After many years because the poster boy for New Atheism, ‘God Delusion’ writer Richard Dawkins says he’s a “cultural Christian”.
Speaking to Rachel Johnson on LBC Radio, Dawkins said he was “glad” that the variety of professing Christians within the UK was declining but said it could be “truly dreadful” if Christianity were to get replaced with one other religion.
The straight-talking scientest admitted he was “barely horrified” to see Ramadan lights being displayed in parts of the UK over Easter.
“I need to say I’m barely horrified to listen to that Ramadan is being promoted as a substitute,” he said. “I feel that we’re a Christian country.”
He continued, “It’s true that statistically, the number of people that actually imagine in Christianity is happening and I’m glad with that, but I’d not be glad if, for instance, we lost all our cathedrals and our beautiful parish churches.
“So, I count myself a cultural Christian. I believe it could matter if we… substituted any alternative religion, that will be truly dreadful.”
Reacting to his comments, Christian Concern said, “Who would’ve thought we might ever hear those words come out of Richard Dawkins’ mouth, even a number of years ago?”
Theos CEO Chine McDonald, writing in Christianity magazine, said, “We’ve come a good distance from the antagonism of New Atheism that made it its mission to denounce all religion, including Christianity. But I’ll save my excitement for when Dawkins et al start talking in regards to the ways through which their lives have been turned the wrong way up by the unconventional love of Jesus Christ.”
Later within the interview, Dawkins said that given the selection between Christianity and Islam, he would go for Christianity “each time”.
“[Christianity] seems to me to be a fundamentally decent religion in a way that I believe Islam shouldn’t be,” he said.
He went on, “I’m not talking about individual Muslims, who, in fact, are all quite different, however the doctrines of Islam, the Hadith and the Quran, it’s fundamentally hostile to women, hostile to gays and, I find that I prefer to live in a culturally Christian country, although I don’t imagine a single word of the Christian faith.”
Dawkins has up to now spoken about his “normal Anglican upbringing” before abandoning Christianity in his teenage years.
