Last week Pope Benedict XVI issued an encyclical titled Spe Salvi, a reference to a statment made by Paul to the Romans; "Spe Salvi facti sumus"—in hope we were saved.It probably won't come as a surprise to learn that God is the "hope" that sustains all Roman Catholics.
In this sense it is true that anyone who does not know God, even though he may entertain all kinds of hopes, is ultimately without hope, without the great hope that sustains the whole of life (cf. Eph 2:12). Man's great, true hope which holds firm in spite of all disappointments can only be God—God who has loved us and who continues to love us "to the end," until all "is accomplished"Atheists, by definition, do not believe in God. Therefore, we cannot have hope. This makes sense if you substitute "superstition" for "hope."
It's often the case when reading these papal ramblings that some passages are difficult to understand. I wonder if this is deliberate? Here's an example,
It is not the elemental spirits of the universe, the laws of matter, which ultimately govern the world and mankind, but a personal God governs the stars, that is, the universe; it is not the laws of matter and of evolution that have the final say, but reason, will, love—a Person. And if we know this Person and he knows us, then truly the inexorable power of material elements no longer has the last word; we are not slaves of the universe and of its laws, we are free. In ancient times, honest enquiring minds were aware of this. Heaven is not empty. Life is not a simple product of laws and the randomness of matter, but within everything and at the same time above everything, there is a personal will, there is a Spirit who in Jesus has revealed himself as Love.This seems to be more than just the passive Theistic Evolutionism of Ken Miller. It seems to be closer to a God who intervenes and guides frequently. A God who plays a much more active role than most Catholics I know would be willing to admit.
The most controversial part of the Pope's message is the following,
The atheism of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries is—in its origins and aims—a type of moralism: a protest against the injustices of the world and of world history....If in the face of this world's suffering, protest against God is understandable, the claim that humanity can and must do what no God actually does or is able to do is both presumptuous and intrinsically false. It is no accident that this idea has led to the greatest forms of cruelty and violations of justice; rather, it is grounded in the intrinsic falsity of the claim. A world which has to create its own justice is a world without hope.Now, I understand the part about a world without hope. It must be nice to rely on your preferred superstitions to get out of dealing with the problems of the world. You can be comforted in the hope that God will eventually fix it when he turns his attention to our suffering.
The part I don't get is the claim that atheism is the source of the greatest forms of cruelty and injustice. For more than a thousand years the Roman Catholic Church dominated European culture and almost everyone was a Christian. As far as I know, cruelty and injustice didn't go away during those times.
On the other hand, since the enlightenment and the coming out of atheists in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, we have seen huge advances in extension of fairness and justice to all people. For example, in most secular nations women are treated with something approaching equality. Meanwhile, the true believers still haven't elected a female Pope.
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