Protestantism is to blame
[The popularity of this post led me to reconsider it, and I think there is a significant inaccuracy that has to be taken into account: the Wars of Religion proper were not wars between Protestants (English revolutions are the exception). However, the fragmentation of Protestantism still occurred, and still would be a strong motivator for a philosophical shift toward non-theological views of the world in Protestant nations, so I think there is still a significant truth in my post.]
The historical debate about the genealogy of modern atheism continues amongst historians and theologians, blaming various figures such as Duns Scotus, Francisco Saurez, the deists, René Descartes, and many others. I don’t doubt that some of these figures may have contributed in one way or another, but I remain persuaded, at least for the moment, that the main culprit is really Martin Luther.
Now, I say this as a convinced Protestant. I agree 100% with Luther’s sola scriptura. But I think it was probably the cause of atheism. To boil it down: Luther raised the possibility of a Christianity not founded on Papal (or at least clerical, in Councils) primacy, but based on the individual scholar/Christian reading the scriptures for themselves. Unfortunately, those who agreed with Luther on this starting point failed to present a unified front on several of the important issues in theology and ethics, with the result of the (in)famous fragmentation of Protestantism. This fragmentation became (at least perceived to be; see below) violent with the Wars of Religion, with the result that philosophers started to look for a grounding for politics and ethics outside of any kind of theology. This led to a distinctively modern kind of foundationalism, which, combined with a judgment that there was no good evidence for Christianity, led to atheism.
Now, I think there are two needed qualifications to this thesis. Firstly, I think William Cavanaugh has at least put a big question mark on the general idea that the Wars of Religion was really about, or fought along the lines of religion. More likely it was about the princes trying to get power, and using religious disputes as a justification for their taking more power. Secondly, I doubt there could be a significant explanation of French atheism apart from the apparent friendliness of Catholicism and royal corruption.
But, nevertheless, I think Protestantism has to take a large part of the blame. Because Protestants were unable to secure unity, the state stepped in to do it for us instead. Theologically, this lines up perfectly with Jesus’ statements in his final discourse in John, at least as a mirror-image of what he wanted: Christ said that the world would come to believe based on the unity and love amongst Christians, and so the lack of those things led to the world doing the opposite.
The sad part, bringing things closer to home, is that this failure shows no signs of improving in the near future (witness Dan’s most recent post).
City of God 
Charles Taylor talks about this in A Secular Age. The apparent compromise position for dealing with the fallout from the wars of religion was something along the lines of a Christianized stoicism among the European elites.
This is an absurd causal story. Suppose that there are ten necessary links between two events. Suppose that the first event is the split between the Catholic and the Orthodox Churches. Suppose the final event is atheism. In the middle, we have the Reformation, which the split between East and West made possible because the Catholic Church centralized political power which arguably led to the corruption that generated the Reformation.
Here’s the question: Why pick the Reformation as the key event? Why not pick the split? Why not pick the Papal consolidation of power? It seems arbitrary to select Martin Luther as a causal origin. In fact, you could make further, similar choices downstream, such as the move away from Trinitarianism, or the actual development of foundationalism, or maybe, um, actual atheism.
Dan: what is notably about Taylor’s story is that it starts with Calvin, not Luther.
Actually, Kevin, while I picked up on the fact that Taylor doesn’t seem to be a big fan of Calvin, he doesn’t seem to be picking a starting point so much as he tries to emphasize continuity between late medieval efforts at reform and what was done in the Reformation and the Counter-Reformation.
I saw Calvin as a pivot-point for Taylor because Calvin emphasized demystification, which Taylor argues is a way for elites to signal their superior sensibility and intelligence. This signalling process produces increasing demystification as the prior demystification trickles down to the masses at large. Maybe you have a different read. It is a long book!
Also, I take it the thesis expressed in the original post is not meant to be Taylor exegesis.
