“We pass the corner near the café, where it all began … We stop. St. Bartholomew’s. The church is smaller than I remember. Moss, damp and thick, spreads across its walkway. The ash-grey granite shows only the slow persistence of weather. I climb the steps. The old bulletin board still hangs beside the door … It hasn’t changed much, but standing here again, I realise that I have. The driver keeps his hands on the wheel. His voice, when it comes, is low. “These bells don’t toll more,” he says. “Stopped a long time ago.”
It sounds like something out of a dystopian novel or David Lynch film.
But that paragraph actually comes from the pen of Professor Chris Palmer, an expert in all things nihilism, suffering, meaning, and author of A World Without God: The Search for Meaning in a Society Overwhelmed by Despair.
Chris’s book takes the post-Enlightenment dream of a godless world, steps back from it, and gives an honest appraisal of things.
The result – for Chris – is the construction of the dreary, depressing town of Novemberton – a place devoid of hope, with residents sleepwalking through their lives.
Overhanging the entire thing is the question: Is this really the world we wanted?
Killing God
The notion of “killing God” stems from 19th-century writer Friedrich Nietzsche’s famous Parable of the Madman (1882):
“Have you not heard of that madman who lit a lantern in the bright morning hours, ran to the marketplace, and cried incessantly: ‘I seek God! I seek God!’—As many of those who did not believe in God were standing around just then, he provoked much laughter … The madman jumped into their midst and pierced them with his eyes. ‘Whither is God?’ he cried; ‘I will tell you. We have killed him—you and I.'”
The “death of God” became somewhat of a cultural meme that surged in popularity at the height of the new atheist movement in the 00’s. God could be discarded. Science gave us all the answers- and meaning – that we needed.
But where has this left us now?
In a world staring down an increasingly volatile geopolitical future, a looming environmental crisis, and the rise of artificially produced news, information, and even social interaction, the “death of God” has left many people flailing and feeling abandoned.
In a New York Times article titled The West Is Lost, sociologist Andreas Reckwitz cuts to the chase:
The modern secular religion of progress tends to excommunicate feelings of loss. Science, technology and capitalism all presume constant innovation and growth; liberal politics promise ever-greater well-being; middle-class life is built on expectations of rising living standards and expanding self-realisation. The ideal of modern society is freedom from loss. This denial is Western modernity’s foundational lie.
It’s perhaps because of this – the god of reason coming up short when we need it most – that people are beginning to at least give religion a second look.
A topic we’ve featured a few times on the podcast is the resurgence of church attendance throughout the global West, and a reappraisal of the cultural impact of Christianity.
A more recent Christianity Today article documented previously atheist soldiers finding faith in the midst of the ongoing war in the Middle East (2026 at time of writing) as the world around them crumbles.
Ayaan Hirsi Ali famously noted in her viral essay Why I Am Now A Christian that – on a more macro level – Christianity can provide a sense of meaning that can undergird entire societies:
Unless we offer something as meaningful, I fear the erosion of our civilisation will continue. Fortunately, there is no need to look for a new-age concoction of medication and mindfulness. Christianity has it all.
Holding onto hope
Chris Palmer points out that, regardless of the societal or psychological perks of belief, people inherently have a sneaking suspicion that there’s something deeper going on behind the scenes of the universe.
A good example of this is Christmas.
“The meaning and the purpose of Christmas is why the world feels so joyful and celebratory (at that time of year), because it seems as though we get to have an escape from our modern ways,” Chris said, speaking on Undeceptions.
“Nobody’s strong enough to bear the weight of nihilism, and that’s why we have the church … the reason why I believe that there is a rebirth in the belief in God is that we’re tired and we’re exhausted, and we’re not meant to bear this weight every day.
“We are flooded with information (Chris refers to this information overload as ‘infobesity’), and it’s all a reminder that modernism is not the answer … (but) we have to decide, do we want a Jesus that stays in the grave or do we want a Jesus that has come out of the grave? That’s the crucial question culture’s asking today.”
People felt like they had killed God – but many quickly cast around for a replacement.
For some, that was science. For others, it was embracing the meaninglessness of life – a route taken by acclaimed British poet Ted Hughes, who wrote in his poem Examination at the Womb-Door:
Who owns these scrawny little feet? Death.
Who owns this briskly scorched-looking face? Death.
Who owns these still-working lungs? Death.
Who owns this utility coat of muscles? Death.
Who owns these unspeakable guts? Death.
[…]
Who is stronger than hope? Death.
Who is stronger than Will? Death.
Stronger than love, Death.
Stronger than life? Death.
Christianity offers a brighter – and important – alternative. But it’s up to the observer to take it up.
“Do we want a world with God or a world without God?” Chris asks.
“Gifts show up on doorsteps that are intended for a child who innocently died of cancer … do we wanna answer (this question) with metaphysical proof or with hope? Because we can’t have both.”
At the end of A World Without God, one of the characters returns to the church in Novemberton.
Despite the dreariness, despite the hopelessness… the church is still there, even if no one has bothered to help with its upkeep. God has remained in the town, and no amount of reason can kill him off. This is a transformative realisation for the character in question.
In the real world, it would also seem that people are increasingly becoming aware that no matter how often we try to kill God, He continues to linger … and many are wondering now if that might not be a good thing, after all.
Adapted by Alasdair Belling from Undeceptions episode 171, ‘ Without God’. You can listen to the full episode here.
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