Religious Implications of Atheism - страница 34

It is also important to note another aspect of non-religious Christianity, correctly noted by Dietrich Bonhoeffer: the Christian’s task is to be a real human, that is, to embody God’s plan for a human, to find and realize his true self. It often becomes possible to do this only if a man not looks back at the opinions of others, at cultural, social and even religious stereotypes. The Bible encourages a person to be himself, and not to play a false role (albeit an honorable one) imposed by social or religious paradigms.

For example, King David rode and danced while bringing the ark of God into Jerusalem, like a boy, like a commoner. His wife, Michal, told him that this was a “violation of protocol”, a degradation of the king’s dignity. But David answered her:

“It was before the LORD, who chose me in place of your father and all his household, to appoint me as prince over Israel, the people of the LORD, that I have danced before the LORD. I will make myself yet more contemptible than this, and I will be abased in my own eyes; but by the maids of whom you have spoken, by them I shall be held in honor” (2 Sam. 6:21–22).

Likewise, Zacchaeus, a chief tax collector and a rich man, climbed a sycamore tree like a boy to see Jesus (Luke 19:2–4). The head of the tax department is a fairly high rank, and even in that era, such behavior would have caused ridicule of the people. But Zacchaeus, like David, did not think about it, since all his attention was drawn to the Lord.

Some people, being completely turned to God, did not even look back at religious stereotypes. Religious people did not understand this and therefore expelled them from their society. St. Augustinus wrote about this, “Divine Providence often allows even good people to be driven out of Christian society, because of some extremely violent indignations of the carnal people . . . The Father, who sees the secret, secretly prepares a crown for such. People of this kind are rare, but examples are not lacking; there are even more of them than you might think.” [58]

And of course, there can be no religion in a baby in the womb. The greatest of all the prophets, John the Baptist, in the womb of Elizabeth joyfully greeted the Virgin Mary, who also bore Christ in the womb at that time (Luke 1:41,44). Naturally, he did not even think about any religion at that moment. In Christian Tradition, there are many more cases when babies express their feelings for God. Therefore, we can talk about completely non-religious and even pre-verbal communication with God. For example, the gospel call “to be changed and become like children” (Matt. 18:3; 19:14) is just about this. The theologians’ formulas “Christianity is the end of religion” and “Christianity is the trial of religion” will be completely incomprehensible to children. If Christianity is defined as love for God, this will be clear to everyone.

It follows from what has been said that in the modern universal meaning the term “religion” is extremely unfortunate due to its abstractness. In any case, it would be wrong to attribute Christianity to religion in some cases.

In one thing, atheists are right: in religions, the human factor plays a significant role, there is much human, sometimes too much human. Religion is a social phenomenon. This is how religions differ from pure metaphysics. One, two, or three people can philosophize about metaphysics as much as they want, but they will never create a religion. And a few people living in a desert will not create a religion. It only occurs in a fairly large society. Therefore, it would be a mistake to view any religion outside the historical, social, and cultural context. Many people are followers of one religion or another, not because they searched for a long time and found some truth in it, but simply because it is the religion of their ancestors, or they were brought up in a certain cultural environment or it is so accepted among their relatives and friends.