Quote of the day
posted at 10:30 pm on April 13, 2009 by Allahpundit
“A Catholic German bishop has come under fire for his remarks condemning atheists. In a sermon given on Easter Sunday, the bishop of Augsburg, Walter Mixa, warned of rising atheism in Germany. ‘Wherever God is denied or fought against, there people and their dignity will soon be denied and held in disregard,’ he said in the sermon. He also said that ‘a society without God is hell on earth’ and quoted the Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevsky: ‘If God does not exist, everything is permitted.’
Most controversially, he linked the Nazi and Communist crimes to atheism. ‘In the last century, the godless regimes of Nazism and Communism, with their penal camps, their secret police and their mass murder, proved in a terrible way the inhumanity of atheism in practice.’ Christians and the Church were always the subject of ‘special persecution’ under these systems, he said.”
Blowback
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Amazing how the Church has always flourished when forced to go underground.
To paraphrase Paul I believe: Where sin increased, God’s love increased more.
Atheism is a pretty bad religion!
Bubba Redneck on April 14, 2009 at 3:13 AM
As others have said better than I, the basic rules of morality, which are part of G-d’s instructions for personal conduct, are the foundation of law. If laws are not tied to moral principle, as they are to Judeo-Christian morality in the USA, then they are tied to the whims of the majority.
In other words, if laws are not based on anything, they may allow anything!
The Nazis were well withing their “laws” to persecute and slaughter the Jews. Of course, they had to first separate the whole concept of law from its moral foundations first, then it was a free ride to hell!
stonemeister on April 14, 2009 at 3:59 AM
Our Declaration of Independence:
If these Rights are indeed self-evident, then far too much of the world is willfully blind to them, and such blindness is spreading through the United States as well.
If these Rights are a result of natural law, they seem to be the exceptions, rather than the rules.
If these Rights are the result of evolution, then they are subject to change and extinction, without notice.
I believe these Rights are universal and eternal, and are endowed to all of us by our Creator.
The clearest threat to these Rights is tyranny, whether undertaken by an individual or groups, and regardless of the ideology: political, cultural, religious or atheist. However, there is also a more subtle threat spreading through the world, and that is the corrosion of indifference, whether it is a result of intellectualism, or as the common contemporary saying goes, whatever.
So, even though we believe in these Rights for different reasons, I hope all conservatives can work together to defend, preserve and foster them, here and throughout our world.
Loxodonta on April 14, 2009 at 4:25 AM
I am not claiming divine knowledge. I said as much. I reject the Levantine faiths because I spent time studying scripture and found it lacking in so many ways. Because I find those faiths to be untrue does not mean that I am not open minded to divinity… I am merely convinced that the scripture you think comes from god actually comes from men and is absolutely not divine for a range of reasons..
`
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Well… given that you are unaware of my errors I am amused that you feel entitled to comment on them at all. I have never pretended to undue my wrongs… I merely tried my best to mitigate the damage whenever possible. I will leave the fake absolution to the levantine tribes and their scapegoat cultures.
I am NOT setting myself up as a God. I merely try to be responsible for my actions. Most men are capable of this. I am able to discern right from wrong in most instances without consulting scripture to determine my diet and a range of other habits and actions.
`
`
No. Most of it is really easy. I do not police this alone.. there are also these really odd things called laws which are secular and not derived from religion. While hard for you to understand… these things are somehow easy for me to abide by despite the fact that I think your god is make believe. I think many morals are innate and not the result of scripture or messages from gods.
`
I’m not trying to fool anyone. I am merely stating my beliefs. I would venture that the churches which are trying to get people to hand over their money, blow themselves up to get to heaven, and use childish threats about hell and heaven are the one trying trying to fool people.
Ready for what?
Adjoran on April 14, 2009 at 2:18 AM
lexhamfox on April 14, 2009 at 4:51 AM
Morality comes from a god who orders his people to go into a land and kill everybody in it? Deuteromony 20
….. yeah and this whole thread started because the Pope says that Nazis are the result of rejection of god. OK… sure. lol
lexhamfox on April 14, 2009 at 5:06 AM
What a substantive rebuttal.
Jim Treacher on April 14, 2009 at 5:40 AM
In the development of the adolescent mind there comes a transition period were a child, who is in a pure form of narcissism, becomes aware of the fact that the people in the world around him are not extensions of himself. This is where we start to develop empathy and supposedly lose most of our narcissistic tendencies. I, on the other hand, propose that narcissism is not lost or diminished.
