Rabbi Sacks - Europe is dying, lacking Religion
Dr. Jonathan Sacks, Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations in the Commonwealth and Baron of Aldgate has been a theological speaker worth listening to for many years. Combining Jewish tradition, liberal philosophy and modern sciences, he targeted collective blind spots of society more than once. Speaking last week at the Theos think tank in London, Rabbi Sacks quickly induced a range (!) of intensive debates with a single lecture.
A main thrust of his argument was the observation of the link between religious practice (especially in Monotheist religions) and the stability and size of families. He argued that religions were offering what the market, sciences, politics and philosophies were not able to offer: Absolute (that is: believed) answers about the meaning(s) of life. These could range from dangerous and intolerant fundamentalisms to dedications towards peace, charity and dialogue.
He pointed out that extreme atheists and especially "Neo-Darwinians" refuted themselves: Lacking any fundamental answers about the meaning(s) of life, they fell to moral relativism and the decline of family and birth rates. Therefore, secular Europe was about to die, while religious communities grew demographically. Rabbi Sacks advised kind of a "third way", combining deep religiosity with enlightened interest in sciences and dialogue.
* Read his complete lecture in English here.
* Here is a German translation of Rabbi Sack's lecture.
And I might just add a graph from a recent blogpost ("Homo religiosus") about Religion & Demography.
The problem with the theory being that the most religious countries in Europe are also among the least fertile (Poland 1.38, Italy 1.18, Greece 1.33, vs Norway 1.85. Denmark 1.73, Netherlands 1.64). http://en.wikipedia.org/...ories_by_fertility_rate
In other words, this is a classic ecological effect. Religion does increase fertility, but lack of religion is not the explanation for low fertility in Europe.
Hi Tom, I agree with you on that one! Although Inglehart & Norris did a good piece with "Sacred and Secular" on the basis of (inter-)national data, the overall picture is more complex. For example, nations with traditional churches are often hindering the development of competition and modern child care institutions (i.e. Italy, Poland), while more secular ones are espousing them (i.e. France, Sweden). The same is true i.e. for Yehovas Witnesses or the New Apostolic Church in Switzerland, who are attaining very low birth rates in contrast i.e. to new protestant movements combining family values and modern child care:
http://www.blume-religionswissenschaft.de/...9.pdf
Nevertheless, I am glad that Chief Rabbi Sacks opened the topic and that he pointed to the dangers of religious fundamentalism! I think he's sharing some fears you wrote about, too.
Good point, the fact that the most religious countries in Europe are also those with the lowest birth rates does refute the claim about alleged evolutionary advantages of regiousness that we have seen repeated somewhat like a mantra. The conclusive data should put the case to rest, hopefully.
I don't quite agree with your statement that "religion does increase fertility". I think one must be careful not to confuse "cause and effect" and "mere correlation". Many things may show a degree of statistical correlation wthout one being the cuase of the other.
I am quite certain, for instance, that one will find a significant correlation between the number of storks and the birth rates, if anyone actually tried to do such spurious analysis. The reason is of course not that storks actually bring the babies, but that the two issues are related. Storks are more prevalent in rural areas, and the lifestlyes of (human) rural dwellers are more traditional that those of urban residents, with people tending to marry earlier and having more kids.
Likewise, such correlations are plausible between religiousness and birth rates. Some faiths forbid contraception and abortion, and in general, religious people can be expected to be more likely to adhere to traditional values and life styles. In other words, traditional-minded people tend to be more likely to marry young and have kids, and they also tend to be more likely to adhere to religion. So the root cause here is traditionalism, not religiosity.
Of course, things are more complicated than just that. Economic factors should be taken into account, as well as societal ones. In an economic downturn, or in societies where the public provides little help in child care, or where affordable housing is a widespread problem, it would not be surprising to find a decreased birth rate.
That's all there is to it, and in view of such a mere correlation, or a set of correlations, it is indeed far-fetched, even untenable, to ascribe increased birth rates to religiousness.
I perceive Rabbi Sacks' position as somewhat sanctimonious. Yet another attempt of religious persons to claim the moral high ground, with little justification. I do not see that any side, religious or not, can, or should, claim to be in possession of superior moral values.
