Wednesday 17 December 2014

Why Do Atheists Evangelise?

Yeah all right. Evangelising isn't exactly the right word, but it gets the point across.

This is something I wonder about. A lot of atheists seem to want to spread the message that God isn't real and are pretty aggressive about it too. Beyond their own feeling of self satisfaction about being right, I don't know what the point is. I'm sure plenty of other atheists feel this way too as they simply get on with their lives and let religious people believe what they want.

Does everyone know about Pascal's Wager? It's something like this:
If you feel that the weight of evidence for the existence of God and the non-existence of God is balanced, then why not gamble on the safe bet? If he exists you win eternity in heaven, if he doesn't you just die and that's the end of it and you lose nothing. If you decide he doesn't exist, but he does, then you're risking eternity in hell. So betting on his non-existence is a lose-lose situation.

Some people see Pascal's Wager as an argument that should convince people to believe. I don't think it works that well on that front. Plus Christianity isn't just about believing, it's about lifestyle and a relationship with God, so the Wager doesn't cover the more important things.
Essentially, this post is an extended Pascal's Wager, and I've already said I don't think much of it, but this stuff is worth considering when it comes thinking about what it is that atheists are trying to get people to accept.

Thursday 11 December 2014

Atheism Is A Lack Of Belief

As William Lane Craig puts it "the definition that will not die!"

Because it should.. because it's wrong!

Mr Tree offers the extremely common misconception:

There's a reason that this is on our list of Atheist Clichés That Need To Stop Being Said. It's so plainly dumb it shouldn't need explaining.

Wednesday 10 December 2014

"What's more damaging"? Science or Religion Meme

Stop! The stupid! It hurts! HAHAHA. Actually it's pretty funny...


Don't you love it when people try to make out there's a conflict between science and religion? Like only one can be true and the other can't? I'm gonna put science in quote marks because this clearly is not a representation of the real thing.

I kind of get where they're coming from with the religion side. We are fallen beings, we are flawed. None of us are perfect. We all have weaknesses. We all make mistakes and do silly things. To say otherwise is called arrogance or pride. Which is something the Bible is very much against.
Christianity teaches us to be humble - to recognise our limits and try to make ourselves better. Yes that means realising that we are broken, flawed, and sinful, but that's the first step to fixing and redeeming ourselves for a greater good. Someone explain to me what's wrong with that?

Tuesday 9 December 2014

Is Atheism A Religion?

I'm a bit wary of Christians who say that Atheism is a religion, but to give them their due, a lot of atheists aren't helping the case against the claim.

Symbols

All faiths have a symbol to represent them. Christians have the cross or the fish, Jews have the star of David, and so on.
Atheists inspired by their dedication to 'science' have come up with a few of their own badges.

You'll notice that most of them look a bit like atoms, which are bit like the poster child for science. Shoving an 'A' into an atom just cements the atheist relationship with scientific discovery and thought.

It's maybe a bit arrogant to assume that atheists have the only claim to science. Considering facts like Joseph J. Thomson, the founder of atomic physics was a devout Christian. Or that Charles Darwin, whose theory of evolution inspires the atheist fish, was a Christian for most of his life. Or Isaac Newton, Galileo, or even modern day leaders of science like Francis Collins were also Christian.

So, as atheists have a number of symbols to choose from, it's only natural that they would want to display their faith for all to see.

Or if clothing and accessories aren't enough, why not permanently seal the deal and have the symbol of your belief inked?


And they say atheism is just "a lack of belief"... Sure...

Churches

Do I need to go further than this point? Atheists have churches now, They meet up on Sundays and share their faith and learn how they can use it to make the world a better place. Come on!


"Don't Impose Your Views On Me"

Here's one you hear a lot. When you try to preach something because it's in the Bible that people might not agree with, it's quote "shoving it down their throat".

For some reason that's meant to put an end to it. You're meant to say "Sorry, I didn't mean to offend you. Carry on!"
But that's nonsense.

Where it comes up a lot is on the subject of homosexuality. A lot of Christians believe that the Bible teaches that gay love is wrong. Most will say that it's the physical act, not the sexual orientation that's a sin, but either way it's besides the point. Christians will say that homosexuality is a sin and those that hear it will insist they stop shoving their 2,000 year old beliefs down their throat.

I'll just interject here and state for the record that I personally don't think that the Bible teaches against homosexuality. I'm pretty certain that those passages refer to paedophilia and/or keeping slaves for sex. They're specific things that involve same gender sex, but don't mean the entire scope of what homosexuality is. Like how banning tutti fruiti wouldn't be the same as banning all ice cream. (Had to pick the campest sounding example didn't I? Oh boy...)

Monday 8 December 2014

Kirk Cameron's Saving Christmas

One of my usual mantras is to deal with ideas not people. I can call an idea stupid as much as I like without insulting the intelligence of the person holding it.

But this kind of thing is pathetic.

Kirk Cameron has released a Christian movie, so militant atheists are trying to give it low ratings. They haven't seen the film, probably don't know much about the content, but simply because it's religiously themed they want to destroy it. Stuff like this makes you question the phrase 'good without God'.