I’m Agnostic, and have been for quite some time. I don’t think that God exists, but I’d be willing to look at any new evidence.
Right now I’m reading “Quiverfull: Inside the Christian Patriarchy Movement” by Katherine Joyce, and I keep running into a problem- I cannot understand these people at all. I can understand them as well as I understand gyroscopes: I can describe to you what they are going to do, but for the life of you I can’t wrap my mind why.
For those of you who don’t know “Quiverfull” is a blanket term regarding people who are believers in a Biblical Patriarchy (women submit to their husbands or fathers- and I do mean “submit”), and more importantly, who are staunchly anti-birth control; no condoms, no pills, no sterilization, no rhythm method, nothing but “God’s Will”. The phrase comes from Psalm 127:5 “Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them(children). They will not be put to shame when they contend with their enemies in the gate.” Quiverfull people believe that they are in a cultural war with liberal secularists, and they intended to win through demographics alone. They believe that these roles and behaviors are “god’s will” and that they are on the side of righteousness. Frequently, they are into seriously modest dress and homeschooling.
I keep running into the same problem with these beliefs- I don’t understand why they would want to worship this god. I’m fairly anti-authoritarian: I want to choose which authority I follow, and at the end of the day I think I am ultimately responsible for any action I take, whether or not someone in power over me told me to do it or not. I don’t want to risk my health and my life. I am drawn towards debate, and I am occasionally smarter than my husband. These proscribed roles, in other words, would make me MISERABLE (and my husband miserable too). So, if the Quiverfull people are correct, and there is a god, and he made me the exact opposite of what I’m supposed to be (indeed, a lot of Quiverfull talk about how women have an inherently rebellious nature because of Eve), which sounds like a recipe for misery, then god’s a dick. Why should I worship a dick? The general answer of “because of heaven and hell” is 100% unsatisfying to me- I’m supposed to toady up to a bully just to avoid getting beat up? That’s not moral- that’s cowardly.
So, this post is for any lurking Quiverfulls. Heck, if you’re just a person who thinks god cares more about what we do with our genitals than whether or not we hurt people, you can post too. I’ll leave off the “prove that god even exists part”- for this exercise I’ll just go with it for now. I need support for “if god exists, why should we worship him?” Make your case.
EDIT: Like all things I want to know, I had to search google to see if it had any knowledge. The first website had a post that made exactly zero sense to me, but the answer was
We worship Him because He commands it. We worship Him because He alone deserves it, knowing what He is and what He does. We worship Him because without so doing we cannot rise to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.
So…yeah, worship a bully because a bully says so? Even though he’s a bully? And I don’t want to be a bully?
I really wish I knew someone in real life who held these views and would talk to me. I’m missing something important here- something that’d snap it into place.
Why would a god require worshiping in the first place? Why would a truly omniscient being give a rat’s ass about the minutia of human lives? I’m agnostic as well and I can’t get over how narcissistic many religions are – the universe is so huge, but they work from the assumption that humans are special in the largest frame of reference there is. Or if every sentient species gets this much attention from god, why is god such an insufferable busybody? It just doesn’t make sense to me.
Have you read the No Longer Quivering blog? http://2spb.blogspot.com/. I think it sheds a lot of light onto how someone could come to believe these things. Right now they are also having guest posters from other women who have left religious extremist groups (for instance, the Hare Krishnas). Fascinating stuff.
sweet antigone, be careful you don’t piss off the gods…
I get what you are saying but I think that Amy provides a telling clue of the answer when she writes “…how someone could come to believe these things.” It’s a matter of belief/faith/etc* – so although I agree the question is interesting and I would love love love to have someone actually try to answer it, I don’t think it comes from within our frame and so will be seen as an non-relevant question by one who believes. I coudl be wrong.
*etc understood to mean unthinking/unquestioning/submitting
I have read no longer Quivering, but so far, they haven’t seemed to answer my question.
Here in Arkansas (I live about sixty miles from the Duggars, who are probably the most famous Quiverers) we have plenty of these folk, and plenty who believe the same sort of way. Six blocks from my house is a gignormous church, like space-ship hangar big (no kidding — my dad worked for NASA when I was a kid, and it reminds me of the hangar where his division built the fuel tanks), which is where, I’d say, 1/3 of Pork Smith goes to church –
Anyway, plenty of my students get their worldview from this church and churches like it. The level of false consciousness and warped thinking they are able to have, it’s — I don’t know if amazing or sickening is the right word. Negative capability ain’t nothing next to it. These are ones who have made it into the university, and into my upper level English classes, so they’re usually fairly sharp; but they frequently manage to carry, right into these classes, and their other ones as well, this other worldview — that the world is 6000 years old; that the Bible was written by God’s Fiery Finger and is the Literal Truth (Noah’s Ark and the Tower of Babel and all — which makes teaching the History of the English Language charming) — and, of course, that men are the boss.