I will give another example of religious self-righteousness that I find unacceptable. Here in Germany, there have been some cases of children being killed by their parents via a combination of neglect and violence.
Apparently, there is an increases prevalence of such cases in the Eastern part of Germany, the former socialist GDR, though I am not sure that the (fortunately still low) number of such incidents is sufficient to provide a statistically meaningful database.
In a radio interview, a commentator whose name I now cannot remember claimed that "East Germans were more prone than West Germans to committing such crimes against their own children because, due to the reduced adherence to Christian faith in East Germany there was also a reduced level of moral inhibitions there".
I think that such sanctimonious drivel should not stand unchallenged.
Thanks for your comment! Tom (who is rather critical about religion) is perfectly right: There is a strong fertility effect of religiosity, but it is more complex than a simple correlation.
You might want to see Tom's post about it:
http://bhascience.blogspot.com/...-fewer-kids.html
or a recent article with different sets of data:
http://www.blume-religionswissenschaft.de/...9.pdf
If you would like to cross-check these data, you might want to see the studies i.e. of Frejka & Westoff, Kaufmann, Zhang, Philipov & Berghammer, Adsera and many more, all of whom conclusively found the strong religion-reproduction link. I listed and linked a range of these studies here:
http://www.blume-religionswissenschaft.de/....html
Note: Not “every” religious community is reproductively successful (just think of i.e. the Shakers or the Raelians), but those religions espousing marriage, children and child-care institutions (as i.e. kindergartens, schools, jeshivoth, madrassas etc.) indeed manage to be “fruitful and multiply” – as God’s first biblical words to mankind are reported, constituting i.e. the first commandment in Jewish law and Amish ordnung.
Regarding the claims of moral superiority, I agree with you in full. But Rabbi Sacks didn't claim religious people to be better - he spoke about the potential and the dangers (!) of religious beliefs, explicitly warning against religious intolerance and fundamentalism. His lecture is worth a real reading.
Best wishes!
I am sorry, Michael, but I must disagree here.
Despite his warnings against intolerance and fundamentalism, and his appeal for respectful dialogue (which I totaly agree with) I was left with an unpleasant taste upon reading Rabbi Sacks's lecture. Like Michael (Khan), I also felt that he was trying to claim the higher moral ground. Let me explain:
Throughout his talk, he is claiming values like "freedom, justice, human dignity, compassion, love, forgiveness and hope",to be religious values, instead of shared human values. Then, he goes on to claim that in a society with declining religion, civil society will also decline, which I think is a) patently false and b) not very respectful for non-believers, as he is suggesting that they are unable to build a stable society. Finally, he goes on to oppose the "Angry atheists", in a rather unpleasant way. He conflates atheism with "neo-darwinism", which contradicts his previous claim that religion and science are different intellectual activities. Then he falls for the natural fallacy, claiming that neo-darwinism is self-defeating because secular countries have a low population growth. I think it is not nice to suppose that "angry atheists" like Richard Dawkins prefer population growth over freedom, compassion and hope.
I appreciate and embrace his call for respectful dialogue, but I am rather put of by his glaring self-righteousness.
Thanks for your comment! And yes, I agree with you that Rabbi Sacks is using some strong language which I wouldn't (and didn't) use.
But then, Sacks' acknowledged sciences and dialogue and his words are for more friendly than those i.e. of Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens and many more preachers from the non-religious side, which didn't have any problems of naming religion "a delusion", "a poison" or "a virus", calling the Biblical God a "monster" etc. As I was appalled at first about this lack of respect, friends told me that this was the way of lively debate and that the criticized should stop whining about it.
Okay, I can live with that and I concede that the US and the British do have a longer tradition of debating culture. But then, religious should have the right to sharpen their own arguments, too. Personally, I am interested in the matter from a scientific side and wouldn't like to join these kind of debates. But I think, if Richard Dawkins and other non-religious are allowed to bring forth their arguments in rather poignant ways, religious preachers should be allowed the same. And I have a slim hope that many listeners might be interested in evaluating the respective arguments from both sides.