1. Tony Blair: Religions Must Unite Against Secularism, Atheists

Tony Blair 'Face to Faith' June 9, 2009 Photo: Leon Neal, WPA Pool, Getty Images I must confess that I've never entirely understood some people's animus towards former British Prime Minister Tony Blair -- but I've never directly disputed it, though, because I've never known enough about him to have a strong opinion. Now, though, I think I do understand their animus: the man is a political menace and an intellectual vacuum. And I think I'm being overly kind in this conclusion. I've reached this conclusion after learning that Tony Blair is calling on all religions to "unite" against the evil forces of "secularism" and "atheists." Yes, atheists and secularism (which, by the way, is supported by both irreligious atheists and religious theists) are so awful in the eyes of Tony Blair that they must be combatted by the combined political, cultural, social, and economic power of all the world's religions. Just how scared are they of us? The only people who think that secularism is a threat are people who support some form of theocracy. The only people who think that atheists need to be suppressed by religion are bigots. "We face an aggressive secular attack from without. We face the threat of extremism from within." Arguing that there was "no hope" from atheists who scorn God, he said the best way to confront the secularist agenda was for all faiths to unite against it. Source: Times This should sound familiar: it's almost exactly the same message that's been pushed over the past couple of years by Saudi King Abdullah. The Saudis have even hosted a couple of "interfaith" conferences designed to bring together represented from multiple religions and get them to work together against secularism, atheism, and the associated freedoms -- freedoms like the freedom of speech, used by people to criticize religion or to try to reform religion. "I ask representatives of all the monotheistic religions to meet with their brothers in faith," Abdullah told delegates to a seminar on "Dialogue Among Civilizations between Japan and the Islamic World," according to the official Saudi Press Agency (SPA). "If God wills it, we will then meet with our brothers from other religions, including those of the Torah and the Gospel... to come up with ways to safeguard humanity," he added. Abdullah said the country's top clerics have given him approval to pursue his idea and that he plans to get the opinion of Muslim leaders from other countries. According to SPA, the Saudi king also intends to address the United Nations on the subject. "We have lost sincerity, morals, fidelity and attachment to our religions and to humanity," Abdullah said Monday, deploring "the disintegration of the family and the rise of atheism in the world - a frightening phenomenon that all religions must confront and vanquish." Source: Christian Post [emphasis added] What if Tony Blair's message read like this: "Arguing that there was "no hope" from Jews who scorn Christ, he said the best way to confront the Jewish agenda was for all Christian denominations to unite against it." How hard would it be for people to recognize such a message as stupid, dangerous, and bigoted? Blair would probably be criticized quickly and strongly, but that's because people today can recognize anti-Semitic bigotry for what it is. People have a much harder time recognizing or even caring about anti-atheist bigotry -- and few seem to have any comprehension of the dangers in anti-secularist politics. For most atheists, simply not being religious and not participating in any overly religious rituals or activities is sufficient. For some atheists, though, there is the feeling that any connection with religion may be hypocritical and may only be serving to reinforce the assumption that religion is acceptable. They argue that it would be better to strip all religious aspects from their lives, otherwise, they can't claim to be leading truly irreligious, rational, and naturalistic lives.

