" Many of them can only be made by atheists, or at least by individuals whose belief in Christianity is metaphorical rather than literal. " - YES, thank you.
I remember seeing a clip of Jordan Peterson on Chris Williamson's podcast, saying something like "You have to believe in the ontological transcendent, and that the truth will set you free" in order to be a scientist. And that is just plain ridiculous. I assume he meant epistemological, but even still, that's just saying "you gotta think there's stuff you don't know," only in a language so unnecessarily flamboyant it’d make Foucault proud. I think it exemplifies quite well the issue with the "let’s bring back Christianity." crowd, at least the non-believers in it. They act as if your average believer sits around contemplating Jungian archetypes during Sunday mass.
Half of these people could just say, "People need meaning and community," but instead they'll say shit like, "We must return to the metaphysical framework of the transcendent logos underpinning Being." They seem to think that big words and delusions change the fact that, for actual believers, this is pretty fucking Literal.
Also, love the section of the nonsensical historical claims. That's something that's bothered me for a long time.
Your articles always make my heart sing, and there is so little that does it today. I wish more of the "writers" around had the same ability to state issues so clearly and yet with passion. It may be ought to the fact that so many are "journalists" who seem to lack a solid foundation of knowledge in a discipline, unless that is some side-wing of the social sciences.
Your arguments are all so very true, and even more so, they MAKE SENSE.
And yes, all these people hallucinate Christianity. They seem to have no idea of what it has been for almost two millennia, to have no idea what it is ready to become again any time it should get ruling power. I have spent seventy years in this world and at times I truly believe that the curse of mankind is that we are not long lived enough to remember history and besides, we have a brain that has evolved for selective memory and an imagination that is exceptionally prone to rewriting history if the emotional need is strong enough. I am also a mediaeval historian who happens to have a degree in philosophy in addition, and can find no fault at all in your reasoning.
I am not an atheist, because I have a deep sense of the spiritual... but it has always struck me that organised religion has most often very little to do with spirituality. Organised religion has to do with the need of humans to avoid the actual burden of choice and to be told what to do, and where to bite or what to break when the fit of frustration takes us, both individually and collectively. And organised religion, especially in its monotheistic variety, is a matter of regressing to a state of childhood with an all-powerful Parent, while ennobling our ressentiment as a side perk (Nietzsche trod dangerous brinks in many places, but he uncovered a shining mirror there).
Organised religion, and Christianity paramount, has always been a vehicle of group control, filled with internecine bloody fights among groups belonging to the same faith, and inclined to violent suppression of groups of different faiths. It was like that since the start, since the battles about the requirement of circumcision when some of the Apostles were still alive (Paul won that on account of pure proselytising calculations, because circumcision was abominable to the Greeks, who were then the target converts). Since the first Councils when people killed one another in the streets over which notion of the nature of God should prevail, and after which the losing side were relentlessly persecuted and mobbed to death until that function was passed to the state after Thessalonica. And so forth, from Charlemagne telling the Saxons to choose between taking the cross or the sword, to the crusades declared against heretic Christian communities like the Albigesians and the Cathars, the killing of numberless heretics, and the Holy Inquisition (who few ever expect) dismembering bodies in order to save the souls they contained.
I would like to suggest to these apparently naive folks who believe in the inherently peaceful cohesion of Christianity, to spend a few hours reading the history of the Protestant Reformation, the Thirty Years war and the bloodshed and massacres on both sides (for Thomas More undersigned the execution of heretics, but so did Calvin is peaceful Switzerland, and many others).
Christianity as a body ruling began to actually follow the precepts of the New Testament (and turn away from the blood-drenched Old one) only when it was removed from secular power and the ability to impose itself on the unwilling. Began. It has, in my judgement, a very long way still to go before it is called a religion of peace and love. (And besides, which Christianity? Like you duly noted, many tens of thousand denominations, and the Anglican version in which I was raised has very little in common, in spirit, with the Anglican Communion out in Africa, not to speak of the Catholic Church, the Evangelicals, and, let me shudder, Mormon, only to name a few.)
But I have, in the end, a suspicion. That like many in the present culture wars, these previously rational folks chose a side, frequently based on what hurt them personally (see Peterson, see Ferguson and Hirsi Ali, see Weiss, and many others): and they chose a kind of authoritarianism over another, just like many on the left that have done... an easier choice, because continuing to struggle against both sides is harder -- and because, unfortunately, the personal desire for retaliation, in particular against everything reminiscent of former associates that have failed to support, is one of the most common traits of human nature.
