Posted on 07/13/2008 4:56:08 AM PDT by kellynla
Religion – including Christianity and Judaism – is "violent, irrational, intolerant, allied to racism, tribalism, and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free inquiry, contemptuous of women and coercive toward children." At least that's according to the No. 1 New York Times bestseller "God is Not Great: Why Religion Poisons Everything" by journalist Christopher Hitchens.
In the news business, we often cite a nation's current top-selling books – for example, the popularity of anti-Semitic titles in Arab countries – as evidence of the mindset of the people.
Well, in the United States of America right now, some of the most-bought, most-read and most-discussed books are angry, in-your-face atheist manifestos.
Besides Hitchens' book, which has dominated nonfiction bestseller charts for months, there's the popular "Letter to a Christian Nation" by atheist author Sam Harris, sequel to his earlier tome "The End of Faith," and Oxford biologist Richard Dawkins' "The God Delusion" – all New York Times bestsellers.
Then there are other hot titles: "God: The Failed Hypothesis: How Science Shows That God Does Not Exist" by Victor J. Stenger. "Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon" by Daniel C. Dennett. "Atheist Universe: The Thinking Person's Answer to Christian Fundamentalism" by David Mills. And so on.
"This is atheism's moment," crowed David Steinberger, CEO of Perseus Books in a Wall Street Journal interview. "Mr. Hitchens has written the category killer, and we're excited about having the next book." That's right – this fall the publishing world will further cash in on the anti-God juggernaut with "The Pocket Atheist," featuring the writings of famous atheists, edited by Hitchens.
(Excerpt) Read more at wnd.com ...
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
Very true. However, the quote neglects to add that it is also uplifting, enlightening, full of hope, charity, a spreader of good works and an incitement to virtue, plus a million other positives too numerous to mention.
Religion has been associated to many evils in the past - that does not mean they automatically go together, anymore than having a sense of national pride automtically equates to fascism and death camps!
I hate lazy books and self-serving folk like this who won't argue well or consistently and their reveiewers are too lazy to call them on it.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
Without taking sided it appears that free-thinking people simply want to break the strangle hold religion has on world politics and remove the artificial division that all religions create through adherence to their texts.
Imagine no religion, it’s easy if you try.
If you want to attack religion - great! Do it openly and be prepared to debate. That what apologetics is all about and has led to some of the finest philpsophy of the last few millennia. But skulking in the shadows saying "religion bad, atheism good" is as intellectually stretching as a Britney Spears lyric.
I read on a blog that Tony Snow was actually a missionary to Kenya. Haven’t heard that on the news at all.
Atheism draws people away today the same way it has always done: flattery. Appealing to the vanity of the listener. Here’s what Psalm 12 has to say about it:
Help, LORD; for the godly man ceaseth; for the faithful fail from among the children of men.
2 They speak vanity every one with his neighbour: with flattering lips and with a double heart do they speak.
3 The LORD shall cut off all flattering lips, and the tongue that speaketh proud things:
4 Who have said, With our tongue will we prevail; our lips are our own: who is lord over us?
5 For the oppression of the poor, for the sighing of the needy, now will I arise, saith the LORD; I will set him in safety from him that puffeth at him.
6 The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.
7 Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.
8 The wicked walk on every side, when the vilest men are exalted.
Psalm 12
Just another battle in the loooooooong war.
I like your analogy! Gotta use that sometime. lol One of the General Authorities of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints said something similar. He called such sophistry “intellectual/spiritual twinkies”. They taste great but are utterly devoid of any kind of nutritional value.
Thank you! Reasoned debate trumps generic abuse any day!
Atheism is popular due to ignorance of the Bible (when an atheist doesn’t understand the Bible, he/she declares it false. When I don’t understand the Bible, I talk to my pastor), ignorance of the history of religion (one atheist I spoke to claimed that nothing has caused more deaths than religion), a rebellious nature in people (I blame the 60’s counter-culture for this), among other things.
Yeah, I imagined it, and I see Gulags and Killing Fields.
Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters.
Thomas Jefferson
The doctrines of Jesus are simple, and tend all to the happiness of mankind.
Benjamin Rush
The only foundation for a useful education in a republic is to be laid in religion. Without this there can be no virtue, and without virtue there can be no liberty, and liberty is the object and life of all republican governments.
“Can't we all just get along?”
No we can't. History has proved that.
I believe religion is a personal issue between my god and myself that can never be taken away.
The atheist writers cited are all Stalinists, whether they know it or not, and I suspect that they do. It was Stalin who said, “Religion is the opiate of the world.”
Yes, it is an opiate. It soothes the pain, it calms the ego. But that doesn’t prove that it is wrong. It was Stalin’s way of fighting against God-loving people who protested his murder of millions of people.
