‘No Room for Religion or Spirituality or Cooking Tips’: Exploring Practical Atheism as an Unspoken Consensus in the Development of Social Work Values in England

Abstract

Academic interest in the subject of social work and religion is a relatively new phenomenon in Britain. This article draws on material derived from a doctorate on the history, development and current practice of church-based social work in Britain to examine the reasons for the absence of debate on this topic dating back to professional social work's earliest days. It takes Alistair McFayden's concept of ‘practical atheism’ and shows how, in different ways, this concept has been prevalent in church-based social work. It argues that social work in England (rather than Britain as a whole) has been secular in part by default, because those who might be expected to oppose such a position have, for a number of reasons, failed to do so. The result has been an absence of debate concerning matters of religion, replaced instead by an unspoken but widespread practical atheism. The secular humanism found within English social work has never been required to define itself, to test itself against a position that argues for a social work suffused with theological insights. The article concludes that a more open debate on this topic would be of benefit to all concerned.