So, if the narcissism is not lost, why would anyone commit good acts? Why do we not live in a world filled with people constantly taking what they want at gun point and killing anyone who angers them? Well narcissism is not lost or diminished; it is simply redirected by guilt. We are taught from very little on what we should feel bad about. Being the selfish beings that we are we like to feel pleasure and avoid pain. Thus we are socially conditioned to feel pleasure doing “good” acts and feel pain, emotionally through guilt, when we commit bad acts. It is merely a social construct that reinforces positive behavior.
So what all this boils down to is that “selfless” is a misnomer. Good actions can be attributed to the fear of guilt and/or reprisal. You didn’t rob the store? You were afraid of being caught. You took a bullet for a friend? You were afraid of how you would feel if you didn’t. Social conditioning has twisted your own innate narcissism into doing things that are in the best interests of the community.
SnakeintheGrass on April 14, 2009 at 5:51 AM
He’s talking about your atheist brethren in general, people like the lawyers of ACLU who run hard after Protestant and Catholic institutions like Christmas in schools, but suddenly don’t care that children are being taught to pray toward Mecca in the same schools.
But turns out, “hypocrisy” is the old word for “elastic social contract.” Thanks Einstein!!1!
TMK on April 14, 2009 at 5:54 AM
Condemning the Nazis is rarely controversial. This fella found a way to do it.
Why the picture of the pope on the item here?
AbaddonsReign on April 14, 2009 at 5:55 AM
I was wondering that, too. This is what Walter Mixa looks like.
Mr. D on April 14, 2009 at 6:39 AM
Another huge thread
Allah, you magnificent bastard
blatantblue on April 14, 2009 at 7:13 AM
So atheists lash out against a Christian because he was speaking against atheism? Why on earth is this news?
I believe that a fool says in his heart that there is no God and that every knee will bend before Jesus Christ when He returns. Do I care at all if I am criticized for saying this? When I preach sermons about it? Laughable.
Grafted on April 14, 2009 at 7:47 AM
ITA with the first paragraph, and in part with the second. Obama did not mention God anywhere that I can recall during all of last week, did not mention His name for Capt. Phillips’ rescue which is an odyssey to be told for years. Without God’s intervention we would have lost him.
He still has to pick a church (why the delay? Whoops-forgot who I was writing about). I have been praying everyday, morning, evening and if possible noon, and the Holy Rosary daily. Why? I dunno-I feel this is from Above. Worse things are to come, and if this gets me to have more strength to face it, so be it.
Catholicism is losing members every day because of several reasons that the Church must address. I hope that it is not because “it is harder” or people want “an easy way out” bypassing Mother Mary, Mother of Jesus; She is a key figure in Catholicism because, precisely, she is the Mother Of God. How can we pray to God and Jesus, but diss and not mention His Holy Mother?
I believe most religions have good intentions to help people go to God. That is fine with me, there is not one true religion-contrary to popular belief-but for causes quite mysterious to me, I returned to Catholicism after a life of getting to know several religions.
Take to heart this bishop’s words. Meditate on them and seek the truth in it.
ProudPalinFan on April 14, 2009 at 8:01 AM
You gotta love how Christians even to this day use a single source to disown all the clear evidence that Hitler viewed himself as a religious person. Newsflash: Hitler’s Table Talks isn’t a valid source, especially with the mountain of both public and prvate sources which contradict them.
Typhonsentra on April 14, 2009 at 8:04 AM
Atheists and secularists and marxists won’t stand a chance against isslam.
Sorry p*ssies, only Judeo-Christian warriors can take on the cult of darkness.
Let’s roll.
ex-Democrat on April 14, 2009 at 8:08 AM
oh please get a clue
So this second Christmas of Hitler’s war finds Niemoller and upwards of 200,000 other Christians (some estimates run as high as 800,000) behind the barbed wire of the frozen Nazi concentration camps. Here men bear mute witness that the Christ—whose birth the outside world celebrates unthinkingly at Christmas—can still inspire a living faith for which men and women even now endure im prisonment, torture and death as bravely as in centuries past.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,765103-1,00.html
actions speak louder than words..
right4life on April 14, 2009 at 8:09 AM
SnakeintheGrass
Are you really suggesting that all acts of goodness are the result of guilt? Feeling a wee bit cynical today, are we, or do you just hate your species?