“I believe that women are equal to men,” one of my best students wrote in her essay in Victorian literature, an essay on early feminism (they had a choice: she didn’t have to pick this topic), “but that God wants the man to rule in the family, and woman to submit.”
And as to why you would worship a God like that? Because he wants you to worship him.
What don’t you understand about that?
It’s plain and simple! God commands us to worship and obey him!
One must obey God, because he’s the guy in charge. D’oh!
The rules are very simple, in this worldview. All you have to do is follow them, and never question them, and everything is dandy.
(You should see how nervous they get, btw, in 1213, the second half of Freshman Comp, where I insist that the first rule of this class is that they have to question everything.)
I don’t understand that “You must obey god because god tells you to obey him” circular “logic” though. If I went up to one of them and said “You must obey me, because I tell you to obey me” they’d know that for bs. They’d know that for bs even if I was pointing a gun to their head.
So, why the difference for god?
As a former catholic, god is A) omnipotent and B) omniscient. The way I learned it, it was actually played off that God, knowing the future, knows what’s best for us and wants us to do it, but is just benevolent enough to let us have a choice. Of course, if we disobey it he gets annoyed and you go to purgatory, and if he gets annoyed enough he gets angry, and then you go to hell (which is forever). So by obeying god, you’re doing what’s best for you.
This gets difficult to rectify in the modern age where what’s best for me and others as well is not necessarily what god wants. I donate plasma, although god forbids it: “But flesh with the life thereof, [which is] the blood thereof, shall ye not eat. And surely your blood of your lives will I require; at the hand of every beast will I require it, and at the hand of man; at the hand of every man’s brother will I require the life of man. Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man.” Genesis 9:4-6. Can’t eat blood (or, in Jehovah’s Witness interpretation, recieve it as a transfusion), nor draw it. For a while in the late 60′s and the 70′s the JW’s didn’t even allow organ donations because of the blood thing. However, science has now shown that whatever good intent god might have had in this forbiddence has been lost because it is no longer dangerous. Science beats god again.
Anyways, the point is that most people nowadays don’t fear god. It’s not about being afraid of hell, it’s about doing what they believe is best for themselves and their children: effectively, attaining heaven. You catch so many more flies with a spoonful of honey than a barrel full of rocks, so the people who are religious are mostly in it for the honey, not the fear of rocks.
TRH
The research I’ve got into this is that they think somehow that god isn’t an asshole. But, everything ascribed to god that I’ve seen is pretty assholish- going back to wanting me to miserable all day. So, yeah….maybe this is the disconnect? I can’t see their god as anything but a bully.
Statement of belief: in the world, there are dicks. People who are dicks. People who, if I met them, I would not like them. However, they have friends (often other dicks). Sometimes, their friends are people I DO like, and enjoy spending time with. So the question is, what is the difference between me and the people I enjoy spending time with who enjoy spending time with dicks?
Perspective. They see something different in these dicks. Their eyes are not mine, and I will remind you sister, that you persistently have this problem of projecting your own views and beliefs and values onto others. So that is the big difference, and yes, that is the disconnect, is they don’t see god’s choices for them as “wanting them to be miserable”. Their idea of misery is entirely different from yours, as is their concept of what is joyful. One of my teachers in high school told us about his bachelor party: it was a one-hour prayer circle, and his fiance attended. He enjoyed it though, it was what he liked to do.
It is hard to understand why people enjoy some things and not others. I enjoy being surrounded by clutter and a generally messy work and living space, while I have had roommates who do not. I have met people who’s hobbies include fishing: it bores the shit out of me to sit in a boat that is not moving and wait. Why they like these things will give you a good clue as to what they are as a person. Usually it is a taught family value, or there is a serious emotional connection to it (think about civil war reenactors, and why they do that).
So yeah, ultimately that is the disconnect, is that they don’t see god as an asshole and you don’t see why they think that way. It’s usually because they were brought up to it, sometimes because religion was presented to them just before they got out of a very bad situation. Why people choose religion can ultimately be very very different from person to person, but I think you’ll find most people don’t actually choose it, they just don’t know there’s any other option.
