When I was a theist, two theologians I really enjoyed reading were Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Thomas Merton, a Lutheran pastor and a Catholic monk.
Of Bonhoeffer’s books I’d recommend The Cost of Discipleship and/or Ethics. Three of my favorite books by Merton are The Way of Chuang Tzu, Zen and the Birds of Appetite and Mystics and Zen Masters. These also provide a Western thinker’s view of Eastern religion. Merton also wrote Faith and Violence and The Silent Life, both of which I also recommend even to secular readers interested in social theology or life as a contemplative monk.
Religious belief is a complex and puzzling mental process.
Science studies the physical causes of it but hasn’t reached any well-accepted conclusions yet. But science can’t address the philosophical aspects of religious belief. Atheists can, but in order to do so they need more than just a passing familiarity with religious belief in general. I don’t consider blowhards like Falwell and his kind to be deep thinkers, whether they’re discussing life or religion. They’re masters of the soundbite but couldn’t think their way out of a puddle.
To understand the appeal and the concepts of religious belief our best sources are those who have devoted their lives to theological contemplation. They aren’t out to stroke their own egos, name universities after themselves, pal around with the powerful. Yes I’m talking to you Falwell, Swaggert, Graham, your popiness, all you who value things of this world too highly, giving lie to your words. Pompous asses for the masses.
I believe in learning from the wisest, not the loudest or most popular. If you really want to understand religious belief, read the theologians, especially theologians who can present their ideas in clear, concise, moderate language, like Bonhoeffer and Merton.
Theists, particularly Christians and Muslims, cast themselves as enemies of sin, evil and other works of the devil (free speech, equality, humanism, etc.). In other words, enemies of the rest of us who don’t swear allegiance to their particular notion of god. With that in mind, I recommend getting to know thy enemy.