And following that suspicion, I am less surprised about the delusions, apparent naivety and rewriting of history: because when these folks speak of a peaceful cohesive society, what they project is a "pacified" society: a society in which dissent is quashed, which does not upset them any more, and where the right kind of offenders are silenced and punished.
A traditional Christian society fulfils the requirements very well, and I fear that this is the reason why they promote this vision, consciously or not.
You are very kind! Your last paragraph has made me think whether some people may be motivated by spite. I was impressed by Simon McCarthy-Jones’ book on this in which he looks at the human tendency to be willing to harm ourselves if we perceive that it will harm the people we want to punish more. For illiberals on the right whose main enmity is for Muslims and the woke, Christianity would serve that purpose well. I do think most are inspired by seeking comfort and security in shared narratives and are misguided rather than spiteful, though. God, I hope so.
But it is my perception that often the two things -- both the spite and the search for comfort and security in shared narratives -- go together.
I do look at myself. I recognise a lot of contempt in me... against organised religion for example, and against the pride of being ignorant, and against all that is driven by strong irrational impulses not acknowledged as irrational; I find an equally strong contempt for those who embrace the "oppressed" category as a power ploy as for those who rejoice in oppressing others. It may lack the personal element of malice intrinsic in spite, but yet, I could go on... I just hope that the awareness of negative emotions as the source of it keep preventing me from embracing it wholesale. There is always an element of spite in such feelings, and of pettiness as well, even if they are vastly justified.
And I think that when one loses sight of the source of feelings, good and bad, all strong feelings, of where they come from and how they evolved, there is a risk. For there is where it becomes true that the sleep of reason begets monsters.
And I think that this is what happened and happens to many of these people, and to their mirror images on the left. I once enjoyed the discourse of Niall Ferguson, it enriched me; I admired Hirsi Ali for her courage and shared much of her opinions about the present state of Islam and Islam as a religion (which cannot become a positive force until it is expelled from the public sphere). I admired Bari Weiss when she left the NYT and founded the Free Press. I found Peterson's ideas thought provoking, before he descended into social media induced delirium. Hell, on the other side, I did once read Owen Jones with interest and pleasure. All of these folks have plummeted into tunnels of self-reinforcing dogmatic thought, a lot of which appears hallucinatory, and seem to have become incapable of shaping constructive dialogue.
But this may tell little about the reason why, on the rightward subset of them, a sanitised image of the Christian religion and tradition takes hold.
The latter, as I said, I suspect to be due to that intrinsic authoritarianism that all salvific religions embody: the tyranny of the righteous. When one has been hurt, put down, offended, and dismissed, one desires, naturally, vindication. And what better place for that than embracing a faith, within which one can feel righteous and be recognised as righteous, and which pursues a world that is finally perfect according to one's imagined principles. And all those who offended, once subjugated, will see the light and our righteousness.
It is a bending over backwards for secular thinkers, but the draw of righteousness is strong. What else has been, after all, the draw of all eschatological ideologies since time immemorial, including in modern times Communism and recently the deranged but not harmless mess of Wokeism?
I am irreligious and consider myself spiritual/mystical in that I joyfully embrace the mystery of existence and am content with uncertainty. I orient my life towards experiences of bliss, peace, and love.
I confess to a slight discomfort with the kind of mental onanism that produces these convolutions (a habit with a lot of philosophy, after the first postulates, for the paradoxes of epistemic logic matter only to those who have plenty of time to waste). Growing old, I am increasingly less interested in being brilliant and more interested in being understood, and so I look at the world from that angle.
I prefer to define myself agnostic, which stands to me in a clear place opposite atheism and theism. I do not know. It is not that the idea of a divine entity is meaningless to me, because it is full of meaning, and often horrid meaning, for me as well as for other human beings; the meaning is what we put in the the words. But it is on the existence of God, and the knowability of God, that I cannot say much: for it seems to be only an individually experiential perception, outside of the realm of proof and fact.
I am irreligious and consider myself spiritual/mystical in that I joyfully embrace the mystery of existence and am content with uncertainty. I orient my life towards experiences of bliss, peace, and love.
That's an excellent article. Your point, that the emergence of CSJ in the more religious USA rather than less religious Europe is evidence against it being due to a decrease in religiosity, had not occurred to me.
