In this book a widely recognized authority on religion and psychoanalysis takes a fascinating journey into Freud's past to examine the roots of his atheism. Dr. Ana-Maria Rizzuto reviews and reorganizes data about Freud's development and life circumstances to provide a psychodynamic interpretation of his rejection of God. She argues that Freud's early life and family relationships made it psychically impossible for him to believe in a provident and caring divine being. The book traces significant aspects of Freud's relationship with his father and mother, his childhood nanny, and other relatives and outlines his religious evolution from somewhat conventional beliefs as a young boy to adult unbelief. Dr. Rizzuto presents significant new details about the Philippson Bible-a copy of which Freud's father presented to Sigmund on his thirty-fifth birthday-and shows how the illustrations in that edition related to Freud's passion for collecting antiquities. The book brings to light critical aspects of Freud's early and late object relations and their lasting impact on his rejection of God.

In recent years the Christian faith has been challenged by skeptics, including the New Atheists, who claim that belief in God is simply not reasonable. Here prominent Christian philosopher C. Stephen Evans offers a fresh, contemporary, and nuanced response. He makes the case for belief in a personal God through an exploration of natural "signs," which open our minds to theistic possibilities and foster belief in the Christian revelation. Evans then discusses why God's self-revelation is both authoritative and authentic. This sophisticated yet accessible book provides a clear account of the evidence for Christian faith, concluding that it still makes sense to believe.

What do classical elitists like Pareto and Mosca have in common with Marxists like Labriola and Gramsci? In this collection of essays, Joseph Femia argues that all four thinkers are united by the 'worldly humanism' they inherited from Machiavelli. Their distinctively Italian hostility to the metaphysical abstractions of natural law and Christian theology accounted for similarities in their thought that are obscured by the familiar terminology of 'left' and 'right'. The collection includes critical essays on each of the four thinkers, as well as an introductory chapter on their links with Machiavelli.

MSIA, the Movement of Spiritual Inner Awareness, has been called the Cadillac of cults and the leader was once dubbed the "Hollywood guru." Those interested in new religions only know MSIA from these kinds of labels. However, when looked at from a qualitative sociological perspective, a more complex story of religious innovation and cultural change emerges. An important study in religious syncretism, A Study of the Movement of Inner Awareness analyzes the ways MSIA exemplifies the blending of Eastern and Western religion with therapeutic self-help traditions in pop psychology and New Age thought and presents a sensitive portrayal of its leaders and members.

This book interrogates the ways in which new technological advances impact the thought and practices of humanism. Chapters investigate the social, political, and cultural implications of the creation and use of advanced forms of technology, examining both defining benefits and potential dangers. Contributors also discuss technology's relationship to and impact on the shifting definitions we hold for humankind. International and multi-disciplinary in nature and scope, the volume presents an exploration of humanism and technology that is both racially diverse and gender sensitive. With great depth and self-awareness, contributors offer suggestions for how humanists and humanist organizations might think about and relate to technology in a rapidly changing world. More broadly, the book offers a critical humanistic interrogation of the concept of "progress" especially as it relates to technological advancement.

This detailed examination of the "Torah" (the first five books of the Bible) lays particular emphasis on the role and character of the Torah's transcendent God, as its central protagonist. Viewing both the 'Torah' and its God as purely human creations, humanist Jordan Jay Hillman seeks in no way to devalue this hugely influential book. His aim instead is to reinterpret it as a still vital text that used theistic means appropriate to its time to inspire people toward their worthiest human purposes. It is thus for its 'timeless themes' rather than its 'dated particularities' (including its model of a transcendent God) that we should honour the 'Torah' in our time as both the wellspring of Judaic culture and a major influence on Christian and Islamic ethics and morals. From his humanist perspective and his background as a lawyer and professor of law at North-western University (now emeritus), Hillman offers many insights into the narrative and wide-ranging legal code of "Genesis", "Exodus", "Leviticus", "Numbers", and "Deuteronomy"- including their many contradictions and anomalies. His analysis draws on a broad scholarly consensus regarding the 'Documentary Theory', as it bears on the identities and periods of the Torah's human sources. This thorough explication of an often misunderstood ancient text will help humanists, and many theists alike, to appreciate the rich moral, ethical, and cultural heritage of the 'Torah' and its enduring relevance to our time.

Jeanne Morefield synthesizes Palestinian American theorist and cultural critic Edward Said's critical humanism as a conceptual approach for addressing crises in contemporary global politics that demands reflection about historical context and the nature of the collective public before considering solutions to perceived problems. Said's approach to humanistic inquiry speaks directly to the way scholars of international ethics who speak from a liberal internationalist perspective react to global crises by fixating on the international status quo, often advocating global order for global order's sake. In the process, Said's humanism transforms the very idea of what it means to theorize global ethics in a postcolonial age and offers a clarifying way to navigate through foreign policy discussions with conflicting interest groups and ideologies.

