Posted on 06/22/2009 5:33:32 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Do you believe in God? Really? And you're willing to admit it in public?
Oops. Sorry, for a moment I slipped back into the arrogant Atheism of my youth.
Before my parents had children, they decided to raise their kids in a secular home. We had gifts at Christmas time and chocolate covered matzoh during Passover, but there was no religion and certainly no God.
When I was in grade school, God was just a kind of nondescript character who popped up in Little House on the Prairie books from time to time. He seemed like a decent enough fellow, but was more or less a bit player who didn't have much to say.
After my grandfather died when I was seven, his Baptist minister lifted me up in his arms and told me, "It's all right, Grandpa's with God now." At that moment, I could feel my dress was hiked up in the back and all I could think about was pulling it back down. But later, I asked around and discovered that God was our Heavenly father, whatever that was supposed to mean.
I figured, who better to ask about my Heavenly father than my earthly father, but when I did he laughed.
He wasn't amused in a "kids say the darnedest things" kind of way. He was laughing derisively at the idea that my mother's family believed in God. And thus began my introduction to Atheism.
There are people who call themselves atheist who are simply nonbelievers, and then there are the big "A" Atheists for whom Atheism is almost a religion. This quasi-religious doctrine isn't neutral on the existence of other religions; rather, Atheism is a virulently anti-theistic creed characterized by sneering contempt for religion and a profoundly dogmatic bigotry toward people of faith.
Want to know how Atheists see the rest of us?
I grew up learning from my father that Atheism is rational, and therefore, religious belief is irrational; Atheism is defined by logic, religious faith by fantasy; and science is real while religion is make believe. Faith, I was taught, requires a willful stifling of reason.
The Torah, the Gospels, the Qur'an? All woefully inaccurate, laughably inconsistent fictions used to encourage belief in an illusion for the purpose of social control.
My curiosity in religion surfaced again in seventh grade when several of my friends were planning Bat Mitzvahs. Surely my friends weren't ignorant enough to actually believe in God, were they? The answer was no. For most of these Reform Jews, this celebration marked the official end to the tedium of Hebrew school. Most of their families were Ethical Culturists with a recreational interest in preserving their Jewish cultural identity. In other words, they too were Atheists.
By the time I reached high school, having had little contact with religion, I was convinced that people of faith were credulous and unenlightened. They gravitated toward soothing tales of God and afterlife to help them deal with their own mortality. At best, I considered belief in God an anachronism, a quaint vestige of days gone by, on par with superstitions about wicked thoughts causing birth defects.
At my extremely liberal college, I was exposed to even more militant Atheism. It was there that I learned the mere whiff of religiosity is worthy of denigration. Many of the people I met approached religion with something between disdain and loathing, and considered all religious belief a form of fanaticism. Christians in particular were characterized as knuckle-dragging, mouth-breathing fundies (and that was in polite company.)
Fortunately my mother taught me enough manners that I kept my bias to myself.
In this new environment, my Atheism was more than evidence of good reasoning, it was a socially desirable badge of intellectual superiority. Make no mistake: Atheists think they're smarter than you. Atheism isn't simple skepticism. It is a certainty that believers are wrong, and by extension, intellectually inferior. Religion, especially Judeo-Christian religion, is nothing more than a crutch for dupes.
But Atheists aren't content to leave religion as a mere object of ridicule. They want it cleansed from public life. And enlightened as they are, they've come up with quite the pretense for justifying the righteousness of their bigotry: they are defending the vision of our Founding Fathers from a dominionist conspiracy to establish Christianity as the state religion.
You see, for liberal Atheists, the only thing worse than religion is the Religious Right, a term they use to encompass all Christian conservatives. And what better way to siphon fuel from the Religious Right than to convince Americans that the government is perpetually on the verge of becoming a theocracy?
And so, they accuse local governments of trampling the Constitution in the name of God and they find subliminal Christian iconography in political ads. They wring new meanings from Thomas Jefferson's notion of separation between church and state, and condemn our country's motto and the status of Christmas as a national holiday. But above all, Atheists stoke fear among religious and nonreligious alike that conservatives view government as a tool to force religion down your throat.