These atheists should follow their logic all the way down and try to figure out why they even bother to care. They have religionized their “wrong” concept of a methodology, science, which uses “doubt” but is based on positive curiosity, the belief in settled order, and that the human concept of truth, though always incomplete can at least coincide with TRUTH.
Actually, with just a little under-the-surface scrutiny, they would have to admit that their arguments are bristling with faith. They too are “faith-heads” but not “Faith-hearts”...
This split, this alienation, of using the axioms of faith for the destruction of faith (and morals), that is, for those very things that made science possible in the first place, shows that theirs is only a destructive ATTITUDE and little more.
One of my favorite examples of this comes from the movie "Superman" (the first one with Christopher Reeves.) Lex Luthor (Gene Hackman) makes the comment: "There are those who can read 'War and Peace' and think that its just a good action novel. And there are those who can read the back of a bubble-gum wrapper and unlock the secrets of the universe." Pretty profound stuff from a fictional character! Truth can come from anywhere IF we are looking for and open to it. All truth, secular and non-secular, is His. So, why worry where it comes from? That, for me, is the true purpose and soul of reasoned debate.
So you propose to create a void and fill it with what?
Socialism, Marxism, Communism, Democracy?
Seems like to me as a Republic we have done a good job of keeping religion out of government
BTW, I'm all for removing religion from government and government from religion. Atheist want to remove religion from society
Bear in mind not all religions are equal, Islam and Christianity, Judaism are vastly different in their views on government. With Islam there is no division as it is a political entity as well as a religion
btt
I don't have to imagine it. I've read about the body counts and gulags under Mao, Stalin, Pol Pot, and others.
And, in the end, atheism is also a religion. The one that has caused the most division, and slaughter, in mankind's bloody history.
“For the arguments of the Deists, which were quoted to be refuted, appeared to be much stronger than the refutations; in short, I soon became a thorough Deist”
THOMAS JEFFERSON in a letter to Benjamin Rush
“To the corruptions of Christianity I am indeed opposed, but not to the genuine precepts of Jesus himself. I am a Christian, in the only sense in which he wished anyone to be: sincerely attached to his doctrines in preference to all others, ascribing to himself every human excellence, and believing he never claimed any other.”
For the arguments of the Deists, which were quoted to be refuted, appeared to be much stronger than the refutations; in short, I soon became a thorough Deist. My arguments perverted some others, particularly Collins and Ralph; but each of these having wronged me greatly without the least compunction, and recollecting Keith’s conduct towards me (who was another freethinker), and my own towards Vernon and Miss Read, which at times gave me great trouble, I began to suspect that this doctrine, though it might be true, was not very useful. My London pamphlet, printed in 1725, 2 which had for its motto these lines of Dryden:
"Whatever is, is right. But purblind man
Sees but a part o’ the chain, the nearest links;
His eyes not carrying to that equal beam,
That poises all above";
and which from the attributes of God, his infinite wisdom, goodness, and power, concluded that nothing could possibly be wrong in the world and that vice and virtue were empty distinctions, no such things existing, appeared now not so clever a performance as I once thought it; and I doubted whether some error had not insinuated itself unperceived into my argument so as to infect all that follows, as is common in metaphysical reasonings.
I grew convinced that truth, sincerity and integrity, in dealings between man and man, were of the utmost importance to the felicity of life; and I formed written resolutions, which still remain in my journal book, to practise them ever while I lived.3 Revelation had indeed no weight with me, as such, but I entertained an opinion, that, though certain actions might not be bad, because they were forbidden by it, or good, because it commanded them; yet probably these actions might be forbidden because they were bad for us, or commanded because they were beneficial to us, in their own natures, all the circumstances of things considered. And this persuasion, with the kind hand of Providence, or some guardian angel, or accidental favourable circumstances and situations, or all together, preserved me through this dangerous time of youth, and the hazardous situations I was sometimes in among strangers, remote from the eye and advice of my father, free from any wilful immorality or injustice, that might have been expected from my want of religion. I say wilful, because the instances I have mentioned had something of necessity in them, from my youth, inexperience, and the knavery of others. I had therefore a tolerable character to begin the world with; I valued it properly, and determined to preserve it.
Jefferson states in that quote that he is a Christian. He also said : "And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure if we have lost the only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with His wrath?"
Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia (Philadelphia: Matthew Carey, 1794), Query XVIII, p. 237.
I agree. I used to complain bitterly about Christians and their effects on me while I was growing up. As I grew more aware of Islam, however, I came to see the difference between those who will nag you and those who will kill you.
I now appreciate Christians because they at least will fight for this country. Liberal atheists won't.