This book brings together a diverse and wide-ranging group of thinkers to forge unsuspecting conversations across the humanist and non-humanist divide. How should humanism relate to a non-humanist world? What distinguishes "humanism" from the "non-humanist?" Readers will encounter a wide-range of perspectives on the terms bringing together this volume, where "Humanism" "Non-Humanist" and "World" are not taken for granted, but instead, tackled from a wide variety of perspectives, spaces, discourses, and approaches. This volume offers both a pragmatic and scholarly account of these terms and worldviews allowing for multiple points of analytical and practical points of entry into the unfolding dialogue between humanism and the non-humanist world. In this way, this volume is attentive to both theoretically and historically grounded inquiry and applied practical application.

Tracing embodied transformation in the context of Gaga, the Israeli dance improvisation practice, this book demystifies what Lina Aschenbrenner coins as "neo-spiritual aesthetics." This book takes the reader on an analytical journey through a Gaga class, outlining the effective aesthetics of Gaga as an example for the broader field of neo-spiritualities. It distinguishes a threefold effect of Gaga practice-from a momentary extraordinary experience, to a lasting therapeutic effect, and finally Gaga's worldview potential. It situates the effect in an assemblage of interrelating aesthetics of environment, movement, and bodies. The book shows why seemingly leisure time activities such as Gaga form fruitful research objects to an academic study of religion and opens up research on neo-spiritual practices. In understanding the sensory effect of practice and its cultural and social implications, the book follows an Aesthetics of Religion approach. It departs from the idea that cognition is embodied and that the body is thus central to understanding cultural and social phenomena. Drawing upon a wide array of data gathered in the context of Gaga at the Suzanne Dellal Center in Tel Aviv, the book weaves together different methods of discourse, ritual, movement, body knowledge, and narrative analysis, while acknowledging insights from neuroscience and cognitive science.

Islam in France is often regarded as a political 'issue' and much of the scholarly and public debates about Islam in contemporary France over the last three decades have concentrated on the supposedly 'antagonistic' relationship between France, Islam and its Muslims. Against such a troubled backdrop, however, this book looks at the ways in which certain prominent French Muslim intellectuals seek to articulate a vision of multi-faith co-existence, which embraces a critical secularism, and which simultaneously draw on religious and secular humanist traditions. Intellectuals have historically played a major part in French public life, yet relatively little is known about the work of Abdelwahab Meddeb, Malek Chebel, Leila Babes, Dounia Bouzar and Abdennour Bidar, whose writings and public interventions this book examines. Secularism, Islam and public intellectuals in contemporary France will be of particular interest to specialists, undergraduate and post-graduate students working across the Humanities and Social Sciences from disciplines such as Francophone Studies, Anthropology, Religious Studies or Sociology. -- .

Over the last decade, "New Atheists" such as Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, and Christopher Hitchens have pushed the issue of atheism to the forefront of public discussion. Yet very few of the ensuing debates and discussions have managed to provide a full and objective treatment of the subject. Atheism: What Everyone Needs to Know provides a balanced look at the topic, considering atheism historically, philosophically, theologically, sociologically and psychologically. Written in an easily accessible style, the book uses a question and answer format to examine the history of atheism, arguments for and against atheism, the relationship between religion and science, and the issue of the meaning of life-and whether or not one can be a happy and satisfied atheist. Above all, the author stresses that the atheism controversy is not just a matter of the facts, but a matter of burning moral concern, both about the stand one should take on the issues and the consequences of one's commitment.

Drawing on ethnographic research, this book explores individualized religion in and around Hebden Bridge in West Yorkshire. Claire Wanless demonstrates that counter to the claims of secularization theorists, the combination of informal structures and practices can provide a viable basis for socially significant religious activity that can sustain itself. The subjects of this research claim a variety of religious identities and practices, and are suspicious of religious institutions, hierarchies, rules and dogmas. Yet they participate actively in an overlapping and cross-linking informal network of practice communities and other associations. Their engagements propagate and sustain a core ideology that prioritizes subjectivity, locates authority at the level of the individual, and also predicates itself on ideals of sharing, mutuality and community. Providing a new theory of religious association, this book is a nuanced counterpoint to the secularization thesis in the UK and points the way to new research on individual religion.

After reviewing the mounting evidence that organised religion is declining in many countries, this accessible book provides the first scientific study of active atheists.

