Airy Nothings Religion and the Flight from Time [Paperback]

Even as the number of unbelievers continues to rise, religion in America still gets unwarrantably good press. Unfortunately, the central religious concept of the sacred proves, upon closer inspection, to be fictitious. This book surveys the various traditional fortresses of the sacred and finds them all empty and indefensible.Even as the number of unbelievers continues to rise, religion in America still gets unwarrantably good press. The tenets and teachings, however nonsensical, of each and every community of faith may not be attacked. Secular academics who would never be caught in a synagogue, church, or mosque seldom fail to manifest politically correct reverence for the creeds, codes, and cults of the religious. Unfortunately, the central religious concept of the sacred proves, upon closer inspection, to be fictitious. The understandably popular holy times, places, deities, peoples, books, laws, and scenarios for the afterlife are fantasies projected into everyday experience by human beings trapped in time and unwilling to accept their own transiency and long-term insignificance. This book surveys the various traditional fortresses of the sacred and finds them all empty and indefensible.AcknowledgementsIntroduction: Fear of Flowing1.Holy Time2.Holy Space3.Holy God4.Holy People5.Holy Hero-Worship6.Holy Books7.Holy Laws8.Holy AfterlifeConclusionThe Triumph of TimePeter Heinegg is a professor of English and comparative literature at Union College in Schenectady, New York. A former Jesuit seminarian, he has written widely on the subject of religion and culture.