Jefferson rejected the notion of any miraculous powers of Jesus. He said he thought he possessed every HUMAN excellence and believed Jesus never claimed any other, which is a direct refutation of Christianity; Christianity being belief in the New Testament and the divinity of Christ.
Not true. I read the Bible all the way through twice -- once when I was 10 and again when I was 30.
I'm still an atheist.
My conclusion: It is a classic work of fiction.
If so many millions of people are buying into whatever these athiest books are preaching, then "atheism" is simply another option among religious choices.
None of them, neither the athiests nor any of the organized religions, respect the rights of individuals to choose a belief in both God and reason that does not provide a neat little box and label for category assignment.
Thomas Paine had it nailed: Religion and the state
He argues that the Church and the State are a single corrupt institution which does not act in the best interests of the people—both must be radically altered: Soon after I had published the pamphlet "Common Sense," in America, I saw the exceeding probability that a revolution in the system of government would be followed by a revolution in the system of religion. The adulterous connection of Church and State, wherever it has taken place . . . has so effectually prohibited by pains and penalties every discussion upon established creeds, and upon first principles of religion, that until the system of government should be changed, those subjects could not be brought fairly and openly before the world; but that whenever this should be done, a revolution in the system of religion would follow. Human inventions and priestcraft would be detected; and man would return to the pure, unmixed and unadulterated belief of one God, and no more.
For the foreseeable future it will be B. Hussein Obama.
Forgive me, I’m speaking from my own experiences with atheists. A lot of them miss things in the Bible that are obvious to me.
I wonder what he would have to say about how church and state are “separated” nowadays.
Thomas Paine's anti-Christianity was his greatest failing as a person. If not for that he would be ranked among the greats of our founders, all of whom had great respect for Christianity or were themselves Christian (the majority).
We are made to “live it out” through government schooling.
Surprised he didn't mention Oolon Colluphid's trilogy of philosophical blockbusters "Where God Went Wrong", "Some More of God's Greatest Mistakes" and "Who is this God Person Anyway?". And his final masterpiece, "Well That About Wraps it up For God."
Regardless of his views of Christianity, I doubt he would support the government suppressing prayer in school and religious symbols in public.
Here is what Thomas Paine thought of the Bible. He said it was more likely the word of a demon than the word of God.
“Whenever we read the obscene stories the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness with which more than half the bible is filled, it would be more consistent that we call it the word of a demon rather than the word of god. It is a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind; and, for my part, I sincerely detest it as I detest everything that is cruel.” Thomas Paine
Here is what he thought of Christianity.
“As to the Christian system of faith, it appears to me as a species of Atheism — a sort of religious denial of God. It professes to believe in a man rather than in God. It is a compound made up chiefly of Manism with but little Deism, and is as near to Atheism as twilight is to darkness. It introduces between man and his Maker an opaque body, which it calls a Redeemer, as the moon introduces her opaque self between the earth and the sun, and it produces by this means a religious, or an irreligious, eclipse of light. It has put the whole orbit of reason into shade.”
So he would support violating the First Amendment (Congress shall make no law...prohibiting the free exercise thereof (religion)” and the Tenth Amendment (The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.)?
Surely he, like many of the other Founding Fathers, would be willing to put his personal beliefs aside rather than violate the Constitution.
What goes on at home and in the church is “free exercise of religion”, thus it shall be free from government oversight or sanction; and Congress shall pass no laws prohibiting it.
Would a Muslim be being denied his free exercise of religion unless the students were told by the teacher to pray towards Mecca five times a day?
Would a Mormon be being denied his free exercise of religion unless the Book of Mormon was read from in class?
Maybe the shoe doesn't fit so well on the other foot.
I grew convinced that truth, sincerity and integrity, in dealings between man and man, were of the utmost importance to the felicity of life; and I formed written resolutions, which still remain in my journal book, to practise them ever while I lived.3 Revelation had indeed no weight with me, as such, but I entertained an opinion, that, though certain actions might not be bad, because they were forbidden by it, or good, because it commanded them; yet probably these actions might be forbidden because they were bad for us, or commanded because they were beneficial to us, in their own natures, all the circumstances of things considered. And this persuasion, with the kind hand of Providence, or some guardian angel, or accidental favourable circumstances and situations, or all together, preserved me through this dangerous time of youth,
He turned away from deism.
Indeed rejection of Divine revelation to man, yet belief in the divine, is pretty much the definition of Deism.
Not quite. Deists do not believe in prayer nor do they believe that God answers it. During the Constitutional Congress, Franklin REQUESTED prayer.