There are elements of CSJ beliefs that arguably resemble Christian beliefs, enough so to reasonably speculate that the former may be partially derivative of the latter, notwithstanding the secular character of the former.
What a brilliant piece in the Skeptic. My hope is that when AI gets a lot smarter, it will explain to us why the human mind is prone to the forms of mental illnesses we call religions. Perhaps Bari Weiss gave us a hint when she was interviewed by Coleman Hughes and he asked her ‘Do you believe in God?’. She hesitated for a while, then replied ‘I have this yearning for God to exist’. I had that yearning too, until I was about fourteen. It was an absurd theology lesson at my Catholic school that finally cured me of my ‘faith’.
Dear Helen. Your very comprehensive explanation of our present day world wide chaos and anxiety as much as I can absorb makes a lot of common sense. I appreciate your rich background in church and the history of Christianity I believe that returning to history in any issue is vital in putting emotional issues in perspective. I am a Catholic but do not adhere to some dogmas especially if they cross my sense of what I believe is Catholic action and everyday charity I also believe that whoever you are we are united in what makes our lives more meaningful and livable, a balanced and peaceful life. “By their fruits you will know them” from the New Testament seems to fit anyone anywhere without having to belong to any organized belief system. Atheists could not deny this could they?
A reasoned, factual & compelling historical argument busting the myth about Christianity's benign nature & exposing its inherent authoritarianism. Pluckrose also points to the science of human psychology showing that facts rarely change emotional reasoning, especially in times of instability & existential angst when humans revert to religion & tribal values. It takes a concerted individual effort to seek a communiy of like-minded skeptics who argue for & have the social & political power to maintain policies which promote "evidence, reason, pluralism, and the rights of individuals".
I'm not convinced by your rebuttal (though I also don't understand exactly what a revival of christianity should mean, I suppose it's a different idea for different people). Fundamentally, the reason is that if they don't know what the causes of the current situation are, and what consequences their suggestion would bring, you too can't know for sure if it would be worse.
Societies are changing at an ever faster pace, and if we are reaching a moment where the majority of people are not religious, this would be unprecedented. We can't just assume it would be for the best.
"The real safeguard is not mass commitment to any orthodoxy, but a principled commitment to secular liberalism" (which by the way is another orthodoxy ;)
You yourself and your committment to liberal values are the product of growing up in a religious environment. Can you know how different you would have ended up if growing in a society with minimal religion in the culture? Maybe at the age when every teenager rebels against their parents you could have ended up becoming an authoritarian religious fundamentalist. Who knows?
The idea of helicopter parenting sounded nice, but the desire to protect children likely turned out cultivating a generation of anxious and intolerant people. Maybe (just maybe) we can't exclude that an utterly secular society has similar backfiring effects?
These are the kind of arguments I would have loved to see addressed. Absent this, I find the whole unconvincing.
The Mediocre Post @ztmp wrote that those supporting the christian revival could just say "people need meaning and community". Well, they do. Shouldn't we find a way to provide this? I also think they need a moral compass. Sure, ethics need not be founded on religion. But in practice, until now, we all grew up in a religious society and only in this culture found secularism, liberalism, atheism.
I grew up in Italy in the 80s in a region where people nearby had been the victims of crusades against Cathar, Albigeses, etc. Nonetheless, I mostly experienced a strange ideology: a fusion of catholicism and communism. Shouldn't they be antithetical, what with atheism etc? Not so much, if they focused on the common ethics: "commit themselves to trying to live a life that is Christ-like—loving their enemies, casting not the first stone, caring about the sick and poor—the most benevolent, forgiving, prosocial, and generally delightful people one can ever hope to meet".
The local priest taught that Hell did not exist (unless one "chose" it for themselves): precisely because the condition, as you describe with the cliff, would be the worst thing possible, even the worst sin possible would not be enough to warrant such a punishment.
Such teachings make the risks of your cliff metaphor disappear.
You say "Atheists and skeptics's (...) case rests on revisionist history, and nostalgia for a culture that never existed".
Well I think it did, not in middle ages, but 40 years ago in the part of Italy where I grew up. And things got worse, not better.
" Many of them can only be made by atheists, or at least by individuals whose belief in Christianity is metaphorical rather than literal. " - YES, thank you.
