There an interesting podcast here about (and from) preachers who no longer believe in god. This is from Dan Dennett’s work (his study is here) and he is interviewed by CBC’s Mary Hynes on the hour long show Tapestry.
July 28, 2011
Atheism: What’s a man (of god) to do when he no longer believes?
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Questionable Motives 
live life for its own sake
Comment by Random Ntrygg — July 28, 2011 @ 5:49 pm |
Interesting study. And it is an important discussion and a worthwhile study to undertake.
Interesting how many of the respondents actually didn’t classify themselves as true believers to begin with, rather classifying themselves as being more agnostic or pantheistic. Even more telling though is that there was a sense of looking at the position of clergy as being one of a career and not a calling.
On a personal note, I don’t personally believe in PSA and acknowledge that within the context of church history there is around 8 substantial theories of the atonement – yet the Apostles don’t actually spell out in detail how the atonement works, so there is room for discussion as to how it works….While the Presbyterian minister didn’t believe in the virgin birth, or the deity of Christ….the report doesn’t say whether or not he believes in the resurrection which is the central part of the Christian faith…
Finally – non of the study participants ever claimed to have had a life changing encounter with God somewhere along the way and it appears that there religious belief / practice was more in line with cultural belief / tradition. This is an important distinction to note…for history shows indeed that there are / were many dedicated atheists who completely scoffed and dismissed the idea of there being a God, who did encounter God in a life changing way and in doing so fell into the camp of no longer believing in atheism.
Comment by Craig Benno — July 28, 2011 @ 6:10 pm |
This study reminds me of Francis Galton’s study into the efficiency of prayer…
Comment by misunderstoodranter — July 31, 2011 @ 11:13 am |