A religious revival is a movement or series of meetings "to reawaken faith". So says my dictionary. The word "revival" presupposes the continuance of faith. But will faith itself endure? Will it survive the assaults that have been mounted against it by the legion of atheists, skeptics, scientists, and heathens in the twentieth century? Is a benevolent God even conceivable after the century we have just witnessed, filled as it was with genocide, war, rape of women, buggering of children (sometimes by His own priests), pillage, tyranny, and slaughter? Wouldn't it be rational to dismiss once and for all this indifferent Absentee?
I am writing this in 1997. I see people streaming into the churches on Sunday mornings; fewer than when I was a child, but still numerous. Belief persists. Religious faith, it seems to me, has little to do with the question of whether or not God exists. It has to do with human need. Most people need to believe in some higher Being or Beings. The angel Raphael told Adam in the Garden of Eden not to trouble his head about the heavens: "Think onely what concernes thee and thy being;/ Dream not of other worlds." But men and women throughout history, from cavemen to spacemen, have ceaselessly believed in, pictured, genuflected to, prayed to, worshipped, and pined for what was in the "other worlds" beyond their ken. Belief of this nature is human and ineradicable. It doesn't have to settle on Jesus or Mohammed. Queequeg in Moby Dick carries out elaborate ceremonies of worship before the ludicrous "little black god", Yojo, "a curious little deformed image with a hunch on its back". Men have bowed their heads before the moon, before running water, fire, snakes, totem poles, trees-like "a congregation of ants worshipping a toad-stool" (Melville). Mankind will believe in anything that can be construed as numinous or otherworldly.
This by way of preamble to the questions posed by the editors of Books in Canada.
Yes, the twenty-first century, like the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth centuries, not to mention earlier ones, will be "an age of religious revival". The dawn of a new century will not bring with it new men and new women. Once you accept that religious faith will endure, nay, thrive, it is sensible to assume that zealots of various types will be around to drive it in one direction or another, depending on their own visions and interests. And within religious congregations there are always those who desire modest change, even reform; this too is a normal human appetite. There are always the stupid as well who will toady to anyone able to string three loud sentences together. Hence the zealots will find adherents. More prophets will arise to announce convincing dates for Armageddon, appoint their followers to The Elect, and proclaim Truth to the multitude.
The form this revival will take? This is hard to foretell. But perhaps we've been given a hint of what is to come in the rallies and imbecilities of the late twentieth century. In addition to revivalist movements within the old religions, we'll likely see more Jim Joneses, leading their disciples into the jungle to escape worldly corruption and, ultimately, immolate themselves as an ensemble to gain entry to Paradise. (Providing, in the happy interim, some sexual diversion for the pastors.) Maybe we'll see mass conversions to the Order of the Solar Temple, with thousands lying in circles and setting themselves on fire with gasoline in hopes of translation to approaching comets. Or to the Branch Davidians.
We'll have more revivals on the mass media, more spectacles. These will satisfy two human needs: to believe, and to be entertained. One million young people flooded Paris in late August, 1997, to attend the closing mass of Pope John Paul II's visit. What happened was: in the eyes of hip youngsters, the Pope became a Pop star. They came out en masse as they would to see and hear Elton John.
Will the twenty-first century revivals be a good thing? Religion is like any other man-made construct; like man himself, a mixture of good and evil. If the twentieth-first century revivals are fanatical in nature, we may be in for long dark days of shrill intolerance. But some revivals may not be fanatical. A television evangelist who urges a commitment to the Sermon on the Mount will likely do no harm to the human race (though even this can be twisted by a zealot). Rather than predict whether religious revivals in the twenty-first century will be good or bad, I will simply state: they are inevitable. God is installed forever. Mankind will find many novel and odd ways to get onside with Him.
Patrick O'Flaherty is the author of the novel Priest of God. He lives in St. Phillips, Newfoundland.
