Washington Post: Skepticism Is Tearing Society Apart. Belief is the Answer, by Christopher Beha (Author, Why I Am Not an Atheist: The Confessions of a Skeptical Believer (2026)):
Twenty-five years ago, I decided, in the self-conscious manner of late adolescence, to live my life as a skeptic. Having given up the Catholic faith in which I’d been raised, I didn’t want to be defined by my newfound atheism — a refusal to worship one among a potentially limitless number of imaginary deities — but by the cast of mind that had led to it.
Skepticism struck me as a crucial step toward becoming a serious adult. It also seemed the signature achievement of the modern era, in which humanity itself had come into its adulthood, as Immanuel Kant put it, by shaking off reflexive respect for authority and replacing it with respect for the individual’s capacity to reason about the world.
Having taken that step myself, I began to read those thinkers who helped the Western world cast off religion and bring about the modern age. I was surprised to learn that they largely viewed skepticism as, at best, a starting point and, at worst, a danger to be overcome. …
Today’s great epistemic institutions — government, universities, media — face much the same crisis of authority that befell the religious institutions they replaced. While philosophical skepticism promised detachment and tranquility, modern skepticism has curdled into cynicism and despair.
What can be done to address this fact, particularly if the philosophers are right and there is no shared foundation of objective knowledge from which to proceed? Hume once suggested that even the most confident conclusions should be tempered by a “degree of doubt.” Looking around today, I’m more inclined to say that skepticism should be tempered with a bit of belief. …
My own turn to belief eventually led me all the way back to the church of my childhood. I’m not suggesting that it will take others that far. But perhaps they could do with a bit more belief than modern society encourages. By the skeptics’ own lights, it takes belief to recognize the reality of the world outside one’s head, the reality of other people and the obligations that these realities entail. It takes belief to transcend despair and work for a better future. It takes belief to escape the cynicism and nihilism that seem the default mindsets of the day. It takes belief to put skepticism in its proper place.
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