I finally gave up Christianity when I was 15,” wrote the famous atheist Richard Dawkins in Outgrowing God: A Beginner’s Guide. Dawkins hoped to reach the rising generation of kids with the good news that they don’t need religion. In the decades since the New Atheist movement launched, you might think this was the only message sounding from the academic world. But this is simply not the case.
Religious belief was supposed to decline as modernization swept the world. But it hasn’t. Being a world-class academic and a serious, orthodox Christian was supposed to be increasingly untenable. But it isn’t. Giving up on religion was supposed to make people happier, healthier, and more moral. But it doesn’t. In fact, even Dawkins has had to acknowledge (grudgingly) the evidence that people who believe in God seem to behave better than those who don’t.