Atheism and Secular Humanism, according to Dallin H. Oaks
What counts as those “who deny the existence of God”?
Elder Dallin H. Oaks, member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, recently gave a public, bristling attack against two secular philosophies—humanism and atheism—that created a modest amount of buzz amongst the intellectual community of the LDS Church. After having read his talk, I’d like to examine its claims for what it tries to communicate about these worldviews but too casually mischaracterizes and perhaps disservices, even in the wake of its more positive aims and suggestions.
Oaks begins by affirming that “we live in a world where many deny the existence of God” in addition to the eternal truths of “right and wrong [as] defined by His teachings and His commandments.” This “rejection of divine authority as the ultimate basis of right and wrong” is characteristic, he says, of those who the Apostle John called “anti-Christ,” or those who “denieth the Father and the Son” (1John 2:22). Oaks blankets both atheists and secular humanists into this category, comparing their lack of moral adherence to “traditional religious morality” with the Book of Mormon’s teachings on the “great and abominable church of all the earth, whose founder is the devil” (1Nephi 14:7). “Any philosophy or organization that opposes belief in God,” says Oaks, must belong “to the church of the devil” (1Nephi 14:10; also see 1Nephi 13:4-6).
There are many puzzling things about these statements.
The first that comes to mind is to determine what counts as those “who deny the existence of God.” Does a denial of a counterfeit “God” cast one into “the church of the devil”? Or is it only through the denial of knowing some extremely intimate “God,” like one who is acquainted with a friend, that qualifies for the ruling, “anti-Christ”?
The second question to unravel is to determine what counts as those who reject “the eternal reality of the truths of right and wrong defined by His teachings and His commandments”? Do those who reject moral precepts grounded in metaphysical constructs count as those who reject morality altogether? Should those who reject moral precepts given by finite and fallible humans always be cast with those who reject “[God’s] teachings and [God’s} commandments”? And should those who replace the metaphysical positioning of religious morality with a morality grounded in humanly-understood principles belong to “the church of the devil”?
These are crucially important questions, ones that Oaks deliberately or inadvertently doesn’t answer. It seems far easier to couch those who reject religion and religious morals into a blanketed set of devils than to wrestle with the harder, more nuanced discussion about why secular humanists and atheists might reject current discourses on the divine and alleged divine morals. It may be even harder to understand how many have rejected and replaced religious morals with more intimately understood principles, not grounded in metaphysical narratives. However, none of this should warrant any sort of vague or oversimplified condemnation against those irreligionists who do not fit Oak’s stereotypes.
In learning what many intellectual atheists and secular humanists specifically reject in religion, I have discovered that their denial of divine authority is inextricably tied to their denial of the supernatural, as well as any ethical absolute grounded in metaphysical propositions. They deny counterfeit “Gods,” are sensitive to religious power gone awry, and yes, use combative reason, satire and ridicule to mock the “people of God,” but such scorn must be understood sympathetically given that we no longer live in a culture where the basic questions of existence are already answered for us. Religious belief, in other words, is not enough to quell existential questioning.
This is why Oak’s amazing blanket statements about atheists and secular humanists does terrible disservice to our evangelical need to understand outsiders—it seems to suggest that unless you believe in God, or unless you accept the divine authoritative foundation for morality, you cannot be moral or spiritual. This is hardly true. Insofar as religious believers can accept the idea that there are admirable people who nevertheless do not believe, must mean that even religious people cannot close off the door to genuine existential questioning; they cannot assume that the knottiest problems of our existence have already been articulated in the holy books, let alone should prevent us from still greater articulations.
To be generous, I do believe Oaks is trying to condemn, and rightfully so, the laissez faire sham morality made “popular [in the] media and in current peer pressure.” It’s the eat-drink-and-be-merry attitude, which, correctly, has done nothing but cause people to pursue shallow, carnal and selfish pleasures. Furthermore, to Oak’s credit, he doesn’t necessarily compare those who deny or doubt the existence of God with those who would default to a morally relativistic lifestyle. Paradoxically, he also doesn’t acknowledge whether one can lead a moral lifestyle without religion, or “God” for that matter. He simply states the issue is “difficult to explain.”
The real challenge of his talk lies in the margins of what is meant by “moral relativism.” Oaks cites several scholars who describe this worldview as anything that admits to “no universally right or wrong answers” to moral questions, and that there are “no reasonable or rational ways by which to make moral distinctions that apply in every time, in every place, and to every person.” To agree with this definition is to automatically claim its contrapositive—that is, that there are, in fact, universal morals that can and should be applied “in every time, in every place, and to every person.”
Oak’s confidence in the existence of moral absolutes, as defined above, makes it difficult to understand, for example, how Joseph Smith could grant an exception to the moral rule when he justified polygamy, or when Brigham Young made an exception to the moral rule when he justified blood atonement rhetoric. “That which is wrong under one circumstance, may be and often is, right under another,” said Joseph. I wonder how Oaks would respond to Joseph here, for it is this unnerving principle that prioritizes relationships over rules. When we do not acknowledge that our personal relationship with God (or whatever your brand of spiritual conscience entails) is the norming factor in making moral decisions, but instead believe that rules apply “in every time, in every place, and to every person,” exceptions to the rule cannot be granted. And this does nothing but make a paradoxical mess of the development of Mormon theology.
I understand that Oaks was speaking to a very specific audience, namely LDS members. Although he does not outright state that it’s impossible to be moral without belief in God, he does potently group atheists and secular humanists into the same boat as those of the “church of the devil” and those who are “anti-Christ,” which can only then reinforce the “us versus them” attitude in the minds of believers, thinking themselves to be righteous while those who disbelieve to be unrighteous. Such mischaracterization and oversimplification surely does not help our goal to preach the gospel in more richly nuanced, self-reflective ways.