SKYFOX on April 14, 2009 at 8:10 AM
The bishop needs to follow his ever-changing unchangeable church… in “The Faith of Catholics” Chilton (with imprimatur from the Archbishop of Newark) teaches that atheists may achieve salvation as can Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims, animists (etc.) “climbing on the other side of the mountain” as it were… elsewhere the pope stated that “love of neighbor” may also be an atheist’s path to eternal life (or thereabouts).
Not that I (and many of the Founders) don’t agree with the general sentiment… but let his say it about Islam.
mankai on April 14, 2009 at 8:38 AM
So, where is the controversial part?
mwdiver on April 14, 2009 at 8:39 AM
At least it proves that the atheists aren’t “hypocrites”…
right2bright on April 14, 2009 at 8:51 AM
I am not sure what you are talking about, since you don’t really state anything.
But calling yourself a “Christian”, or “identifying” yourself as someone who “accepts” Christians, is a ploy as old as the bible.
Of course smart leaders would never say “I hate Christians and will destroy them”, they would say:
“As a Christian, I feel many have gone astray, I will help them understand, we will set up schools to help the learn, and teach them what they need. We will provide them with health care, and make sure they have a job working for the government. Like all Christians, we will not let anyone suffer.”
right2bright on April 14, 2009 at 8:57 AM
I don’t know about the Marxists, but I do know that secularists and Atheists stand for things that are diametrically opposed to the tenets of radical Islam and Sharia.
I don’t know how the fundamentalist Christians can rant and rave about the evils of fundamentalist Islam, especially if one were to employ a checklist on what they agree on.
Islamists, so I’m told, hate our freedoms. Stuff like freedom of religion and freedom of the press on the government side, which are things Christian fundamentalists seem to have issues with. Our personal freedoms are the big ones, though. Gays get to be gay IN PUBLIC. Women are equal under the law. Creationism is regarded as a joke, simply because it cannot stand against rational inquiry.
So, in my opinion, the first ones to pay the religious tax (even though Islam has no chance of taking over the West) will be fundamentalist Christians because they would have little problem with no gays and covered women. You also would not lift a finger to save any secularist or atheist from the capital crime of no religious belief.
You lot didn’t do much to stop the Nazis or the Bolsheviks. You happily joined in the slaughter in Bosnia. Oh, I’m sorry, I suppose that Germans and Russians and Yugoslavians aren’t REAL Christians.
Krydor on April 14, 2009 at 9:03 AM
I guess the pic of Benedict is because he’s ‘their’ leader & one of ‘them.’ So a story on Olbermann should have an Obama pic, right? Nothing controversial here…just an increasingly bitter atheist and his nightly supposed news postings. This is why I don’t bother to look at HA at night anymore…
DCJeff on April 14, 2009 at 9:21 AM
For the fun of it :)
I would guess it is something of a game for Allah…. post a pict that is quasi related to the quote, but not the person being quoted, and bet (perhaps with Ed or other blogger buddies) how many commenters are “skimmers”. And of course there are various iterations of this game that can be played, now that there is a classification system for commenters:
http://hotair.com/archives/2009/04/11/what-kind-of-commenter-are-you/
Something has got to keep this gig interesting for Allah. I bet some of the thrill of being at the top of the blogoshpere is starting to lessen.
What I want to know: what is the wager… what does the winner get???
FLKraKa on April 14, 2009 at 9:23 AM
…oh lighten up! Seriously, check out my answer, it think it is way better ;)
FLKraKa on April 14, 2009 at 9:25 AM
te hee hee… guess this makes you the “dismisser” and I am the “defender”….
arggh.. this can be endless!!
FLKraKa on April 14, 2009 at 9:30 AM
FLKraKa on April 14, 2009 at 9:25 AM
It just gets really childish and was boring months ago…and I’ve never understood how most of the time it fits into this site…there are other sites I can go to get what I want and now I do…I guess it’s just become popular posting game or something…
DCJeff on April 14, 2009 at 9:38 AM
Amen, brother.
mwdiver on April 14, 2009 at 9:51 AM
May I ask, what’s a Judeo-Christian, and where do they meet?
Akzed on April 14, 2009 at 9:59 AM
True.
Yeah, that’s somewhat the same way people react when their blessed liberalism is drug out into the light.
