The God Question and its Relationship to Homeopathy
by Richard Pitt
God and Religion, are they the same thing?
It is clear that the majority of white English people have given up on religion. The Church of England has also given up the Ghost, meandering into benign oblivion, leaving their flock to find new pastures. Many feel this is all well and good and part of the natural evolution of things as society re-evaluates its relationship to redundant belief systems and redefines its spiritual values. Most of Western Europe has followed a similar trajectory, even such Catholic countries as Italy and Spain. The United States is an exemption to this direction in Western civilization, but the battle lines are also there between secular and religious forces.
A number of problems arise during significant social transitions. What do you put in its place when you relegate a cultural belief system to the dustbin and what does it mean here about the larger question of God itself? Is God the same as religion and if God is to go as well, then what next? A variation of the good old benign humanism, or something more radical instead? Communism was tried and simply became another religion and then religion came back as the door on communism closed - at least in Russia. You can have God without religion but most people condemning religion find it easier to condemn God as well and which fits into their own philosophical paradigm.
Our historical relationship to religion
This is not the first time in relatively modern history that society has turned its back on traditional religion. Perhaps most dramatically during the French Revolution, the bible was outlawed for a while and any person expressing Christian beliefs could face the death penalty. Notre Dame was dedicated to the cult of Reason and the revolution adopted a strict atheistic society. Religious freedoms were soon re-instated but still under the mandate of reason. At the same time, William Blake in England was making similar, if less violent arguments about the role of religion and church in society. Similar waves of rebellion against religious orthodoxies occurred in the 1840’s-1850’s, being influenced by many intellectuals and philosophers, perhaps most famously Marx and Engels. And again, at the turn of the 20th century, as technological advances profoundly altered society, another wave of secularism took root in European society, leading to the Bolshevik revolution in Russia.
Most recently, during the social revolution of the 1960’s, many social and cultural restraints were challenged and broken down, leading to radical changes in society including the role of religious beliefs and churches. As this impulse has continued since the 1960’s, it has taken many turns and in Europe has more profoundly changed the formal influence of the Christian church than in the United States where the power of religion has continued to be strong, especially in the evangelical church. In Europe, while many indigenous Christians have discarded their beliefs, many immigrants have brought their own religion with them, Islam and Hinduism being the two largest religions practiced. The relationship between Islam and Christianity has been a difficult one, beginning most significantly during the 1st Crusades in the late 11th century and then erupting most recently and most devastatingly during the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Muslims have felt a justifiable cause against the abuses of Christianity and, in the name of Allah, significant atrocities have been meted out to Christians and other non-believers.
In the United States, the events of 9/11 and the subsequent wars in the Middle East fueled the more evangelical movements within the Christian church, as well as the secular parts of society, despairing at the religious inspired depravity and the polarization of religious beliefs into ever increasing fundamentalisms. A growing polarization in religious and social values has been seen in the United States, with both the main political parties reflecting this widening cultural war.
Where do people go when they give up on religion?
In Europe, since the 1960’s and 1970’s, most people who have given up on traditional religion have moved in one of three main directions.
The belief in science, rationalism and materialism – that part of European intellectual history, beginning most significantly with Bacon, Descartes and Newton and now seeing an expression in the fields of medical politics and the mostly secular media.
A (non) position of benign agnosticism or practical utilitarianism to explain things and the challenges of modern society. Not particularly religious/spiritual and not particularly partisan to the god of rationalism, it seeks simply the evolution of society through a combination of practicality, rationalism and individual freedom.
An exploration of alternative forms of religious and spiritual forms, incorporating eastern religions such as Buddhism, Hinduism, Paganism, Shamanism and other spiritual and lifestyle philosophies. Included in this would be the plethora of alternative medical therapies, forms of healing, spirit beliefs, environmentalism, alternative lifestyles, organic agriculture and broad forms of pantheism in which nature in its pristine glory is celebrated. A growing suspicion of scientific rationalism is often expressed here and the underlying guiding principles people follow are more holistic and would incorporate some form of spiritual belief.
