More thoughts on atheism
Following on from this post and its comments . These are mostly disorganized notes. Writing in the 1950's, French Catholic theologian Henry Duméry wisely observed, “ On ne repousse l’Absolu qu'au nom d’un Absolu meilleure .” ("One does not reject the Absolute except in the name of a higher Absolute.") In other words, one needs to have some ultimate concern or ground from which to orient one's world view. If one does not believe in a traditional God-image as it comes through a tradition, then one replaces it with some other ideal. He also observed that atheism criticizes caricatures of God rather than the real God. (" L’athéisme critique plus des caricatures de Dieu que le vrai Dieu. "). Quite often these caricatures are served up by believers themselves who are still on a very literal and childish level of comprehension of their own system. In other words, whatever ideals are presented as the "absolute" -- even if they are consciously s...