Someone once said that one of the advantages of religion is that it offers security in return for obedience.
That is true.
Whoever said it forgot to mention that the adage only applies to the priests of that religion, not the poor saps who tithe. Those merely give up freedom in return for promises of security.
Someone else once said that those who are willing to sacrifice freedom for security deserve neither.
That applies to everyone.
Tomorrow, a group of muslims are planning to march through London’s Brick Lane, protesting the sale of alcohol. They are against it because they say it is un-islamic and causes social problems (presumably the drinking, not selling of booze – but with religious people you are never sure). While alcohol consumption can (and does) cause social problems, you can bet your last cent that the real reason for their protest is that it’s not allowed for a muslim to drink alcohol. So it’s a religious thing, not a social concern.
If you don’t want to drink alcohol, that’s your prerogative. But here is the problem: The goal of the protesters is to strong-arm shop owners into not selling alcohol. The protesters don’t just want people to stop drinking by their own volition: just like the gang of muslim thugs a few weeks earlier that tried to enforce homophobic sharia law in the streets of London, the protesters want to outlaw the sale and consumption of alcohol for all. If you don’t want me to sell or drink alcohol, well, go and get stuffed. That’s my decision, not yours. Citing religious freedom to impose your views on me means not understanding what the word freedom actually means.
Yesterday, a priest in Germany discovered that thieves had stolen a 200 years old bible and a gold plated cross from his church.
To me, this is theft, plain and simple. Interestingly, so it is to the priest. I say interestingly because, theologically speaking, it’s impossible to steal from God. He either allows it, and then the ‘thief’ is merely fulfilling His will. If God doesn’t want you to steal from him, he could intercede any time. That’s where his omnipotence comes in. Knowing all this, and praising his Boss’ almighty powers, the priest still reported this as a theft.
Obviously, the police also doesn’t believe that this supposedly almighty god is able to intercede on his own behalf: they weren’t looking for, nor questioning, victims of recent lightning strikes, earth quakes or plagues. They are looking for a decidedly un-smitten perpetrator.
So is it really that far fetched to argue that not even priests believe in the might of their god?
Aaaand here we go again. The Christmas Nuts are decidedly mixed this year. Claiming that secular governments have declared a ‘war on Christmas’, religiously conservatives sound the klaxon and urge everyone to come to their defense. It’s even shriller than their normal ‘persecution of Christianity’ routine.
Honestly, I’m not sure what they are talking about. Atheists surely don’t want to abolish Christmas – heck it’s where we make most of our business, and we get a few days of vacation. It’s not the other religions either. The biggest Santa Claus figure I’ve seen was in a predominantly Buddhistic region – a shopping mall in Singapore. So they have no interest in abolishing Christmas either.
So what’s their beef this year? They point to Texas to alert you to the fact that Texas had to pass a bill to allow everyone to say ‘Merry Christmas’ (presumably also on non-Christmas days). This, according to the conservative’s siege mentality, proves that before the bill was passed, it was illegal. Not really – and it seems that the legislation was a stunt just to elicit this response: When asked for specific examples, the bill’s sponsor, Texas Rep. Dwayne Bohac (R-Houston) couldn’t point to any.
All we are seeing here is someone who tries to stop out-of-control politically correctness with a wall of stupid. It never was illegal to say ‘Merry Christmas’. Just like is wasn’t illegal to live before the day the UN passed the Human Right to live. The idiots are just too frightened of being perceived as politically incorrect when say say ‘Merry Christmas’ – so they give you ‘Season’s Greetings’. Wussies. Heck, I don’t believe – but I still wish my religious friends Merry Christmas.
Even my jewish friends.
Tomorrow is International Human Rights Day. In other words, another perfect opportunity for the Catholic Church to publicly disgrace itself, this time with yet another homophobic homily.
Chur Bishop Vitus Huonders published (warning: in german) his official letter for Human Rights Day. In it, he denounces what he calls ‘Genderism’ – his thinly veiled ersatz for homosexuality. True to christian form, he calls homosexual behavior immoral, and demands that gay people must not marry nor be allowed to adopt children. He complains that the rights these gays ‘allegedly’ have would corrupt our impressionable young, and will invariably lead to the downfall of civilization. In short, he went full-on Goebbels. Denying essential rights on International Human Rights day is an interesting way to assert moral superiority.
In a somewhat confused middle segment Huonders also seems to cite scientific ‘evidence’ that homosexuality isn’t natural. Since he is a scientific ignoramus (a.k.a. ‘deeply religious’), we can forgive him that stupidity, although I fear the irony of that is lost on this cleric.
The bible tells the story where the Israelites, after vanquishing the Medianites, murder all male children, and all non-virgin women. They then take all virgins (Numeri 31:35 boasts that their number was 32’000) as their (sex) slaves. A little later, after again being victorious – this time against the Canaanites – the Israelites kill all survivors: women, boys, girls, even infants.
No-one in their right mind would argue today that these are morally defensible acts.
Enter Professor William Lane Craig. He argues – in writing – that the wholesale slaughter of infants, women and children was essentially their salvation, not murder. Not content with spouting this horrifyingly twisted madness, he then goes on to argue that the massacre was hardest on the Israelites who had to murder all these defenseless, terrorized people.
This is, by the way, the same professor who argues that without a god there would be no objective morals. Color me immoral, but I want nothing of this celestial morality.
What bothers me most, though, is that Craig is by no means stupid. In fact, he’s much more intelligent than you and me combined. If someone this smart can rationalize away religious terror, mayhem and murder, we don’t need to explain why stupid people do it.
After attending an ecumenical prayer meeting (apparently I’m borderline masochistic) my friend asked me
“Did you hear the important point the reverend made? The one about God’s might? Neither did I.”
The punchline? She’s pentecostal. She hates sissy priests.
There is a saying that ‘There are no atheists in foxholes‘ – meaning that under extreme duress all people believe in, or hope for, a higher power.
Perhaps.
What is evident, though, is that in foxholes no-one believes in the Gods they claim to believe in. Because if they did believe in Yahweh, Allah, or whatever, they wouldn’t need foxholes: their god would protect them; and even if their God screwed that one, they’d be promptly whisked to paradise. If they really believed that, they’d have nothing to worry about.
So what is a religious person doing in a foxhole? Most likely they are afraid of meeting their god, and hope for a truly nice guy in the sky instead. They hope that their ‘real’ god doesn’t exist.
Hence the foxhole.
When Think Progress slammed Bishop Thomas Paprocki for his moronic ‘exorcism’ of same-sex marriage, a Lutheran believer voiced his dismay over the fact that the article wrote ‘the bishop’ without adding the distinction that Paprocki was ‘Catholic’:
I absolutely hate how the media uses words like “bishop” and “diocese” without specifying Catholic. The Episcopal bishop of Springfield – ie the same location – has been similarly right-wing and uninformed, yes, but most Episcopal and Lutheran bishops are not.[…] By not saying “Catholic bishop” – just “bishop” – Think Progress ignores those critical distinctions
Sorry, but that distinction may be relevant to believers, but it is completely lost on anyone rational. From the outside, the loony bin is just a big house; we really don’t bother with the inmates’ specific delusions. We don’t differentiate between those who think they are Napoleon and those who call themselves Cleopatra. It really makes no difference.
They are all simply nuts.
CNN has published a list of the world’s 10 most dangerous terrorists. That list is an outrage:
We can’t let this stand. We must remove the dominance of Islam on this list! Petition your representative at the UN to stop this gross injustice. Advocate a 10 point agenda for religions, continents and women to have at least 2 individuals in the top three each. And screw the math!
We must stop the dominance of Islamist terror.