This was the debate I went to at Wellington College a few days ago. I wanted to take my teenage son to hear Richard Dawkins speak because he’s meant to be reading some of his books for Biology A level – namely “The Selfish Gene” and “The Ancestor’s Tale” and I thought it might bring it all a bit more to life if he could relate to the author. Richard Dawkins is widely acclaimed for his views. He is one of the world’s best known atheists and “has established himself as a biological guru”. His most recent publication “The God Delusion” in which he claims that there is “probably no god” in manner of proper scientist has become an international bestseller.

For the motion was Richard Harries, former Bishop of Oxford and Charles Moore who was editor of the Daily Telegraph and currently Group Consulting Editor and columnist. Against the motion was Richard Dawkins and Anthony Grayling, Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck College and a Humanist.

It was a fascinating debate. Richard Dawkins and Anthony Grayling were arguing that atheism has not become the new fundamentalism, even if it is the topic of the millenium. They believe that in order to be a fundamentalist you have to have a blind obedience to a holy book, whereas there is no book for atheists, only evidence.

As scientists they could not accept that religion forces you to believe in a “truth” and a faith without questioning it instead of understanding that truth should be rational and based on evidence. Richard Dawkins argued that although religion is not necessarily associated with violence, there is always a logical pathway that can be traced back to it which cannot be found within atheism. They came out with the following quote to sum this up, which received the loudest cheer of the evening:-

“Science flies you to the moon, religion flies you into buildings”.

Another point Richard Dawkins made was that if it was anything else he was criticising there wouldn’t be such a furore. But with religion it is different – you are not allowed to criticise religion because it is seen as somehow bad manners to attack blind faith rather than reasonable honest clarity of expression to speak your mind.

It must be virtually impossible to argue against logic and freedom of thought. The two religious speakers came across as defensive and bigoted. It’s not easy to persuade a large audience to change their mind in a two hour time frame although the numbers of people who voted against the motion rose when votes were taken again at the end of the discussion (although several people in our party voted “For” and changed to “Against” simply because they hadn’t understood the question at the beginning).

So in conclusion well over two thirds of the audience disagreed that atheism had become the new fundamentalism.

Firstly I had to deal with a kitchen explosion created as a result of the highly successful meal we had last night served by five gorgeous boys to 15 impressed adults.  They did a great job and it was lovely to have them about.    They made the most bloody awful mess, but what the hell….here is one of their choices of puddings with attractive centrepiece:-

Then Builder Bloke came round and took me out for lunch. I haven’t seen him much of late, but he’d asked me a while ago if he could see me over the weekend and lunch today was the only time I was free. He helped me move everything back to normal, mended my back gate that had been broken into and then off we went in my car. It was pissing with rain. You could hardly see a thing.

Ten minutes into the drive my ex husband called, who I haven’t talked to for ages.  He asked me if I had a few moments as he wanted to talk to me about something. “As a matter of courtesy” he said, “because I’ve told the children and they’re all really happy, I thought I should let you know that we’ve got engaged and we’re getting married next year”.

In case you haven’t been following my blog, he is getting married to Builder Bloke’s ex wife, so it was completely bizarre that he called at that moment when we were together.  I told him I hoped they’d be very happy together (slightly through gritted teeth but I said it anyway) but that it all seemed so sudden – they’ve been together 9 months now – ever since she phoned him when we went away on holiday together back in February.  He disagreed, obviously.

I went very quiet. It’s a lot to take in. I wasn’t sure how I felt about her being my children’s stepmother or how my children were feeling about it and Builder Bloke was remarkably calm in comparison. It was still pissing down. He drove me to one of his favourite pubs. He parked and as I got out and walked round the corner down to the river there was the biggest, brightest, double rainbow I have ever seen. I could see the whole thing. Both ends. But look where I was standing….right in front of the pot of gold:-

We had a lovely lunch mulling over all that the latest news could mean and during that time he got a text from his ex wife informing him of her impending nuptials.  It said:-

“Hi, and whilst on the subject, just as courtesy I thought u should know that we’ve got engaged and intend to get married next yr.  Boys know.  They r happy.  Hope u can manage to behave appropriately with regards 2 children as a parent should cos if they get messed up emotionally again cos u don’t want me 2 (not that it’s any of your business who I c or marry) there will be action taken 2 keep them happy and away from horridness”.