Monday, 12 October 2009 | 16232 hits | Print | PDF |  E-mail | Report

2. Muslims pray for ‘soul of America’ at Capitol

WASHINGTON—Swapping prayer rugs for massive plastic rain tarps, an estimated 3,500 Muslims gathered at the foot of the U.S. Capitol on Friday (Sept. 25) to pray for “the soul of America” in a grassroots demonstration of religious and national pride. The rally, organized by the Dar-Ul-Islam mosque in Elizabeth, N.J., was billed as regular Friday “jummah” prayers, but it quickly became a chance for rank-and-file Muslims to publicly witness to their faith and claim their place as American citizens. “Islam and Muslims will never ever give to America anything except the best,” said Hamad Chebli, the imam, or spiritual leader, of the Islamic Society of Central Jersey in South Brunswick, N.J. “Islam and America will never ever bring anything from their homelands, from their countries, except the best.” Participants were told that the “Islam on Capitol Hill” rally would not be a political event, and were advised to leave their protest signs at home. Indeed, the only protests came from a few dozen vocal Christian demonstrators with bullhorns shouting from the sidelines. (RNS1-SEPT25) An estimated 3,500 Muslims gathered on Sept. 25 at the foot of the U.S. Capitol for a first-ever "Islam on Capitol Hill" prayer rally. For use with RNS-MUSLIMS-PRAY, transmitted Sept. 25, 2009. Religion News Service photo by Nick Kirkpatrick. (RNS2-SEPT25) An estimated 3,500 Muslims gathered on Sept. 25 at the foot of the U.S. Capitol for a first-ever "Islam on Capitol Hill" prayer rally. For use with RNS-MUSLIMS-PRAY, transmitted Sept. 25, 2009. Religion News Service photo by Nick Kirkpatrick. (RNS3-SEPT25) An estimated 3,500 Muslims gathered on Sept. 25 at the foot of the U.S. Capitol for a first-ever "Islam on Capitol Hill" prayer rally. For use with RNS-MUSLIMS-PRAY, transmitted Sept. 25, 2009. Religion News Service photo by Nick Kirkpatrick. “The political stuff is not what we’re here for,” said Ahmed Bashir of Newark, N.J., wearing a sweatshirt that said “The Quran: Learn It, Love It, Live It.” “This is not a political statement; this is just our Friday prayers.” The crowd fell far short of the 50,000 participants organizers had planned for. The event was pulled together without the endorsement of major U.S. Muslim groups, and the two Muslim members of Congress—Democratic Reps. Keith Ellison of Minnesota and Andre Carson of Indiana—did not attend. The event was bare bones, with no stage, an uncooperative sound system and constant pleas from organizers for attendees to sit down and stop talking. Men sat on the left, and women on the right, as participants performed ritual pre-prayer washing with plastic bottles of water. But participants said the low attendance numbers and lack of organizational support did not distract from the enthusiasm they felt for being part of the first-ever Friday prayers on the Capitol grounds. Many said the event may help ease concerns about America’s increasingly visible Muslim population. “I love this flag,” said Azizah Abdullah of Rustburg, Va., who wore a stars-and-stripes hijab around her head. “This is my flag, too.” Speakers at the rally deliberately downplayed politics, sensitive topics and mentions of terrorism. Abdul Malik, a frequent preacher at mosques in New Jersey and New York, voiced praise for President Obama and urged Muslim doctors to provide free medical care, but largely steered clear of hot-button issues. At the same time, participants said they wanted the rally to showcase the diversity and patriotism of U.S. Muslims, as well as dispel myths about a faith that is still foreign to many Americans. “We are here for the Muslims, but we’re also here for humanity,” said Rachel Foye, a Muslim convert from Newark. “We’re here to be part of the solution, not the problem.” Her friend, Hamidah Abdullah, piped in, saying, “And to show that we’re not terrorists. Islam means peace." Still, not everyone was convinced. Vocal Christian protestors carried signs reading “Islam Is A Lie” and argued with Capitol Police who tried to keep them at a distance. Critics had accused the event’s chief organizer, attorney Hassen Abdellah, of defending terrorists in court. On Thursday evening, officials from the Family Research Council and the National Day of Prayer Task Force hosted