Anti-Faith Extremism

Fourth Quarter 2004

Editor's Watch

by James W. Skillen

On July 1, Robert B. Reich, labor secretary in the Clinton administration, wrote an article on Bush's God, titled "The Last Word," in the on-line edition of The American Prospect.  Reich was exercised over the fact that the Bush campaign and members of Congress were trying to find ways to organize conservative churches to support Bush's reelection. Reich's concern about the politicization of churches and other nonprofit organizations is quite legitimate. But his diatribe against Bush and conservative Christianity expresses such anti-religious extremism that one can hardly distinguish it from religious bigotry itself.

Here is Reich's concluding paragraph. "The great conflict of the 21st century may be between the West and terrorism. But terrorism is a tactic, not a belief. The underlying battle will be between modern civilization and anti-modernist fanatics; between those who believe in the primacy of the individual and those who believe that human beings owe blind allegiance to a higher authority, between those who give priority to life in this world and those who believe that human life is no more than preparation for an existence beyond life; between those who believe that truth is revealed solely through scripture and religious dogma, and those who rely primarily on science, reason, and logic. Terrorism will disrupt and destroy lives. But terrorism is not the only danger we face."

Reich's red-faced, high-blood-pressure anger needs to be exposed for what it is. First, it is a distortion of the religion he is maligning to the point of lumping evangelical Christianity together with radical Islamism. There are many closed-minded, fanatical religious folks in this world, to be sure, but Christianity does not represent "blind allegiance to a higher authority," or a belief that "human life is no more than preparation for" a future existence, or belief that truth is revealed "solely through scripture and religious dogma." This use of an extreme to represent the totality of what the author wants to discredit represents the old tactic of constructing a straw man that one can easily push over.

The second way in which Reich's fanatical diatribe needs to be exposed is by highlighting its religious fervor, its evangelistic intention, its dogmatic character. From Reich's point of view there are only two roads one can follow, the old road to a dark hell or the road to a sane, rational, and non-religious life in this world. Only one of these roads makes any sense to him, given his faith in modern civilization over against anti-modern fanaticism. In opposition to blind allegiance to a higher authority, Reich gives blind obedience to science, reason, and logic. In opposition to the priority of a future life, Reich insists dogmatically on the priority of this life. His aim is to denounce the devil of the anti-modern by urging the renewal of faith in modernism. And if the reader happens to belong to the wrong faith community, then she should convert today and join Brother Bob in the camp of the true faith.

Neither of these paths of faith will lead us away from bigotry and close-mindedness. Instead, a life of open-minded, thankful-hearted allegiance to the God who created us can lead to the highest possible elevation of the worth of individuals and human communities. The light of the Scripture illumines the path of life in this world along which the legitimate truths of creaturely experience, deliberative judgment, and scientific study have their proper place. Terrorism is, indeed, not the only danger we face. Those who denounce as extremism that which they do not understand are also a danger—especially a danger to deliberative democracy and the survival of an open pluralistic society.