Atheists lose their own
Leading atheists such as Richard Dawkins and the late Christopher Hitchens have long argued that without religious instruction and ‘parental indoctrination’, there would be far more atheists. Some atheists, such as Dawkins and Lawrence Krauss, have strongly campaigned against the teaching of creation, whether by schools or parents, labelling it ‘child abuse’. If only children can be protected from parental and societal ‘brainwashing’ until they reach the ‘age of reason’, argue the atheists, then religious belief will wane and atheism will flourish.
But that prediction is contradicted by the recent finding in the U.S. that the children of atheists are the least likely of any worldview to retain their parents’ beliefs. The ‘retention rate’ for atheism was only 30%, i.e. less than one-third of the children of atheist parents retained their atheism as adults. (Cf. 84% for Hindus, 68% for Roman Catholics, and 60% for Baptists.)
As one commentator observed, “If atheism is natural and religion is only caused by brainwashing, then atheists ought to have the highest retention rate of any religion.” Yet 70% of the children of atheists abandon atheism.
Also, antitheistic psychologist Susan Blackmore, who was an ardent supporter of Dawkins’ “religion as a mind virus” theory, has publicly retracted this support after “data suggesting that religious people are happier and possibly even healthier than secularists.”
- Religion cannot be a ‘virus of the mind’, kstatecollegian.com, 2 December 2013.
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