Pope-slandering buffoon Bill Maher, something of a patron saint among Atheists, has called religion "the ultimate hustle." Last fall, Maher's fellow liberal Chris Matthews, a self-described Catholic, roundly criticized Alaska Governor Sarah Palin for talking about prayer in a "secular environment" and complained that she made the Republican Party look more like a church tent than a big tent. In March, Matthews complained, "Why does everything sound like the '700 Club' with this Party now?" Such examples of anti-religious bias can be found every day on cable news, network television, and in the pages of The New York Times and The Washington Post.
As my politics strayed right of center after college, I realized I wanted no part of that Maher/Matthews worldview based in elitism and the ridicule of others. I made the transition from Atheist to atheist to agnostic, and have since discovered why it is often said that religion is experiential.
There was a time when I would have preferred any manner of torture to admitting the possibility of a higher power. These days, I'm proud to say I lost my faith in the Atheist creed.
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Jenn Q. Public writes about news, politics, and the seedy underbelly of liberalism at JennQPublic.com.
You, sir or madam, are as much a hypocrite or more.
You have no idea what people have risked for their faith.
What, do you want us to wear merit badges?
What, do you think we do NOTHING but sit in our little homes and gather in little or large groups to sing and socialize then go home and return to our regularly scheduled programming?
Maybe there are some Christians that live like that, BUT I DON’T KNOW ANY!
We have risked our jobs, our homes, our lives, our fortunes, our futures, our earthly “security” for our faith, not just to propagate it, but to honor the directives to love the unloveable and bless them that curse us.
You are an observer from the outside who has NO IDEA of the day-to-day, year-to-year struggles of the committed Christian.
In fact, you, as an Atheist, are a first-order contributor to what makes our lives so difficult and risky.
Now go launch an ACLU lawsuit against little children having the temerity to actually bring a Bible to school to read during their lunch hour.
Yes, I agreed with you before you typed that. I clearly mentioned my respect for those who have risked it all, for their faith.
They are the true believers.
Karl Marx may have been an atheist, but if he bakes a cake, does that make all atheists, bakers? Learn to separate one point from another.
But what of the True Believer who is not called to be a Missionary? Or if you are not called, do you not consider them a True Believer?
I do. Please read my earlier posts on this thread. I have acknowledged their sacrifice for their faith.
Repeat the above instruction as is necessary.
That is true. If I were an atheist I'd want everybody else to be a Christian -- as in a follower of the teachings of Jesus Christ.
I'd insist that every child be taught to Do Unto Others as You'd HAVE THEM Do unto You - with a fair attribution to its source.
I would not object to public prayer (at least short ones) assuming the prayers are for blessings and guidance as they traditionally are.
I would encourage the Bible to be respectfully taught. It, after all, is the most influential work on our culture.
I would not object to memorials and symbols featuring the cross -- why should I be offended? Am I Dracula?
"In God we trust" would be just mere words to me, nothing to get upset about.
Most importantly I'd want those who make and enforce laws to believe that there is a higher authority than the state and this this Creator, if you will, endows inalienable rights, even if I didn't particularly believe that myself.
But atheists don't seem to do these things and you are quite correct in that I don't understand why.
In order to get the masses to completely submit to complete authority of the state,
there cannot be an unappealable, extra-human source of human rights,
as the Founders of our country asserted.
Atheism is REQUIRED for authoritarian rule to “succeed”.
Christians cannot operate that way because we realize that judgment will come, and we need to answer for our actions.
You raised the issue of the Inquisition earlier in this thread. Do you have any idea how many people were killed by the Spanish Inquisition? Over a period of centuries, those bloodthirsty Christians killed about 1000 people. A thousand! Now, there were inquisitions outside of Spain as well, so the total death toll is a bit higher, but think about this:
For your example of murderous Christians, you have to go 500 years into the past, and specify an event with 1000 casualties.
But there are Christians alive today who can testify to you about the millions of people killed by atheists. They witnessed these events.
Being a Christian is your choice. You clearly don't want to be one of us. But if you believe atheists to be morally, or intellectually superior to Christians, then you are simply ignorant.
I don’t believe anyone can be “called” that way. It’s their own conviction that drives them to take that risk.
If they hear voices in their head, they need to get themselves examined.
“...true believers would risk EVERYTHING for their god...”
As a true believer, I must agree with you. I have often questioned my own faith as to why I settle for the rubbish of this world while rewards in Heaven await and will be apportioned to me based on my acts of faith. I despise the weakness in me that chooses the things of this life over the joys of the next...What is it about my too, too solid flesh that is so willing to yield to the cares and worries of this world? How can it be that I, having tasted of the heavenlies, having experienced the Person of the Lord on my own personal Emmaus Road...how is it that I should turn aside every now and again to add on a room to my panelled house, cherish the praise of men and give to my career more than to my Lord, long to indulge in the fruits of my own labors rather than labor in the Lord’s vinyard for what He promises are joys unspeakable? Why don’t I trust Him?!!!
