coming out as an atheist

DWill · Sun Mar 13, 2011 12:07 pm

When we try to analyze harm, it's interesting what we might find, and when there's a connection between religion and harm it might have nothing to do with fundamentalism. With Catholicism and the widespread priest pedophilia, I'd point to the church attitude of the sinfulness of sex, leading to the doctrine that priests must not marry, leading to the priesthood becoming a haven for men who lust for boys. The authority that the church members invest in priests gives them almost carte blanche to operate behind the scenes with unquestioned access to boys (and sometimes to girls, too). It seems inconceivable that a priest could justify his crimes, to himself and to his victims, in terms of his religious authority, but I think that could be what happens.

The Catholic sex scandal is at least good for perspective. I can't see that young earth belief has caused anything close to the harm that the non-fundamentalist Catholic priests have caused.

tat tvam asi · Sun Mar 13, 2011 4:07 pm

The problem here is that everything found in the Catholic church is likewise found throughout the Protestant sects as well. We had all sorts of youth pastors and preachers being moved one community to the next so the SDA conference could try and cover over similar scandals. And as for Stahrwe's evangelical teachings I was referring to that quote and others where he expressed that he's in charge of teaching children. The clock and bag intelligent designer act is pretty sad but not too abusive.

The more abusive stuff is the Satan is fooling the world BS and how secular science is of the devil. I still remember my school trip to the local planetarium where the speaker started out with the big bang and then knowing a church school group was present said "...and some people believe that God caused a big bang..." and continued from there. That still wasn't good enough for us because we were brought up believing that there never was a big bang in the first place, by a God or otherwise. I remember my teacher telling us to disregard that as the speaker went along and then continued to censor information right on through as he saw fit. But you know what, that censorship actually came back around to bite them in the ass because I never forgot about that day and over the years it kept bothering me about why they had to keep knee jerk reacting to everything the astronomer had to say that day. But even then, I still didn't read up on BB cosmology until much later after I had my membership cancelled with the church. It was such an eye opening experience because I could see why the teacher was so hell bent on keeping us from knowing about the discoveries of the secular sciences...

Robert Tulip · Sun Mar 13, 2011 4:20 pm


	DWill wrote: I can't see that young earth belief has caused anything close to the harm that the non-fundamentalist Catholic priests have caused.

A couple of things here. Roman Catholics believe that Jesus Christ was literally born of the Virgin Mary, did miracles, was resurrected and ascended to heaven. This is fundamentalist. Any belief that contradicts widely available evidence can only be accepted by a fundamental rejection of science, and should be classed as fundamentalist. I know there is a cultural difference between Catholics and the inerrant YEC overt fundamentalists, but at bottom it is the same problem. Teaching the dogma of the creed as historical fact corrupts human ability to sort fact from fiction.

YECism is a deeper and bigger problem than the Catholic sex scandals. It has an ideology of dominion which directly alienates humanity from nature. It therefore creates and endorses a social trajectory that presents dangers to our future as a species, in terms of nuclear war, climate change, biodiversity and bioethics.

It all gets back to Voltaire's acute diagnosis, that accepting absurdity permits atrocity. In the Catholic case, the disrespect for women involved in putting a virgin mother on a pedestal through Mariolatry contributes to the psychological base of the widespread acceptance of pederasty. Sexual abuse is a symptom. The cause is delusory belief. Debate over atheism is important because atheism refutes beliefs that cause unethical behaviour.

tat tvam asi · Sun Mar 13, 2011 4:39 pm

That's right Robert. And Joseph Campbell's response to literalist dogma was directed right at his Catholic childhood where he was given the virgin birth and everything else as literal history. This is similar to the fundies in many ways. Especially the doctrine of no salvation outside the church as I was saying earlier. The Catholic problems are essentially fundamentalist problems any which way we face it...

DWill · Sun Mar 13, 2011 8:42 pm

Robert Tulip wrote:


	DWill wrote: I can't see that young earth belief has caused anything close to the harm that the non-fundamentalist Ca[/youtube]tholic priests have caused.

A couple of things here. Roman Catholics believe that Jesus Christ was literally born of the Virgin Mary, did miracles, was resurrected and ascended to heaven. This is fundamentalist. Any belief that contradicts widely available evidence can only be accepted by a fundamental rejection of science, and should be classed as fundamentalist. I know there is a cultural difference between Catholics and the inerrant YEC overt fundamentalists, but at bottom it is the same problem. Teaching the dogma of the creed as historical fact corrupts human ability to sort fact from fiction.

If we remove fundamentalism from its social context, where it means Protestant belief in the inerrancy of the Bible, and instead look at the way that you have, then it's true that "fundamentalism" exists on a continuum. I know people who scoff at YEC notions, yet when it comes to biblical statements about Christ believe these to be true without a doubt. It is even sometimes alleged that believing in a historical Jesus is "fundamentalist." I've disagreed with you before on the debilitating effect on the brain that belief in supernatural agency supposedly causes. I think this relies on a simplistic notion of the mind as well as ignores the example of the mass of people who compartmentalize religion with no ill effects on general rationality. In fact, I think the burden would be on you to find a person whose reality testing is impaired solely by his profession of belief in a God who works supernatural wonders. I might risk being taken as an apologist for religion, but my interest is in putting the matter of religion in a right perspective.


