or in the governance of a pluralistic populace consisting of many faiths and a growing number of those with no faith.

The NDR opposes the NDP on the following grounds:

1.     The NDP violates the First Amendment. It asks federal and local governments to “set aside tax dollar supported time and space to engage in religious ceremonies.” This is simply government support of religion over no religion.

2.     The NDP has sponsored thousands of events. As they hold these events of the NDP, government officials participate as if they are government endorsed. 

3.     The Supreme Court has stated that state sponsored prayer in schools is “inappropriately exclusionary.” The NDR asks, “Why is a nationally sponsored day of prayer and more inclusive?” A national effort geared toward a percentage of believers should be outside of the government’s abilities/duties/endorsements.

4.     A NDP has the effect of making those who don’t pray feel like second-class citizens. “Why set aside a national day that needlessly excludes?”

5.     Why do religious folk need a federally sponsored day to be reminded to pray? Why limit prayer to a single day in the first place? Government should simply have no voice in saying what Americans should do, especially if it is to engage in a religious practice.

6.     This NDP is focused on a certain form and manifestation of religious engagement. In this way, it gives preference and endorsement of this form of religion in opposition to other religious engagements and nonreligious engagements that may deserve more public support such as civil rights, social justice, peace activism etc.

7.     Many religious groups disagree with public prayer. This state sponsored public display of prayer is thus “a direct affront to such teachings and disrespects countless religious Americans” who do keep their religious life private.

8.     The freedoms of religion and expression are given to all Americans. We can choose to pray or not to pray as we wish. We do not need any government-endorsed program to influence one way or another. There is simply no need for the NDP.

Secular Humanists and all nonbelievers should be generally concerned with the religious right and their political agenda. The NDP is a manifestation of their desire for Christian cultural dominance in public life. It reflects an agenda that transcends this one manifestation. Other areas of concern include, support of faith-based initiatives which “proselytize and employ discriminatory hiring practices”, restricting important scientific research on the basis of religious and so-called moral objections, attempts to include creationism (including “intelligent design”) into public education, the appointment of judges who render decisions on the basis of their private religious beliefs, and lately the religiously motivated restrictions on reproductive rights and information as well as gay marriage, domestic partnership and corresponding civil rights.

Ken Ham, President and CEO of Answers in Genesis USA, is a perfect example of the threat of the religious right. He recently published an article responding to president Obama’s endorsement of gay marriage. His response, I think, embodies the threat the religious right poses in these and other areas. Ham is a “Young-Earth” Creationist. He believes in a literal interpretation of the Book of Genesis and denies evolution.

Obama said his view on gay marriage has “evolved”. For Ham, and many religious people, morals do not evolve or change. Morals are absolute and are given by God. Of course, this means the Christian God. Naturally. This idea is a really interesting and dangerous idea that I have written about extensively, especially in previous blog posts concerning Richard Dawkins, Rodney Stark and Ken Wilber. If you do not believe in absolute morality, then what sort of moral reasoning or guidance can you possibly have? Or as Ham says, “how does an atheist or agnostic determine what is ‘good’”? Ham thinks there is only one way to determine what is “good” and that “is from the absolute authority who is all ‘good’ – God!” Despite the simple denial of the human-made nature of religion and the arrogance to presume to have exclusive knowledge of God and God’s will, as I discussed with Brian Kimball in a previous post, this position asserts that nonbelievers are morally inferior, and that those of other religious faiths are either morally misguided or morally wrong.

Ham’s worldview is black and white. If you abandon this Christian absolute standard of morality, “we will see people doing what is right in their own eyes.” This, he says, is what we are experiencing in U.S. public policy. He says, “The recent announcement by the president of the USA in support of ‘gay’ marriage is just one such example—he abandoned the absolute standard for what is ‘good’ and now is wanting to impose his subjective opinion on the nation.” There is no acknowledgement that his subjective religious version of absolute morality is not imposed on others. It can’t be because it’s not subjective. This is objective truth. And as such, is justified in being coerced onto others. God’s word, Ham says, is being replaced. It is being replaced with “man’s word.” Our national religion, he says, is changing “from Christianity to secular humanism.” Secular humanism, first of all, is not a religion. Secondly, he views it as being fundamentally at odds with his version of Christian values, which are of course, the only correct values to have. As such, these values must be the values that form the basis of public policy. These are the values that should guide our politicians. As the NDP website says, we must “mobilize the Christian community to intercede for America’s leaders and its families.”

I’ll close with a quote from President Barak Obama. Speaking on the issue of contraceptives, he said, “No, you cants deny women their basic rights and pretend it’s about your ‘religious freedom’. If you don’t like birth control, don’t use it. Religious freedom doesn’t mean you can force others to live by your own beliefs.” Likewise, a Christian majority, cannot force their version of morality onto others just because they think they have exclusive access to the absolute truth. No minority, especially nonbelievers should have their rights subject to the passions and sentiments of the majority. The NDP is a clear breach of the First Amendment and is a symbol of the religious rights war on anyone who disagrees with them. As such, I celebrate the National Day of Reason!