I remember seeing a clip of Jordan Peterson on Chris Williamson's podcast, saying something like "You have to believe in the ontological transcendent, and that the truth will set you free" in order to be a scientist. And that is just plain ridiculous. I assume he meant epistemological, but even still, that's just saying "you gotta think there's stuff you don't know," only in a language so unnecessarily flamboyant it’d make Foucault proud. I think it exemplifies quite well the issue with the "let’s bring back Christianity." crowd, at least the non-believers in it. They act as if your average believer sits around contemplating Jungian archetypes during Sunday mass.
Half of these people could just say, "People need meaning and community," but instead they'll say shit like, "We must return to the metaphysical framework of the transcendent logos underpinning Being." They seem to think that big words and delusions change the fact that, for actual believers, this is pretty fucking Literal.
Also, love the section of the nonsensical historical claims. That's something that's bothered me for a long time.
Your articles always make my heart sing, and there is so little that does it today. I wish more of the "writers" around had the same ability to state issues so clearly and yet with passion. It may be ought to the fact that so many are "journalists" who seem to lack a solid foundation of knowledge in a discipline, unless that is some side-wing of the social sciences.
Your arguments are all so very true, and even more so, they MAKE SENSE.
And yes, all these people hallucinate Christianity. They seem to have no idea of what it has been for almost two millennia, to have no idea what it is ready to become again any time it should get ruling power. I have spent seventy years in this world and at times I truly believe that the curse of mankind is that we are not long lived enough to remember history and besides, we have a brain that has evolved for selective memory and an imagination that is exceptionally prone to rewriting history if the emotional need is strong enough. I am also a mediaeval historian who happens to have a degree in philosophy in addition, and can find no fault at all in your reasoning.
I am not an atheist, because I have a deep sense of the spiritual... but it has always struck me that organised religion has most often very little to do with spirituality. Organised religion has to do with the need of humans to avoid the actual burden of choice and to be told what to do, and where to bite or what to break when the fit of frustration takes us, both individually and collectively. And organised religion, especially in its monotheistic variety, is a matter of regressing to a state of childhood with an all-powerful Parent, while ennobling our ressentiment as a side perk (Nietzsche trod dangerous brinks in many places, but he uncovered a shining mirror there).
Organised religion, and Christianity paramount, has always been a vehicle of group control, filled with internecine bloody fights among groups belonging to the same faith, and inclined to violent suppression of groups of different faiths. It was like that since the start, since the battles about the requirement of circumcision when some of the Apostles were still alive (Paul won that on account of pure proselytising calculations, because circumcision was abominable to the Greeks, who were then the target converts). Since the first Councils when people killed one another in the streets over which notion of the nature of God should prevail, and after which the losing side were relentlessly persecuted and mobbed to death until that function was passed to the state after Thessalonica. And so forth, from Charlemagne telling the Saxons to choose between taking the cross or the sword, to the crusades declared against heretic Christian communities like the Albigesians and the Cathars, the killing of numberless heretics, and the Holy Inquisition (who few ever expect) dismembering bodies in order to save the souls they contained.
I would like to suggest to these apparently naive folks who believe in the inherently peaceful cohesion of Christianity, to spend a few hours reading the history of the Protestant Reformation, the Thirty Years war and the bloodshed and massacres on both sides (for Thomas More undersigned the execution of heretics, but so did Calvin is peaceful Switzerland, and many others).
Christianity as a body ruling began to actually follow the precepts of the New Testament (and turn away from the blood-drenched Old one) only when it was removed from secular power and the ability to impose itself on the unwilling. Began. It has, in my judgement, a very long way still to go before it is called a religion of peace and love. (And besides, which Christianity? Like you duly noted, many tens of thousand denominations, and the Anglican version in which I was raised has very little in common, in spirit, with the Anglican Communion out in Africa, not to speak of the Catholic Church, the Evangelicals, and, let me shudder, Mormon, only to name a few.)
But I have, in the end, a suspicion. That like many in the present culture wars, these previously rational folks chose a side, frequently based on what hurt them personally (see Peterson, see Ferguson and Hirsi Ali, see Weiss, and many others): and they chose a kind of authoritarianism over another, just like many on the left that have done... an easier choice, because continuing to struggle against both sides is harder -- and because, unfortunately, the personal desire for retaliation, in particular against everything reminiscent of former associates that have failed to support, is one of the most common traits of human nature.
And following that suspicion, I am less surprised about the delusions, apparent naivety and rewriting of history: because when these folks speak of a peaceful cohesive society, what they project is a "pacified" society: a society in which dissent is quashed, which does not upset them any more, and where the right kind of offenders are silenced and punished.
A traditional Christian society fulfils the requirements very well, and I fear that this is the reason why they promote this vision, consciously or not.
