Religions Survive Because Magical Thinking Thrives

The devout don’t seem to notice or care

In my article here last week I mentioned the Catholic sacrament known as the Eucharist, in which the wafer and wine—through the miracle of transubstantiation—actually become the body and blood of Jesus. So the church claims, based on really creepy Jesus-script in John 6:53-58. We’re dealing here with magical thinking, that is, the body and blood become magic potions that guarantee eternal life. Holy Water, which supposedly has healing power because it has been blessed by a priest, also reflects magical thinking. Hence baptism also falls into this category: the sprinkling of blessed water on an infant while reciting sacred words, protects the child’s soul. In 1981, following the assassination attempt on Pope John-Paul II, the pope had one of the bullets added to the crown of the Virgin Mary at Fatima. He was sure that Mary, Queen of Heaven, had diverted the bullet to miss an artery. This is crazy, illogical magical thinking: why didn’t the Heavenly Queen Mary divert the bullet to miss the pope altogether?
 
 
In fact, careful analysis of so many religions reveals heavy layers of magical thinking.
 
Recently Margaret Downey, founder of The Freethought Society, introduced me to the 2024 book by Robert S. Porter, The Answer Is Never “Magic”. This is a highly readable book, 187 pages, presented—as stated on the cover—in the form of “A Socratic dialogue on faith and religion between a skeptic and a believer.” But those dialoguing are two neighbors in modern America, identified as R (the religious guy) and P (the non-believer)—and R’s wife also eventually joins the discussion. 
 
Along the way, Porter manages to insert humor and wit. 
 
Throughout the dialogue, R and his wife remain firmly committed to their belief in the god who reveals his will in the Bible. I especially appreciate Porter’s continual description of this god as Yahweh, since that is the name of the god described in the Old Testament. Translators have done a good job disguising this fact by using LORD—all capital letters—when the original text says Yahweh. Anyone who takes the time to read the Old Testament carefully soon discovers how nasty and cruel Yahweh turns out to be. 
 
Porter’s first chapter is titled Yahweh, and non-believer P tries to discover what exactly R believes about his god. After several pages of back-and-forth, P attempts to summarize R’s claims about his god:
 
“Yahweh is an invisible, and corporal mind that permeates the entire universe and instantaneously knows everything that happens everywhere in the universe, including the conscious and subconscious content of all human (and possibly animal) minds. It has unlimited, magical control of matter and energy, and space and time solely by directing its thoughts, rather than through any mechanism that follows or is even bound by currently understood (or to-be-discovered) natural physical laws.” (p. 14)
 
R finds this depiction “a bit stark and technical.” He points out that it “fails completely to capture the glory and, more importantly, the meaning of God’s presence in the world…” (p. 14) Why are believers so hung up on the glory of god? Isn’t that an admission that their god has an ego that must constantly be boosted and stoked? How else to understand the hymns of praise that are so popular? Holy! Holy! Holy Lord God Almighty!   How Great Thou Art     Amazing grace! How sweet the sound, That saved a wretch like me! Is the creator of the immense cosmos with billions of galaxies and trillions of planets paying attention to humans singing—and gratified by this flattery? 
 
This idea of meaning comes into play dramatically, later in the book, when Mrs. R describes a horrendous event. Backing out of the driveway, she ran over and killed her only son—she didn’t know he was there. This was during her first marriage, which was destroyed by the tragedy, and she turned to drink. But her despair was erased one night when she was at her lowest. 
 
“… the point of our relationship with God is that when we love Him and let Him into our heart, totally trusting in Him, He leads us to peace and understanding…” (p 123) She grants that her current husband, R, has made good arguments for the existence of god, but…
 
“Well, those are all well and good, though I don’t understand half of them. I suppose they’re true, but to me they’re really beside the point. I know God exists because I feel Him in my life. He came to me. He helped me. He continues to help me. That’s the reality and all the proof I need… I have no doubt that God saved me that night. That’s why we speak of God as our savior. He literally saves us from a life of guilt and sin..” (p. 124)
 
I suspect that most devout churchgoers can offer only superficial arguments for god’s existence, e.g., “Look at the wonders of creation, and the exquisite design of nature we see all around us.” Such arguments have been thoroughly debunked, which is rarely grasped. We hear instead that people feel Jesus in their hearts—and that’s good enough. It was good enough for Mrs. R. But it’s highly unlikely that Mr. R can tell us exactly where we can find reliable, verifiable, objective evidence for the god he defends and champions. 
 
In the 13^th chapter titled, Science and Evidence, P poses this challenge to R:
 
“I mean wouldn’t you at least admit that there’s some inconsistency in the idea of a god that’s infinitely old and wise but wants praise and groveling like a Bronze Age king and flies into a psychotic rage at theleast questioning of its wishes? A god that apparently wants to be involved in every aspect of our lives down to what we think, eat, and wear on our heads but hides from us like a timid bunny? Isn’t a little skepticism here reasonable?”  (p. 143)
 
I highly recommend this book. Robert Porter has done a splendid job depicting what a relatively polite discussion between believers and non-believers can look like.
 
By the end of the energetic dialogue, none of the participants have changed their minds—and we would have surprised if that had happened—because R and Mrs. R cannot escape from the indoctrination that has determined their thinking. But P puts the truth bluntly, which is bad news for the devout of so many religious brands:
 
“Whenever we’ve figured something out, really gotten to the bottom of it, found the ‘real answer,’ the answer has never been ‘magic.’”  (p. 154)
 
 
David Madison was a pastor in the Methodist Church for nine years, and has a PhD in Biblical Studies from Boston University. He is the author of Ten Tough Problems in Christian Thought and Belief: a Minister-Turned-Atheist Shows Why You Should Ditch the Faith, now being reissued in several volumes:
·      Guessing About God (2023),
·   Ten Things Christians Wish Jesus Hadn’t Taught: And Other Reasons to Question His Words (2021). The Spanish translation of this book is also available. 
·    Everything You Need to Know About Prayer But May Not Want to Admit (2025)
 
His YouTube channel is here. At the invitation of John Loftus, he has written for the Debunking Christianity Blog since 2016.
 
The Cure-for-Christianity Library©, now with more than 500 titles, is here. A brief video explanation of the Library is here.