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A review by kevin_shepherd
Faith No More: Why People Reject Religion by Phil Zuckerman
4.0
“A wind of secularity is blowing across North America.” ~Phil Zuckerman, 2012
A 2021 poll showed that 29% of Americans now claim “none” as their religious affiliation. In 1990 the “nones” hovered around 8%. That’s a 350% increase in the last 30 years. Why?
Zuckerman, a Professor of Sociology, conducted in-depth interviews with 87 American apostates (people who have not only lost their faith in a personal, biblical god but who have also disassociated themselves from religious self-identification). Although his findings are far from conclusive, he does identify many similarities and recurring themes among those who have opted out of faith-based ideologies.
Like most of the secular Americans Zuckerman interviewed, there was no single reason, no miraculous epiphany, that led me to turn my back on supernatural reasoning. It was a slow process with multiple contributing factors. Education, for example, was important for me—as was exposure to multiculturalism, conflicting politics, and recognizing the blatant hypocrisy of the religious-right. Leaving the fold is a very personal and sometimes complicated decision. Every individual chooses their own path and their own pace. For some it’s a nonreligious or indifferent parent, for others it might be misfortune in the tragic loss of a loved one. Still others might feel compelled to distance themselves from the malfeasance of a pedophilic priest or rabbi. It is rarely if ever just one reason and it is rarely if ever a decision made lightly.
“…there is no one single “thing”—be it an experience, event, relationship, and so on—that always, in and of itself, causes apostasy. All the factors …can increase the chances or likelihood that a person will reject religion. And when several of them occur in a given person’s life simultaneously, they become corrosive to religious faith.”
In his concluding summary, Zuckerman also lists personality traits that are near universal within his sampling of American apostates. On the whole, they are courageous (it takes a certain amount of guts to openly reject a faith that permeates one’s own family and social community). They are bright and inquisitive and/or avid readers. They are relatively individualistic and self-reliant. Finally, they are “life-lovers”—focusing on the here and now, not taking this world and their time on it for granted.
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“Whosoever disbelieves in Allah… who finds ease in disbelief: On them is wrath from Allah. Theirs will be an awful doom.” ~Sura XVI:106, Qu’ran
“…the unbelieving… their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur.” ~Revelation 21:8
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“It's our need to believe, and to surrender our skepticism and our reason, our yearning to discard that and put all our trust or faith in someone or something, that is the sinister thing to me.” ~Christopher Hitchens, 2011
A 2021 poll showed that 29% of Americans now claim “none” as their religious affiliation. In 1990 the “nones” hovered around 8%. That’s a 350% increase in the last 30 years. Why?
Zuckerman, a Professor of Sociology, conducted in-depth interviews with 87 American apostates (people who have not only lost their faith in a personal, biblical god but who have also disassociated themselves from religious self-identification). Although his findings are far from conclusive, he does identify many similarities and recurring themes among those who have opted out of faith-based ideologies.
Like most of the secular Americans Zuckerman interviewed, there was no single reason, no miraculous epiphany, that led me to turn my back on supernatural reasoning. It was a slow process with multiple contributing factors. Education, for example, was important for me—as was exposure to multiculturalism, conflicting politics, and recognizing the blatant hypocrisy of the religious-right. Leaving the fold is a very personal and sometimes complicated decision. Every individual chooses their own path and their own pace. For some it’s a nonreligious or indifferent parent, for others it might be misfortune in the tragic loss of a loved one. Still others might feel compelled to distance themselves from the malfeasance of a pedophilic priest or rabbi. It is rarely if ever just one reason and it is rarely if ever a decision made lightly.
“…there is no one single “thing”—be it an experience, event, relationship, and so on—that always, in and of itself, causes apostasy. All the factors …can increase the chances or likelihood that a person will reject religion. And when several of them occur in a given person’s life simultaneously, they become corrosive to religious faith.”
In his concluding summary, Zuckerman also lists personality traits that are near universal within his sampling of American apostates. On the whole, they are courageous (it takes a certain amount of guts to openly reject a faith that permeates one’s own family and social community). They are bright and inquisitive and/or avid readers. They are relatively individualistic and self-reliant. Finally, they are “life-lovers”—focusing on the here and now, not taking this world and their time on it for granted.
__________________________________
“Whosoever disbelieves in Allah… who finds ease in disbelief: On them is wrath from Allah. Theirs will be an awful doom.” ~Sura XVI:106, Qu’ran
“…the unbelieving… their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur.” ~Revelation 21:8
__________________________________
“It's our need to believe, and to surrender our skepticism and our reason, our yearning to discard that and put all our trust or faith in someone or something, that is the sinister thing to me.” ~Christopher Hitchens, 2011