Interview published in Le Figaro Madame –
Comments collected by Guillemette de Sairigne —
Guillemette de Sairigné. – Everything in the last century seemed to announce the death of God…
Frédéric Lenoir. – For the great systems of thought born in the 19th century, the case is clear: religion and the modern world are incompatible. Denounced as an intellectual alienation by Auguste Comte or a psychological one by Freud, as the fruit of socio-economic alienation by Marx, religion is supposed to constitute a major obstacle to individual and social progress. The decline in religious practice and the crisis in vocations could have proven the prophets of the death of God right if we had not observed at the same time a permanence of Faith.
How does it translate?
In France, regularly practicing Catholics do not exceed 10%. But they are highly mobilized. People no longer go to Mass to sacrifice to a rite; there is a deeper faith among them, a desire for visibility, hence the large gatherings around the Pope on the occasion of WYD. And then, we observe that, even if they are not engaged in a practice, 67% of Europeans – and up to 93% of Americans! – claim to believe in God. Between militant faith and atheism, most people are followers of "off-piste," of spiritual nomadism.
A development that fits well with contemporary individualism?
It's obvious. With the development of critical thinking and free will that appeared at the end of the Middle Ages and led to the Enlightenment revolution, how can we imagine that individuals who increasingly made their own emotional, intellectual, and artistic choices would allow their religion to be imposed on them? As a result, they can change it, hence the fairly recent phenomenon of conversions; we see it with Westerners seduced by Buddhism or Islam, or with the constant growth in the number of adult catechumens in churches. Even if we remain within our religion, we want to reclaim our faith.
Is the coalman's faith old-fashioned?
It can be the result of a personal approach. But we are mainly witnessing the development of a religion à la carte, with people picking up what suits them here and there, while distancing themselves from Catholic morality. We can thus imagine a woman who goes to mass on Sunday but takes the pill, has perhaps had an abortion once in her life, recommends that her grown children use condoms; while remaining sensitive to the message of Christ, she may very well read esoteric books, believe in Reincarnation...
Like a third of Catholics, despite the Church's disapproval!
Eternal life is so abstract! To combat the fear of nothingness, it is easier to imagine that we will return to earth to purge what could not be purged (which, incidentally, appears to a learned Buddhist not as a consolation but as the very image of hell on earth, since his dream is to end the cycle of reincarnations to reach nirvana!). In both theories, there is also the idea that we are responsible for our actions, that these influence our future, but while the idea of Reincarnation is linked to an implacable retribution for actions, Resurrection introduces the dimension of divine mercy.
However, to carry out these “spiritual tinkerings”, one must be aware of other forms of spirituality...
This is where the second evolution specific to our time comes in: globalization. There is a conjunction of supply and demand: at the moment when the individual is busy building his own religion, all the spiritualities of the world are offered to him on a plate. Anyone can find a spiritual master who will initiate him into Muslim mysticism or reveal the secrets of Kabbalah, a Zen center where he can practice meditation... The advantage is that of increased tolerance: let us remember that, until Vatican II, it was considered that outside the Church, there was no salvation! Only 10% of Westerners today believe that there is only one true religion.
The risk, on the other hand, is to fall into the most dreadful syncretism!
This is the great danger of our time: confusion. The danger of concocting a sort of metaphysical mash in which nothing has any flavor. If we are content to accumulate meetings, training courses, readings while remaining superficial, we risk going around in circles. It is up to modern man to have enough depth and discernment to prioritize these beliefs and practices so that they help him to make a true spiritual path. Whether or not he is concerned with remaining within the framework of a religion.
Some believers will remain faithful to established religions...