From the very beginning James Joyce's readers have considered him as a Catholic or an anti-Catholic writer, and in recent years the tendency has been to recuperate him for an alternative and decidedly liberal form of Catholicism. However, a careful study of Joyce's published and unpublished writings reveals that throughout his career as a writer he rejected the church in which he had grown up. As a result, Geert Lernout argues that it is misleading to divorce his work from that particular context, which was so important to his decision to become a writer in the first place. Arguing that Joyce's unbelief is critical for a fuller understanding of his work, Lernout takes his title from Ulysses, "I believe, O Lord, help my unbelief. That is, help me to believe or help me to unbelieve?," itself a quote from Mark 9: 24. This incisive study will be of interest to all readers of Joyce and to anyone interested in the relationship between religion and literature. >

Since the Age of Enlightenment, France has upheld clear constitutional guidelines that protect human rights and religious freedom. Today, however, intolerant attitudes and discriminatory practices towards unconventional faiths have become acceptable and even institutionalized in public life. Susan Palmer offers an insightful examination of France's most stigmatized new religions, or ''sectes,'' and the public management of religious and philosophical minorities by the state. The New Heretics of France tracks the mounting government-sponsored anticult movement in the wake of the shocking mass suicides of the Solar Temple in 1994, and the negative impact of this movement on France's most visible religious minorities, whose names appeared on a ''blacklist'' of 172 sectes commissioned by the National Assembly. Drawing on extensive interviews and field research, Palmer describes the controversial histories of well-known international NRMs (the Church of Scientology, Raelian Movement, and Unificationism) in France, as well as esoteric local groups. Palmer also reveals the partisanship of Catholic priests, journalists, village mayors, and the passive public who support La Republique's efforts to control minority faiths - all in the name of ''Liberty, Equality and Fraternity.'' Drawing on historical and sociological theory, Palmer analyzes France's war on sects as a strategical response to social pressures arising from globalization and immigration. Her study addresses important issues of religious freedom, public tolerance, and the impact of globalization and immigration on traditional cultures and national character.

In The Atheist's Primer, a prominent philosopher, Dr Michael Palmer, reinstates the importance of philosophy in the debate about God's existence. The 'new atheism' of Richard Dawkins and others has been driven by largely Darwinian objections to God's existence, limiting the debate to within a principally scientific framework. This has obscured the philosophical tradition of atheism, in which the main intellectual landmarks in atheism's history are to be found. With an analysis of atheistic thought from the Ancient Greeks to the present day, Palmer explains and comments on the philosophical arguments warranting atheism, discussing issues such as evil, morality, miracles, and the motivations for belief. The emphasis placed on materialism and the limitations of our knowledge might seem disheartening to some; but Palmer concludes on a positive note, arguing alongside Nietzsche, Marx and Freud and many others that happiness and personal fulfilment are to be found in the very materialism that religious belief rejects. Michael Palmer first addressed these issues in his student-oriented edition, The Atheist's Creed, of which The Atheist's Primer is a revised abridgement for the general reader. Palmer has now stripped out the primary texts and expanded his commentaries into fluent and concise analyses of the arguments. Free of philosophical jargon and assumptions of prior knowledge, this is an important introduction to a major cultural debate."

This book offers a philosophical defence of nihilism. The authors argue that the concept of nihilism has been employed pejoratively by almost all philosophers and religious leaders to indicate a widespread cultural crisis of truth, meaning, or morals. Many religious believers think atheism leads to moral chaos (because it leads to nihilism), and atheists typically insist that we can make life meaningful through our own actions (thereby avoiding nihilism). In this way, both sides conflate the cosmic sense of meaning at stake with a social sense of meaning. This book charts a third course between extremist and alarmist views of nihilism. It casts doubt on the assumption that nihilism is something to fear, or a problem which human culture should overcome by way of seeking, discovering, or making meaning. In this way, the authors believe that a revised understanding of nihilism can help remove a significant barrier of misunderstanding between religious believers and atheists. A Defence of Nihilism will be of interest to scholars and students in philosophy, religion, and other disciplines who are interested in questions surrounding the meaning of life.

'The God Delusion Revisited' is an ordinary Christian's review of Richard Dawkins' recent polemic on religion, 'The God Delusion'. It specifically and comprehensively targets the views expounded in 'The God Delusion' and questions the credibility that Dawkins enjoys through his scientific writings, a credibility that is not based on his 'religious' expertise but on his work in the field of zoology. 'The God Delusion Revisited' highlights this undeserved prominence and provides balance in the current growing debate on religion. Mike King is a Christian and has written 'The God Delusion Revisited' from a Christian perspective. He was born and raised as a Roman Catholic and attended schools run by Benedictine monks. He lost his faith in his mid-teens and for most of his life has regarded himself as somewhere between atheism and agnosticism. He became a Christian in 2002. He is married with two children and has also written 'In the blink of an eye', an autobiographical work.