Of course, these categories are not rigid and people can inhabit aspects of all of them. However, there is perhaps a growing polarity between the first and third group, as seen in the growing attacks on alternative medicine by a radical group of “scientific reductionists,” who have become increasingly intolerant of any form of healing that does not conform to a narrow rationale of what they think works.
The Canadian philosopher, Charles Taylor, in his book A Secular Age also described the struggle between the secular and the spiritual as a three-cornered battle:
Secular, exclusive humanists with Enlightenment values who deny transcendence and the notion of God.
Anti-humanists who deny and attack claims of the power of reason to find scientific, objective truths of reality. This is the domain of much of post-modern thinkers. They challenge the Enlightenment but don’t seek meaning in religion or the transcendent.
Believers in transcendence, who have some conviction in a higher reality or transformation possible, even beyond human perfection.
Likewise, he sees shifting and overlapping alliances between the three groups. (1) And (2) are anti-spiritual. (2) and (3) share forces against the naïve optimism and belief in progress of (1). (1) and (3) are both opposed to the relativism and nihilism of (2).
In the arena of healthcare and the attacks on many forms of holistic methods, influenced by secular society and also the tendency to increasing fundamentalism as a whole, there has been an alignment of various groups:
Medical professionals who believe that the domain of science is best served by only allowing the most conventional of medical practice to be accepted and who by default dismiss the vast majority of alternative healing from a basic philosophical position.
“Big Pharma.” A powerful lobbying influence whose agenda is to maintain their power and profits and who seek to influence the discourse of what is acceptable in medicine and healing.
Radical secularists, who have a burning passion to dismiss anything that is seen as “non-rational” or “non-scientific.” This would include all notions of God and spirituality, as well as forms of alternative healing, astrology and other similar belief systems. People included in this group include part of the secular intellectual movement as well as traditional left wing “Marxist” groups who follow Marx’s basic materialistic doctrine, whether it is right or left wing in the ever-changing boundaries of cultural and political expression.
In this movement of increasing criticism against non-orthodox forms of healing and spiritual beliefs, one has seen a growing alignment of forces that in other times would be on other sides of the fence, that is, the capitalist forces of the medical/industrial complex and secular atheists that normally would be seen in more socialist circles and critics of the cultural class-based culture. However, in this case, the values of science have been distorted and used to support not only the advance of science and medicine but also a broader belief system in which there is no room for God or anything that acknowledges a broader holistic and spiritual dimension to life, in which the “unknown” or “unknowable”, in whichever form that may take is seen as unacceptable. Also, it is part of a political and economic attack on the challenge to the authority of orthodox medicine to control access and availability of all forms of healthcare, a broad-based agenda to maintain its dominant position. This is at a time when the health care system in many countries, especially in the United States, is facing huge economic and political challenges and the iatrogenic impact of a drug-based health system is taking a huge toll.
This alignment has expressed itself most strongly in the United Kingdom, where religious indifference and a powerful secular movement, along with a sympathetic media, have seen the most virulent attacks on homeopathy and the broader “holistic” movement. These attacks have been widely supported by conservative forces in the medical profession and also by elements of the pharmaceutical industry. In the United States there has not been such an alignment, in the main because secular forces are not so dominant. The conventional medical paradigm is also still in a dominant economic and political position, in spite of the plethora of alternative therapies being practised and they have not felt such a burning need to condemn and threaten many of the alternative therapies practised, unless that is, one of their own steps too far outside the norms of medical practice.
The polarization between religious and secular beliefs has created a predicament for many who would ideally have affinity for the secular movement’s ideas and also the belief in science but who also feel there is room for other ways of believing and healing which cannot be explained by conventional scientific methods. The many previous attempts to dismiss religion and God tend to create another set of fundamentalisms and rigid beliefs, all expressions of the human condition and our attempt to create order out of disorder, meaning from emptiness and social forms that allow society to function harmoniously.
