I think you make a very good point about the way that Humanist ceremonies are happy to incorporate elements from paganism Buddhism and other belief systems but not Christianity and I have a side light to shed on that.
Some years ago, the former archbishop of Edinburgh, Richard Holloway, launched a new book called, a short history of religion. I went along to the launch and I asked him why he thought that Humanism In Scotland was so anti-religious.
I pointed out that in England and Wales, Humanists were perfectly happy to allow religious content in their funeral ceremonies if it reflected the life of the deceased, but in Scotland that was not the case.
He replied that every new system of belief comes into existence in opposition to the dominant belief system of its place and time.
Humanism in England was up against the Church of England which is pretty easy-going, whereas in Scotland humanism came into being in opposition to Calvinism and Scottish Catholicism, which are more dogmatic, forbidding and prescriptive.
That explains a great deal and I agree with him but it doesn’t mean that humanism can’t change. In fact, I believe it can and should.
I think you make a very good point about the way that Humanist ceremonies are happy to incorporate elements from paganism Buddhism and other belief systems but not Christianity and I have a side light to shed on that.
Some years ago, the former archbishop of Edinburgh, Richard Holloway, launched a new book called, a short history of religion. I went along to the launch and I asked him why he thought that Humanism In Scotland was so anti-religious.
I pointed out that in England and Wales, Humanists were perfectly happy to allow religious content in their funeral ceremonies if it reflected the life of the deceased, but in Scotland that was not the case.
He replied that every new system of belief comes into existence in opposition to the dominant belief system of its place and time.
Humanism in England was up against the Church of England which is pretty easy-going, whereas in Scotland humanism came into being in opposition to Calvinism and Scottish Catholicism, which are more dogmatic, forbidding and prescriptive.
That explains a great deal and I agree with him but it doesn’t mean that humanism can’t change. In fact, I believe it can and should.
It was once put to me that “Humanism as a belief system is a Christian heresy”
And this is probably where that comes from
https://unherd.com/2022/11/humanism-is-a-heresy/