Hitler used Christianity the Occult and Islam to scapegoat, oppress, murder and conquer millions, Marx espoused a Utopian society, Lenin, Stalin used the commune metaphor to oppress and murder millions, Mussolini the Fascist King who was the progenitor of today’s American Progressive set himself up as his own Religion to oppress and murder.
They are the tools of tyranny, the reformation claimed the lives comprising a third of Europe, Christian leaders murdered for the sake of conquest, gold and control all around continent of Africa, Latin America, the new world for hundreds of years.
Any organizing influence can used to destroy liberty and bring hell on earth.
When a Religionist or a liberal attacks in the perception of a criticism its the same zero tolerance reaction to protect their belief.
One believes in their modern human representation of Deity and (most) the other a more ancient representation of human Deity.
The brain centers that light up in response to criticism must be exactly the same because their reactions share startling similarities.
Oh God I am so tired of the hypocrisy needed by the majority to support their Religion of choice.
Speakup on April 14, 2009 at 10:46 AM
I meant “materialistic” in the Marxist dialectical sense… I wasn’t talking about consumerism. Material greed is aggressively non-denominational: religions have their golden calves, and there are plenty of Spartan atheists. Dialectical materialism, the denial of transcendence, is an indispensable component of an atheist society, by which I mean a society that aggressively rejects religion as a foundation of its legal or ethical code. To use the terms non-religious people often prefer, an atheist society is one that asserts all religion is false, so none of them have any business influencing law or government. An agnostic society is one that respects all religions without elevating any one of them, and is willing to acknowledge the validity of religious authority in shaping its laws – as the American Founders enthusiastically credited religious tradition as the inspiration for their supremely rational and logical Constitution.
America, in my view, only managed to function as an atheist society for very short periods of time. We certainly are not an atheist society now – we have an official state religion called environmentalism, which is granted power and authority above all other religious faiths. It is taught in government schools, where any dissent from its orthodoxy is punished. Submission to its rituals is mandatory, and a tremendous percentage of our legal code is dictated by its beliefs. Its high priests frequently serve as government officials. Respect for its holidays is encouraged by the state with a clarity denied to any other religious holiday – the same state that requires its functionaries to avoid wishing people “merry Christmas” makes no bones about the exact reasons for observing Earth Day, and makes participation in Earth Day activities mandatory in the public schools. Environmentalism has even picked up some of the nastier habits of older religions, such as selling indulgences.
This is meant to illustrate what I said earlier about atheist governments: they can only be imposed from the top down, because the majority of the citizens are not, and never will be, atheists. Even when you succeed in imposing atheism as the officially sanctioned position of the government, it doesn’t last – it’s not long before those who belong to the federal tribe, which is a vast population comparable to one of the smaller states in the Union, begin looking for a religion to provide meaning and certainty in their lives. In America, they synthesized the religion of environmentalism, a weak faith that has extremely simple requirements from its acolytes – obey these cheerfully presented “earth-friendly” policies, mouth certain platitudes whether you believe them or not, and bow to mysterious holy spirits like “alternative energy” and “global warming,” and you’re automatically declared virtuous and spiritually complete. This kind of anorexic belief system will never survive sustained aggression from something like radical Islam, which is very interested in building enough political power to dominate any democracy it can gain a foothold in. To have a fighting chance, and satisfy the spiritual longing in the lives of its citizens, materialist philosophy needs something more like fanatical devotion to the State itself, which is what every explicitly atheist society has degenerated into thus far.
Individual atheists can be humble, and individual religious believers can be horribly arrogant, of course. As a matter of philosophy, atheism requires the denial of humility, because it rejects the idea of transcendent moral order: a thing is “good” because we make it legal, not legal because we recognize its inherent goodness. The American Founders did not say “we have carefully and logically reasoned out some basic principles of a just society, and will now present our reasoning.” They said “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.”
Humility is the virtue that prevents a group of politicians from asserting they are better able to distribute wealth than the people who earn it – in defiance of what they would see as the perfectly logical conclusion that their huge assortment of advanced economic degrees, and the fawning adulation of their supporters, says they ARE better able to distribute that wealth. Humility is the willingness to conceded that your beliefs might be wrong, and far from being over-rated, it is an essential quality that atheists, religious believers, and politicians should all possess in abundance. It is a resource in tragically short supply, in a country that not only thinks its political leaders are better able to manage the economy than free citizens, but also believes today’s politicians are better able to “invest” the wealth of future citizens that haven’t even been born yet.