	Quote: YECism is a deeper and bigger problem than the Catholic sex scandals. It has an ideology of dominion which directly alienates humanity from nature. It therefore creates and endorses a social trajectory that presents dangers to our future as a species, in terms of nuclear war, climate change, biodiversity and bioethics.

When I stack the concrete harm done to children by Catholic priests against your much more debatable assertion, there's no doubt in my mind which is the greater harm. The Scopes trial was almost a century ago. We've had this anti-evolution strain in American society for such a long time. It's nothing to be proud of, and a drag on our ability to move ahead. But I think you overstate the effects that can be attributed to it.


	Quote: It all gets back to Voltaire's acute diagnosis, that accepting absurdity permits atrocity. In the Catholic case, the disrespect for women involved in putting a virgin mother on a pedestal through Mariolatry contributes to the psychological base of the widespread acceptance of pederasty. Sexual abuse is a symptom. The cause is delusory belief. Debate over atheism is important because atheism refutes beliefs that cause unethical behaviour.

[/quote][/quote]
Again I think that in perspective, fundamentalism has longterm effects on our society but hasn't caused acute crises like the clergy sex crimes. If you look at atrocity, such as one of your favorites, the crimes of the Stalinist Soviet Union, what can you say about the "absurdity" that led to them? It wasn't an absurdity of religious dogma, and it wasn't one of atheism, either. Atheists, defending against the charge that atheism was responsible for those crimes against humanity, often get around to saying that communism became like a religion and Stalin like a god. They don't realize that this puts them on a circular track where ideology is like religion and religion is like ideology, and yes, that is true. It shows us how much broader than religion our target needs to be in many cases.

We're made through evolution to be very keen on identifying enemies and threats, an essential ability for our survival. It doesn't do to be vague about the animal or person that might want to kill us. It's not different when it comes to less physical threats, threats we perceive as arising from the culture. We need to put a specific name on the threat, to particularize it in the manner of a beast that wants to eat us. But in culture we're facing multiplicity, which makes an unsuitable enemy threat. So we simplify according to the characteristics of our brains, which have been trained by our experiences. We're going to come up with different answers.

tat tvam asi · Sun Mar 13, 2011 10:15 pm

Let's make it very simple and call the dangerous beast religious literalism, any religion interpreted as literal fact. It's an animal living in each and every human mind and it wants to consume us. Some of us have faced off with the beast and defeated it while others struggle along. But those struggling along tend to be the ones in power for the time being, so the beast is more or less still in control of the world in that sense. But one by one the beast is being defeated within individual minds. The numbers of it's strong hold are decreasing with time as knowledge increases. It's an easy enemy or predator to identify and it's fruits come as that which we find in all of these religious and political scandals. In Hinduism and Islam the same is true - literalistic readings provide a basis from which corruption will grow and splinter and sect. I've heard all sorts of nonsense from Krishna cults every bit as twisted as that which comes from the Christ cults.

patrickt · Thu Mar 31, 2011 4:50 pm

Of course, I don't share my beliefs with Christians unless they specifically ask. I assume they're as interested in my beliefs as I am in theirs. That would be not at all and I wish they would quit knocking on my door to share their beliefs with me.

johnson1010 · Sat Apr 16, 2011 8:40 am


	Quote: Tat said: I remember my teacher telling us to disregard that as the speaker went along and then continued to censor information right on through as he saw fit. But you know what, that censorship actually came back around to bite them in the ass because I never forgot about that day and over the years it kept bothering me about why they had to keep knee jerk reacting to everything the astronomer had to say that day.

This reminds me of Ricky Gervais' de-conversion story.

how-did-you-stop-believing-t9227.html?hilit= how did you stop believing

Murrill · Sat Apr 16, 2011 7:05 pm

My understanding of atheism is that it is the absence of a belief in a deity. I am an atheist, albeit one who tries to live spiritual life. Spiritual atheist: It is not an oxymoron. Instead, the absence of a figurehead, the lack of rigid and contived rules and regulations....without these smokescreens I stand naked and undefined. I align myself with an energy that is constant, non-interventionist, non-descript. When I strip myself of ego I am connected with what I call spirit. It is, quite simply, truth. But just try to explain this to family & friends....Atheism is often perceived as anti-god, evil, soul-less. I have a soul, and I believe that we--humans--are connected via spirit. Frankly, I find organized religions to be the soapbox & justification for judgement & condescension.

Azrael · Sat Apr 16, 2011 7:42 pm

Coming out as an atheist one should be prepared for backlash. Religious zealots have a way of not practicing what they preach. A person has to follow their own path letting others dictate to you is not the way to go. Religion in most cases assumes it knows whats best for its followers but thats only if the offering plate is full every Sunday. You can be a non believer and still have a belief in a deity. You should checkout Deism Google it. With all that said I was born and raised mostly Lutheran all my life which stands to reason since all of my fathers side came from Germany in the 1700's. Until I got the internet and began visiting sites such as this and doing my own research I found out that all my life I had been lied to. I play along with my family as far as religion goes let them believe what they will. There will always be external influences on you that create pressure for you to follow the status quo its human nature. A relation with yourself is a lot more important because you have to live with yourself.

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