This book examines the post-9/11 God debate in the West. Through a close study of prominent English God debaters Richard Dawkins, Karen Armstrong, Christopher Hitchens, and Terry Eagleton, Adrian Rosenfeldt demonstrates that New Atheist and religious apologist ideas and arguments about God, science, and identity are driven by mythic autobiographical narratives and Protestant or Catholic cultural heritage. This study is informed by criticism of the New Atheist polemic as being positivistic, and the religious apologists as propagating "sophisticated theology." In both cases, the God debaters are perceived as disassociating themselves from human lived experience. It is through reconnecting the God debaters' intellectual ideas to their cultural and social background that the God debate can be grounded in a recognisable human reality that eludes reductive distinctions and disembodied abstractions.

Atheism Revisited is a collection of essays that explore the multifaceted nature of atheism. Starting from the notion that today's atheism is shaped by the defining processes of Modernity-such as secularization and the breakup of science, philosophy, and theology-the first part of the book undertakes a thorough scrutiny of Modern atheisms, from Spinoza and Hobbes to Marx and Nietzsche. The second part of the book seeks to draw practical conclusions from this scrutiny and answer the questions: what is the state of atheism today? What is the role of an atheist in a world affected by religious fundamentalisms? What should the relationship between atheists and religious people look like? The wide scope of the book allows readers to see atheism as a central concern of many intellectual movements, from Marxism and French Theory to post-secularism and the reevaluation of Modernity, and to understand atheism as a focal point of the most important contemporary philosophical debates.

This book considers how the non-religious self is performed publicly online, and how digital culture and technology shapes this process. Building on a YouTube case study with women vloggers, it presents unique empirical data on non-organized atheism in the United States. Lundmark suggests that the atheist self as performed online exists in tension between a perception of atheism as sinful and amoral in relation to hegemonical Christianity in the U.S., and the hyperrational, male-centered discourse that has characterized the atheist movement. She argues that women atheist vloggers co-effect third spaces of emotive resonance that enable a precarious counterpublicness of performing atheist visibility. The volume offers a valuable contribution to the discussion of how the public, the private, and areas in-between are understood within digital religion, and opens up new space for engaging with the increased visibility of atheist identity in a mediatized society.

Eric Bain-Selbo argues that the study of religion—from philosophers to psychologists, and historians of religion to sociologists—has separated out the “ends” or goals of religion and thus created the conditions by which institutional religion is increasingly irrelevant in contemporary Western culture. There is ample evidence that institutional religion is in trouble, and little evidence that it will strengthen in the future, giving some reason to believe that we are in the process of seeing the end of religion. At the same time, various cultural practices have met in the past and continue to meet today certain fundamental human needs—needs that we might identify as religious that now are being fulfilled through what Bain-Selbo calls the “religion of culture.” The End(s) of Religion traces the way that the very study of religion has led to institutional religion being viewed as just one human institution that can address our particular “religious” needs rather than the sole institution to do so. In turn, ultimately we can begin to see how other institutions or forms of culture can function to serve these same needs or “ends.”

This unique volume looks at three engaging and contemporary case studies. This topic has a wide appeal in sociology, political theory, religious studies, and cultural studies, along with the burgeoning field of studies in secularity and nonreligion. Anxiety surrounding religious symbols have never been more apparent than in society today and this volume offers a comprehensive analysis of this controversial topic.

Nineteenth-Century British Secularism offers a new paradigm for understanding secularization in the nineteenth century. It addresses the crisis in the secularization thesis by foregrounding a nineteenth-century development called 'Secularism' - the particular movement and creed founded by George Jacob Holyoake from 1851 to 1852. Nineteenth-Century British Secularism rethinks and reevaluates the significance of Holyoake's Secularism, regarding it as a historic moment of modernity and granting it centrality as both a herald and exemplar for a new understanding of modern secularity. In addition to Secularism proper, the book treats several other moments of secular emergence in the nineteenth century, including Thomas Carlyle's 'natural supernaturalism', Richard Carlile's anti-theist science advocacy, Charles Lyell's uniformity principle in geology, Francis Newman's naturalized religion or 'primitive Christianity', and George Eliot's secularism and post-secularism.

This book expands the current axiology of theism literature by assessing the axiological status of alternative conceptions of God and the divine. To date, most of the literature on the axiology of theism focuses almost exclusively on the axiological status of theism and atheism. Specifically, it focuses almost entirely on monotheism, typically Judeo-Christian conceptions of God, and atheism, usually construed as ontological naturalism. This volume features essays from prominent philosophers of religion, ethicists, and metaphysicians addressing the value impact of alternative views such as ultimism, polytheism, pantheism, panentheism, and idealism. Additionally, it reflects a wider trend in analytic philosophy of religion to broaden its scope beyond the Judeo-Christian tradition. Value Beyond Monotheism will be of interest to scholars and advanced students working in the philosophy of religion, ethics, and metaphysics.