Happiness Without God
This past Saturday, it was my turn to give a talk or presentation. (I guess I could use the term sermon, but that word makes me bristle.) Because I am not the best speaker (or writer for that matter) I decided that it would probably be a good idea to find a previously written article that may convey what I had wanted to talk about. In this case, I wanted to present something that talked about a humanist's life on a personal level. I decided on happiness. I found an interesting article entitled "Godless Happiness What's Faith Got To Do With It?" by Timothy J. Madigan. This article was originally published in Free Inquiry, Volume 18, Number 3. You can read it on the Secular Humanism site.
Secular Humanism site. Anyhoo...here is my talk. I did edit it slightly for style and grammar, but not for content.
Happiness Without God
For many of us that grew up in a theistic household, I was taught that in order to live a good, happy life, one must not only study and get to "know" God, but also obey Him. Without God, not only was there no chance of redemption, any kind of reward in an afterlife, but it just wasn't possible to be happy. And if you knew someone that was an avowed atheist, agnostic or other non-thesist, well, it wasn't a "real happiness".
Growing up, it wasn't unusual to hear rumors about people I had known that had left our congregation. Of course, now that they were not "on the right path", I would hear things like, "oh so and so looks awful! They look so unhappy!" This was especially true if the former member was seen during the holiday season buying Christmas items, since our particular religion taught that Christmas was pagan, and “true” Christians should not participate.
When I left, that religion, Christianity, and eventually theism altogether, one of the things during my journey that I was concerned about was Happiness. My whole life I was taught that a relationship with god was directly tied to genuine happiness. Over the past several years, I have come to find out that this is a myth, really. That I can be happy, and so can my kids.
In preparing for this talk, I found an interesting article that entitled Godless Happiness :What's Faith Got To Do With It? by Timothy J. Madigan, in a past issue Free Inquiry Magazine. This article does a fine job of pointing out why faith in God or theistic religion is not necessary for genuine happiness.
My notes on the article:
As Madigan noted, while for many the structure of religion can bring order and happiness to a person's life, in the case of any religion based on a belief in the supernatural, this happiness is based on shielding people from reality, and I think, in some cases allows people to shirk responsibility for their own happiness, because, God will take care of it if they just follow his rules. This often will cause people to limit themselves, to not strive to reach a "personal best".
I have seen this numerous times in my own life, talking with former members of my previous religion, about "the person they could have been" if ONLY they had not lived their life within the tight constraints of Christendom.
Theism relies heavily on controlling believers with fear and guilt, which are two emotions that decrease a person's ability to experience happiness. I can tell you from personal experience, it is hard to be truly happy when you are feeling guilty because you may not have the physical energy to serve God every weekend. And it is hard to stay happy when you are in constant fear of the state of your children's spirituality.
That last line of Madigan's article struck a personal chord with me:
"In a culture that still disparages independent thinking, today's humanists also need to be spurred on to achieve excellent lives. And the best way to do this is with a little help from their friends. "
This is why I am here, and why I bring my family to the Humanist Fellowship of North Texas. Because although I have experienced happiness with out God for a few years now, I believe it is easier to do when you are able to meet with others that are like minded in this area.
Secular Humanism site. Anyhoo...here is my talk. I did edit it slightly for style and grammar, but not for content.
Happiness Without God
For many of us that grew up in a theistic household, I was taught that in order to live a good, happy life, one must not only study and get to "know" God, but also obey Him. Without God, not only was there no chance of redemption, any kind of reward in an afterlife, but it just wasn't possible to be happy. And if you knew someone that was an avowed atheist, agnostic or other non-thesist, well, it wasn't a "real happiness".
Growing up, it wasn't unusual to hear rumors about people I had known that had left our congregation. Of course, now that they were not "on the right path", I would hear things like, "oh so and so looks awful! They look so unhappy!" This was especially true if the former member was seen during the holiday season buying Christmas items, since our particular religion taught that Christmas was pagan, and “true” Christians should not participate.
When I left, that religion, Christianity, and eventually theism altogether, one of the things during my journey that I was concerned about was Happiness. My whole life I was taught that a relationship with god was directly tied to genuine happiness. Over the past several years, I have come to find out that this is a myth, really. That I can be happy, and so can my kids.
In preparing for this talk, I found an interesting article that entitled Godless Happiness :What's Faith Got To Do With It? by Timothy J. Madigan, in a past issue Free Inquiry Magazine. This article does a fine job of pointing out why faith in God or theistic religion is not necessary for genuine happiness.
My notes on the article:
As Madigan noted, while for many the structure of religion can bring order and happiness to a person's life, in the case of any religion based on a belief in the supernatural, this happiness is based on shielding people from reality, and I think, in some cases allows people to shirk responsibility for their own happiness, because, God will take care of it if they just follow his rules. This often will cause people to limit themselves, to not strive to reach a "personal best".
I have seen this numerous times in my own life, talking with former members of my previous religion, about "the person they could have been" if ONLY they had not lived their life within the tight constraints of Christendom.
Theism relies heavily on controlling believers with fear and guilt, which are two emotions that decrease a person's ability to experience happiness. I can tell you from personal experience, it is hard to be truly happy when you are feeling guilty because you may not have the physical energy to serve God every weekend. And it is hard to stay happy when you are in constant fear of the state of your children's spirituality.
That last line of Madigan's article struck a personal chord with me:
"In a culture that still disparages independent thinking, today's humanists also need to be spurred on to achieve excellent lives. And the best way to do this is with a little help from their friends. "
This is why I am here, and why I bring my family to the Humanist Fellowship of North Texas. Because although I have experienced happiness with out God for a few years now, I believe it is easier to do when you are able to meet with others that are like minded in this area.
posted by The CrazyHumanist @ 2:13 PM
1 Comments:
At 8:15 PM,
David Wallace Croft said…
I enjoyed hearing your talk and I loved being able to read it later online as well. I picked up a copy of "The Myth of Sisyphus" by Camus at Half Price Books today.
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