I am often surprised by how many otherwise intelligent people fall into the intellectual error of presuming that ontological (or indeed epistemological) claims are ethical claims -- invariably moving from the general to the specific as they do so. Even granting that there is a theotropic instinct, that in no way implies that societies ought to be governed religiously, nor (as the religious apologists who often make such arguments implicitly claim) does it mean that a specific religion or manifestation of the religious impulse should be preferred. The argument that there is an innate human tendency towards "religion" (usually opportunistically defined to suit the writer's theological prejudice) is often trotted out as a liberally palatable means for those who really ought to know better to indulge their superstitions while appearing sagacious and Darwinian. I am not, of course, referring to those like Daniel Dennett, who study that instinct as an is without concluding an ought, but rather to those like C.S. Lewis, who argue that because children have a sense of fair play, God must exist (an argument so utterly dumb that only the Crutch of Faith could make it seem palatable to a mind as sharp as Lewis').

What we must ask is, presuming the theotropic instinct exists, what it really is, and what it attempts to do. Is it the need for that feeling people get in cathedrals when all is still and the light streams down in multicolored strands illuminating gently dancing motes of dust above an altar? Is it the pleasure of the endorphin rush that comes from stomping one's feet and singing the same (banal) chorus over and over again? Is it a means to cope with the inability to imagine that someday (once again, the level-headed atheist points out), the world will be devoid of our special presence?

Whatever it is, we have to ask ourselves, when presented with the claim that "Man is a religious animal" whether or not that instinct (or, as seems more likely, cluster of instincts), can be satisfied in any other means than religion and with any other construct than God? That it is called the theotropic instinct assumes that it cannot. The claim of the secularist is either that it can, or that it is a mistake to think that there is such an instinct.

I'm inclined towards the latter belief. As a dear (atheist) friend of mine says, "People, when they talk of faith, talk of finding something deep down inside -- and I just don't see anything there." Observing myself, I find, piecemeal, some of the desires that religion claims to gratify (e.g., certainty, condemnation, that nameless feeling that accompanies singing hymns I remember from childhood), but only piecemeal -- they do not unify into a single over-arching instinct. Nor are all of them attractive or positive desires -- as often as I indulge it, I don't claim that the smug feeling of Election that accompanies thinking I'm right is a good thing, or something to be striven for (though if any impulse may lay claim to theotropic status, it is that one).

In conclusion, (for what started as a simple amen from the choir has rambled into a small sermon) there is no need for religion, any more than there is a need for rape -- though both have some claim as evolutionarily successful tactics, that in no way necessitates their adoption as ethical strategies.