Kevin:
Obviously I was not saying Protestantism was the only cause. I mentioned some others in that post. But the link between Protestantism and atheism is clearly more close than the link between the schism and atheism: almost 600 years passed between those two events without atheism becoming significant. But within a couple centuries (with some wars significantly caused by the Reformation) after the Reformation atheism has become a serious contender intellectually. It’s not unreasonable to draw a closer connection between those events than between events separated by over half a millennium.
Kevin:
Also, “In fact, you could make further, similar choices downstream, such as the move away from Trinitarianism, or the actual development of foundationalism, or maybe, um, actual atheism.”
How would atheism be the cause of atheism? That strikes me as an explanation that would be actually absurd…
“…the (in)famous fragmentation of Protestantism…”
The one common feature of Protestantism is fragmentation. One looks for unity in Protestantism, but it’s too late. Fragmentation is inherent.
Well, I don’t think you can prove fragmentation is inherent from the present fact of it. At least, that doesn’t follow by necessity.
The visit of the Pope to the Czech Republic was a good opportunity to inform oneself about Jan Hus, a forerunner of Martin Luther, about 100 years before. And have a look also on the Valdense congregation which was excommunicated because of the sola scriptura principle. The History of European Religion is not as simple as Andrew thinks. Inform yourself better before initiating such bad affirmations. By the way the first splitting was between Peter and Paul in the Acts of the Apostles.
“Inform yourself better before initiating such bad affirmations.”
Thanks for the helpful advice.
“By the way the first splitting was between Peter and Paul in the Acts of the Apostles.”
You may want to take another read of Acts… I think you’re probably referring to the event mentioned in Galatians, which hardly merits the term “split”.
As I posted on the other response to this, how is this different than what is going on with James Turner’s _Without God, Without Creed_?
There may be a grain of truth to this. For example, one reason I left Catholicism was a realisation that Catholics themselves disagree fundamentally on crucial doctrines. This is papered-over by nominal allegiance to the Papacy (not, of course, to every Pope, but to one’s own preferred Pontiffs who “got it right”), and by frequently repetition of Chesterton’s “Catholics agree on everything. They just disagree on everything else”… but if we (as Belloc said) think in things not words, we see that Catholicism in practice is as doctrinally fragmented as Protestantism. For me that was certainly an argument against its being true.
Hmmm . . . but the Catholic Church isn’t doctrinally fragmented. The magisterium is the doctrinal mouthpiece for the church. For example: The Catholic Church teaches that contraception is immoral. If you find Catholics who think otherwise, that doesn’t mean the Catholic Church teaches contradictory positions, it means those Catholics don’t accept the church’s teaching.
Of course this doesn’t mean that all things are known (the magisterium has not defined everything, nor is there a reason to think it could or should), it just means that some things can be (unlike within Protestantism).
Your basic mistake is that you make the Protestant Revolution
into a reformation, which it never was. It was a violent
overthrow of the original Christianity fueled by
insatiable greed as is most clearly seen in England. It is
also enabled by innumerable lies in what can only be seen
modernly as propaganda. Most of what Protestants think they
know about the Catholic Church is firmly built on mendacity.
“It was a violent overthrow of the original Christianity fueled by insatiable greed as is most clearly seen in England. It is also enabled by innumerable lies in what can only be seen
modernly as propaganda.”
Nah, it wasn’t.
Archimandrite Constantine,
Please read a history of the renaissance popes at the very least before deciding whether the reformation was needed.
I mean you no disrespect, but that is silly.
I think most of the comments are wrong in assuming that Atheism was an attempt to restore or elevate reason. Atheism is the rejection of reason too–at least if “reason” means abstraction. Both Protestantism and Atheism were rejections of medieval abstraction, and both are products of Nominalism.
Hey Tom,
We have moved since this was posted. Would you mind posting your comments here?: http://www.cityofgodblog.com/2009/09/protestantism-is-to-blame/
Thanks for your thoughts!
OK Andrew, thanks. It’s not really that important.