The Origins of Religious Violence

Hector Avalos has produced an invaluable contribution to the field of religious studies in his book The Origins of Religious Violence. He presents a radical new theory to religious violence based on the creation of scarce resources. Through this theory he contrasts religious violence with secular (or nonreligious) violence and applies it to the field of international politics and foreign policy. I will briefly present an overview of his ideas.

Avalos presents two main propositions: (1) “Most violence”, he says, “is due to scarce resources, real or perceived. Whenever people perceive that there is not enough of something they value, conflict may ensue to maintain or acquire that resource. This can range from love in a family to oil on a global scale.” (2) “When religion causes violence, it often does so because it has created new scarce resources” (18). Avalos outline four main scarce resources that are created by religion: access to the divine will (particularity through inscripturation), sacred space, group privileging and salvation. I will return to how religion creates these scarce resources later on.

Avalos defines religion as a “mode of life and thought that presupposes the existence of, and a relationship with, supernatural forces and/or beings” (103). He uses an empirico-rationalist approach, which states, “unreasonable beliefs are those that neither can be verified nor are based on verifiable phenomena” (27). We define natural as that which by one or more of the five senses and/or logic. The supernatural must be unknown or unknowable. If we could detect it, it would cease to be supernatural. Avalos concludes, “if it is not natural then it is nothing more than a concept whose reality cannot be verified” (103).

As opposed to verifiable resource scarcities such as water, food and shelter, scarcities generated by religion require only belief in them in order to exist. The competition for these resources can cause conflict when the competitors need to acquire it or feel that loss of control of the resource will somehow threaten their well being (79). Religious believers can thus die or kill over a perceived scarcity that in actuality is not scarce at all. Violence predicated on the acquisition or maintenance of an unverifiable resource is simply needless. Bodily wellbeing, or life, is being traded for nonexistent gain. The scarce resources created by religion are completely manufactured by, or reliant upon, unverifiable premises. Thus, religion causes violence if and when the perpetration of violence is a logical consequence of beliefs in unverifiable forces and/or beings. “A scarce resource X created by religion may cause violence when at least one of two or more persons or groups (1) desires to acquire or maintain X, and (2) believes violence is an allowable and proper method to acquire and/or maintain X” (22).

Avalos spends time discussing previous theories of religious violence. If will briefly present his main point. “Current theories of religious violence” he says, “are still permeated by the idea that religion is essentially good and that violence is a deviation” (93). Previous theories are thus incomplete. Religious violence is seen as unrepresentative while the true religion and real god is being distorted. Avalos criticizes the claim that religious violence is a response to modernism and secularism. He says that it allows religious apologists to retain the value of religion, while deflecting the fundamentals mechanisms of violence to which all religions are susceptible. “Such militants are violent because modernism and secularization threaten the scarce resources (e.g., salvation, sacred space) that their belief systems have manufactured” (80). Similar to Rodney Stark, Regina Schwartz argued that because monotheism automatically creates a group of insiders and outsiders, the creation of outsiders is itself a violent act. Diana Edelman then argued for inclusive monotheism that acknowledges various forms of one supreme deity. This once again, is an attempt to keep the value of religion while claiming that violent religion is simply an aberration. Avalos, in regards to monotheism said, “The creation of scarce resources may occur when the adherents of a religion claim that the benefits of that religion are not or cannot be equally distributed to all human beings” (22). Outsiders are denied access to benefits provided by that one god. These benefits could be anything ranging from land to national identity. Avalos argues that the Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) are all heavily dependent on violence premises in that “they all regard their scriptures as sacred despite the violence endorsed therein” (29). Religion does not always cause violence, he says, but religion is inherently prone to violence. Any theory of religious violence must address the fundamental susceptibility to violence based on the creation of scarce resources, in this case, unverifiable resources.

What are scarce resources? They can be anything from tangible resources such as food, as elaborated by those such as Amartya Sen (and within economic theory, Thomas Malthus), to power and status within families, communities and countries. Scarce resources can incite ethnic conflicts and create immigration issues. It is based in the fear of losing a valued resource or of losing control of a resource. There are economic/status based threats and cultural/symbolic threats, which would include religion and way of life. This inherently brings up geopolitics and the control of resources deemed valuable. The “militarization of space” can be seen as a direct consequence of seeing space and a precious and scarce resource (99), which I will return to shortly.

The idea that insufficiency is a major, if not the main, cause of conflict is not new. Whenever there is not enough of something that is valued, conflict is the likely result. Scarcities are related to conflict from the smaller social units to the largest sociopolitical entities. And while a broad spectrum of researchers see the importance of scarcities, none of them seems to appreciate fully how religion can create scarce resources. What unites all of the scarcities, even those that are human-made, is that they exist or can exist. Available quantities of oil can really be insufficient to meet the needs or wants of people. Love and justice can really be insufficient in a family. “But these scarcities differ in important ways from scarcities that are precipitated by religion. Those differences, we shall argue, render religion a more tragic source of violence” (100).

