“Students should be more open to religion at Vassar” is a reasonable and agreeable statement. The opinion article of that name by Catherine Borthwick '24 and Eli Cuomo '24, published by The Miscellany News on Sept. 27, is not as reasonable as its title suggests. The negative experiences of religious people at Vassar are valuable perspectives to share, but the article's diversion into Christian apologia and general scorn for the nonreligious is concerning.
We want to make it absolutely clear: we are not attacking religious individuals. Everyone has the right to engage in personal religious practice, and we respect that right. This response is not intended as an attack on religion, but rather, an explanation of why religion should not have a privileged role on Vassar's secular campus.
Borthwick and Cuomo rightfully expect that critics of religions should not view adherents as indistinguishable, but they fail to extend this expectation to nonbelievers. Their rhetoric, particularly the use of the terms “secular liberal” and “the atheist,” implies that they view nonreligious people as a monolith, when this is simply not the case. The nonreligious have no shared practices, texts or tenets. While atheism can be for some, non-religiosity is not an identity — it is the lack thereof. In fact, we are writing a joint response precisely because we often disagree about spirituality, politics and all kinds of topics.
The article contends that religion has been “wrongfully politicized,” but religion has always been political. To say otherwise is to misunderstand what it has always been. Was Jesus' resistance to Roman laws not a political act? What about the conquest of Mecca by Muhammad and his army? The personal is political. As soon as religious beliefs impact others (like how one raises their children) or translate into public action (like voting based on “Christian values”), it becomes a political matter. We absolutely agree that extreme believers do not represent all individuals in a religion, but to claim that they do not reflect the religion they adhere to is evasive. The difficulty in identifying “true believers” originates from an inherent flaw in Christianity and many religions: When an institution treats a book as an unchallengeable authority — and that book is self-contradictory—it can be (and has been) used to justify almost anything. Despite this complicating factor, evaluating religions is not impossible, and it is not bigoted to do so. The best approach by which to understand a religion is multifaceted: examining its doctrine, scripture and the actions of all of those who identify as its adherents. If a religion comes out of such an examination appearing unfavorable, there is nothing but that religion to blame.
More often than not, Vassar students do adhere to the Enlightenment ideas of secularism and rationality, and that is a good thing. It is dangerous how flippantly Borthwick and Cuomo discard secularism and rationality as “closed-minded.” Rationality was developed not only by atheists, as is seemingly assumed, but by those of many faiths all over the world. For example, René Descartes was Catholic as well as one of the first modern rationalists. But also, rationality and reason are the only methods by which useful truths about the material world can be understood, because no other methods allow for the valid, systematic scrutiny of ideas. There have been Christians opposing rationality every step of the way, from Galileo's trial on heliocentrism to the Scopes trial on evolution to present-day religious anti-vaccine advocacy. Allowing such irrationality to go unchallenged, especially in academia, would be unacceptable.
Secularism is one of the most valuable principles of a free society, ensuring that the powers that be have no religious basis and permit as much religious freedom as possible. When people of various faiths and lack thereof choose to attend a secular college like Vassar, that secularity should be maintained. In the same way that we would not want to see governmental or institutional powers take an actively religious role, we also do not want them to take an anti-religious role — this neutrality defines secularism. Governments that are not secular, identifying themselves with particular religions or actively against religions, are inherently oppressive.
It can be useful, in academia especially, to divorce the philosophy (the debatable matters, like the values and ethics) of a religion from the faith (the unfalsifiable matters, like gods or divinity). So when in its proper place, we in no way “reject Christian philosophy,” as Cuomo and Borthwick suggest. One of us is a student of early modern art history who is constantly immersed in Christian philosophy, holy texts and historical experiences. In fact, we are not opposed to religious ideas of any kind being brought into class discussions. But if the ideas are rejected — for example, if the consensus is that their unprovable nature renders them not useful — that is fair. If one wishes to convince academics of religion's “intrinsic worth,” one must actually prove it. All ideas should be scrutinized; religion deserves no immunity, even if it is “thousands of years” old.
Borthwick and Cuomo state, “In rejecting the transcendent, secular liberals have doomed themselves to an existential and hopeless outlook on an increasingly downward-spiraling world.” They ignore millennia of secular, material philosophies, and again treat nonreligious people as indistinguishable. And above all, any “transcendent” worldview that leads away from reality is inherently illusory. The world is in crisis in many ways — this is depressing, but something we have to acknowledge in order to fix. This is how the “opium of the masses” operates: reality-transcending structures of belief can lull followers into a false sense of contentment with a diseased world.
Regarding spirituality, investigate it in whatever manner feels most appropriate to you. But that does not mean all religious practices should be tolerated. If we want a truly free society, manipulative tactics historically utilized by religion cannot be tolerated and must be confronted. Some examples include doctrine forbidding the questioning of dogma, ostracization of and violence against apostates, inclusion of religion into state institutions like education, and indoctrination from birth. When religious practice and demonstration are embedded into school life, as seen in Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, they can strip away secularity and perpetuate coercion.
Despite the article's claim that “Religion has been sidelined and compartmentalized in American society,” three-quarters of Americans identify as religious — the vast majority Christian — according to the Public Religion Research Institute. Christianity is everywhere, from our public holidays to “In God We Trust” as our country's motto (only since 1957, it is worth mentioning). Conversely, many atheists have to keep themselves “in the closet” to avoid the discrimination they might be subject to by their families, employers and communities. The consequences of this persecution are seen in government: according to Pew Research Center, only one member (0.2 percent) of Congress is openly unaffiliated with a religion, compared to roughly a quarter of Americans. A clear explanation for this phenomenon is that, according to a 2019 Gallup poll, only 60 percent of Americans would be willing to vote for an atheist — significantly lower than the proportions who would be willing to vote for a Catholic, Evangelical Christian, Muslim, or Jewish person.
But it is true that in the 21st century, the United States is (debatably) beginning to move past a culture where Christianity is treated as untouchable, and we are beginning to reject its entanglement with our government and institutions. This progress is a good thing, despite some Christians wanting to claw back that privilege. As the saying goes, “When you're accustomed to privilege, equality feels like oppression.”
We are happy to hear of the joy and community found at Pratt House, and we hope that it continues. Supporting people from minority cultures is of paramount importance, and the fact that some have felt out of place or attacked at Vassar is unacceptable. We clearly have work to do. But in order to have a rigorous academic environment, students should not contribute or promote ideas that they are unwilling to have questioned or scrutinized. Although we want everyone to experience comfort in their community, comfort that comes from shutting oneself off from critiques of one's beliefs is not only closed-minded, but harmful.
We will continue to be open to others' religious perspectives. We hope that religious people at Vassar will be open to ours.