Doctor Zero on April 14, 2009 at 11:24 AM
Not.at.all.
This is merely more in the attempt to equate more purpose to a lack of blind faith than there actually is.
If one term is apropos concerning Atheism its the lack of all kinds oppression.
Remove the need to control others and humility becomes easier to come by.
Speakup on April 14, 2009 at 11:41 AM
Where’s the rest of the star fleet?
Surely more than just one blowhard is feeling incited by sacrilegious comments.
Speakup on April 14, 2009 at 11:46 AM
Whatever makes you think atheism is the lack of oppression, or that atheists have no need to control others? At the very least, atheism as a governing philosophy has generated as much oppression as any religion ever has.
It’s true that atheism is not necessarily oppressive, and that religious faith is hardly a perfect tonic against oppressive tendencies, but religious faith taken seriously is much more likely to bring a sense of humility to its believers. Atheism as the founding philosophy of a government is, conversely, more likely to produce the sort of arrogance that characterizes the socialist politicians that infest the various nations of the world. None of this is meant as commentary on the arrogance or humility of individual religious believers or atheists.
Look at it this way: to organize a society on atheist principles, you must, by definition, begin with the blanket dismissial of religious tradition, as did the various nations criticized in the quote that began this thread. You must assert that with logic and reason, the leadership will assemble the structure of law without feeling bound by any of the spiritual traditions of the past, taking nothing on faith. It’s hard to follow that procedure to its conclusion and remain “humble.”
Doctor Zero on April 14, 2009 at 12:00 PM
What makes the lack of blind faith oppressive?
Typical Religionist, Atheism is not a set of principles.
You obviously have a need to be principled by dogmatic doctrine, not all do.
Some learn right from wrong and then live by their own determination without continual indoctrination.
I’m not sure how many times it’ll take but people oppress people, not Atheism.
Speakup on April 14, 2009 at 12:14 PM
Totally absurd. The leadership of what? Bound by the spiritual traditions of which past? Taking nothing on faith? Asserting logic and reason prevents the a conclusion and remain humble?
Is your head bobbing up and down because that’s easily as looney as a podium filled with progressives.
Speakup on April 14, 2009 at 12:24 PM
Just as I’ve found puzzling the moniker of atheist – which would imply that one knows everything and categorically rejects that which he cannot possibly disprove (so much for rationalism) – I’ve never quite understood the aversion to comments that, form an atheistic perspective, appropriately place human beings in the animal kingdom with no more intrinsic value than mold.
Just as a young male lion may overthrow/kill the existing dominant male, promptly destroy all of the former leader’s offspring, and then assume unilateral command of the entire pride, why do you find it so offensive when human animals do something similar to other human animals?
Any form of discrimination, or genocide, or enslavement has a basis in atheistic philosophy where human life is of little or no value (much like a fly or cockroach) and can be destroyed or controlled at the will of the stronger, as is the rule in the nature.
Why should human animals behave any differently? Unless, of course, they have been created with souls to serve a higher purpose and to understand that God loves all people the same.
CaliConstitutionalist on April 14, 2009 at 1:08 PM
Fear
Speakup on April 14, 2009 at 1:20 PM
He’s exactly right. Communism follows from Marxist doctrine, which is explicity atheist. Nazism follows from Nietsche, which is even more explicitly atheist. Both were thought to be the new way forward (by atheists) until they turned out to be complete disasters for all involved.
Gaunilon on April 14, 2009 at 1:33 PM
No atheist actually believes that humans are just like mold. Even if they did, that would be a step up from how many Christians see… everybody but themselves. At least mold doesn’t deserve to burn in hell for eternity. I don’t know, maybe it does. Nobody likes mold.
RightOFLeft on April 14, 2009 at 1:34 PM
Christians say crap like this and then they get all dumbfounded that atheists are a little nervous about giving them more influence in government. I’d also like to point out the rank hypocrisy that allows Christians to call atheists black-hearted Nazi vampires or some ****, but should an atheist suggest that maybe some of the tribal customs that pass for moral philosophy in religion are a little silly … oh no, that just shows what kind of monsters we really are.
I don’t know what leads to Nazism. Germans, I guess, for one thing. It’s certainly a lot more freakin’ complex than, “atheists!!1!.” You know what led to the Dark Ages? Yeah, that’s right, Christianity.
