Praying with atheists

[Damian]

So, I ask you, in what spiritual tradition is this an appropriate way to address a step-son who’s Catholic mother has been recently diagnosed with cancer?

The appropriate way to address these issues with anyone who is going through potential lethal illness is the same way close friends comfort and care for each other. We know our how our loved ones will grieve and we just be there for them on how they are going through the emotional process of the reality of the issue. What ever rituals are normal for that person then participate or at least help them find the time to perform their rituals. Some people use prayer, others like to go fishing, others want to exercise, have a beer with friends and game night until they are ready to talk or not talk, etc. My family uses humor to address terrible issues like this so we made sure that we had a nurse that was fine ripping my dad a new one since that was his personality and we went fishing.

 

[tad]

In that case, what my father and especially my step-mother have done could only be described as an epic fail. What I’ve come to realize, is that they need me a lot more than I need them. They’ve already proved abundantly that they have nothing to offer. I feel bad for them, because I know their hurting and they’ve voluntarily chosen to cut themselves off from what helps me best.

My father called again last weekend. I didn’t really care to talk but I figured he was in a lot of pain due to the poor behavior of his third wife so I picked up the phone. Again, he has nothing to offer me but I took the time to console him. If he had stayed married to my mom, yesterday (9/11) would have been their 58th wedding anniversary. We had a good conversation. The only thing I mentioned about my faith, was that it was helping me get through this. Hard to argue with that.

At the end, I told him I would continue praying for him and thank you for sending good thoughts. He told me he would vote for what’s good for me and not necessarily what’s good for my Church. Kind of a weird thing to say, but it points to the spiritual poverty of his atheism.

 

[Damian]

Really gotta push back on the word “atheism” there since, being an Atheist, I don’t like being the “enemy” group that the religious think we are.
There is no world view of Atheism. You can pluralize the word Atheist, to Atheists. But there is no “-ism” to being an atheist since it’s a single position on a single question. There are no universal world views, political views, tenants, dogma, leaders, etc. Atheist are all individuals that are just grouped together under the label of Atheist that is in reference to a single question on a single topic., “Are you convinced or believe that the supernatural exists?” If you say no, you are an atheist. That’s really all it is. That’s why they say organizing atheists is like herding cats. We are of every world view, political position, etc. You can be a non-spiritual religious person as well and be an atheist. That’s what the jewish community is. You can be a non-spiritual catholic and be an atheist as well.
What ever the rift is between your dad and you, he seems to want to still keep it there by attacking something that is important to you. That’s all just fear manifesting itself into conflict which we are more comfortable dealing with than the unknown.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

A Catholic who does not believe in the core “supernatural” teachings of our faith that are expressed in the Catholic Profession of Faith is not a true Catholic. He may have been baptized into the Church, he may be a “cultural Catholic”, but Catholicism is not a cultural group.
You reject those key supernatural teachings, you are not Catholic because you have rejected the required beliefs.

So no, you cannot be a “non-spiritual Catholic”. I don’t know where you got the idea that was even possible. And you cannot somehow be a Catholic and an atheist at the same time. A person who claims that they are both things is lying about one or the other.

 

[tad]

It should be pretty easy to define atheists, as the name indicates ‘no God’. There’s atheist churches now, they must be preaching atheism.

I’ve known for a while now that true atheists are rather rare. Personally, I think it takes a lot of faith to be an atheist. I know I don’t have that kind of faith.

As I get older and encounter more of these situations, it seems to me as big life events occur such as a birth of a child, marriage or the death of a parent, the atheist is forced to co-opt some one else’s faith tradition, invent one of their own, or the most honest option, do nothing. That’s what I mean when I speak of the bleakness of atheism.

 

[Damian]

Yes atheist does refer to “no God”, but its a lack of being convinced that the supernatural is part of reality, not a positive statement that there actually is no supernatural. Just like if I fail to convince you that I bought a puppy yesterday. You don’t actually know that just based on the evidence and argument I put forth in the conversation, but you were not convinced/believe that I did purchase a puppy yesterday. The default position of any claim about reality is to not believe it until you are presented with enough evidence to accept the claim to be true.

Yes there are “atheist churches” being setup but they are not preaching “Atheism” as I understand it. The cause behind this process is that the people that have come out and told people they don’t believe in the supernatural, aka are an atheist, are then kicked out of the family and their churches. They have now lost their social support structure that was supposed to never leave them. Now there is a vacuum in their world where they are still wanting that social community and family. So these churches are popping up to fill that. They are discussing all the things that are important to people in church, minus the attachment to the supernatural. So they talk about how to be better brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, husbands, wives to each other; discuss the stresses of living the good life as a community and as an individual; implementing social works within their communities like food banks, libraries, etc. All without a need to reference the supernatural as a reason to do better. These churches would not be there if their family and church did not kick them out and ostracize them.

People brought up in a specific cultural tradition that teaches them what practices to do for emotional release during highly emotional events. If you’re really stressed about and feel helpless about something and your culture taught you to pray, well just the exercise of prayer will reduce your stress level and help calm you down about the situation, even if you believe you are not actually communicating to a deity. We all do this, that’s why we punch the ground out of frustration, rend our cloths at terrible news, kiss photos, etc. We all need rituals. Its just easier to use the rituals we were already taught from childhood than make up our own.

 

[Damian]

I’m just talking about people that enjoy the cultural traditions of catholism without believing in the supernatural part of it. All religions have political positions, rules about how to live the good life, etc. You don’t need to believe in the supernatural to follow these practices and guidelines. There’s a website out there called the Clergy Project that helps preachers and pastors that are secretly atheist for example and there’s statistically people in everyone’s church that is an atheist as well, but enjoys the culture and community of their church. You can call them, not a true X for their disbelief in the supernatural, but still doesn’t mean they don’t identify as religion X since they do value the religion regardless of believing in the supernatural part of it.