In the view of the philosopher Charles Taylor, secularism is not simply the opposite and rejection of religion and spirituality but challenges the historical relationship to and role of formalized religion and religious ritual, but which can still leave room for authentic spiritual enquiry. There are more options now in the secular age than preceding times and the context has changed. Personal experience and subjective relationship to spirituality have taken the place of the externalization of religious conviction in the form of God and formalized religious ritual dominated by religions. Taylor challenges the assumption that secularity has now simply replaced traditional religion, saying that it gave the opportunity to redefine individual experience and spiritual enquiry. It didn’t have to be defined only in the context of formal religion. He described the gradual transition from the Middle Ages when the world was seen as an enchanted cosmos, and the self was embedded within a social and cosmic order. Gradually this enchanted cosmos became disenchanted and in this process the world came to be seen as constituted by individuals, and nature itself as separate from human thought and experience. The Cartesian model slowly became the dominant reality, subject and object more clearly pronounced.
Taylor describes the effect of secularism in three ways: Universalization, where through the influence of the Enlightenment and the power of reason, science could pursue objective truths with universal validity. The second way he described as Psychologization, where greater awareness of internal individual mental and emotional experience, as apart from merely being part of the larger cosmos. The third way is Individualization, where spiritual experience is no longer intrinsically related to society. The spiritual path becomes a personal search.
The first modern scientists and their relationship to God
In the face of the growing development and power of science and medicine, it is perhaps not as easy as it was in Newton’s time to span both religious belief and a deep conviction in scientific materialism. Also, as God has been dominated by the more rigid orthodoxies of traditional religion and the influence of Jesus and Mohammed in the largest two religions, the blanket dismissal of God is perhaps the inevitable conclusion to the challenge of religious orthodoxy and fundamentalism. What began over 500 years ago, when the first scientific explorations of Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler challenged the religious orthodoxies of the day, with the implications that we were not the centre of the known universe, but just swimming in the mix, can lead to the conclusion that there cannot be any God at all as stated by traditional Judeo-Christian beliefs. This conclusion is the result of 500 years of scientific and philosophical enquiry and for many makes total sense. Ultimately the universe is random and the selfish gene dominates.
However, the findings of these early scientists were not attempts to overthrow the power of religion or God and in fact to begin with, these insights were seen in specifically religious contexts. To quote the American philosopher Richard Tarnas in his book “Cosmos and Psyche”:
“After the discovery of the heliocentric theory… the deep mysteries of the universe were suddenly unfolding within the awestruck minds of the new scientists through the grace of a sovereign deity whose glory was now dramatically unveiled. The stunning mathematical harmony and aesthetic perfection of the new cosmos disclosed the workings of a transcendental intelligence of unimaginable power and splendour. In that epiphany, the human intelligence that could grasp such workings was itself profoundly altered and empowered.”
Before that time, stated Tarnas:
“The true nature of life had come to be seen as fundamentally beyond the capacity of the human intellect to understand. Concerning heavenly and divine matters, it seemed only the Bible could reveal the truth.”
Copernicus was well aware that the possible consequences of these revelations could upset the traditional order, creating a wave of reaction, not only from the religious but also from the secular intelligentsia. However, Copernicus and those that followed did not dismiss God, and not just for political reasons. They were able to make their revelations understood within the context of the “workings of a transcendent intelligence of unimaginable power and splendour.” However, as the full consequence of the heliocentric theory unfolded over decades and centuries, the result became a fundamental revision of man’s relationship to the world around him. Instead of being seen as part of the whole, a connected interplay in which man was merely the smallest part, immersed in the whole stream of life; all meaning and intelligence in the world now belongs to man, which is separate and distinct from the “objective, non human world.”
Move forward five hundred years and we now have science standing on a threshold. On one level, we have tremendous breakthroughs in knowledge in many fields of scientific research, from the basic research into matter in physics to an ever more nuanced understanding of human physiology and our ability to manipulate it, reaching into the very foundations of DNA construction. At the same time, we have a science that still often sees itself as abstract from nature, separate from that which it is observing and manipulating, as part of a larger cultural mindset in western society that still maintains that as humans we have dominion over the planet, a premise established from biblical time. This profound conclusion in which man separates himself from and has dominion over nature ironically lays the foundation for the development of the modern scientific method even if many espousing the value of this method deny religion, which makes a similar conclusion.