RightOFLeft on April 14, 2009 at 1:44 PM
On what basis would you hold that humans deserve any higher right to existence or rule other than that of all the rest of nature around him?
I’m sorry you’ve developed such animosity towards Christians – or at least people that have claimed such a title. I even understand that there have been many people claiming that title who have done much to harm the name of Christ – which would give me great pause in accepting their authenticity – but the bottom line is Christ taught to love ALL people and to carry a burden for the condition of their eternal souls. You CANNOT POSSIBLY follow Christ’s example (Christian = Christ-like) and be involved in any sort of discrimination or genocide.
I urge you to not look to man to define Christianity, and think for yourself.
CaliConstitutionalist on April 14, 2009 at 1:48 PM
You mean all those news reports, including a number here on Hotair were nothing but blatant lies?
They all said that it was U.S. Navy SEALS who shot those poor black teenage undocumented ship unloaders and Captain escorts and now you are saying that God struck them down? What did he use? Bolts of Lightning.
I suppose I shouldn’t make fun, but for the love of God some people have such weird beliefs that it’s very hard not to.
MB4 on April 14, 2009 at 1:48 PM
With much anticipation and joy I await the news reports of your many glorious victories. Just do not fire so rapedly that you have any cook offs.
MB4 on April 14, 2009 at 1:53 PM
Apparently your hatred has led to a distorted view of reality and history.
It’s real Christian influence that founded the freest, most prosperous nation on earth. It’s real Christian influence that ended that same country’s awful practice of slavery. It’s real Christian influence that sought to preserve liberty in this country since it’s founding. I could go on and on, but take a look at this country now since humanists took over in the late 50′s. Do you consider it a better, freer place to live? I don’t.
You may want to deny this, but facts are a stubborn thing.
I’m truly sorry you have been so hardened by some who have called themselves Christians, but maybe they weren’t representing Christ at all…
CaliConstitutionalist on April 14, 2009 at 2:02 PM
On the basis that it would be retarded not to live by some moral code. It would also be against my nature as a social animal.
I urge you to look up the no-true scotsman fallacy. For the record, most Christians I know are perfectly lovely people, except that some of them go insane when they get a whiff of political influence.
RightOFLeft on April 14, 2009 at 2:03 PM
Number of people killed in the Dark Ages, about 18,000.
Number of people killed by Stalin, Khmer Rouge, Mao, and other regimes that predicated their rule on first rejecting God: Hundreds of Millions.
Atheism doesn’t always lead to genocide, but Atheism or radical Islam are always involved in them. Stalin’s USSR first rejected God, so they could reject people that disagreed as having any more value than cattle.
Atheists aren’t all killers, but what moral anchor keeps them from going that way? What standard other than “Mommy and Daddy taught me it’s wrong” keeps you from killing? An ancient philosopher? The moral standards that makes genocide and devaluing human life must be predicated by a rejection of a higher power to tie to.
80% of prisoners come from homes with ONLY a mother that was never married, so do you think Christians’ belief that sex should be in a marriage is so far off target?
Where does the prinicple that murder is wrong come from? Judeo-Christian teaching, not from atheists. Ancient Greek philosophers lived in and condoned societies where not every human life was equal and slaves could be killed at whim.
Where do the concepts of individual liberty being only limited to not violating that same freedom for others come from? Judeo-Christian teaching. All other cultural teachings either severely limit individual freedom or allow freedoms to encroach on the rights of others if those others are “inferior”, such as in caste systems.
Today you have some “tribal customs” you have rejected. Your kids will want to reject even more of Judeo-Christian morality, and their kids even more after that, if they don’t turn and embrace it. Moral drift has occured in every society that rejected God as a standard.
Sure, even Christians haven’t always followed God’s standards, but what’s done in the name of Chritianity does not reduce Christianity’s value, it tarnishes the one misusing the name. If I kill forty people in the name of Smith, should the values of all Smiths then be rejected? Many of our founding fathers said that without Judeo-Christian morality, the Constitution would fail. We took the Bible out of schools in the 50s, and look, our Constitution is being fed through the shredder by politicians of both parties.
PastorJon on April 14, 2009 at 2:04 PM
I have examined all the known superstitions of the world and I do not find in our particular superstition of Christianity one redeeming feature. They are all alike founded on fables and mythology. Millions of innocent men, women, and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined, and imprisoned. What has been the effect of this coercion? To make one half the world fools and the other half hypocrites; to support roguery and error all over the earth. The clergy converted the simple teachings of Jesus into an engine for enslaving mankind to filch wealth and power to themselves. They, in fact, constitute the real Anti-Christ.
