Andrew Fiala, Ph.D.

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These are hopeless times. A widely-cited study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention states that 42% of high school students report persistent feelings of sadness and hopelessness. Rates of sadness and hopelessness have increased steadily since 2011 when only 28% of high schoolers reported the same.

A variety of explanations have been offered for this alarming problem. Some argue for a return to traditional religion. But could it be that hopelessness is an appropriate response to a world afflicted by violence, sexism, racism, and injustice? And rather than prescribing the opiate of religion, might the solution be to reform systems built on alienation, exploitation, and hypocrisy?

The causes of alienation

Young people are not unwise to see the world as hopeless. The adults have messed things up. Rather than pretending things are all right, young people see looming threats. Political polarization, racial tension, gun violence, and rising authoritarianism fill the headlines. And climate change has added “climate anxiety” and “eco-grief” to the list of modern maladies.

Psychologist Jonathan Haidt has also suggested that social media plays a role in the growth of depression and anxiety among adolescents. Twitter and TikTok seem to exploit anxiety (for example in “the fear of missing out”). Social media also makes it possible to disseminate fake news and unrealistic expectations about friendship, body image, and happiness. And of course, unscrupulous actors take advantage and profit from this new frontier in exploitation and alienation.

As all of this is going on, some worry that the decline of traditional religion is part of the problem. One recent study by economists Giles, Hungerman, and Oostrom suggests a link between hopelessness and the well-documented decline in religious affiliation. Under the provocative title “Opiates of the Masses?”, the study argues that an increase in “deaths of despair” (caused by alcoholism, drug addiction, and suicides) is correlated with the decline of religiosity in the United States.

The argument against atheism

It’s a correlation worth considering. Defenders of traditional religion often suggest that loss of religion is the primary cause of modern hopelessness.

Consider this passage from evangelical preacher Ravi Zacharias:

Having killed God, the atheist is left with no reason for being, no morality to espouse, no meaning to life, and no hope beyond the grave. Significantly, the absence of future hope has an amazing capacity to reach into the present and eat away at the structure of life… There is a complete sense of alienation in in the world one hundred years after Nietzsche. It is this utterly morbid and hopeless philosophy that has sent many of our youth into a search for other realities. Those who do not have hope, in an effort to drown their despair, turn to drugs and alcohol.

Ravi Zacharias, The Real Face of Atheism

I quote this at length because there is tremendous irony in Zacharias’ work. Zacharias, who died in 2020, has been accused of sexual crimes and using funds donated to his ministry to cover up his sexual misdeeds. But at his funeral, then Vice-President Mike Pence called him one of the greats of Christian apologetics.

Others have claimed that atheism causes hopelessness. In a book that quotes Zacharias at length, Anthony DeStefano put the worry this way: “Human beings simply cannot survive without hope, and atheism is the philosophy of hopelessness.” Another Christian author, Steven Cook, says: “The biblical worldview offers value, purpose, and hope. The atheistic worldview—when followed to its logical conclusion—leads to a meaningless and purposeless life that eventuates in despair.”

But is our present sense of hopelessness really about the lack of faith in eternal life? Or does it come from a more mundane sense that the adults on earth have screwed things up?

The opiate of the people?

Now let’s return to the Giles study and its provocative title, “Opiates of the Masses?” The study notes that “nonreligious organizations often fail to successfully duplicate the sense of community, social services, and cohesion provided by participation in a religious tradition.” There is some truth here. Human beings need a sense of community. But again, the problem is not about hope for eternal life. Rather, it is about the human need for genuine connection, friendship, and belonging. And much of this is lacking in the world of TikTok, Trumpian polarization, and Zacharian hypocrisy. 

This study also suggests that alcoholism and other syndromes have increased as religiously based “blue laws” have been repealed. For example, alcohol is more freely available. And the 24/7 economy no longer includes a mandatory rest day on the Sabbath.

But is the decline of religion to blame for increasing alcoholism, anxiety, and stress? The problem is, rather, that unrestrained capitalism is fraying our nerves, while selling us booze, gambling, pornography, and prescription drugs as placebos. The eradication of blue laws is not about the loss of hope for eternity. It is, rather, about opening the door for exploitation by the addiction-industrial complex. And while religious communities can provide a source of comfort and hope, religious communities also involve exploitation and hypocrisy.

The provocative title of the Giles study is unexplained by the authors. But the phrase “opium of the people” comes from Karl Marx. Marx suggested that the oppressed masses turn to religion as a kind of anesthetizing illusion. In explaining the idea, Marx wrote, “Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions.”

On this view, religion covers up social problems and defuses the revolutionary spirit of people who feel alienated and exploited. This alienation occurs under soulless capitalism. It happens when decent people watch political and corporate elites fiddle as Rome burns. It also occurs when hypocritical religious leaders exploit the faithful for their own corrupt and selfish purposes.

Beyond the opiate of the masses

If the pale hope provided by religion fades away without fixing the underlying human problem of alienation, despair may in fact result. If we are forced to confront the alienating world in which we live without the solace of religion, hopelessness is not unreasonable. This does not mean, however, that religion is the solution.

Beyond using opiates to mask our pain, we need to solve the underlying disease. The problem is exploitation and alienation. The preachers of hope prey upon their flocks. And corporations cash in on human anxiety. To fix that, we need to critique the alienation, corruption, and injustice that are the source of so much human grief. Solutions for hopelessness include a more humane economy, a reform of the political system, and a critique of religious exploitation. But those are human solutions to human problems that do not require a return to the opiate of the masses.

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New York mayor Eric Adams recently objected to the idea of the separation of church and state at an interfaith breakfast event at the New York Public Library. Library President and CEO Anthony Marx offered a welcome that celebrated libraries as places of inclusion, diversity, and freedom of thought. In his speech, the mayor acknowledged religious diversity. But he did not seem to acknowledge either the basic principles of American secularism or the presence of nonreligion. This leads me to wonder whether the interfaith tent is big enough to include nonreligion.