a national call-in prayer-a-thon in which one woman prayed, “We take together (God’s) sword and break the sword of Islam over this nation, and we loose forth the blood-drenched sword of Jesus Christ.” Organizers of the call introduced a girl identified as Rifqa Bary, the 17-year-old Ohio girl at the center of a custody dispute after she converted to Christianity, fled to Florida and sought shelter from a Christian pastor and his wife. The girl grew emotional when she was asked to pray for Muslims to embrace Christianity. “I cry out on behalf of my people, Jesus,” she prayed. “Would you expose the lies ... send forth fire from heaven and ... break their hardened hearts.” Addressing the handful of Christian protestors at the rally, Abdellah pleaded for understanding. “We would never come to a prayer meeting that you have to make a disturbance,” he said. “Please show some respect because for us, this is a sacred moment on a sacred day. Just as your Sunday is sacred, our Friday is sacred.” In his sermon, Malik, the New York preacher, denounced violence in the name of Islam, or any religion, and said “We Muslims must seek the higher ground.” He also appealed to Muslims to become more visible in their schools, jobs and communities. “America is not perfect,” he said, “but there is nowhere else on the planet where we could do what we’re doing here today.” Download/Purchase this photo September 25, 2009 NEWS STORY Muslims pray for ‘soul of America’ at Capitol By Kevin Eckstrom WASHINGTON—Swapping prayer rugs for massive plastic rain tarps, an estimated 3,500 Muslims gathered at the foot of the U.S. Capitol on Friday (Sept. 25) to pray for “the soul of America” in a grassroots demonstration of religious and national pride. The rally, organized by the Dar-Ul-Islam mosque in Elizabeth, N.J., was billed as regular Friday “jummah” prayers, but it quickly became a chance for rank-and-file Muslims to publicly witness to their faith and claim their place as American citizens. “Islam and Muslims will never ever give to America anything except the best,” said Hamad Chebli, the imam, or spiritual leader, of the Islamic Society of Central Jersey in South Brunswick, N.J. “Islam and America will never ever bring anything from their homelands, from their countries, except the best.” Participants were told that the “Islam on Capitol Hill” rally would not be a political event, and were advised to leave their protest signs at home. Indeed, the only protests came from a few dozen vocal Christian demonstrators with bullhorns shouting from the sidelines. “The political stuff is not what we’re here for,” said Ahmed Bashir of Newark, N.J., wearing a sweatshirt that said “The Quran: Learn It, Love It, Live It.” “This is not a political statement; this is just our Friday prayers.” The crowd fell far short of the 50,000 participants organizers had planned for. The event was pulled together without the endorsement of major U.S. Muslim groups, and the two Muslim members of Congress—Democratic Reps. Keith Ellison of Minnesota and Andre Carson of Indiana—did not attend. The event was bare bones, with no stage, an uncooperative sound system and constant pleas from organizers for attendees to sit down and stop talking. Men sat on the left, and women on the right, as participants performed ritual pre-prayer washing with plastic bottles of water. But participants said the low attendance numbers and lack of organizational support did not distract from the enthusiasm they felt for being part of the first-ever Friday prayers on the Capitol grounds. Many said the event may help ease concerns about America’s increasingly visible Muslim population. “I love this flag,” said Azizah Abdullah of Rustburg, Va., who wore a stars-and-stripes hijab around her head. “This is my flag, too.” Speakers at the rally deliberately downplayed politics, sensitive topics and mentions of terrorism. Abdul Malik, a frequent preacher at mosques in New Jersey and New York, voiced praise for President Obama and urged Muslim doctors to provide free medical care, but largely steered clear of hot-button issues. At the same time, participants said they wanted the rally to showcase the diversity and patriotism of U.S. Muslims, as well as dispel myths about a faith that is still foreign to many Americans. “We are here for the Muslims, but we’re also here for humanity,” said

