Confessing Evangelical

In the third chapter of Dawkins' God (see previous posts: 1 | 2), Alister McGrath turns to Dawkins more explicitly "theological" pronouncements, and particularly Dawkins' views on the nature of religious faith. McGrath is not impressed with what he finds:

To put it bluntly, Dawkins' engagement with theology is superficial and inaccurate, often amounting to little more than cheap point scoring. (p.83)

In particular, Dawkins' "tendency to misrepresent the views of his opponents is the least attractive aspect of his writings". One recurring example of this tendency in Dawkins' works is his understanding of the word "faith", which Dawkins defines as "blind trust, in the absence of evidence, even in the teeth of evidence" (cited on p.84). In a 1992 lecture, Dawkins expanded on this assertion as follows:

Faith is the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, the lack of evidence ... Faith is not allowed to justify itself by argument. (cited on p.84)

Dawkins has even described faith (defined in this manner) as "a kind of mental illness", even as a "virus", one "comparable to the smallpox virus but harder to eradicate" (p.84).

McGrath dismisses Dawkins' definition of faith as "ludicrous", and points out that Dawkins offers no evidence "that anyone - let alone religious people - defines 'faith' in this absurd way":

No evidence is offered that [this definition] is representative of religious opinion. No authority is cited in its support. I don't accept this definition of faith, and I have yet to meet a theologian who takes it seriously. It cannot be defended from any official declaration of faith from any Christian denomination. (p.85)

Faith as blind trust "may be what Dawkins thinks; it is not what Christians think". McGrath offers as an alternative the "good and reliable" definition of faith given by the Anglican theologian W.H. Griffith-Thomas:

[Faith] affects the whole of man's nature. It commences with the conviction of the mind based on adequate evidence; it continues in the confidence of the heart or emotions based on conviction, and it is crowned in the consent of the will, by means of which the conviction and confidence are expressed in conduct. (p.86)

Not surprisingly, Dawkins has little difficulty in knocking down the "straw man" he has set up. After all, to do so "is not an unduly difficult or demanding intellectual feat" (p.86).

The problem lies in Dawkins' failure to take into account "the way in which words are used in religious contexts" (p.97) - a point that should be obvious to a professional scientist, working in a context in which everyday words (such as "sugar") have very different meanings from their everyday usage. Indeed, Dawkins is well aware of this point when it suits his purpose, such as when he "famously lambasted philosopher Mary Midgley for criticizing his 'selfish gene' hypothesis without any awareness of how scientists used language." As Dawkins wrote then:

[Midgley] seems not to understand biology or the way biologists use language. No doubt my ignorance would be just as obvious if I rushed headlong into her field of expertise, but I would then adopt a more diffident tone. As it is we are both in my corner, and it is hard for me not regard the gloves as off.

Feel free to spend a few moments gaping, slack-jawed, at the man's complete lack of self-awareness, and then let's rejoin Alister McGrath as he draws the obvious conclusion:

There is a total failure on Dawkins' part to even begin to understand what Christian theology means by its language. It really does make it very difficult to take his judgments concerning its alleged failures with any degree of seriousness.