You are very kind! Your last paragraph has made me think whether some people may be motivated by spite. I was impressed by Simon McCarthy-Jones’ book on this in which he looks at the human tendency to be willing to harm ourselves if we perceive that it will harm the people we want to punish more. For illiberals on the right whose main enmity is for Muslims and the woke, Christianity would serve that purpose well. I do think most are inspired by seeking comfort and security in shared narratives and are misguided rather than spiteful, though. God, I hope so.
We must always hope.
But it is my perception that often the two things -- both the spite and the search for comfort and security in shared narratives -- go together.
I do look at myself. I recognise a lot of contempt in me... against organised religion for example, and against the pride of being ignorant, and against all that is driven by strong irrational impulses not acknowledged as irrational; I find an equally strong contempt for those who embrace the "oppressed" category as a power ploy as for those who rejoice in oppressing others. It may lack the personal element of malice intrinsic in spite, but yet, I could go on... I just hope that the awareness of negative emotions as the source of it keep preventing me from embracing it wholesale. There is always an element of spite in such feelings, and of pettiness as well, even if they are vastly justified.
And I think that when one loses sight of the source of feelings, good and bad, all strong feelings, of where they come from and how they evolved, there is a risk. For there is where it becomes true that the sleep of reason begets monsters.
And I think that this is what happened and happens to many of these people, and to their mirror images on the left. I once enjoyed the discourse of Niall Ferguson, it enriched me; I admired Hirsi Ali for her courage and shared much of her opinions about the present state of Islam and Islam as a religion (which cannot become a positive force until it is expelled from the public sphere). I admired Bari Weiss when she left the NYT and founded the Free Press. I found Peterson's ideas thought provoking, before he descended into social media induced delirium. Hell, on the other side, I did once read Owen Jones with interest and pleasure. All of these folks have plummeted into tunnels of self-reinforcing dogmatic thought, a lot of which appears hallucinatory, and seem to have become incapable of shaping constructive dialogue.
But this may tell little about the reason why, on the rightward subset of them, a sanitised image of the Christian religion and tradition takes hold.
The latter, as I said, I suspect to be due to that intrinsic authoritarianism that all salvific religions embody: the tyranny of the righteous. When one has been hurt, put down, offended, and dismissed, one desires, naturally, vindication. And what better place for that than embracing a faith, within which one can feel righteous and be recognised as righteous, and which pursues a world that is finally perfect according to one's imagined principles. And all those who offended, once subjugated, will see the light and our righteousness.
It is a bending over backwards for secular thinkers, but the draw of righteousness is strong. What else has been, after all, the draw of all eschatological ideologies since time immemorial, including in modern times Communism and recently the deranged but not harmless mess of Wokeism?
Well put!
I am irreligious and consider myself spiritual/mystical in that I joyfully embrace the mystery of existence and am content with uncertainty. I orient my life towards experiences of bliss, peace, and love.
Now 70 myself, I have taken recently to calling myself an igtheist. I offer this for your consideration. https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Ignosticism
Ah, igtheism! I will raise you Emerson Green's blog on the subject: https://emersongreenblog.wordpress.com/2020/05/28/on-igtheism/ -- he passed to Substack a short while ago https://emersongreen.substack.com/)
I confess to a slight discomfort with the kind of mental onanism that produces these convolutions (a habit with a lot of philosophy, after the first postulates, for the paradoxes of epistemic logic matter only to those who have plenty of time to waste). Growing old, I am increasingly less interested in being brilliant and more interested in being understood, and so I look at the world from that angle.
I prefer to define myself agnostic, which stands to me in a clear place opposite atheism and theism. I do not know. It is not that the idea of a divine entity is meaningless to me, because it is full of meaning, and often horrid meaning, for me as well as for other human beings; the meaning is what we put in the the words. But it is on the existence of God, and the knowability of God, that I cannot say much: for it seems to be only an individually experiential perception, outside of the realm of proof and fact.
Well put!
I am irreligious and consider myself spiritual/mystical in that I joyfully embrace the mystery of existence and am content with uncertainty. I orient my life towards experiences of bliss, peace, and love.
Now 70 myself, I have taken recently to calling myself an igtheist. I offer this for your consideration. https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Ignosticism
That's an excellent article. Your point, that the emergence of CSJ in the more religious USA rather than less religious Europe is evidence against it being due to a decrease in religiosity, had not occurred to me.