Tuesday, 29 September 2009 | 117 hits | Print | PDF |  E-mail | Report

3. Scientific search for God leads reporter back to faith

For more than a year, Barbara Bradley Hagerty was a sleuth on God’s trail, hunting for evidence of the divine as far afield as a Native American tepee, brain scans, and epilepsy clinics. As chronicled in her new book, “Fingerprints of God: The Search for the Science of Spirituality,” the award-winning National Public Radio correspondent donned a high-tech “God helmet,” parsed the human genome, and interrogated religious mystics—all in an attempt to satisfy a hunch that there’s more to life than meets the eye. But rather than lure her to some strange new world, Bradley Hagerty’s odyssey—equal parts scientific quest and religious pilgrimage—circled back to her spiritual birthplace: the Christian Science she had once practiced, but left during her 30s. “It’s kind of nice to have a homecoming,” she said in a recent interview. Though she has not rejoined Christian Science, after poring over studies showing the power of mind over matter—an idea long-held by Christian Scientists—she has a renewed appreciation of the faith. “I realized that Mary Baker Eddy was on to something, this mind-body connection, way before scientists were,” Bradley Hagerty said, referring to the founder of Christian Science. “Science is confirming some of these ideas that Christian Science avows.” Likewise, the Christian Science conception of God—more cosmic ideal than grey-bearded grandfather—now seemed more plausible. “Without realizing it at first,” she writes in “God’s Fingerprints,” “I had looped back to the faith of my childhood. I found myself staring squarely at Mary Baker Eddy’s definition of God: `Principle; Mind; Soul; Spirit ... Truth; Love.“‘ Fifteen years ago, on a snowy morning in New Haven, Conn., Bradley Hagerty’s break with Christian Science came in the form of a little yellow pill. Suffering from a stomach flu, with a fever and chills wracking her body, she succumbed to modern medicine and took a Tylenol. As a Christian Scientist for more than 30 years, Bradley Hagerty had turned to prayer for everything from headaches to heartaches to job concerns. As Baker Eddy taught, physical problems are just a manifestation of spiritual problems: to heal the body, you must heal the spirit. Bradley Hagerty had witnessed the efficacy of such methods among friends and family. But all that praying was “tough sledding,” as she puts it. And popping a Tylenol was so simple. A half hour later, she was out of bed for the first time in two days and making tomato soup. “After that, I thought, `Why would I forgo modern medicine?”’ Bradley Hagerty said. Still, it was a wrenching experience to leave the fold of her faith. “Everything that I cared about deeply—my relationship with my parents, my friends at church, my job at The Christian Science Monitor, the metaphysical worldview that steered my thoughts and actions—all of this threatened to topple once I admitted that I no longer had the energy or fortitude to believe in Christian Science,” Bradley Hagerty writes. She held fast to her idea of God, however; and, after experiencing a mystical moment while interviewing a woman in California, Bradley Hagerty resolved to use her training as a journalist to investigate what science can tell us about such experiences. It was a daunting task. Bradley Hagerty had little training in science, and she risked criticism from colleagues for making her own faith part of the story. Even more frightening: What if she discovered her faith was folly, nothing more than a few brain waves? “Basically, it was the hardest test I could put spirituality to,” Bradley Hagerty said. “If you can take a group of people and allow them to use their tools to try to debunk spiritual experience and they can’t, and you even see circumstantial evidence (supporting it)—that’s a big deal.” So, all in the name of science, Bradley Hagerty lay in a brain scanner while a minister prayed for her. She sat cross-legged in tepee for eight hours during a Native American peyote ceremony. She found a non-religious man who became a devout Buddhist after developing temporal lobe epilepsy, a woman who seemed to float above her body while doctors were performing major brain surgery, and identical twins separated at birth who became equally pious—one Christian, the other Jewish. She read scientific studies about the effects of Buddhist meditation and bravely donned an electrode-fitted motorcycle helmet meant to evoke mystical experiences on the wearer. She interviewed geneticists, mystics, psychologists, psychiatrists, neurologists, bioethicists, Sufis, Buddhists, Christians, shamans, and atheists. In the end, Bradley Hagerty said, it comes down to how you read the evidence. Hardcore atheists can look at the body and see a closed system of cells and electrical currents. Believers see an elaborate circuitry meant for something beyond remembering birthdays and shopping lists: it’s hard-wired to connect with God. Wherever the science takes us, Bradley Hagerty said she’s happy where it led her—closer to her Christian Science friends and family. “It was an unexpected benefit for kind of a personal reason,” she said. “I’m extremely close with my mom ... and I could talk to her about all of these issues and she understood them in many ways better than my other religious friends.”

Saturday, 26 September 2009 | 299 hits | Print | PDF |  E-mail | Report

4. Atheist bigotry hiding behind 'health and safety'. How typically British

In umpteen years of reading Victor Lewis-Smith’s Funny Old World column in Private Eye I’ve yet to come across a case of a person being accidentally stabbed to death or even vaguely injured by a crucifix. But I’m presumably not imaginative or neurotic enough, because those things could take your eye out. At least, that’s what the folks at Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital think: Shirley Chaplin, a committed Christian, has been told by her employers that she must hide or remove the cross or remain out of the hospital wards. Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital told her that she cannot wear the one-inch tall silver cross openly around her neck, because it breaches their uniform policy and poses a risk to patients. Atheist bigotry masked by health and safety? How quintessentially British. Throw in a paedo or a crooked politician and you have the perfect storm. If anyone’s under any doubt that the target is Christianity and Christianity alone, then here you have it: While the Trust has banned the crucifix in its wards, it makes concessions for other faiths, including allowing Muslim nurses to wear headscarves on duty. Exceptions are made for requirements of faith, but a crucifix is not considered to fall under this category, they added. How can a crucifix, the most recognisable religious symbol and, dare I say it, brand logo of all time, not be recognised as a religious symbol? And what a nasty and petty mentality that so objects to such a symbol that it’s prepared to ruin someone’s livelihood for displaying it. Shirley Chapman joins a long list of people hounded because of their Christian faith. Persecuted may be too strong a word - Iraq’s Christians are persecuted - but bit by bit various people in authority are trying to make it difficult for churchgoers to work in almost any job. Caroline Petrie, Duke Amnchree and Nadia Eweida might not have been crucified, but they were still made to suffer their faith.  How many more of these cases have to pop before moderate, atheist real liberals (as opposed to pseudo “Left-liberals”) wake up and remember that liberalism means tolerating other people’s eccentricities? Many others have been suspended using anti-discrimination laws, such as Kwabena Peat, a teacher, who refused to go to some ridiculous sort of homophobia teacher training day. I happen to agree with Sue Sanders, the gay rights activist who spoke at the training day, when she said that people who didn’t accept homosexuality had “issues”; but I’d have to say the same about people who get so upset by the sight of the Cross that they start to resemble the bigots that liberalism once opposed.

