Question & Answer

 
A Reader from the Internet, writes:

Question:

I am interested in your thoughts about Atheism, God, Religion as an Institution and Reincarnation.

Answer: By Gretta Vosper

Why does an atheist need God?

I don’t think an atheist does need God. My colleagues who identify as non-theists or post-theists or panentheists need the word ‘god’, but not the traditional understanding. They need the word because, as the late scholar Marcus Borg believed, if we lose our exclusive Christian language, we will lose Christianity. Clergy who continue to use a word that is understood by most people in church pews and beyond to mean “a supernatural, theistic being who can intervene in human affairs if it wants to” may well be working to preserve Christianity but are already, I believe, far outside what that is generally assumed to mean. Indeed, I think if we had been required to come up with a new word to describe what we believed each time our understandings evolved, we may have a stronger church today for our efforts and those who have left because they think we are still talking about that interventionist god we call God may not have needed to do so.

I am willing to lose Christianity if it means saving the future for our children. Because of that, I am willing to sacrifice traditional language to transfer the ethos of my denomination – its ground-breaking justice work and its compassionate call to honour the dignity inherent in all living beings – to generations excluded by that language. It is the ethos of the progressive and liberal churches that defines us, not our language, and it is our ethos that most needs to be shared with the wider world and the world to come.

What is your definition of God?

The definition of god that got me through my theological education and the first several years of my ministry was more about what we create when we build relationships of respect and love with ourselves, others, and the world and less about the stereotypical god of the Bible. Much as Martin Buber wrote in his I, Thou, we have the opportunity to desecrate the relationships we build or to make them beautiful. When we make them beautiful, I believe we create a bond that offers us strength, courage, dignity and invites us to act compassionately in a broken and hurting world. That is what I once called god. But I no longer use the term as I found it terribly confusing for people. They usually thought I meant the Wikipedia definition of a supernatural being with interventionist capabilities in whom moral authority was grounded. I don’t believe that and I believe that is a very dangerous premise.

Why should religion be institutionalized?

I wish it weren’t, actually. I once argued that a spiritual experience, no matter what it was or how described, once transmitted becomes religion. We are, unfortunately, only able to share our experiences with others through our own interpretation of them. As soon as we interpret, the experience is no longer pure; it is confined by our limited perspective. Institutionalized religion is the hardening of those shared experiences. It is as though the ones who had the experience insist upon everyone having it and that they will be able to, or should be able to barring any failings on the recipient’s part, to recreate the experience. Other than for the reason of our meagre attempts to share uplifting moments with one another, the only reason I can think religion needs to be institutionalized is to manage the power associated with claims to truth. And that, too, is a very dangerous premise.

Do you believe in reincarnation?

I do not believe in reincarnation but I am an agnostic when it comes to the nature of reality. I may be pleasantly, or horribly surprised!

~ Gretta Vosper

This Q&A was originally published on Progressing Spirit – As a member of this online community, you’ll receive insightful weekly essays, access to all of the essay archives (including all of Bishop John Shelby Spong), and answers to your questions in our free weekly Q&A. Click here to see free sample essays.

About the Author

The Rev. Gretta Vosper is a United Church of Canada minister who is an atheist. Her best selling books include With or Without God: Why The Way We Live is More Important Than What We Believe, and Amen: What Prayer Can Mean in a World Beyond Belief. She has also published three books of poetry and prayers.