Foster mentioned that he was raised Catholic and that during mass, it is customary for the congregants to show a sign of peace by shaking hands. “You literally shake hands with the person next to you,” he said. “You don’t know this person. You may have never met them, but you shake hands with the person behind, in front, and whatever else.”
“What an incredibly profound gesture that is, just to shake hands with someone,” said Foster. “And all your anger and all your resentment and everything you feel, which is natural, and jealousy…but you make a literal, physical connection with another human being. That is so powerful.”
“Yeah,” said Rogan, “and if you don’t have something to believe in…[if] there’s not a thing that you follow that you believe is making you be a better version of yourself, be a better person…then you know what you get?”
“You get those people that are unable to answer the question of whether or not you should protect an unborn fetus or whether or not they have human rights,” he said, referring to an earlier part of their conversation. “That’s what you get when you have no religion. If you have religion, you go, ‘Wow, that’s a good question. That’s a very good question.’”
“I think human beings need religion,” said Foster.
“I don’t know if you need it,” Rogan said, “but it definitely can help.”
Foster responded, “But I think societies need it.”
“I just think it’s silly to dismiss all these stories as being useless,” said Rogan. “I think they were trying to say something, and I don’t know what that something is, but the deeper you dive into it, the more interesting it gets.” Kisin said that he sees value in religion as a metaphor, even if a religion is not literally true.
The conversation turned to the New Atheists (Richard Dawkins is one of the most prominent figures of this group), whose ideas have declined in popularity since their heyday.
Rogan commented that the New Atheists “don’t seem like they’re at peace, which is interesting…the true Christians that I’ve met—and I’ve met some legitimate, very charitable, kind Christians—they’re some of the happiest and kindest people I’ve ever met.”
“And that’s borne out in the statistics as well,” Kisin agreed. “However, I will say this though, right?…The best people I’ve ever met are Christians, but also some of the worst people I’ve met.”
“Oh, sure,” said Rogan, mentioning Christians in Texas “who want Texas to be a theocracy” and are trying to get the 10 Commandments into every public school.
“And it’s the same with other religions,” said Kisin. “This is not specific to Christians.”
“It’s nutters. It’s just nutters,” said Rogan. “Whether they’re nutters as a Mormon or nutters as a Baptist, they’re just nutters. They’re crazy people that take things to the utmost degree.”
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