Friday, 25 September 2009 | 143 hits | Print | PDF |  E-mail | Report

5. A nightmare for Richard Dawkins: statistics show that atheists are a dying breed

An interesting article in the Guardian today by philosopher Julian Baggini, which begins in cracking form: I have one, and only one, firm and sincere desire about what quality my grandchildren should possess: non-existence. The central question he asks is this: The issue for me is rather one about the possible forms of the good life. I just cannot understand why it is that the vast majority of people seem to think breeding is a vital component of a flourishing existence. Baggini is a prominent atheist and has written several books on the subject, including Atheism, A Very Short Introduction, and while I’m sure his work will be read long after he’s put in the ground, I wonder will he have as much of an influence on mankind’s future as this woman? The commandment to “be fruitful and multiply” the Krishevsky family follows quite closely. Last Saturday, the great grandmother, Rachel Krishevsky passed away at the age of 99, leaving behind no less than 1,400 children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and even great-great-grandchildren. Krishevsky got married to her cousin, Yitzhak, just before turning 19. The couple brought seven sons and four daughters into the world. In accordance with haredi custom, Krishevsky brought up her children to see children as a great joy. Her children subsequently adopted her outlook and produced 150 children of their own. The nature of Israeli society is changing because religious Jews such as Mrs Krishevsky have far higher fertility rates than secular Jews, but it is not alone – the same is true in western Europe, as Eric Kaufmann wrote about in his famous article, Breeding for God: In an analysis of European data from ten west European countries in the period 1981-2004 I found that next to age and marital status, a woman’s religiosity was the strongest predictor of her number of offspring. Many other studies have found a similar relationship, and a whole school of thought in demography — second demographic transition theory — suggests that fertility differences in developed countries are underpinned by value differences, with secular men and women unwilling to sacrifice career and lifestyle aspirations to have children and have them early. Data is rare in this area, but what they do have suggests that atheists are a dying breed. Austria is the only country which records the religious belief of parents but their figure, of 0.85 children per atheist woman, is far below replacement rate (2.1) and below even the most barren European country’s average rate, which is about 1.2. And since most people inherit their parents’ political and religious world views, this is bad news for Team Dawkins. Personally I find the New Atheists’ anti-Christian aggression tedious: criticising people for their privately-held religious beliefs shows a lack of class and maturity, and besides which this sudden outpouring of bile against Christianity seems clearly motivated by a secret fear of another Abrahamic religion. But I wouldn’t want to live in a world without atheists – if I was Julian Baggini I’d be trying to get Guardian readers to breed more to ensure the world in 50 year’s time isn’t populated entirely by religious crackpots of various shades. Then again, why should he care? He’ll be dead by then.

