Posted on 01/07/2006 10:26:53 PM PST by LibWhacker
Scientist compares Moses to Hitler, calls New Testament 'sado-masochistic doctrine'
Controversial scientist and evolutionist Richard Dawkins, dubbed "Darwin's Rottweiler," calls religion a "virus" and faith-based education "child abuse" in a two-part series he wrote and appears in that begins airing on the UK's Channel 4, beginning tomorrow evening.
Entitled "Root of All Evil?," the series features the atheist Dawkins visiting Lourdes, France, Colorado Springs, Colo., the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem and a British religious school, using each of the venues to argue religion subverts reason.
In "The God Delusion," the first film in the series, Dawkins targets Catholicism at the pilgrimage site in Lourdes. "If you want to experience the medieval rituals of faith, the candle light, the incense, music, important-sounding dead languages, nobody does it better than the Catholics," he says.
Dawkins, using his visit to Colorado Springs' New Life Church, criticizes conservative U.S. evangelicals and warns his audience of the influence of "Christian fascism" and "an American Taliban."
The backdrop of the al-Aqsa mosque and an American-born Jew turned fundamentalist Muslim who tells Dawkins to prepare for the Islamic world empire – and who clashes with him after saying he hates atheists – rounds out the first program's case for the delusions of the faithful.
In part two, "The Virus of Faith," Dawkins attacks the teaching of religion to children, calling it child abuse.
"Innocent children are being saddled with demonstrable falsehoods," he says. "It's time to question the abuse of childhood innocence with superstitious ideas of hellfire and damnation. Isn't it weird the way we automatically label a tiny child with its parents' religion?"
"Sectarian religious schools," Dawkins asserts, have been "deeply damaging" to generations of children.
Dawkins, who makes no effort to disguise his atheism and contempt for religion, focuses on the Bible, too.
"The God of the Old Testament has got to be the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous, and proud of it, petty, vindictive, unjust, unforgiving, racist," he says. Dawkins then criticizes Abraham, compares Moses to Hitler and Saddam Hussein, and calls the New Testament "St Paul's nasty, sado-masochistic doctrine of atonement for original sin."
John Deighan, a spokesman for the Catholic Church, took issue with Dawkin's denunciation of religion, telling the Glasgow Sunday Herald, "Dawkins is well known for his vitriolic attacks on faith, and I think faith has withstood his attacks. He really is going beyond his abilities as a scientist when he starts to venture into the field of philosophy and theology. He is the guy with demonstrable problems."
Madeline Bunting, a columnist for the Guardian, who reviewed the series, wrote: "There's an aggrieved frustration that [atheist humanists] have been short-changed by history – we were supposed to be all atheist rationalists by now. Secularization was supposed to be an inextricable part of progress. Even more grating, what secularization there has been is accompanied by the growth of weird irrationalities from crystals to ley lines. As G.K. Chesterton pointed out, the problem when people don't believe in God is not that they believe nothing, it is that they believe anything."
Dawkins, perhaps best know for his much-cited comment that evolution "made it possible to be an intellectually satisfied atheist," appeals to John Lennon in a commentary he authored for the Belfast Telegraph on the eve of his program's premiere: "Religion may not be the root of all evil, but it is a serious contender. Even so it could be justified, if only its claims were true. But they are undermined by science and reason. Imagine a world where nobody is intimidated against following reason, wherever it leads. "You may say I'm a dreamer. But I'm not the only one."
Satan always attacks the Catholic Church, because he knows it's the true Church of Jesus Christ and that it represents the biggest obstacle on earth against his unholy plans. When scientists spew their hatred for religion and specifically name the Catholic Church, we Catholics humbly wear it as a badge of honor. They are 'scientists' indeed, for they have discovered how to turn venom into a faith-strengthening tonic.
Wow, how beautiful, the truth. Thank you for these words.
Thanks ... I'm trying.
Who can deny that European Muslims are not more future oriented than the native white Europeans? Them having lots of children (paid for by various European social welfare systems of course) is the best evidence. Native Europeans are paying for Muslims to breed. Faster than they would otherwise
Thus the pridefully atheistic, such as R Dawkins, finance their own demise and Europe's demise
Much the same as Americans are paying dearly for illegal aliens to fill the void here caused by abortion and birth control.
Both Europe and North America are being overrun by foreignors who refuse to assimilate into our culture, bringing their 3rd world religions, morals and values to take root and conquer us through supplanting our way of life with theirs.
Satan doesn't confine his attacks of Christians only to the Catholic Church. Only those with a relationship with the Son of God are the true Church of Jesus the Christ. God does not limit those He saves to only one denomination. I would agree that the Catholic Church is a popular target due to its size and worldwide influence. I also agree with you that to be persecuted for Jesus is indeed an honor.
More like "Darwin's Howard Dean".
Actually, Dawkins' slurs are regularly parroted by the Darwinists on the threads posted by "he who will ping the admin".
It existed -- The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, 1918-1991, ca. 100 million murdered. All very rational, thank you very much.
Richard Dawkins is to science what Pat Robertson is to Christianity. Both about as extreme as they can get.
Umm, What traction? Where?
You can say many things about the Soviet Union but never try to pass it off as the home of rationality and reason. The name of T. Lysenko might be worth a google search for you and then you might look up the amount of money, time and effort they put into UFO's, ESP and a bunch of other non-rational fields of study to say nothing of marxism, the least rational delusion in history
I'll also note that the Nazis likewise claimed hyper-rationality. It's much easier to get your minions to exterminate whole classes of people when they think it's the logical thing to do.
It was the worship of reason that led to these atrocities. Remember the "Goddess of Reason" that Robespierre wanted the French people to worship? That led directly to The Terror.
Ahhh, I get it. Let's just resolve to be very skeptical of any organization that claims, without proof, to be rational or to hold a higher truth. That'll keep us both from error.
Here we see evolution coming out of the closet and exposing itself as anti-God and Antichrist.
I haven't paid enough attention to Dawkins to know if I "halfway agree with him" or not. As a non-believer, albeit one who is deeply respectful of our Judeo-Christian heritage, it is likely that I ~would~ agree with the science part. But I certainly share your contempt for Dawkins ugly, arrogant hostility toward people of faith.
I believe in the unfettered use of the intellect, but I have the paleo's genetic aversion to radical "reforms" based on any recent theory, especially theories brought forth by those who live their lives in rarefied abstraction little connected to real life, families, and nature's earth (which they invariable claim to love).
Judeo-Christianity, IMHO, is the wellspring and the lifeblood of mankind's gentler instincts, notwithstanding the facts that human beings, cloaked in these spiritualities, have at times behave abominably.
(I admire your excellent post, dennisw.)
I took it as a backhanded compliment.
There's nothing quite like Easter vigil in Latin...
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