Religion in General

For a long time I have been seriously annoyed by people who think religious believers should defend religion in general, or religion in the abstract.  Often this is initiated by atheists, and from their perspective this makes sense, both because they believe all religion is false and because it works as a tactic to make their debate opponents defend absurd positions.  It is much less excusable, though, for believers to internalize this way of thinking.  It is much less excusable, yet it is commonly encountered.

In most areas of life, this kind of confusion is not tolerated.  We do not, for instance, expect the makers of a serious anti-cancer drug to defend "cancer treatments" in general -- and by "in general", I mean everything marketed as a cancer treatment on the Internet.  If you think major drug companies are (at least sort of) honest, this can be because the Internet is full not only of "treatments" that are useless, but of "treatments" that are directly harmful; if you think they are not even marginally honest, this can be because they have no incentive to defend their competitors; but either way, no one expects pharmaceutical companies to defend every purported treatment.  Nor should we expect those who claim to have the cure for spiritual sickness to defend every purported spiritual cure.

And yet we do.  Why?

Certainly one reason is the Scandal of Particularity.  Our culture and our time is particularly offended by this scandal.  The cultural impact comes largely from developments in science.  Copernicus (and his immediate successors) showed that the solar system can be greatly simplified if we consider the sun its center rather than the earth.  (Note:  In the ancient and medieval interpretation, the earth was better described as being at the BOTTOM of the universe than at its CENTER, so its unique status was not exactly a compliment.)  Darwin argued convincingly that there is no sharp BIOLOGICAL distinction between humans and the rest of the animal kingdom.  Einstein authored a compelling theory that nature does not favor any one frame of reference.  All these ideas -- which are supported by reams of observational and experimental data -- seemed to reinforce the idea that no place or species is really better or more important than any other (but it is extremely important to understand that that is reading a deeper meaning into the science than science itself can bear).  History seems to back this up, as it becomes clear that there never really was a golden age, our childhood heroes were more flawed than we had imagined them, and people just like us have committed shocking atrocities.  Consequently, a rejection of the particular in favor of the general is an inescapable part of the Zeitgeist.

But then, the Zeitgeist is by definition a feature von unserer Zeit -- of our time.  It is also largely confined to what has usually been called Western civilization.  There is a degree of irony in passionately asserting that we live in a very special time and place, otherwise we would not realize there is no such thing as a special time or place.  Even setting that aside, the Scandal of Particularity is an example of a logical fallacy:  the rash generalization.

And the fact is, we need particularity.  What is real is a particular case of what might have been, and, contrary to what the Walt Disney Corporation would have us believe, reality is better than fantasy.  The West is dying because it has rejected this truth.