Benjamin Franklin Requests Prayer in the Constitutional Convention June 28, 1787
In this situation of this Assembly, groping as it were in the dark to find political truth, and scarce able to distinguish it when presented to us, how has it happened, Sir, that we have not hitherto once thought of humbly applying to the Father of lights to illuminate our understandings? In the beginning of the Contest with G. Britain, when we were sensible of danger we had daily prayer in this room for the divine protection.- Our prayers, Sir, were heard, & they were graciously answered. All of us who were engaged in the struggle must have observed frequent instances of a superintending providence in our favor. To that kind providence we owe this happy opportunity of consulting in peace on the means of establishing our future national felicity. And have we now forgotten that powerful friend? or do we imagine that we no longer need his assistance? I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth- that God Governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without his aid? We have been assured, Sir, in the sacred writings, that "except the Lord build the House they labour in vain that build it." I firmly believe this; and I also believe that without his concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no better, than the Builders of Babel: We shall be divided by our little partial local interests; our projects will be confounded, and we ourselves shall become a reproach and bye word down to future ages. And what is worse, mankind may hereafter from this unfortunate instance, despair of establishing Governments by Human wisdom and leave it to chance, war and conquest.
Deists do not believe that God governs the affairs of men. Franklin DID believe it.
And yet in the quote YOU posted, Jefferson says he's a Christian. As Governor of Virginia he also declared days of prayer.
I appoint . . . a day of public…Thanksgiving to Almighty God. . . to ask Him that He would . . . pour out His Holy Spirit on all ministers of the Gospel; that He would . . . spread the light of Christian knowledge through the remotest corners of the earth; . . . and that He would establish…these United States upon the basis of religion and virtue. (Governor Thomas Jefferson, 1779)
The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Julian P. Boyd, editor (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1951), Vol. 3, p. 178, Proclamation Appointing a Day of Thanksgiving and Prayer, November 11, 1779.
Some Deists may well not believe in the power of providence or prayer, but some do.
Franklin rejected divine revelation. He continued to support prayer and churches and synagogues. He was particularly enthused with a fiery orator and supported him until it was found out that he was a plagiarist.
Franklin said “Revelation had indeed no weight with me”; but unlike Thomas Paine he thought religion a benevolent institution and supported religion and prayer wholeheartedly.
John Adams
The general principles on which the fathers achieved independence were the general principles of Christianity. I will avow that I then believed, and now believe, that those general principles of Christianity are as eternal and immutable as the existence and attributes of God.
Thomas Jefferson, The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (Washington D. C.: The Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association, 1904), Vol. XIII, p. 292-294. In a letter from John Adams to Thomas Jefferson on June 28, 1813
The Holy Ghost carries on the whole Christian system in this earth. Not a baptism, not a marriage, not a sacrament can be administered but by the Holy Ghost. . . . There is no authority, civil or religious – there can be no legitimate government but what is administered by this Holy Ghost. There can be no salvation without it. All without it is rebellion and perdition, or in more orthodox words damnation.
Letter from John Adams to Benjamin Rush, from Quincy, Massachusetts, dated December 21, 1809, from the original in our possession, David Barton.
Thomas Jefferson
The practice of morality being necessary for the well being of society, He [God] has taken care to impress its precepts so indelibly on our hearts that they shall not be effaced by the subtleties of our brain. We all agree in the obligation of the moral principles of Jesus and nowhere will they be found delivered in greater purity than in His discourses.
Thomas Jefferson, The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Alberty Ellery Bergh, editor (Washington D.C.: The Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association, 1904), Vol. XII, p. 315, to James Fishback, September 27, 1809.
I am a real Christian – that is to say, a disciple of the doctrines of Jesus Christ.
Thomas Jefferson, The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Albert Ellery Bergh, editor (Washington, D.C.: The Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association, 1904), Vol. XIV, p. 385, to Charles Thomson on January 9, 1816.
Congress, U. S. House Judiciary Committee, 1854
Had the people, during the Revolution, had a suspicion of any attempt to war against Christianity, that Revolution would have been strangled in its cradle... In this age, there can be no substitute for Christianity... That was the religion of the founders of the republic and they expected it to remain the religion of their descendants.
Reports of Committees of the House of Representatives Made During the First Session of the Thirty-Third Congress (Washington: A. O. P. Nicholson, 1854), pp. 6-9.
“I am a Christian, in the only sense in which he wished anyone to be: sincerely attached to his doctrines in preference to all others, ascribing to himself every human excellence, and believing he never claimed any other.”
Thomas Jefferson
He also denied the Virgin birth of our Savior in a letter to John Adams.
“And the day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter”
Thomas Jefferson
If one can deny both his divinity and his virgin birth and still be a Christian then the meaning of the word is diluted beyond measure.
Franklin had clearly turned his back on deism and said so. It’s there in black and white.
Franklin rejected Revelation.
Jefferson rejected the divinity and virgin birth of our Lord the Christ.
Paine was anti-Christian, and that was his greatest failing as a person.
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