I was completely shocked.  In the spirit of attempting to heal rifts et al, you’d think she’d be a little more sensitive to how he is feeling and to his situation.  He will now have to deal with my ex husband living with his children in no doubt a big house.  Given what I went through with my ex he is not particularly enamoured with the idea.

A few hours later I found myself at Wellington College with a friend and my son listening to a debate entitled “Is Atheism The New Fundamentalism?” with Richard Dawkins arguing against the motion.  So interesting.  I’ll write a separate post about it – as we went in we had to say whether we were for or against the motion and I was really struggling to get my head around the question, so need a bit more time to process thoughts.

I am sure that there are a lot of people who will be appalled by his approach – “what? No Harry Potter? No magical mystical stuff? Fairies? Elves? Wicked witches? Call that a childhood?” I’m not sure children need to be “warned” against such things but nevertheless, I am quite relieved. I have always been really crap at make believe and things that you can’t actually see and now I can pretend to my children that my lack of imagination was entirely intentional. Obviously, I blame my parents….or more specifically my father. My mother was great, she read me Roald Dahl books endlessly and would even sing sometimes. On the rare occasion my father was on bedtime duty, he would wave his cigarette around my bedroom, making pretty patterns in the dark and then leave me to inhale noxious fumes to sleep.

I wasn’t brought up believing in magic and my parents didn’t encourage me to believe that following my dream meant that I as a princess would one day marry a prince and live happily ever after. Which. Again. I am cross about because one of my classmates actually really really did marry a true life prince and had a truly fairy tale wedding, which was splashed across the front of Hello Magazine and then produced two gorgeous heirs to the throne and then lived….oh, no, she didn’t, she got divorced a couple of years ago – but she has since married a gorgeous much younger man, so I’m sure that she is deliriously happy and will continue to be, till ever after.

I have to say that I agree with Professor Dawkins’ argument that children shouldn’t be indoctrinated from a young age about religion, or morality or the cosmos or wizards, either at home or at school. I try to give my children a broad cross section of religious thoughts – mainly because I’m a little confused myself. I also agree with his appeal to children to think for themselves and to look at the evidence “always look at the evidence”. I am a realist. I tend to look at things practically.

Which is why I nearly fell on the floor with shock the other day during a conversation with my teenage son. We were discussing “Evolution or Creation” and I so didn’t expect him to say “well, Creation, obviously”. Without trying to look horrified I asked him if he was aware that Creation meant that you believed that Adam and Eve were created by God. “Well, if everything else was created why wouldn’t they be made at the same time?” was his reply.

Each to their own is what I say generally, but it is slightly concerning when your own flesh and blood chooses such an alternative approach to life. I spent a week thinking about his response and wondering where and how he had come to that conclusion. Wondering about how strongly he felt about it. Wondering if I was gong to have to go to counselling to cope with the prospect of my son becoming a vicar. I couldn’t resist. I just had to pursue the discussion. At the next opportunity I asked him about his ideas. Did that mean he didn’t believe in dinosaurs? Monkeys? Darwin?

“Mum. I’m not saying I believe in God. It’s just that we as human beings are so intricately made that we can’t have simply evolved from a single celled amoeba. It’s not possible”. “Well, if not God, then who?” I prompted. “Aliens” he said firmly.

Great. So now I’m living with a Scientologist. Therefore, I will definitely need counselling (unless of course he can arrange for me to meet John Travolta, in which case all is forgiven….yup. I know it’s hard to believe, but I really am this shallow).