- Thomas Jefferson
MB4 on April 14, 2009 at 2:05 PM
What a sagacious rebuttal, by the way. Can you argue the logic in my statements or simply dismiss them with insult?
CaliConstitutionalist on April 14, 2009 at 2:06 PM
That is shear unmitigated nonsense and on so many levels that it is absolutely mind boggling.
MB4 on April 14, 2009 at 2:12 PM
Yeah, ending Jim Crow, equal rights for women and ethnic minorities, the Beatles, cheap technology, no world wars. What a nightmare.
RightOFLeft on April 14, 2009 at 2:12 PM
Good point MB4. MAN has distorted Christianity.
CaliConstitutionalist on April 14, 2009 at 2:13 PM
I argued with them and insulted them.
RightOFLeft on April 14, 2009 at 2:14 PM
Another insightful response! Why don’t you just say “I can’t argue with that reason, so I’ll just call you stupid.” That would be much more to the point…
CaliConstitutionalist on April 14, 2009 at 2:15 PM
Wow. If it helps you sleep at night…
CaliConstitutionalist on April 14, 2009 at 2:17 PM
RightOFLeft on April 14, 2009 at 2:12 PM
Well, YEAH. We killed professional sports, as well!
Krydor on April 14, 2009 at 2:17 PM
If you’re going to count the results of failed economic policies as mass murder, you’d get a much higher number than 18,000 for the millenium that Christendom ruled Europe. Then adjust the results for the difference in population, and I think you’ll find that repressive governments extract a horrible toll regardless of whether they’re theocratic or communist.
RightOFLeft on April 14, 2009 at 2:20 PM
Ok, you got me there.
RightOFLeft on April 14, 2009 at 2:21 PM
Nope. Another alligator. Even here, atheists want to suppress freedom of conscience — just imagine what it’s like in Europe right now.
Can’t wait to see whether the Bishop is censured by the civil authorities for hate speech….
unclesmrgol on April 14, 2009 at 2:23 PM
Every cat his own rat. I assume that Jefferson never considered the source of the Bible he used as the basis for his own moral code…
The guy was so smart, and yet so dumb.
unclesmrgol on April 14, 2009 at 2:25 PM
Regarding moral drift, can you guess how many atheists have served as elected federal representatives in the time frame that secularists allegedly ruined? I don’t even know. Pete Stark? 1?
RightOFLeft on April 14, 2009 at 2:27 PM
No, it wasn’t Christianity that led to the Dark Ages. It was the Germanic invasions (by the Goths and Vandals) that led to the destruction of the Roman Empire which were the local cause of the Dark Ages, and those, in turn, were caused by the invasions of the Huns.
Christianity was a victim of these invasions.
unclesmrgol on April 14, 2009 at 2:31 PM
In the first place, atheism is not a philosophy any more than not believing in Little Green Men from Mars is a philosophy, and so therefor the whole foundation for what you say following that is not even built on a foundation of cotton candy.
Even never minding that, which is a whole lot to even hypothetical never mind, atheism does not require the denial of humility, all it requires is the denial of this all powerful invisible guy in the sky.
Atheism does not require rejecting the idea of moral order. Now as to rejecting a “transcendent moral order” (as in the definition of transcendent as: being beyond the limits of all possible experience and knowledge), well what rational person would embrace something that is “beyond the limits of all possible experience and knowledge”?, as that does not even make any sense.
As for your claiming, unless you lost me with your punctuation, that atheists believe the ass backwards: “a thing is ‘good’ because we make it legal, not legal because we recognize its inherent goodness.”, well I don’t know anyone, atheist or otherwise who believes that.
God, when did man lose his reason?
Help us my God, if you’re there!
MB4 on April 14, 2009 at 2:42 PM
Well, not exactly, Christendom benefited from the invasions that finally brought down the last of the Roman empire that self destructed.
Some have said that minus the fall of Rome, Christianity might not have gone anywhere.
And minus Charlemagne probably would not have.
Christians merely filled the power vacuum and then constructed their own version of a very dark corrupt and oppressive Religion that doesn’t to this day hold great resemblance to the Greek Orthodox version which is much closer to the Christianity of Roman times.