As book bans and Christian nationalism grow across our country, we need to recommit ourselves to the separation of church and state. The interfaith project needs to grow to include nonreligious people, and nonreligious folks need to show up at interfaith events.

The problem of The New York interfaith breakfast

The video of Mayor Adams’s February 28 speech is worth watching in full. After the Library’s CEO welcomed people to the event, a Christian pastor gave a prayer that concluded by invoking “the name of Jesus Christ.” Other prayers and invocations were provided by speakers from Buddhism, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, and in both Spanish and English. Before the mayor spoke, a member of his staff celebrated “the power of the faith-based community” and the “power of prayer.”

Then the mayor gave his speech.

The mayor’s worrying remarks about religion were connected to comments he made about raising children. He said, “when we took prayers out of schools, guns came into schools.” He suggested that we need to “instill” in children “some level of faith and belief.”

Mayor Adams continued: “Don’t tell me about no separation of church and state. State is the body. Church is the heart. You take the heart out of the body, the body dies. I can’t separate my belief because I’m an elected official. When I walk, I walk with God. When I talk, I talk with God. When I put policies in place, I put them in with a God-like approach to them. That’s who I am.”

The crowd applauded.

Religio-normativity and the faith assumption

Perhaps this applause is to be expected at an event that was intended to celebrate the faith communities of New York City. But it is worth considering what this says to nonreligious people, including nonreligious parents, teachers, and kids. Can we, the nonbelievers, feel welcome in a world that suggests that we ought to “instill” faith in our children? And how inclusive is an interfaith event in which the keynote speaker suggests that the church is the heart of the body politic?

The applause in response to Mayor Adams’ comments is a sign of what I’ll call “religio-normativity.” I’m coining that term here to help describe the problem faced by nonreligious people. I model the idea from discussions about LGBTQ persons and the challenge of “heteronormativity.” Heteronormativity is the idea that heterosexuality is normal, natural, and ubiquitous. Religio-normativity makes it seem that nonreligion is abnormal, unnatural, unusual, and weird. But, as I discussed in another column, it is not reasonable to assume that faith is natural.

Religio-normativity is the assumption that everyone has a “faith” or describes themselves according to some religious classification. Religio-normativity is obviously inadequate today. As is well-known by now, social scientists and demographers who study religion have recognized the growth of the “nones,” those who do not identify with any religion and who mark “none of the above” when asked. About 30% of Americans now identify as “nones.”

The future of interfaith

This growth of the nones challenges the assumptions of religio-normativity. We should no longer casually assume that everyone has a religion or belongs to a community of faith. And when 3 out of 10 people are not religious, it makes no sense to suggest that kids should pray in school or that faith should be instilled in children.

One would think that those who are actively working in interfaith communities would recognize the need to avoid religio-normativity. But they may need reminders. In my work with interfaith groups, I usually encounter progressive, thoughtful, and sensitive people. Fundamentalists do not typically seek out this kind of thing. But nonreligious people also often fail to show up to interfaith events. And so they are easily overlooked and forgotten.

One powerful interfaith group is the Interfaith Alliance, currently led by Paul Raushenbush. Raushenbush, who is also a Baptist Minister, spoke out in response to Mayor Adams’ remarks. He said, “Every person has the right to religious freedom, including the mayor. However, I encourage the mayor to stop imagining himself as the servant of God and instead take seriously his obligation to serve the diverse people of New York – people of all faiths and no faith alike.”

Thank you Rev. Raushenbush, for recognizing and including nonreligious folks. Public figures need to more actively work to include nonreligion.

Conclusion: the atheist in the front row

Interfaith work needs to include the nonreligious. But the inclusion of nonreligious people in interfaith groups will make things more difficult, since the idea of interfaith includes faith. And some atheists bristle at the very idea that their lack of belief could be described as a kind of “faith.” We will need to work out the details of how nonreligioius people can be included. And we won’t be able to resolve every issue. But nonreligious people can benefit from showing up and demanding representation in interfaith events. And interfaith gatherings can be cured of their religio-normativity, when atheists show up and sit in the front row.  

Announcing my new co-authored book, Can War Be Justified? , a debate with Jennifer Kling, professor of philosophy at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs.

In this book, we debate this question, drawing on contemporary scholarship and new developments in thinking about pacifism and just war theory. Fiala defends the pacifist position, while Kling defends just war traditions. Fiala argues that pacifism follows from the awful reality of war and the nonviolent goal of building a more just and peaceful world. Kling argues that war is sometimes justified when it is a last-ditch, necessary effort to defend people and their communities from utter destruction and death. Pulling from global traditions and histories, their debate will captivate anyone who has wondered or worried about the morality of political violence and military force. Topics discussed include ethical questions of self-defense and other-defense, the great analogy between individuals and states, evolving technologies and methods of warfighting, moral injury and post-traumatic stress disorder, broader political and communal issues, and the problem of regional security in a globalizing world. The authors consider cultural and religious issues as well as the fundamental question of moral obligation in a world saturated in military conflict. The book was written in the aftermath of the war on terrorism and includes reflection on lessons learned from the past decades of war, as well as hopes for the future in light of emerging threats in Europe and elsewhere.

The book is organized in a user-friendly fashion. Each author presents a self-contained argument, which is followed by a series of responses, replies, and counter-arguments. Throughout, the authors model civil discourse by emphasizing points of agreement and remaining areas of disagreement. The book includes reader-friendly summaries, a glossary of key concepts, and suggestions for further study. All of this will help students and scholars follow the authors’ dialogue so they may develop their own answer to the question of whether war can be justified.