Friday, 25 September 2009 | 165 hits | Print | PDF |  E-mail | Report

6. Atheists choose `de-baptism’ to renounce childhood faith

(UNDATED) Up until last summer, Jennifer Gray of Columbus, Ohio, considered herself “a weak Christian” whose baptism at age 11 in a Kentucky church came to mean less and less to her as she gradually lost faith in God. Then the 32-year-old medical transcriptionist took a decisive step, one that previously hadn’t been available. She got “de-baptized.” In a type of mock ceremony that’s now been performed in at least four states, a robed “priest” used a hairdryer marked “reason” in an apparent bid to blow away the waters of baptism once and for all. Several dozen participants then fed on a “de-sacrament” (crackers with peanut butter) and received certificates assuring they had “freely renounced a previous mistake, and accepted Reason over Superstition.” For Gray, the lighthearted spirit of last summer’s Atheist Coming Out Party and De-Baptism Bash in suburban Westerville, Ohio, served a higher purpose than merely spoofing a Christian rite. “It was very therapeutic,” Gray said in an interview. “It was a chance to laugh at the silly things I used to believe as a child. It helped me admit that it was OK to think the way I think and to not have any religious beliefs.” Within the past year, “de-baptism” ceremonies have attracted as many as 250 participants at atheist conventions in Ohio, Texas, Florida and Georgia. More have taken place on college campuses in recent years, according to Hemant Mehta, chair of the board of directors for the Secular Student Alliance, a group that promotes atheism among high school and college students. “If we’re having a winter solstice or summer solstice get-together or some other event, we might say: `Who wants to get de-baptized?”’ said Greg McDowell, the Florida state director for American Atheists, an advocacy and networking group. “It’s a bit of satire. People will play the fool by waving their arms in the air and saying, `I got de-baptized!’ But the paperwork is still legit.” Some of the so-called “de-baptized” have used their certificates to petition churches to remove their names from baptismal rolls. One argument: they were baptized without their consent as children and should now be declared de-baptized. Some churches, however, aren’t budging on what they regard as an irreversible sacrament. Atheist Gary Mueller recently mailed his de-baptism certificate to St. Bonaventure Catholic Church in Concord, Calif., and asked to be dropped from its baptismal record. The church told him, in effect, that he was all wet. “While we do not remove a name/person from a Baptism register, we can note alongside your name that `you have left the Roman Catholic Church,”’ the Rev. Richard Mangini replied in an e-mail. “I hope that God surprises you one day and lets you know that He is quite well.” In Christian theology, baptism can’t be undone. If a Southern Baptist renounces his or her baptism, then that person is usually presumed to have never received an authentic baptism in the first place, according to Nathan Finn, assistant professor of Baptist studies at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, N.C. For mainline Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox Christians, baptism is commonly understood as a sign or means of grace and a covenant that God maintains even when humans turn away, said Laurence Stookey, professor emeritus of preaching and worship at Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington. He said “de-baptizers” misunderstand baptism when they caricature it as an attempt at magic. Baptism “is a kind of adoption where you become a child of God, of the church and of the family,” Stookey said. “You can renounce your physical parents, (the church and God), but they cannot renounce you because you are their child. Anybody who makes fun of baptism probably hasn’t gone into it in enough depth to know that.” De-baptism efforts have been growing internationally in recent years. More than 100,000 Britons downloaded de-baptism certificates from the National Secular Society (NSS) between 2005 and 2009, according to NSS campaigner Stephen Evans. Upwards of 1,000 Italians requested de-baptism certificates prior to Italy’s “De-Baptism Day” last October, according to Italy’s Union of Rationalist Atheists and Agnostics. (BEGIN FIRST OPTIONAL TRIM) Public ceremonies to confer de-baptism, however, seem to be primarily an American phenomenon. “I think a de-baptism ceremony (in Europe) would strike a lot of secularists and atheists as kind of pointless,” Evans said. “They would leave the ceremonies to the religious.” (END FIRST OPTIONAL TRIM) Not all American non-believers have warmed to de-baptism rituals. Secularist Phil Zuckerman, a Pitzer College sociologist who studies apostates, said he would never take part in such an event because it “feels intrinsically negative” and “immature.” Even so, he said, de-baptisms may serve a cathartic function for some participants, as well as a political one. “For a long time, non-religious people in the Bible Belt just kept quiet, but they aren’t keeping quiet anymore,” Zuckerman said. “I think that’s largely a reaction to George W. Bush’s presidency. (Atheists) were saying, `The government is being taken over by very religious people. We need to stand up and say: We’re here. We’re secular. Deal with it.“‘ (SECOND OPTIONAL TRIM FOLLOWS) Atheist groups expect more de-baptisms in years ahead. Mehta, of the Secular Students Alliance, says college groups already bring blow driers to campus recruitment events, offering to de-baptize undergraduates on the spot. Meanwhile, organizers of de-baptisms are broadening their mockery to include other religions. At the American Atheists’ national convention in Atlanta last April, the de-baptism event included a dance where women in burqas stripped down to red-sequined leotards, according to Blair Scott, the group’s national affiliate director. The goal, he said, was to say blasphemy shouldn’t be prohibited. “We made fun of Islam, we made fun of Hinduism, we made fun of Christianity with intent to be blasphemous on purpose to make a point” about a proposed anti-blasphemy initiative at the United Nations, Scott said. “It’s not done with malice or intent to offend. But anytime you criticize religion or poke fun at what atheists would call the sillier parts of religion, you’re going to offend somebody. There’s just no way around that.”

Thursday, 24 September 2009 | 111 hits | Print | PDF |  E-mail | Report

7. Atheists are no good in bed

Look, I don’t want to get competitive or anything - least of all in the field of  “dating”, which is a nasty American style of cattle-market rustling in which I have never indulged - but this story about atheists being more successful at on-line dating than people of faith tells me one thing: Atheists are sitting in front of screens in darkened rooms trying to find a mate, while Christians, Jews and Muslims are out meeting people in the flesh (as it were), talking to people, maybe chatting them up, going to parties, forming relationships, taking chances and, above all, having fun. I don’t for a moment - oh no - suggest that atheists are a bunch of lonely saddos sitting in chat-rooms at their bedsits, while the faithful are out finding hot partners. But what’s cheerful and not a little ironic about this research is that Darwinism, a creed so enthusiastically co-opted by atheists, is telling us that atheists are likely to go extinct as a species. Unless, quite literally, they get a life

