Making it to the New York Times.

With the growing public debate springing from the rise of militant atheism, the conversation has turned at least momentarily to some thoughtful consideration of the role that religion in peoples' lives.

I've referred previously to how difficult it is to fashion a coherent set of principles to live by, done one person at a time, and the value of relying on group intelligence in doing so. In a word, re-inventing the wheel is hard work, much of which is done by trial-and-error, which almost by definition means getting burned before we learn.

Now we find the conversation coming from David Brooks, writing in the New York Times, an august publication if ever there was one.

Brooks suggests that if non-religious people want to be taken seriously, they will need to move beyond spelling out the limits of religious belief, into the realm of positive actions on behalf of their own lifestyle. It's one thing to espouse freedom from the constraints of organized thinking, to champion individual choice. It's quite another to admit the challenges a person faces if this is a priority.

Consider the tasks a person would have to perform, he says, to live secularism well:

•Secular individuals have to build their own moral philosophies. Religious people inherit creeds that have evolved over centuries. Autonomous secular people are called upon to settle on their own individual sacred convictions.

•Secular individuals have to build their own communities. Religions come equipped with covenantal rituals that bind people together, sacred practices that are beyond individual choice. Secular people have to choose their own communities and come up with their own practices to make them meaningful.

•Secular individuals have to build their own Sabbaths. Religious people are commanded to drop worldly concerns. Secular people have to create their own set times for when to pull back and reflect on spiritual matters.

•Secular people have to fashion their own moral motivation. It’s not enough to want to be a decent person. You have to be powerfully motivated to behave well. Religious people are motivated by their love for God and their fervent desire to please Him. Secularists have to come up with their own powerful drive that will compel sacrifice and service.

A common thread here is the vastness of such challenges. Undertaken individually, one person at a time, it's clear that is simply isn't going to happen. How many people actually have the time, the energy, the sheer capacity to even think about these things? Much less to sustain the efforts over an entire lifetime?
As I've written,

Building and maintaining a Belief System is a complex and energy-intensive proposition. It's one of the crucial elements of being human that is best done as a group. But group problem solving takes time as well.

Living secularism well, is the question. Well by whose definition? Perhaps those who aggressively deride the religiously oriented life have a totally different set of expectations for themselves.

That is, after all, the purpose of asserting one's individual right to believe as one wishes.