Posted on 02/18/2005 2:58:40 AM PST by ViLaLuz
Television personality Bill Maher, host of HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher," says Christians and others who are religious suffer from a neurological disorder that "stops people from thinking."
"We are a nation that is unenlightened because of religion. I do believe that. I think that religion stops people from thinking. I think it justifies crazies. I think flying planes into a building was a faith-based initiative. I think religion is a neurological disorder. If you look at it logically, it's something that was drilled into your head when you were a small child. It certainly was drilled into mine at that age. And you really can't be responsible when you are a kid for what adults put into your head."
The former host of "Politically Incorrect" said the lack of enlightenment of so many Americans means the nation actually has more in common with its enemies than one might think.
Said Maher: "When you look at beliefs in such things as, do you go to heaven, is there a devil, we have more in common with Turkey and Iran and Syria than we do with European nations and Canada and nations that, yes, I would consider more enlightened than us."
Maher explained that he was not singling out evangelicals, but was targeting all "religious" people.
"I think the vote in Missouri [rejecting same-sex marriage] and a lot of other states is because people are religious," Maher said. "They don't have to be evangelical, but they're religious. They believe in religion, which as – I think it was Jesse Ventura who had that quote about religion is a crutch for weak-minded people who need strength in numbers."
The television host told Scarborough he was convinced evangelicals' influence will wane.
Said Maher: "When people say to me, 'You hate America,' I don't hate America. I love America. I am just embarrassed that it has been taken over by people like evangelicals, by people who do not believe in science and rationality. It is the 21st century. And I will tell you, my friend. The future does not belong to the evangelicals. The future does not belong to religion."
Later in the interview, Maher returned to the childhood-religion theme, comparing fairy tales to Bible stories:
"When you were a kid and they were telling you whatever you believe in religion, do you think if they had switched the fairy tales that the read to you in bed with the Bible, you would know the difference?
"Do you think if it was the fairy tale about a man who lived inside of a whale and it was religion that Jack built a beanstalk today, you would know the difference? Why do you believe in one fairy tale and not the other? Just because adults told you it was true and they scared you into believing it, at pain of death, at pain of burning in hell."
Bill, wake up and see the truth. There is still time (while you are alive) to repent and come out of the darkness.
Liberals are pissed because it was an energized Christian Republican base that killed Kerry's communism plans.
To each his own, I guess. Is Coco a transexual?
But as for Maher, I can't really agree the United States is similar to its emenies; nor does religion necessarily make one unenlightened (I certainly wouldn't consider Buddhists to be unenlightened people). Sure religion is pressed upon you in childhood, if you come from a Christian home as I did, but at some point you must make the choice to accept or reject those beliefs.
At least Christians in this nation are not attempting to force me to convert, or stoning me for unbelief.
To Bill Maher: Visions of Hell
"I, Sister Faustina Kowalska, by the order of God, have visited the Abysses of Hell so that I might tell souls about it and testify to its existence...the devils were full of hatred for me, but they had to obey me at the command of God, What I have written is but a pale shadow of the things I saw. But I noticed one thing: That most of the souls there are those who disbelieved that there is a hell." (Diary 741)
"Today, I was led by an angel to the Chasms of Hell. It is a place of great torture; how awesomely large and extensive it is! The kinds of tortures I saw:
The First Torture that constitutes hell is:
The loss of God.
The Second is:
Perpetual remorse of conscience.
The Third is
That one's condition will never change.
The Fourth is:
The fire that will penetrate the soul without destroying it. A terrible suffering since it is a purely spiritual fire, lit by God's anger.
The Fifth Torture is:
Continual darkness and a terrible suffocating smell, and despite the darkness, the devils and the souls of the damned see each other and all the evil, both of others and their own.
The Sixth Torture is:
The constant company of Satan.
The Seventh Torture is:
Horrible despair, hatred of God, vile words, curses and blasphemies.
These are the Tortures suffered by all the damned together, but that is not the end of the sufferings.
Indescribable Sufferings
There are special Tortures destined for particular souls. These are the torments of the senses. Each soul undergoes terrible and indescribable sufferings related to the manner in which it has sinned.
I would have died
There are caverns and pits of torture where one form of agony differs from another. I would have died at the very sight of these tortures if the omnipotence of God had not supported me.
No One Can Say There is No Hell
Let the sinner know that he will be tortured throughout all eternity, in those senses which he made use of to sin. I am writing this at the command of God, so that no soul may find an excuse by saying there is no hell, or that nobody has ever been there, and so no one can say what it is like...how terribly souls suffer there! Consequently, I pray even more fervently for the conversion of sinners. I incessantly plead God's mercy upon them. O My Jesus, I would rather be in agony until the end of the world, amidst the greatest sufferings, than offend you by the least sin." (Diary 741)
Diary, Saint Maria Faustina Kowalska, Divine Mercy in My Soul (c) 1987 Congregation of Marians of the Immaculate Conception, Stockbridge, MA 01263. All Rights Reserved. Used with permission.
I think that this buffoon (who supplied the voice over for the film, 'Bill Clinton's Taking Penis')truly suffers from an overinflated sense of self-worth.
I couldn't disagree more with him on his most recent anti religious comment though.
Here's another news flash. A prerequisite for being a Conservative doesn't entail being a humorless stiff assed corn cobb up your butt type.
What ever Coco is or isn't, he/she/it (pick one) is a pretty good looker.
To each his own, I guess.
Maher stated "I think that flying planes in a building was a faith-based initiative." Is he accusing CHRISTIANS of committing the atrocities of September 11, 2001? I think the entire Christian faith has grounds for a libel action against him.
Another quote: "According to Maher, the Bible is a book of fairy tales, calling the account of Jonah a fairy tale the same as Jack in the Beanstalk." Are the ADL and JDL aware of this? Jonah is in the Jewish part of Scripture, and Maher's comments smack of anti-Semitism as well as anti-Christianism. His anti-Jewish bias has been noted in the European press. The American press is ignoring all of it.
The rejection of same sex marriage is not because people are religious it's because most people are sane.
America has always been a very religious nation, what is this "America has been taken over by evangelists"?
Another article, a person attributed the suicide of a friend, Hunter Thompson to "America's shift toward conservativism", America has always been a conservative nation.
It's very strange that I come across this twice within the past hour. Do they think if they allude to America as historically being liberal and nonreligious often enough that most people will grow to accept this?
Repeat a lie often enough... Straight out of Goebbel's book of tactics.
Maher is a fool. An anti-gay marriage measure passed in Oregon, and we are the most unchurched state in the union.
Like Hunter Thompson was, Maher is in a lot of pain.
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