Saturday, 26 September 2009 | 225 hits | Print | PDF |  E-mail | Report

8. Are there Religious Atheists?

Atheism and religion are often portrayed and treated as polar opposites; although there is a strong correlation between being an atheist and being irreligious, there is no necessary and inherent connection between the two. Atheism is not the same as being irreligious; theism is not the same as being religious. Atheists in the West tend not to belong to any religion, but atheism is quite compatible with religion. Theists in the West tend to be religious, but theism is compatible with irreligion. To understand why, it is necessary to keep in mind that atheism is nothing more than absence belief in the existence of gods. Atheism is not the absence of religion, the absence of belief in the supernatural, the absence of superstitions, the absence of irrational beliefs, etc. Because of this, there is no inherent barrier preventing atheism from being part of a religious belief system. So why does the confusion exist? Quite simply, most religious belief systems (especially those dominant in the West) are theistic — they include belief in the existence of at least one god and this belief is often a central, defining characteristic of that religion. It would be very difficult for a person to combine atheism with adherence to such a religious faith because doing so would require redefining the religion to such an extent that most members might not recognize it anymore. This is likely the reason why you will even see some atheists assuming that theism and religion are so deeply intertwined that they won't bother to distinguish between the two, using the labels almost interchangeably. However, just because most religions we encounter incorporate theism, that shouldn't lead us to assume that all religions necessarily include theism. It would be very ethnocentric if we allowed ourselves to define religion in general solely based upon our encounters with a couple of specific religions like Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. There is a much wider and more varied religious universe out there than those three faiths represent. Religion is a human creation and, as such, it is just as varied and complex as human culture generally is. For example, many forms of Buddhism are essentially atheistic. At most they regard the existence of gods as possible, but often they dismiss gods as simply irrelevant to the important task of overcoming suffering. As a consequence, many Buddhists not only dismiss the relevancy of gods, but also the existence of gods — they are atheists, even if they aren't atheists in the scientific, philosophical sense that many atheists in the West are. So, yes, atheists can be religious. There are not only very old and traditional religions like Buddhism which are accessible to atheists, but there are modern organizations as well. Some humanists call themselves religious and many members of Unitarian-Universalism and Ethical Culture societies are also nonbelievers. Raelians are a relatively recent group which is recognized as a religion legally and socially, yet they explicitly deny the existence of gods. There is some question as to whether such forms of humanism do qualify as religions, but what is important for the moment is the fact that atheist members themselves believe that they are part of a religion. Thus, they do not see any conflict between disbelieving in the existence of gods and adopting a belief system which they consider a religion — and these are atheists in the Western sense of scientific, philosophical atheism. The answer to the question is thus an unequivocal yes: atheists can be religious and atheism can occur in conjunction with, or even in the context of, religion.

Sunday, 24 January 2010 | 309 hits | Print | PDF |  E-mail | Report

9. God Hates You, Hate Him Back!

“God Hates You, Hate Him Back!” Says Controversial Author in A New Book That Pokes Fun At The Holy Scriptures With people like Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens leading the way, more and more books discrediting the idea that a single sentient being created everything around us are being devoured by atheists tired of being labeled as un-godly and silenced legally, socially and culturally by the prevalent creationist systems lying behind the world’s most powerful (and arguably most violent) governments. The problem with all these books, as the author sees it, is these books are brilliant if you have mind for science, and/or a genuine interest in theology, but for a majority of people they are  cumbersome to read. While making them popular with the intellectual elite, they are for your average literary hobbyist, complex, and far from entertaining. CJ Werleman, Australian-born author of “God Hates You, Hate Him Back” says, “I believe  people learn more when they find reading a pleasure, and with an entire genre of anti-religious texts sprouting up all over the place, I hadn’t come across any title that just laid out the entire Bible in a manner that for me was pleasurable. And the scriptures of the Bible are wonderful stories that are just begging to be told with a giggle.” CJ, who witnessed first-hand the religiously motivated terrorist atrocities in Bali in 2005, continues, “The objective of the book is to provide the reader with a thorough understanding of the Bible, from end-to-end, while also demonstrating that the ‘God’ people worship so readily and unquestioningly is a vengeful bully, with a monopoly on evil. Which I guess is primarily why the Devil had no reason to publish his own book.” CJ hopes that his approach of using the source of the creationists’ belief-system to make a compelling argument against worshipping such a malevolent patriarch can bridge the gap between superstitious belief and rational understanding by at least shaking believers out of their hypnotized state of relying on “faith over logic”. Many critics of atheism claim that the fanatical fervor displayed by Dawkins and his ilk, betrays their cause. Similarly CJ believes labeling believers as infantile or moronic is counter-productive in leading religious folk to rationality, and ultimately secularism. “The best device we have for secularism or atheism is the Bible itself. When you have all the Biblical assertions laid out in front of you, it is almost impossible to continue holding onto the beliefs created by a tribe of nomadic goat herders, who believed the shovel to be emergent technology!” CJ adds, “Essentially this book demystifies The Bible by using plain speak and humor. I show the reader what it is that pleases God invariably baby killing, and ethnic cleansing. While also demonstrating that not only was Jesus an overtly racist false prophet, and not very nice to his mother, his biography was crudely hammered together by people who never met him.” When asked what he hoped to achieve with his book, CJ quipped, “I hope my book provides one small stepping stone on humanity’s journey away from ancient beliefs that retard social progress and promote human conflict rather than solidarity.”