As the scientific method developed and refined it’s ideas, the classic mechanistic-reductionist model of the world took hold, one in which the only reality is that which we can see and understand with our technology and in which all meaning is reduced to a bio-chemical analysis of the human “machine.” The concept of other levels of reality or consciousness whether one calls it Vitalism, Chi, Prana or some form of energy recognized as being the substrata of biological function is fundamentally denied. What is also implicitly denied is the concept that ALL things are somehow connected; that the human organism is a cohesive whole and that our relationship to the planet in which we live is a symbiotic one, where energetic threads weave a coherent whole, and which includes the whole cosmos. By default, the mechanistic model reduces things to their smallest component, seeking understanding of the whole through the smallest detail of biological function. This model also denies (as it cannot see it) any other level of reality that simply exists in the form of consciousness. This consciousness or energy infuses matter but science can’t see it so it can’t exist, the same as God can’t exist.
The question is whether there is room in the current scientific paradigm to incorporate a more holistic worldview and methodologies that would support this and how long the conservative forces in science and medicine can resist the challenges these views represent.
The power transition from religion to science and beyond
The humanistic/secular movement in western society has directly challenged the role and significance of religion in western culture, which by default, has included the very concept of God itself. As science and “scientism” has reached a certain peak of cultural influence, it has required the dismissal (for some) of that which represented the previous central structure of political and cultural power – religion. Taylor makes the case however that this is only one view of the influence of secularism. Many would argue that although science has come to understand much that previously was in the domain of religion, the blanket dismissal of God (or the unknown) leaves an existential vacuum. If not God, what? The attempt of the secular elite to put “Science” in its place does not work, even when those who support it act as much as “true believers” as the religious powers they are seeking to transplant.
This attempt to transplant one ideology with another has always happened in the evolution of cultures and society in general and has been clearly elucidated in a book by Ken Wilber called A Brief History of Everything. In this book he is using the theories of “Spiral Dynamics” and its stages of development or “memes” as society moves beyond particular paradigms of thought.
One of the ideas he elucidates which he borrows from some modern “evolutionary” thinkers, especially Don Beck and Clare Graves, is a model of evolutionary steps, termed “The Spiral of Development” within which there are eight to ten stages, or “memes”. Meme is a word that has been used by various thinkers who are exploring evolutionary stages of development. It is a pattern or dynamic that constitutes a collective theme. Each stage pertains to a period of evolution and a colour is given for each meme, although each colour given does not have any real significance. The stages are as follows: (1) Beige: Archaic-instinctual stage in which basic survival is the strongest impulse: (2) Purple: Magical-Animist stage where the powers of magical spirits and ancestors are crucial, bonding tribe and community: (3) Red: Power Gods stage where magical=mythic spirits and primitive powerful beings, feudal lords, egocentric heroes exist and the basis of feudal empires; (4) Blue: Mythic Order is dominant, manifest in the power of religion and the all powerful Other (God), where laws and principles are absolute, where right and wrong are clear, and is the seed of much of conventional religion and fundamentalisms across the world: (5) Orange: Scientific achievement is the new God, including the mechanistic views of the world, rationalism, the modern economic capitalist system, individualism and high achievement all taking priority, and finally (6) Green stage: The sensitive self, where connection, community, sharing and dialogue dominate, with influence from post-modern thinkers with their new-found social and cultural relativism and also the growing influence of holistic ideas, of environmentalism and the interconnectedness to the planet is recognized.
Wilber states that after the green meme, human consciousness is poised for a quantum leap into “second-tier thinking”. At this point, the possibility of thinking both vertically and horizontally is possible. He states that one can, for the first time, vividly grasp the entire spectrum of interior development and thus see that each level, each meme, each wave is crucially important for the health of the overall spiral, instead of seeing each layer or meme separately, which is the condition while still in first-tier thinking.
