JOHN MAINDONALD complains of double-vision as he looks over the Network There seem to be two Sea of Faiths. Firstly, there is the Sea of Faith promoted by Don Cupitt’s BBC television series The Sea of Faith, and by his 1984 book of the same name. In this Sea of Faith there is free-ranging debate and discussion. This Sea of Faith emerges also in the prologue Don Cupitt contributes to the Time and Tide collection of essays that Sea of Faith (UK) published a few months ago.
He expresses the hope that the Network will evolve to be the world’s first “truly free religious society”. It would surely not be the first - there have been experiments with free religious societies from Reformation times and before, which mostly petered out in the face of fierce persecution. But yes, the hope for Sea of Faith is that it “The magazine has presented a generally non-realist perspective, which surely sits oddly with a Sea of Faith that hopes to be a truly free religious society”. will become such a society. David Boulton wrote in the Winter 1997 issue of the magazine that “We have no dogmas, and we peddle no certainties”.
The other Sea of Faith is the non-realist Sea of Faith. In the UK, but not I think to any extent in New Zealand or Australia, non-realist perspectives have underpinned a particular Sea of Faith view of religion. There are hints of it in the 1984 edition of “The Sea of Faith”. It emerges in a full-blown form in Don Cupitt’s later books. Recently he has somewhere described non-realism as a rejection of the idea that “there is a mind-independent reality out there”. The magazine has presented a generally nonrealist perspective, which surely sits oddly with a Sea of Faith that hopes to be a truly free religious society.
My prescription for this Free Religious Sea of Faith is that it will: 1) foster free-ranging religious debate; 2) be unfazed if this spills over, as it often must, into areas that many would like to keep separate from religion; 3) allow and encourage participants to develop their own SOF 51 / January 2002 understanding of religion, within a supportive environment; 4) ask of members and participants only that they acknowledge and respect the right of others to hold opinions with which they may disagree; 5) seek the widest possible cooperation between those who have abandoned the notion that belief is of the essence of religion.
In this free society there can be no insistence on orthodoxy, whether in religious outlook or in philosophical perspective. There are, in addition, practical reasons why philosophical orthodoxy along non-realist lines is a non-starter: 1) There is no agreement on the meaning of “nonrealism” (by which I mean philosophical rather than theological non-realism). 2) It would create barriers for cooperation with others who seek a path to the future that is free from the traditional demands for orthodox belief. 3) If pressed, it would cut us off from the stimulation of many of the lively minds from whom we might otherwise gain succour - the likes of Karen Armstrong, Richard Holloway, Paul Davies and so on.
I mention these three because they all contributed readable and stimulating essays to the Time and Tide volume.
What anyway is non-realism? “Realism” has had hugely varying meanings, to the extent that it must be one of the most abused words in philosophical debate.
Philosophical questions about our experience of the world are as old as humanity itself. There will not be any resolution any time soon. For myself, I think it best to abandon the realist/non-realist debate, and talk about models. That too would get us into philosophical deep water. Such deep water, non-realist or of any other kind, is surely not where SoF wants to be. It is enough that we are what we are. Didn’t the God of the early books of the Bible give some such account of himself?
Or was it herself?
John Maindonald is a member of SoF in Australia | The outgoing editor has obtained a leaked | copy of the Steering Committee’s secret | report on candidates for his replacement .We print it here as a service to our readers, in the interests of openness and transparency...