Thursday, 17 December 2009 | 50 hits | Print | PDF |  E-mail | Report

10. Does modern science point to the existence of God?

As we learn more and more about the nature of the universe, we discover conflicts with what has traditionally been taught by religion. For example, some people still believe that the Earth is less than 10,000 years old, in spite of the overwhelming evidence to the contrary, because of their interpretation of the Bible. If strong scientific evidence surfaces which is contrary to the prevailing religious view, open-minded believers will adapt their beliefs accordingly, but many fundamentalists refuse to accept scientific evidence. This is the cause of conflict between science and religion. The area of science that seems to cause the most discomfort for fundamentalists is evolution. The simple fact of the matter, however, is that evolution, including speciation or macro-evolution, has been directly observed. Physics describes the universe in terms of relatively simple concepts (general relativity, quantum field theory, etc. As we learn more and more physics, the structure of the universe, in some sense, seems more and more simple. But theists postulate that an infinitely complex god is necessary to explain the universe. (The conscious human mind is the most complex thing that we know about. Since God is suppose to be omniscient, he must be infinitely more complex than the human mind.) The theists' position just does not make any sense. It replaces the question "How did our simple universe get here?" with the much more difficult question "How did an infinitely complex god get here?". The principle of Ockham's Razor (more parsimonious or simpler explanations are more likely to be correct than complex explanations) cuts God out of the picture. Einstein once said that "the more a man is imbued with the ordered regularity of all events the firmer becomes his conviction that there is no room left by the side of this ordered regularity for causes of a different nature." In other words, the more a person understands about the workings of the universe, the more he or she is aware of nature's simplicity, and the less likely he or she is to believe in gods. That's why 93% of the members of the National Academy of Sciences (USA) are nontheists. (The 93% figure comes from Edward J. Larson and Larry Witham: "Leading Scientists Still Reject God." Nature, 1998; 394, 313.) Although a majority of scientists don't believe in God, they are usually the first to admit that we do not know everything and that there will always be unknowns in science. Many theists see these gaps in our knowledge as reasons for believing in God. The argument usually boils down to this: "We don't understand something, therefore God must have done it." Today's version of the argument is often "We don't understand how the universe got here, therefore God must have created it"; years ago it was "We don't understand thunder, therefore the thunder god must have done it." But is saying "God did it" really an explanation? No, it isn't. An explanation is a description of something we don't currently understand in terms that we do understand. Theists will usually admit that they don't understand their god, saying things like "God works in mysterious ways". Well if we don't understand how God does something, then "God did it" is just about meaningless. We will never have all the answers, but postulating an infinite god and pretending that this provides the answers is just irrational. It is much better to have the intellectual integrity to simply admit that we don't yet know. A fairly common example of the god of the gaps fallacy described above is the argument that since we don't understand where the dimensionless constants in the equations of physics come from, and since carbon based life could not have evolved if some of the parameters varied by a small amount, a god must have chosen the parameters to produce human life. In addition to being an example of the god of the gaps fallacy, this argument is wrong for several other reasons. For example, it assumes that the dimensionless parameters are fundamentally arbitrary. In other words, it assumes that the parameters cannot be predicted with a more fundamental theory. But in string theory, for example, all dimensionless parameters are expected to be predictable.

Thursday, 17 December 2009 | 23 hits | Print | PDF |  E-mail | Report