However, while still in first tier thinking, each wave transcends and includes its predecessor. This can be seen from a basic microbiological level – a cell transcends but includes molecules, which transcend but include atoms. Just so, each wave of existence is a fundamental ingredient of all subsequent waves, and thus each is to be cherished and embraced. Each wave can be activated when necessary. It is not a linear model that once left is never to be returned to. Depending on circumstances the dynamics of one model may be more appropriate than another. Wilber then makes a very important point: “But what none of the first tier memes can do on their own, is fully appreciate the existence of the other memes. Each of the first tier memes thinks that its worldview is the correct or best perspective. It reacts negatively if challenged, using its own tools whenever it is threatened.” He states that with second tier consciousness, there is an appreciation of the necessary roles of all the various memes. Even the green meme that seeks to be inclusive and pluralistic does not have a fully integrated and holistic view; it is still putting the pieces together. This is important as second tier thinking prevents seeing each meme in a judgmental, hierarchical way but acknowledges the importance of all of them. One other important point to emphasize is that within any system of thinking, all the different memes may be evident at different times and that it is important that each meme can be expressed as a particular evolving system.
The main point here to understand is that the next ascending meme of thought seeks to transcend the former. At this point in history, we are poised between the orange meme of scientific development and the green meme, with a growing appreciation of interdependence and challenging conventional structures of power and especially that of scientific reductionism. It can be seen therefore that in the current debate – seen more in Europe than in the United States, there is a philosophical and political battle between the orange meme thinking and the blue meme thinking which represents the former influence of traditional religion. However, what is also happening is that the orange meme dominance is being deeply challenged by the green meme paradigm, which is challenging the mechanistic model of the universe, including the premise of our detachment from the planet, and our right to exploit the planet for the short term benefit of man and his appetites. Included in this challenge is the role of conventional, western medicine in relationship to more holistic alternatives, in which the concepts of consciousness and “energy” medicine is foundational to its understanding.
This is why the very people who are attacking the validity of “alternative” forms of healing are often the same people who are challenging the concept of God. In fact, notions of God and belief in systems of healing such as homeopathy and acupuncture, and also astrology and psychics are all put under the same rubric as that which is unknown or possibly unknowable, that cannot be proven by the scientific method and which challenges the edifice of scientific reductionism. Therefore they have to be dismissed as idiosyncratic beliefs that all have their root in superstition and “mediaeval” ignorance. One well-known doctor in the UK said, “Homeopathy is worse than witchcraft.” One wonders whether he would advocate burning homeopaths at the stake! The attacks on alternative medicine have been growing in recent years, and while one could in theory say that it is due to the machinations of “Big Pharma” and its connivance with political interests (a too easy generalization to make), it also reveals the allegiance of those who are “true believers” in modern science and medicine, and committed atheists. As mentioned earlier, it has also seen an allegiance between those whose political affinities would be traditionally left wing with those who support more right wing values, especially when seen in the business of medicine.
The Enlightenment and its modern adherents
In Dan Hind’s book, The Threat to Reason, Hind questions this strange allegiance and traces some of its impulses to people who believe that in attacking God, religion, alternative medicine, environmentalism and the whole post-modern movement, they are defending the true spirit of the Enlightenment and Rationalism. He discusses how this can take place, and why by putting science at the peak of human development, it allows them to dismiss anything that doesn’t fit within its narrow analysis of life. However, his critique is that the powers of modern capitalism and neo-liberalism have captured the ideas of the Enlightenment and are a much greater threat to society than such “new-age” ideas and philosophies as homeopathy and astrology, as well as the blanket dismissal of religion. Without really defending the latter, he is asking the question that those who are part of the modern rationalist movement are actually defending values which are not truly representative of the Enlightenment. They have reduced the ideas of the Enlightenment to the narrow values of materialism, rationalism and neo-liberal capitalism.
The value of the book is in seeing how some of these modern critics of holistic ideas really believe that they represent a true scientific philosophy but in so doing seem more concerned about the damage that astrology is doing than in the abuses of “Big Pharma” when it covers up its abuses with drugs such as Vioxx, (1) along with the broader iatrogenic crisis within modern medicine.