Though a Christianity that features 1500 or more different denominations can’t be expected to follow the original very well.
Speakup on April 14, 2009 at 2:50 PM
You attribute all of these to a growing humanistic influence? Now that’s shear unmitigated nonsense and on so many levels that it is absolutely mind boggling
CaliConstitutionalist on April 14, 2009 at 2:53 PM
Revolutions are always verbose.
- Leon Trotsky
MB4 on April 14, 2009 at 2:56 PM
To be fair, Christianity embodies a moral set and even though I don’t care about it the notion that man is created in the image of God has inspired the exceptionalism that truly helped create the greatness America has enjoyed.
The essential moral set of Christianity including forgiveness as necessary is far and away superior to any other modern moral set and should be a poster on the wall of every school room and public place.
If your offended by Religion fine, keep the morals.
Speakup on April 14, 2009 at 2:59 PM
I was just being a smart-ass. I actually tend to reject the simplistic kind of “x, then y” analysis that dominates historical study. I think you make a good point, if Germanic invasions are viewed as a contributer rather than a literal cause.
RightOFLeft on April 14, 2009 at 3:00 PM
LOL, even oppressors have a sense of humor.
Speakup on April 14, 2009 at 3:01 PM
Pretty much all religions believe that God loves them the most and therein lays much of the world’s problems.
MB4 on April 14, 2009 at 3:01 PM
I won’t argue with that for sure. As somebody or other once said, “If Christ could come back to earth there is one thing he would for sure not be and that is a Christian”.
MB4 on April 14, 2009 at 3:09 PM
No, I don’t attribute those to anything. I’m just pointing out that the fifties weren’t the golden wonderland you seem to think they were.
I think our successes were the natural result of living in a free society, and may of our failures — like the unintended consequences of the sexual revolution, to give an example popular with the religious right — can be righted without government intervention. There are two issues: what is the appropriate role of religion culturally, and what is the appropriate role of religion politically?
If you think that religion plays an important role in encouraging moral behavior, shocker, I agree. If you think that everybody should have the same religious values as you do, and that the government should encourage that sort of thing (which is the only reason Christians would conceivably form a political movement), then GTFO.
RightOFLeft on April 14, 2009 at 3:10 PM
How did this come up in the catholic context? The catholic church is what has historically sent the Christian church underground. They’d burn them at the stake otherwise.
TTheoLogan on April 14, 2009 at 3:11 PM
Well, do you like this more verbose version any better then?
My guess is, probably not.
MB4 on April 14, 2009 at 3:16 PM
Hey Allah how bout a Green Room for those not blinded by faith?
Imagine the number of page views.
Speakup on April 14, 2009 at 3:19 PM
Corrected
Speakup on April 14, 2009 at 3:21 PM
I have posted the following before and since I saved it I will post it again:
I see a certain “paradox” here. The more like Christ a Christian is the better person he likely is. The more like Mohammad a Muslim is the worse person he likely is. So I guess we should all want Christians to be good at being Christians (that is being like Christ) and Muslims to be poor at being Muslims (that is being like Mohammad). Frankly the best Muslims seem to be those who are not very good at being Muslims.
MB4 on April 14, 2009 at 3:27 PM
I can agree with that.
I shall never again bend a knee having seen the results of acquiescence, but, there’s worse than Christianity as practiced in modern times.
Speakup on April 14, 2009 at 3:33 PM
I think the bishop got that about right.
PersonalLiberty on April 14, 2009 at 4:57 PM
Allahpundit, is it possible that the meaning of atheist is a little fuzzy and broad?
Might it be that you simply don’t believe in any God and find the belief in God or gods faintly bemusing but not worth fighting against? Might it be that some others feel their atheism is a reason to actively fight to denounce all religion?
I feel the latter people should read Fjordman’s fine essays about how Christianity appears to be the great enabler for the scientific revolution and the life style we all enjoy today. As such I feel the atheists who feel they must fight against all religions are going off half cocked with an agenda fully as dangerous and disgusting as any attempts to create a purely theocratic regime of one kind or another.
I feel believing in a religion or a God is optional. I believe fighting against all religions as the sign of a fool, even when armed with the likes of Christopher Hitchens’ erudition. It’s reaching towards the trunk of a tree with a saw and starting to cut.
{^_^}
herself on April 14, 2009 at 11:56 PM
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