There are elements of CSJ beliefs that arguably resemble Christian beliefs, enough so to reasonably speculate that the former may be partially derivative of the latter, notwithstanding the secular character of the former.
A Christian revival? Hell no.
Douglas Murray is the prime example of the issue under discussion. Very disappointing.
You should publish this in the Free Press. When it comes to religion, they only ever publish pieces about a return to Christianity.
I was thinking the same thing.
What a brilliant piece in the Skeptic. My hope is that when AI gets a lot smarter, it will explain to us why the human mind is prone to the forms of mental illnesses we call religions. Perhaps Bari Weiss gave us a hint when she was interviewed by Coleman Hughes and he asked her ‘Do you believe in God?’. She hesitated for a while, then replied ‘I have this yearning for God to exist’. I had that yearning too, until I was about fourteen. It was an absurd theology lesson at my Catholic school that finally cured me of my ‘faith’.
Dear Helen. Your very comprehensive explanation of our present day world wide chaos and anxiety as much as I can absorb makes a lot of common sense. I appreciate your rich background in church and the history of Christianity I believe that returning to history in any issue is vital in putting emotional issues in perspective. I am a Catholic but do not adhere to some dogmas especially if they cross my sense of what I believe is Catholic action and everyday charity I also believe that whoever you are we are united in what makes our lives more meaningful and livable, a balanced and peaceful life. “By their fruits you will know them” from the New Testament seems to fit anyone anywhere without having to belong to any organized belief system. Atheists could not deny this could they?
Not at all, no! We shall work together against the authoritarians!
A reasoned, factual & compelling historical argument busting the myth about Christianity's benign nature & exposing its inherent authoritarianism. Pluckrose also points to the science of human psychology showing that facts rarely change emotional reasoning, especially in times of instability & existential angst when humans revert to religion & tribal values. It takes a concerted individual effort to seek a communiy of like-minded skeptics who argue for & have the social & political power to maintain policies which promote "evidence, reason, pluralism, and the rights of individuals".
Hello Helen, hope you feel better.
I'm not convinced by your rebuttal (though I also don't understand exactly what a revival of christianity should mean, I suppose it's a different idea for different people). Fundamentally, the reason is that if they don't know what the causes of the current situation are, and what consequences their suggestion would bring, you too can't know for sure if it would be worse.
Societies are changing at an ever faster pace, and if we are reaching a moment where the majority of people are not religious, this would be unprecedented. We can't just assume it would be for the best.
"The real safeguard is not mass commitment to any orthodoxy, but a principled commitment to secular liberalism" (which by the way is another orthodoxy ;)
You yourself and your committment to liberal values are the product of growing up in a religious environment. Can you know how different you would have ended up if growing in a society with minimal religion in the culture? Maybe at the age when every teenager rebels against their parents you could have ended up becoming an authoritarian religious fundamentalist. Who knows?
The idea of helicopter parenting sounded nice, but the desire to protect children likely turned out cultivating a generation of anxious and intolerant people. Maybe (just maybe) we can't exclude that an utterly secular society has similar backfiring effects?
These are the kind of arguments I would have loved to see addressed. Absent this, I find the whole unconvincing.
The Mediocre Post @ztmp wrote that those supporting the christian revival could just say "people need meaning and community". Well, they do. Shouldn't we find a way to provide this? I also think they need a moral compass. Sure, ethics need not be founded on religion. But in practice, until now, we all grew up in a religious society and only in this culture found secularism, liberalism, atheism.
I grew up in Italy in the 80s in a region where people nearby had been the victims of crusades against Cathar, Albigeses, etc. Nonetheless, I mostly experienced a strange ideology: a fusion of catholicism and communism. Shouldn't they be antithetical, what with atheism etc? Not so much, if they focused on the common ethics: "commit themselves to trying to live a life that is Christ-like—loving their enemies, casting not the first stone, caring about the sick and poor—the most benevolent, forgiving, prosocial, and generally delightful people one can ever hope to meet".
The local priest taught that Hell did not exist (unless one "chose" it for themselves): precisely because the condition, as you describe with the cliff, would be the worst thing possible, even the worst sin possible would not be enough to warrant such a punishment.
Such teachings make the risks of your cliff metaphor disappear.
You say "Atheists and skeptics's (...) case rests on revisionist history, and nostalgia for a culture that never existed".
Well I think it did, not in middle ages, but 40 years ago in the part of Italy where I grew up. And things got worse, not better.