We even observe powerful ferments of renewal, the most conservative structures are sometimes masters in the use of modern means of organization and communication, this is very clear for the two main fundamentalisms of our time: Protestant and Muslim. Pentecostalism owes its colossal success to the fact that it gives primacy to emotions, defends the idea that one can already experience in one's body, on this earth, the encounter with God, the grace of Salvation. All these "born again" invigorated by the Holy Spirit - there are some two hundred million of them in South America, Africa, China and of course in the United States, including George Bush and his main collaborators (to whom we could link the Catholic charismatic movements that directly emerged from them) - remain within a Christian reference, they have a strict morality, a living faith. But since the movement is quite poor in terms of doctrine, one can fear that it will mix with local cults, with the result that the Christian message will be greatly impoverished. And then there is this proselytizing side that anchors Americans in the idea that their country is called to play a messianic role, to bring to the whole world a faith, values, virtues, hence their total incomprehension in the face of the refusal of the French to follow them in their fight against Evil, namely Muslim fundamentalism...
On belonging to sects, you seem, in your book*, less worried…
The danger of sectarianism exists, but it seems to me to be completely overestimated by the media. We have created a whole mythology of indoctrination, while most people enter and leave sects as they please, spending on average only two or three years in them. The root of the problem is this psychological need that too many of our contemporaries, who have lost their bearings, have to join a group that will tell them where the Truth lies.
Is it not lacking in ambition to define, as you do, the religious dimension of man by "his awareness of different levels of reality"?
I would add: "and by the belief in a supersensible reality." My perspective is anthropological: I try to see what there is in common between the prehistoric man who flowers tombs, the builder of cathedrals in the Middle Ages, the Hindu monk in his ashram and the European of today who cobbles together his own little spirituality. For me, it is not primarily about sharing a religion with a collective ideal, even if that is still the case for many people, but about believing in invisible worlds, in a life after death. In this respect, having recourse to alternative medicines, personal development techniques, believing in angels or extraterrestrials, being a fervent reader of "The Alchemist" or "The Lord of the Rings" or even "Harry Potter" - yes, this is in a certain way being religious.
Not long ago, the physicist Georges Charpak denounced our society's taste for the irrational.
For two centuries in Europe, there has been an alliance of Science and Religion to domesticate the irrational: for materialists, only that which can be experienced by the scientific method is valid; for Catholics, the only part of the irrational accepted is that which is expressed in faith in God. But man is also irrational! Sexuality is irrational, and art, and emotions! The sense of the sacred, the impression of being connected to something universal, transcendent, man can just as easily experience it in front of a face or a sunset...
You talk about "re-enchanting the world." But the deception is never far away!
It's true. When we are driven by our emotions, we can be manipulated, which is why we must be careful to maintain our critical thinking to protect ourselves from false prophets. We can also delude ourselves, confuse the magical with the sacred. But that doesn't stop us from reacting against contemporary materialism, against a mechanized world, ruled by technology and money. This is the positive side of all this alternative, New Age-type religiosity, whatever its excesses.
You also talk about the metamorphoses of representations of God...
Today's man needs a God who is less distant, more interior. A God who is less personalized, too. He readily equates Him with a force, an energy. A God who is finally more feminine, no longer the bogeyman who lays down his Law, but a God of mercy, tenderness, and love.
In this restructuring of the religious landscape, Catholicism therefore has its place...
Yes, if he returns to his evangelical sources, abandons the burden of guilt-inducing morality to rediscover the direct link with Jesus. If he also agrees to have more open positions on burning current issues, such as the marriage of priests. And then, he will not be able to indefinitely maintain the dominant position that is his today, defending the conviction – dear to John Paul II – that he holds the ultimate Truth. We must welcome the idea that the Word of God was incarnated at a moment in History in the person of Jesus, but that he could have manifested himself in other forms, in other times and in other countries.
Could it be because you yourself rediscovered the Gospels at the age of nineteen, after studying Eastern spiritualities?
I am indeed convinced that we are moving in the long term towards a certain interpenetration of Christianity and Buddhism, towards a synthesis between on the one hand the sense of the person, which is the central message of Jesus, for whom every human being is unique, and on the other hand this work of interiorization dear to the Buddha, without which there is no true personal faith, no spiritual growth, this work which, pushing back our dark side, invites us to free the goodness and compassion which inhabit the heart of every man.
Interview published in Le Figaro Madame