TRH
I think you misunderstand what atheists are. Most atheists don’t believe god exists, but would be willing to look at new evidence. We’re not ciose-minded.. The thing is, there is no new evidence. Believers got nothing. If they ever come up with something besides obviously bullshit miracles and “I just know, because I had a feeling once,” then we can talk. But if your definition of yourself is that you don’t believe, but are open to new evidence, you’re an atheist, not an agnostic.
TRH-
If I suffer from projecting my views on to other people, they suffer it in SPADES. But, beyond that point, even reading their own writing it sounds like they’re unhappy with it a lot. It’s always about what terrible people they are in god’s eyes. It’s not just me- they seem unhappy with this guy too, and if it was anyone else doing it, they’d call him an asshole.
Amanda-
I prefer the ability to self-identify, thank you. I’m not an atheist- I find it possible that there is a god out there, and it’s just not in our capability to understand it. In many ways, I’m functionally an atheist (because if I can’t understand it, and could never understand it, what is it’s purpose to me?), but just because I don’t understand it or don’t think it exists does not make me an atheist.
The farthest I get is that I don’t understand “good” completely, so when God does or allows something bad, it’s bad in my limited understanding, but not bad in truth.
If I believe that God knows all and is all-powerful, then I must accept that whatever happens is good.
I don’t, though; sometimes, things suck, and I don’t have any way to look through God’s eyes and see what’s good.
So God made me to be miserable sometimes, and that’s good in some way that I can’t understand because I’m not God.
Vagina: it’s not a clown car.
There’s a graphic for that somewhere. I think it features the Duggars.
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/89/249270409_664e6841fa_o.jpg
This one?
That’s the one. Words to live by.
Como se dice, “Serious Health Risks?” And they HOME BIRTH too…how has shenot had a complication and bled out yet?
TRH
I suppose the big part of this is I want to be able to empathize with these people. I can disagree with people a lot, and still be able to see where they’re coming from. I could think up situations where I would want to kill someone (even though I don’t think I would ever actually do it, but you never know I suppose). I can think of situations that I would lie to someone. But, with this, I can’t see it. I can’t think of any situation in which I would try and have the government outlaw Christianity, or any situations in which I think having dozens of children in the modern American world would be a good idea, or when submitting to someone 100% would be wise.
I think empathy is a terrific thing to want. It will be impossible to attain, though, if you require that the people you want to empathize with hold completely consistent belief systems. You’re not going to be able to grow the love that way. You certainly wouldn’t with me, and I’m not even religious! Just inconsistent. Cuz, y’know, I’m human and all that.
If an empathic connection is your goal, trying to engage Quiverfulls in arguments over whether or not God is a bully seems unlikely to ever get you anywhere. It’s not only that you’re trying to catch them in an inconsistency, though. It’s also because you are assaulting their most central belief. One even deeper than faith in God’s existence. This is their trust in authority (not just the authority of God)– or perhaps more precisely, in the existing social order of which they are a part. This is why, though rare, apparently conservative atheists actually do exist.
Maybe this is a place you can start empathizing with deeply religious conservatives. Because all of us, well nearly all of us anyway I’m sure, have warring voices in their heads duking it out over whether and how often to trust existing authority vs forging our own way. We each find our own relative stasis point between these two poles. Viewed like this, it’s easy to appreciate how someone starting from a different point on that graph from a young age would come to a very different outlook than you or I might have.
This kind of empathy could becomes even easier, if the data in studies like this bear out under further scrutiny.
As someone who went to a Christian school and was quite adamant about atheism/paganism/spirituality as opposed to religion I’ve never quite seen the point either.
Ferlessledr: “Science beats god again.”
This jumped out at me. I don’t know if you watch the BBC Doctor Who spin-off “Torchwood” or not but a recent episode touched on this very statement. In the world of Torchwood, Earth (and specifically Britain) is now well-aware of extraterrestrial life. A medical doctor told one of the characters that suicides went up three fold since alien life has made its appearance. The first suicide he encountered was of a life-long Christian woman who freaked out at the fact that her place in the universe was small and insignificant and couldn’t handle it. She said, “It’s like science has won.”
I’d never heard of these Quiverfulls before reading this. Interesting group, that is. I wonder how much of the reproduction sprees the Quiverfulls encourage crossover with the groups who fear the browning of America?