what if it's not damnation, but rather giving you what you choose? what if hell isn't hell in the way we think...but merely the absence of God? eternity without God? i've heard it said that God isn't a cosmic rapist...he doesn't force his love on you...you get exactly the same relationship with Him in an after-life that you have right now. not by His choice..but by ours.
#1 I'm agnostic rather than atheist because I cannot know that there is no god as surley as religious people cannot know there is a God. But atleast my theory is based within the current understanding of time and space, I have to laugh when the author says there is no compelling vision of atheism . What could possibly be compelling in telling people that there is no purpose in their pain, strugglesand death or that their only end is oblivion. How can people be compelled to accept that the world is rational when the ulimate fate for Mother Teresa is the same as that of Adolph Hitler. And why would they adopt any empathy or ethics? Fantasy is usually more entertaining than fact. Stories with happy endings where justice is served are more satisfying than ones that end unresolved. So noone is going to go out and zealously preach atheism or even agnosticism. I'm perfectly happy letting people live with their delusions, more power to them, oh happy day! Just don't burn me at the stake because I don't see the emperor's new clothes.
Dubious -- but people HAVE zealously sold atheism in the past. it's just wrong to assert otherwise. they have. we were told that atheism would actually solve problems because religious disputes keep us from true cooperation. that religion was merely an opiate that distracted us and kept us easily oppressed. there are "postiives" associated by those who have preached atheism. there are organizations that have promoted those ideals, not merely as contrarians but rather as people who possessed ideas that they felt would help out humanity. O'Hair and Thompson are just a couple of names in that article who fit the mold. but atheism was part of the package deal with progressive thought in the 19th and 20th century.
I think the author does two things that are wrong: 1. He overstates atheism's past celebrity. His two big examples, Freud and Marx, were not big because of atheism and it was not their central message. In general, "modern" documented atheism that has existed since roughly the 13th century has always been marginal and classified as "bad" or "wrong" by society. 2. He understates atheism's present. There still are intellectuals and activists promoting atheism as the solution. Society just doesn't pay attention. What about groups such as the Council for Secular Humanism? They have publications and conferences and have some big name people as members. What about Europe, where church attendance continues to decline (in general)? Atheism will never die. It also will most likely never be a powerful force in society as a whole. By definition atheism is unorganized, though, and it always has been.
The only people that have "preached" atheism did so in an effort of take political control or to seek intellectual freedom from the forced religious dogma of their societies. Russian Orthodoxy was seen as complicit with the Czars. Victorian thinkers were considered heretics within their societies. Atheism or agnosticism, as the author observes, is not a philosophy that promotes aggregation. Nobody gets together to celebrate atheism. We quietly accept it as the cold, cruel, unforgiving probability. Who could blame people for partaking in the opiate of religion in the face of that?
This is like a writer for High Times faulting sobriety for its inherent boredoms: "We've got prettier colors!" Heroin is a better seller than Antabuse. Always has been, and, barring past atheists' idealism, always will. Nothing surprising in that.
I haven’t read the article, but this seems like a strange statement to me. That may be because the context I’m coming from is different in this regard than yours, however. Atheism is quite prominent amongst democratic socialists outside the US and it has, in recent years anyeway, been central to the major thrust of their protests, a thrust that has largely misunderstood the issues and missed the mark, IMO. There is a complicated history to this, however, as many prominent early democratic socialist in Canada were Christians coming from the Social Gospel perspective. A recent CBC competition named Tommy Douglas, a Baptist minister who led the first socialist government in North America, as the Greatest Canadian ever, yet his party today is heavily atheist … and floundering for lack of vision. I agree with the sentiment that atheism is on the wane, along with postmodernism, and I think there is a connection. I think that these belief systems have not provided answers either in people’s personal lives or to social problems in our communities. I further think that the process of engaging these dilemmas, both personally and collectively, has a strong tendency to lead people to beliefs in something greater, and for me personally that path of exploration ultimately led to God and then to Christianity (which is not the typical path people speak of.)
Glad you popped in, making this more enjoyable. First, I understand your confusion because I jumped around a bit and didn't define in what context I was always speaking. Now, you are talking about the present, which I addressed as not as minimal as the author suggested in his article (that atheism had a glroious heyday that promised the world and is now disorganized with few followers and getting worse). Your post supports this, as I pointed to countries outside of the US. Most definitely atheism was tied to socialist, anarchist, and other revolutionary movements, mostly because fighting an oppressive government was seen as going hand in hand with fighting an oppressive theocracy. However, even if it can cause social changes or have influence, such movements are reactionary and, generally by definition, marginal due to their "anti" stature. This is obviously most the case here in the us where socialism/atheism/radicalism of any kind is seen as dangerous and, mostly, evil. Of course you would have to bring a shot at postmodernism into the picture (Jurgen is smiling somewhere). Are you saying they are similar in that they both attempt to commit a kind of patricide ("God is dead" vs "the author is dead") or do you mean in that they both promised a more enlightened reality? Obviously, atheism has had much greater staying power and, I firmly believe, always will. Postmodernism was/is an intellectual fad. It is also a restrictive, conservative mindset that had a limited shelf-life printed on its package from the beginning. Debord would call it a "general science of false consciousness." Atheism, to me, is a natural reaction within a certain element of society that will always be around and will continue to have a relationship with radical philosophical/political/economic movements and thought in the future.
