The Sacred

In a recent conversation, someone remarked that one of the insights they had gained over time, through all the ups and downs and ins and outs and trials and tribulations, was that “everything is sacred” in this life. I nodded appreciatively, even though the irritating critic that lives in my head had already begun accumulating a list of things—war, poverty, gun violence, systemic evil, mosquitoes, TikTok—that I would not want to put in that category. The sentiment that we are trying to express when we say something like “everything is sacred” is surely worthy of affirmation. It is a recognition that there is something special or important or even holy about the world that can be discovered anywhere.

As it happened, I had been pondering that word, “sacred,” for a few days. The social psychologist Jonathan Haidt, who just released a vitally important new book called The Anxious Generation (which is everywhere these days!), recently sat down with Elizabeth Oldfield, host of a podcast called—appropriately!—The Sacred. Oldfield begins each episode by asking her guests what is sacred to them. Haidt, who describes himself as an atheist, responded with “the truth.” “Interesting.

I’m a big admirer of Jonathan Haidt. His The Righteous Mind has been one of the more helpful books I’ve read in the last decade or so when it comes to trying to make sense of our cultural moment and the polarization that has come to dominate it (see here and here, for example). His work on how smartphones and social media are laying waste to the mental health of the young should be read by, well, everyone. In general, I find him to be a compelling thinker and an important voice. But when I heard his response to Oldfield’s opening question, I thought, “Well, Jon, I’m not sure this is an option for you.”

The word “sacred” connotes things like respect, reverence, veneration. If you go far enough back, its origins have to do with things that are “consecrated” or “holy.” What or who could ever confer such a status? Us? That seems rather arbitrary. I could declare the Egg McMuffin I just consumed on the way from the gym to the office to be “sacred.” Would that make it so? Is the word “sacred” just an exalted (if misguided) expression of subjective preference? Is it (God help us) just another exercise in personal branding, a way of staking out a claim to the things that matter to us and might set us apart from others? Or could “the sacred” be a category that does not depend upon us for its legitimacy at all?

If Haidt is to be consistent with the atheism he professes, I’m not sure how he can claim “the truth” to be sacred. Indeed, if there is no meaning to anything beyond what we (mistakenly, it should be noted) ascribe ourselves, then why would truth have any kind of exalted status?  I suppose he could say that the truth is really, really important to him (why this is the case would be an interesting question to ponder). Or that he thinks we should all pursue it more diligently (for utilitarian reasons, I suppose). But to call it” sacred” seems to be wandering into terrain that the consistent atheist should disavow or have no interest in. “Sacred” comes from the world of meaning, and if there is no meaning to this whole show beyond the fictions we console ourselves with, “the truth” of the matter is no more or less meaningful than “the useful” or “the adaptive.”

Most atheists will (rightly) not tolerate a radically relativistic approach to knowledge that says that truth is just whatever happens to feel or seem true or useful to this or that individual or group. Many (again, rightly) believe that they are the sort of creatures that can form reliable knowledge about a rationally ordered world through disciplined inquiry. The question is which anthropology—an atheistic or a religious one—provides the best theoretical justification for the existence of this combination of truth‐seeking and truth‐attaining human beings and a world whose structure corresponds to the structure of human minds?

For the Christian, truth matters because, ultimately, we believe that the God who made and sustains the world is truthful and that creatures possessing true beliefs about God and the world are part of his creational intent. For the atheist, matters are far less clear. Truth may be something that human beings can choose to attach value to but as it is not an inherent feature of the cosmos it can just as logically (if not psychologically) be ignored.

On a Christian (or more broadly theist) view of the world, it makes sense that human beings should seek truth—even revere the truth—and that truth should be available. Human minds and the structure of the created world are, in a sense, made for each other by a rational God. The truth actually is sacred because God has created us to seek it, to love it, to tell it, and ultimately to bow before it.

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Image above is taken from the 2023-24 Christian Seasons Calendar. It is called “Beloved” and was created by Caroline Coolidge Brown.