For those practitioners of methods of healing such as homeopathy, acupuncture, psychotherapy and all kinds of “energy” based therapies, as well as practitioners of astrology and eastern philosophies and religion, there is more in common with some religious beliefs than in the materialism and reductionism of the atheistically inclined rationalists. While many of the so called “new-age” type therapies may not have much in common with the tenets of traditional religion and its rigid orthodoxies, they are somehow forced into an alignment based if on nothing other than the idea that there will always be some kind of mystery to life (Transcendence) and that there is some form of supra consciousness pervading all things, and that another world of “spirit” may exist, in whichever form it may take.
Further, there is a commonly held conviction that blind adoration to “scientism” is a great error and lacks the imagination of the human spirit and reduces everything to an empty, disconnected, detached void of nothingness, a universe without intrinsic order or meaning.
The implications for the future of science and God
Many of those who practice alternative medicine would say that their methods are scientific and that if only the reductionists would widen the goalposts, and in the true spirit of science which is the pursuit of knowledge and not just the pursuit of what people want to believe in, it would allow many other therapies and ideas to be included.
It could also begin to embrace the idea of interconnectedness, of synchronicity, of consciousness itself and that the mystery of life can be experienced more directly, not trying to simply fit it into a test tube. Instead of relying on a narrowly defined “evidence based medicine” which is often being used to support only “evidence” deemed acceptable from a materialistic view, , a radical empiricism could take place where all systems of thought and therapies can be tested by direct experience and this evidence can be collated and reviewed in whichever way is acceptable. Of course this doesn’t exclude all forms of scientific investigation but it doesn’t start from the prejudiced position of denial. To do this, funds would have to be made available for much more research into holistic models of healing, and scientific and medical journals would have to be much more open to publishing this research. In the last few years, The Lancet, one of the most respectable medical journals in the U.K., has taken a virulent anti-homeopathy position, even heading one of its editorials, ”The Death of Homeopathy”. This happened when publishing the “Shang et al” report, (Lancet 366), which purportedly showed that in 110 homeopathic trials,, compared with allopathic trials, homeopathy did not work, attributing any homeopathic effect to merely placebo. However, the conclusions were drawn from only 8 of the 105 papers studied. Whatever the disputes of the agenda and methodology of the report’s authors, the fact that the Lancet would follow it with such a dramatic editorial comment makes it clear where they stand and their willingness to believe reports on homeopathy, even if the “Shang et al” study brought up as many questions as answers.
The implications of opening up the field of research into all forms of holistic thinking would also include a “scientific” exploration of all forms of belief, including the concept of God. From a holistic view, God may not be limited to a traditional Judeo-Christian model but could simply mean that there is a “universal consciousness” in which all things are connected and in which there is an inherent order to all things. This type of universal holism would then be used to explore the human body in a much more integrated way, recognizing that all functions of mind and body are connected and are a reflection of an “energetic” life force. The implications of this kind of research could help bridge more religious/spiritual impulses with a scientific perspective, opening up the boundaries of science and also challenging limited views of the concept of God.
Real evolution happens when new ideas are constantly challenging the old ways of being and it is crucial that room be given for these new ideas to develop. However much this challenges the old structures, so be it, and they can’t be allowed to suppress and deny the impulse toward a more inclusive and truly holistic paradigm,, one which incorporates the highest expression of human understanding and development. This is vital in the field of healthcare and also in the understanding of our relationship to the planet, where the tendency to manipulate and exploit the planet for narrow interests simply cannot work much longer. We are at a crossroads and the overlapping areas of concern may come down to our understanding that it is all connected. We are not separate from nature or from each other. Science and much of conventional religion has believed in this separation but the existential, political and environmental crises of the modern age are forcing us to redefine these ideas as we move toward a truly holistic view of the world we live in.
Vioxx was the anti-inflammatory drug made by Merck and Co, which was withdrawn because of serious side effects, including heart disease. However, Merck withheld information it had about these side effects for five years, leading to up to 60,000 deaths worldwide. However, Merck by then had made over $2.5 billion in sales revenue from the drug.
References:
Taylor, Charles: A Secular Age.
Tarnas, Richard: Cosmos and Psyche.
Wilber, Ken: A Brief History of Everything.
Hind, Dan: The Threat to Reason.
