Anselm GRÜN, Tomáš HALÍK, and Winfried NONHOFF. Is God Absent?: Faith, Atheism, and Our Search for Meaning. New York: Paulist, 2019. Originally published in German in 2016. Translated by Peter Dahm Robertson. pp. 179. $19.95 pb. ISBN 978-08091-5343-5. Reviewed by David VON SCHLICHTEN, Seton Hill University, Greensburg, PA 15601.

My students frequently think about theism and atheism in binary terms. A person either believes in God or does not, and these two positions oppose each other, often antagonistically. One of my objectives as a religious studies professor is to help my students venture beyond such binaries to think in more complex ways about religion, philosophy, and spirituality.  

Is God Absent?: Faith, Atheism, and Our Search for Meaning offers valuable assistance. In this concise, lucid, and stimulating book, renowned theologians Anselm Grün and Tomáš Halík share their thoughts about the potentially fruitful tension between theism and atheism. Each author contributes six essays. Winfried Nonhoff, a freelance consultant and writer, frames the collection with a foreword and, in an appendix, a conversation with the two theologians. Not counting the prologue, epilogue, and appendix, the essays are divided into pairs, one by Grün and one by Halík, with each pair under one of five parts: “Part I: When God is Silent”; “Part II: The Many Forms of Atheism”; “Part III: Converted to Seeking”; “Part IV: Living the Mystery”; and “Part V: On the Path to the Mystery.”

Early in the book is a recounting of Nietzsche’s famous “Parable of the Madman” (1882), in which the madman announces to atheists that “we” have murdered God and that we need to figure out how to go on in light of this profound change. Grün and Halík return repeatedly to the tale as part of exploring the complexity of atheism.

Is God Absent? is a valuable response to simplistic, reductive understandings of faith, religion, and spirituality. It offers an illuminating examination of different types of atheism. The book also critiques both New Atheism as well as a widespread, shallow secularism, including among people who profess to believe in God. The authors highlight the pervasive problem of apatheism (indifference to faith) and what Halík calls “somethingism” (43), a belief in something greater that resists any profound exploration of what that something might be. The book’s central message is that we humans, at least in Europe and the United States, need to turn down the societal noise and meditate on spiritual mystery, open to how unbelief can strengthen belief.

Is God Absent? reads as a series of reflections by two men who have spent a lifetime accumulating wisdom. Both authors draw from their wealth of scholarship and professional experiences. Particularly noteworthy is Halík’s background as a priest in an underground church in atheist Czechoslovakia before the fall of communism in Eastern Europe.

In a few spots, I find the book problematic. First, some of the analyses of biblical passages seem a bit strained. For example, in his analysis of the Parable of the Prodigal Son from Luke 15, Grün speculates unconvincingly (and pointlessly) that, because the older brother brings up prostitutes when he complains about his younger brother’s sinfulness (even though the younger brother makes no mention of prostitutes), the older brother likely has repressed sexual desire. More significantly, Grün contends that the younger brother is to be commended for having left home and that we should imitate him. Such a conclusion strikes me as stretching beyond the point of the parable.

A more disturbing passage from the book comes from Halík in Chapter Ten, when he writes this about the clergy sex abuse scandal:

Then followed a series of revelations of child sexual abuse by Catholic priests. Only when Pope Francis finally found the courage to refer to such overemphasis on this one part of the Church’s moral message as a “neurotic obsession” did the tsunami of scandals in the media, so harmful to the Church’s credibility, finally calm down. (129)

Halík appears to want to protect the Church’s “credibility” at the expense of shining a light on sexual abuse by clergy, but perhaps I am misunderstanding him.

verall, Is God Absent? is rich and stimulating. It can be invaluable as background reading for much-needed discussions that may guide us in the twenty-first century to think in a more nuanced and therefore nourishing way about religion, spirituality, atheism, faith, and God. I will certainly take some of the book’s wisdom to my students to help them venture beyond binary, superficial thinking about these concepts and perhaps even journey onward, daring to meditate on the mystery.