Deism as Process

When people ask me what my religion is, I generally tell them I'm a Deist. I do this because it is a simple question that really requires a complicated answer, but I know I would be taxing the patience of the asker. I'm not really sure Deism qualifies as a religion in the conventional sense. Deists don't call other Deists heretics - at least, not openly. And there's no such thing as a bad Deist, or a Christmas and Easter Deist, either, because there is no established, Divinely-mandated authority or organization. So Deism as a religion in the conventional sense is out.

Is Deism a philosophy? Well, that label doesn't exactly stick in a conventional sense, either. Most major schools of philosophy are built upon some cosmological framework, often making certain assumptions that most Deists would pick through with a series of questions and tests pretty quickly. I think most Deists would also be appalled at Plato's notion that it is acceptable to invent religious myth in order to get people to do certain things. Most Deists don't have the elaborate and speculative cosmologies of the Stoics, either. I think most of us are pretty content to believe nothing more than there is a God who created what we call the physical universe. We don't seem to care too much for the how's. In fact, we seem to talk more about debunking other people's cosmological assumptions, such as evolution or creationism.

So, even though I tell people my religion is Deism, I think, for lack of a better term, Deism is a process. It is an observational process whereby each person attempts to arrive at truth through certain reasonable assumptions: that (1) there is an intrinsic order to the universe that, as of yet cannot be replicated by man and (2) rationally implies a Creator and not random chance, and (3) this Creator can be best known through attention to the natural order and sound reason. While others may phrase it a little differently or make some variations, I think this is pretty close to what most Deists accept. The implication of this is that each person is responsible to use the process to arrive at, and continually re-evaluate, truth. So any Deist who says what a person should believe or should be doing is forgetting that Deism is about each person applying one's reason to the search for truth in the created order. To accept what Voltaire, or Descartes, or Thomas Paine, or Ethan Allen, or Thomas Jefferson says without question, or to quote them as some sort of authority on God without being able to articulate one's personal process of examining what they have said, is to depart entirely from Deism, and begin to walk down the well-trodden path of religion and philosophy.

I think Deism is gaining credibility in general because it is not a religion or philosophy in the conventional sense. I think people are embracing Deism because it is a process. What would squelch this increased attention almost immediately would be for Deists to begin treading the well-worn path of religion by establishing organizations with authoritatian power structures, or establishing Deist dogma beyond the most general statements. Once someone or some people become THE AUTHORITY on Deism, to the censure of any dissidents, it is over. Better yet, let there be a schism. All we would need would be a rift dividing Deists in half over some trivial point for people on the outside to say, "Yep. Deism is another church."

So fellow Deists, we must be very careful to avoid the temptation to be a religion or a philosophy based on either authority, dogma, or speculation. There are already blogs and websites that make definitive and sweeping statements about Deism that I'm not sure apply to all. This is a direction we must avoid. I think the biggest rift in historic Deism was not over beliefs, but how much invective to heap at established religion. It was a discussion that was never resolved, so before we jump into "Deists believe..." statements, let's see if we can even decide how we are going to relate to those who want to save our souls from the fires of hell.