I'm not an atheist but I am an agnostic/apostate. Spirituality is OK, I guess but religion in my opinion is one of mankind's greatest evils.
Pun, there's nothing inherently evil about religion. Most promote ethical behavior and provide a source of hope. I think many problems arise from the fact that for religions to maintain the believablilty of their particular myth they have to defend it's certainty and that means discrediting other myths. And when you have people of differing views saying they are certainly right and others are certainly wrong that a scenario for bloody conflict. Also, I think their is an evolutionary imperative (power=money=sex=ego) for men to seek control over groups of people, and historically controlling religion is one sure fire way to control people. I don't mean to say all religious organization is political, of course promoting religion can be about promoting ethical behavior, but it is an easily abused system. Who can question leaders who derive their power directly from the almighty? (Uh, atheist?)
I'm proud of this thread! This could be a touchy subject...but everyone seems to be carrying out this conversation well without being a jackass. More rock, less talk. Of course, you're all gonna burn in hell...but it will only feel like eternity! (totally kidding!!!!) i'll be burning right along with you for succumbing to Satan's favorite sin...pride (in this thread)! any thread with a Grizzled sighting is a good one.
damn, batman and i find common ground! i would add that although i'm extremely ambivalent about the concept of a supreme being, i absolutely believe there are forces of good and evil at work in the world, forces that we don't entirely understand. that's why i can embrace W's concept that the WOT is a war aginst evil, w/o embracing the underlying theology. however, i don't find the theology in this case inconsistent w/ my own views.
That's what is evil about it, to me at least, is the control they have over their groups. Any time you instill fear in people you can control them and that is basically what religion does and not just on a spiritual level. I have told many of you on this board about the fight in my county to make it wet but this town I live in is also known as the "City of Churches" because of it's over-supply of them. Pastors have actually preached, wrote letters, and spoke about how if the county ever became wet then parents would no longer feed their kids because they would by booze, children would grow up to be alcoholics, even one went as far as to say it would cause the downfall of the entire city. They preach and speak to their congregation on these matters and the congregation in turn believes them and then they use the Bible to back their claims up. The Bible to me is like Nostradamus' quatrains, you can interpret sections you like to fit your goals/needs and that's what pastors do. Hell now they're in an uproar over Nelly having a concert here at the Convocation Center and are trying to get him banned from the city. It is also no different than what I have heard missionaries do, which is go to convert people in poor countries and bring along food and goods badly needed in those sections of the world and say look at what my God has given me compared to your own. This is what I am talking about when I say evil. I realize that there may be some out there that are actually good but from what I have seen so far I must say I am disappointed.
i'm sorry. i'm always disappointed to hear this because it means, to me anyway, that followers of Christ haven't followed closely enough. that the church has strayed. i would just caution you to consider that what you're pointing out are problems with men...not problems of God.
Yes I realize that and that is what pushes me away from religion, spirituality is OK in my book. Batman Jones pretty much summed up why I am an agnostic too, the apostate part comes from me abandoning religion as a result of these men. I don't think I ever said that this was God's fault, I mean if I do not know it is there or not how can I blame it, right? If I implied that I blamed God for anything I do apologize for the offense.
you didn't. you didn't at all. just pointing that out. and i do wish you'd look more into charities and the good things that those of faith organize to do. things like Habitat for Humanity...Mother Theresa's ministries are a HUGE example...little things that local churches do to benefit the communities that surround them. so many ministries from different faiths around the world that do what they do because of some compunction that it's the right thing to do by God.
Well, it has been pretty well established in scholarship that politics is the reason Catholocism "won" during the early development of Christianity. It's hierarchical structure mirrored, and was based upon, Imperial Rome's. Then, of course, you certainly have Monarchies tying themselves to God-rule...but they took their cue from the priest-king model of the ancient Near-Eastern cultures. But, yeah, your last sentence is why revolutionaries have often used atheism as part of their foundation...and why Satan got a non-believing following starting in the late 18th century - he was the first guy to say enough with opression and he rebelled for freedom. Others also said he made the ultimate symbolic sacrifice for human freedom. I always love it when non-believers play in theology and make it their own. Belief, the printed word, all of these "old stuffy (dead) things" continue to live and breathe and spawn new offspring.
