"An atheist, a Catholic, and a conservative white evangelical go into a bar. The atheist says …"
So might begin a joke - probably an unrealistic and pathetic joke at that. For sure the Catholic and atheist might go drinking together, but its rare to find a conservative evangelical in their company. But let's stretch our imagination, what if it did happen? What might the conversation be, what jokes might be cracked, and what lies might be told? What if, after enough beer the conversation actually turned from casual chitchat to more useful subjects? On his third beer the atheist began “Hey, I know you evangelicals are rather precious about your identity. Why is that? Is it because I threaten your church culture – your mostly white culture I might add. Don't you find it rather hypocritical?” And the Catholic weighed in, seemingly at first on the side of the atheist. “Yes, I know you evangelicals and us Catholics supposedly share some moral and theological fundamentals, like on abortion, or same-sex relationships. But isn't your continuous defensiveness a bit overdone? That goes for you too my atheist friend, for you seem to live by the maxim that attack is the best form of defence. Both of you display an unusual amount of aggression in defending your belief. It seems only us Catholics are comfortable in our skin, as it were. Your attitudes suggest you're acting out of fear. Now the interesting question is, fear of what? Is it fear of losing your comfort zone, fear of being wrong, fear of being irrelevant, or is it simply the fear of insecurity about your faith because you don't actually know it very well ... and yes, atheism is also a faith.” “For”, continued the Catholic, as the beer gave free reign to the tongue, “you my evangelical friend seem to be fuelling a new rise of nationalism, anti-immigration, and anti-diversity, all seemingly out of your insecurity. You cry 'small government' in the hope you'll have the freedom to indulge in protectionism, and support economic policies that foster a class society, grow inequity, and build barriers to those who don't begin life with white privilege. And you atheists, you do the same but in the name of freedom and relativism wrapped up in a banner of faux socialism, all expressed with self-righteous authority and militant rhetoric. Yet I suspect you're just not brave enough to admit you're fighting morality in order to make space for hedonism. And you claim social responsibility - surely that should be for the evangelical, for isn't that the essence of what evangelicals espouse in every church service, yet they walk out the door and do the exact opposite?” And with that the Catholic drew angrily on the beer. The atheist jumped in again, as the evangelical looked a bit battered by this attack. “You're a fine one to speak” he retorted, “with all your trappings of finery on your alters, your mystical rituals and arcane jargon, yet in all that visual expression is deep contradiction to what you espouse. Where's your humility in the alter decorations, or your compassion in your condemnations, and where's the love in your schools when you abuse and cause humiliation? What you espouse and what you show suggests to the world that one or other are a lie. And don't even get me started on your history; the IRA, the inquisition, and indulgences. While you evangelicals, the dichotomy between what you preach and the way you live is almost more abhorrent to me.” With that the atheist mumbled into the mug “At least atheists are mostly honest about their interests”. This provoked the evangelical into a response. Putting down the lemonade the evangelical began tentatively “Well my dear atheist, let me note that you're not entirely innocent. And I'm not talking about innocence from sin because you don't believe in that. I'm talking about innocent from causing human suffering. For you profess a relativism that is so permissive that human selfishness - you surely admit to human selfishness - has been given free reign while you espouse a moral code with no substance at all. In your world of self-definition each is allowed to design their own form of utopian ethics – to tolerate everything except intolerance. Talk about an insubstantial way to live. Yet you hold to this so strongly that you want to impose it on everyone else … so who's being aggressive out of fear now? Your relativism is so encompassing that it leaves no room to recognize its own hypocritical claim to be absolute.” And embarrassed by the outburst the evangelical looked down and stared into the lemonade once again. The barmaid, a dark-skinned refugee from some unknown country, looked at these three with a mixture of resignation and disgust. Her thoughts she kept to herself for she knew the outcome of trying to enter their conversation of assumed righteousness. "These arrogant @#&^$", she thought. With a wisdom that comes from living a real life, she reflected on privilege, on what real humility might look like if it were lived out, and how the contradictions between these people's possessions, rhetoric, and lifestyles exemplified a human nature of contestation, which each seemed unable to see. And the barmaid began to imagine what she might say if they would only listen. “Have you considered your assumptions?” she thought she might begin. For she knew a lot about assumptions, such as gender assumptions that went way beyond legitimate gender presumptions. Such as the presumption about female physical strength which was legitimately rooted in fact, but then extrapolated to a false assumption about weak intellect and capabilities that is a product of arrogance and ego. And she knew about the assumption about her skin that, in the eyes of some, placed her one rung down on the ladder of humanity and bred a culture of prejudice. These assumptions closed doors to opportunity and have led some who claimed a morality to cry “you just need to pull yourself up by your bootstraps”, forgetting they had already stolen her boots. So she poured another round for these three pseudo-moralists, and quietly took the courage to ask “Do any of you know the difference between a presumption and an assumption?” The three looked at her in surprise, having barely recognized her presence until then. In that small moment of confusion the opportunity for truth stood forward bright and expectant. Until, almost in unison, they dismissively said “they're the same thing”, and turned away once more. She sadly wondered what it would take for them to see that presumption and assumption were not the same, how one was founded in fact and the other in ego. How would evangelicals ever see how they had taken a presumption of salvation and made it into an assumption of authority. And when would the atheists realize that their presumption of intellectual rigour had instead become an assumption of being correct. Or the Catholics, how could they understand their presumption of orthodoxy had turned into an assumption that only they held a true reflection of God. And how all of them had let their assumptions walk over the backs of those less privileged as each contested for their protected space of faith. And she wondered what God thought of that. And so an atheist and catholic and evangelical went into a bar. Each attacked the other and defended their own, and when they left, opportunity was once again an orphan.
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Why?
Probably the best therapy is to express yourself. Why do you think psychiatrists make you lie on the couch and talk, while all they do is murmur "hmmm", "uhuh", or "go on"? Archives
May 2017
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