Religion creates scarce resources in four main ways, through inscripturation, scared space, group privileging and salvation. Inscripturation refers to the creation of a written account of what is “believed to be authoritative information about or from supernatural forces and/or beings…what readers believe to be the thoughts and actions of a deity or supernatural force” (104). Writing becomes a scarce resource when not everyone has access to the writing or the ability to read. This can be the case with many females in the Muslim world who are denied access to scriptures or cannot become imams. More importantly however, is the creation of a scarce resource based on inscripturation, that of divine communication or religious authority. For example, the Catholic Church is the ultimate interpretative authority on scripture, and Catholics follow their interpretation. A secular example would be the US Supreme Court as being the ultimate interpretive authority on the US Constitution. Avalos says, “when divine communication is believed to reside in one book or set of books, and not in all books, then a sacred canon can be considered a form of sacred space, wherein the word of deities is embodied in those texts” (106).

When some are denied access to sacred space, or cannot live in sacred space, it becomes a scarce resource. This can be best understood in a social functionalist view, religion as being a mechanism that legitimizes existing social organizations and hierarchies. Avalos explains sacred space thusly,

Let us say that population X has declared a certain bounded space was given to them by god, who communicates only with members of population X. While there may be enough physical space for the community, the space has now been made scarce solely because of the belief that a god has declared it to be his property. Any loss of life resulting from that scarcity would be completely wasteful if that god did not in fact exist/ any violence resulting from this belief would be judged wasteful and or immoral (355).

Land is scarce already. It is absurd to create a new scarcity of land by calling it “holy” on the basis of unverifiable claims.

Group privileging usually withholds economic and social benefits. “Violence may follow attempts to acquire those benefits or attempts to prevent the loss of those benefits” (109). In the case of inscripturation, not everyone can read and write therefore, elite groups had control over written information. Salvation is not available to everyone. It stipulates that anyone can receive a more permanent supernatural status or benefit by joining a particular religion. But this is not tangible or verifiable. As Avalos states, “salvation exists only insofar as people believe in it” (109); salvation, of course meaning salvation from sin, or from the ultimate destruction caused by sin. Martyrdom can also fall into this category. It is a virtual ticket to heaven that is not available to everyone. You gain supernatural boons by giving up ones life in a violent exodus. Salvation through the shedding of blood was necessary for the abolition of sin. People become saved though the violence death of the son of god. Ultimately, any notion that sacrifice is necessary for our collective health is neither empirically verifiable nor helpful for overcoming violence itself. Avalos says,

The idea that anyone needs supernatural salvation is unverifiable. The concept that god or god’s son or anyone else has to die to be saved is not only unverifiable but can be seen as a continuation of ancient violence ideas about blood magic and sacrifice that simply have no place in the modern world. The idea that god died not because it was necessary, but simply to show his love, is equally misguided. The idea that violence is an expression of love is the problem (367).

Any person, or group of persons, that threatens another’s salvation can become the object of violence. In all these cases, violence can occur “when the loss of those valued resources is thought to be imminent or when someone else attempts to acquire those scarce resources” (110).

Avalos’s main argument is based in comparative ethics, meaning “scarcities caused by unverifiable propositions form a more tragic and preventable violence” (301). Avalos claims “the lack of verifiability in religious belief ethically differentiates the violence attributed to religion from the violence attributed to nonreligious factors” (29). His argument is quite simple. What exists has more value than what does not exist. Life exists. Therefore, life is worth more than what does not exist. Accordingly, any action that places the value of life as equal or less than equal than the value of nothing is immoral. It is always immoral to kill for something that has no value. Avalos says, “since religion is a mode of life and thought premised on the existence of and or relationship with unverifiable supernatural forces and or beings, then it follows that killing for religious reasons is always immoral” (354). Expressed another way, if acts of violence caused by actual (verifiable) scarcities are judged as immoral, then acts of violence caused by resources that are not actually scarce (unverifiable) are more immoral. Religious violence is always immoral. Non religious violence is not always immoral. This is the fundamental ethical difference.

The best prospect for a nonviolent global society is a secular humanist hegemony. Violence based on verifiable scarcities is workable, violence based on unverifiable scarcities is simply unnecessary and unhelpful. Avalos presents a few solutions to this problem of religious violence. It is given in the framework of minimization, meaning that we must concentrate on “ ridding ourselves of unnecessary violence” (359). Sacred space, salvation and group privileging are not essential features of religion! His solution is to focus on those resources that people are actually lacking, food, shelter, justice and so on. “Using empirico-rationalist epistemology is the key to determining what people actually need to live” (368). Religion, in this way, is unnecessary for morality. Including god in our moral considerations does not change them, except to add another unnecessary scarce resource and layers of bureaucracy and power structures. Religion should have no place whatsoever in our moral considerations nor should it have a place in finding solutions for religious violence.