Anonymous Asks (307)

“Why are there so many atheists in the world?”

The impression that the world is full of atheists is actually quite false. It has several causes, not least the vocal efforts of a small minority of “true unbelievers” to keep their hobbyhorse in the public eye and to blame religion for every feature of the world they dislike. The high profile of men like Stephen Fry, Bertrand Russell and Richard Dawkins leaves many with the impression their beliefs are scientific and their numbers statistically significant. That is simply wrong.

Not So Many After All

A second contributing factor to the false impression atheists are as ubiquitous as Chickenman (“He’s everywhere! He’s everywhere!”) is a misconception that blurs atheism, agnosticism and mere irreligiosity. Once asked his religion, the actor Bruce Lee replied “None at all”, forever earning him a spot on lists of famous atheists. But atheism is not merely a lack of belief or lack of interest in religious practice. It is the insistence that no God or gods exist, which is actually quite rare. The philosophical and evidentiary basis for atheism is so flimsy that even Dawkins himself switches to the term “strong agnostic” when pressed. The more intelligent professing atheists recognize pure negation is weak tea: science can’t prove a negative. Anyone over age six who thinks “God doesn’t exist because I’ve never seen him” is a winning argument hasn’t got enough ammo in his intellectual arsenal to engage in theological debate.

In fact, according to sociologists Ariela Keysar and Juhem Navarro-Rivera, there are between 450-500 million atheists and strong agnostics [“There’s a chance God could exist, but I really, really think he doesn’t”] combined, a mere 7% of the world’s population. Sociologist Phil Zuckerman puts the number as high as 750 million or a little over 9%. Both numbers are inflated by including agnostics in the total. The vast majority of self-described atheists are men, of whom many appear to have “daddy issues”. There is also a statistical correlation between atheism and autism notable enough to merit discussion in Psychology Today.

The Bigger Problem

For Christians, generalized unbelief is a far bigger problem than atheism, in that it affects both sexes equally, causes no consistently observable pattern of lifestyle misery and engages less with transcendence of any sort. The West is chock full of men and women who would never read Richard Dawkins, never call themselves atheists and may even candidly tell you it’s quite possible God exists. Some will even say they hope it’s so. Then they go right back to their busy lives without a further thought for God, sin, righteousness or judgment. They have vacations to book, money to make, families to raise, videogames to play, friends to hang out with, social media “likes” to tally, or long, healthy retirements to which to look forward.

For all practical purposes, they are worse than atheists. They are certainly harder to engage with as they always have something they’d rather be talking about, and they will quickly and politely ignore or dismiss any attempt to bring God into a conversation so they can move on to a subject in which they have some actual interest. At least atheists are prepared to engage with the idea of God and attempt to rebut arguments in favor of his claims. If you show the slightest intellectual weakness in an argument with a confirmed atheist, they will be all over you because they actually care about the answer to the question “Does God exist?”, or at very least about winning the argument over it. Like Saul, many atheists are “kicking against the pricks” of a troubled conscience. For such, there is always hope of conversion, forgiveness and eternal life because they can’t help but keep exposing themselves to people who have the answers.

Blinded Billions

Generalized unbelief is worse because it does not bother to consider God at all. A vague notion that God might possibly exist cannot save you if you will not do something about seeking him out. A man who vigorously debates the validity of Christ’s claims is closer to the kingdom than a hedonist lying on the beach with a drink in his hand, thinking only vaguely, if at all, about spiritual realities.

The number of authentic atheists in the world is comparatively trivial. The number of men and women captive to generalized unbelief is in the billions. The god of this world has blinded their minds.