I do not mean to excuse this behavior with the following (I do not), merely explain it:
“O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then with the mind I myself serve the Law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.” Romans 7:24-25
Never was much impressed by so-called intellectual atheists. The smartest person in my family — one of those supergeniuses you hear about and rarely encounter — was always the most devout believer. It regularly astonished people when they heard it, and dismayed quite a few, as well.
Yep, you nailed it.
We, sinful flawed creatures that we are, seem to be, with few exceptions, incapable of yielding all to the sovereignty of God.
To start with full disclosure... I am a Christian.
Big “A” atheists are far more willing to believe in UFOs than God. Their nonbelief is based (IMHO) and some kind of “deep soul” anger at God for reasons I’m not sure even they understand... Thus we get that arrogant condescension of Bill Maher and his types.
In my observations and again IMHO… when one rejects the Savior, all that is left is Ego… Ego is a cruel and merciless master, never satiated, demands to be worshiped, and becomes angry in the presence of God. So why do atheists pour such vitriol on those of us who believe? Again (IMHO) the presence of God convicts the unredeemed sinner… and the mere mention of God demonstrates his presence!
Thus we get the rage of the heathen mentioned in Psalm 2:1.
“Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing? “
Read your history. Not all inquisitions are violent and brutal. The two most infamous were established at the request of political leaders, the monarchs of Spain and Portugal.
Men seeking power will use almost any means to achieve it and any excuse to justify it. This was just one.
But ultimately, the Inquisition goes completely against the teachings of Christ and the Bible. There is no way that it can be laid at the feet of Christianity as it is not justified in any way, shape, or form by the teachings of the Bible.
Pathetic try on your part.
"Communists (by definition atheists)..."
WRONG.
All Communists may be Atheists (strongly disputed), but all Atheists are not Communists. Murder is not an atheist monopoly. By your own standard of measurement, I'd say there are fewer Atheist murderers than there are murderers who have not declared themselves Atheist. Atheism is not believing in an invisible being in the sky. Full-stop.
"...murdered 100 million people in the 20th century. This didn't weigh heavily on their conscience, because they didn't believe that anyone was in a position to judge them. It's all about political power, and as long as you're the top dog, you can do whatever you want."
Communists murdering millions has nothing to do with Atheism. If that were the case, the United States would have most of its murderers being declared Atheist. Clearly that is not the case. Genuine Atheists are pragmatists.
"Christians cannot operate that way because we realize that judgment will come, and we need to answer for our actions."
Neither can an Atheist justify risking social disorder that will ultimately result in his or her own demise.
"You raised the issue of the Inquisition earlier in this thread. Do you have any idea how many people were killed by the Spanish Inquisition? Over a period of centuries, those bloodthirsty Christians killed about 1000 people. A thousand!"
What was that old Biblical quote again about killing one innocent being akin to killing all humanity?
Now, there were inquisitions outside of Spain as well, so the total death toll is a bit higher, but think about this:
For your example of murderous Christians, you have to go 500 years into the past, and specify an event with 1000 casualties.
But there are Christians alive today who can testify to you about the millions of people killed by atheists. They witnessed these events.
You are confusing people who murdered for political gain, or by force, with Atheists. One has very little to do with the other. Otherwise, there would be a murderous streak within Atheists worldwide, and not just in Eastern Europe or China.
Being a Christian is your choice. You clearly don't want to be one of us.
I am not yet convinced a god exists.
But if you believe atheists to be morally, or intellectually superior to Christians, then you are simply ignorant.
So would you be, if you think believers can't do any wrong.
Ah, the old *weak faith because you don't live like I think you should* accusation.
That didn't take long.
You fit this author's characterization of an atheist to a T.
Right back at you!
Stalin killing millions for political advancement has nothing to do with Atheism, either. In fact, he might have believed that he was God.
Read the other posts here, in agreement with mine, that true believers would risk everything for their faith. No suffering they endure on this planet, for their beliefs would compare to what they believe awaits them, in the Afterlife.
You, however, are a weak believer. An opportunist, one might say.
Those who believe in a god to hate, is no Atheist.
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