3 Stories of Sacrifice Way Better Than Christianity

The Christian narrative goes something like this:

Sin entered the world with Adam and Eve.

Four thousand years later that sin was paid for, and mankind redeemed, by the blood sacrifice of Jesus.

It’s all perfectly pleasant (unless you happened to be on the receiving end of Yahweh’s wrath in the 4,000-year interim), but did it really happen?

Fundamentalist Christians will blithely state (with zero justification) that it’s all historical fact.

Moderate Christians who (ironically) know their bible better than their fundy cousins, are more hesitant to do so.

That raises a problem though.

If it didn’t really happen, then what … ?

Is it just an elaborate metaphor? Is the mere story of Jesus’ sacrifice so iconic that it merits all this attention?

Surely not. As a sacrificial story, it’s far from impressive.

Despite Mel Gibson’s special effects budget, Jesus’ suffering was no worse than any other enemies of the Roman Empire.

And unlike his fellow crucifees, Jesus got to go home afterwards, as if nothing had happened! Some sacrifice.

If you really want to talk sacrifice, and I mean sacrifice with genuine human consequences, then I’ve got some stories much more worthy of analysis from the pulpit.

Casablanca [1942]

Stuck in an African backwater, Rick is given the opportunity to keep his long-lost love or contribute to the war effort. It tears him up inside but he chooses to give up both the girl and his sacred neutrality.

I’m fine, I’ve just got something in my eye.

Donnie Darko [2001]

To save Gretchen, Donnie has to give up his own life. But with time spinning around like a psychotic 4-year-old he has to do it before she ever actually meets him.

So she never knows what he does for her.

And finally …

The Dark Knight [2008]

Gotham needs its hero, but Batman will have to be that hero without any recognition. Worse, he’ll be hated and feared by the people he’s helping. He knows this, and he goes ahead and does it anyway.

I love this last one. It kind of makes Jesus’ constant demands to be revered and worshipped seem a little pathetic, doesn’t it?

Everybody Draw Mohammed Day!

Today we’re sending a message that we will not be intimidated. Today, everybody draws Mohammed!

The lunatic fringes of the Muslim faith want to claim that images of their prophet are off-limits. And they will enforce this edict with threats of violence.

Screw that.

I don’t care if images of your prophet are sacred.

Yes, this is about disrespect. And if it offends you, that’s fine. You’re allowed to be offended.

I’m constantly offended by the influence of religion on our government and our culture.

But this is about something more important than respect.

This is about meeting threats by violent fanatics with what they deserve … mockery and laughter.

And A Very Good Friday To You

Welcome to Good Friday, in which Christians worldwide gather in their places of worship to celebrate the torture and killing of an ancient Jewish Rabbi.

(Why that’s apparently “good” is anyone’s guess).

This year they seem to be in a bit of a lather though, with a number of ministers using the platform to take pot-shots at those pesky atheists.

Anglican Archbishop Peter Jensen declared Atheism to be a form of idolatry (to what, I wonder?) and made this astonishingly stupid statement:

“[Atheism is] about our determination as human beings to have our own way, to make our own rules, to live our own lives, unfettered by the rule of God and the right of God to rule over us.”

… which is so patently ridiculous it’s not even wrong.

The statement can’t even claim to possess meaning unless Jensen can demonstrate that this “God” he’s talking about actually exists.

Then he said:

“… we are not dealing here with cool philosophy up against faith without a brain.”

Actually, I think we are. But that’s not even the point.

Atheism is no threat to anyone’s faith. I’ve never met an atheist who wants to ban religion or force everyone to worship Saint Dawkins.

But atheism is a direct threat to the assumed authority of the clergy and, by extension, a huge threat to the political and financial power of the church.

I suspect that might be Jensen’s real concern.

Global Atheist Convention 2010

The dust is settling after Australia’s biggest ever gathering of atheists and the godless delegates are making their godless way home.

The convention was a great opportunity to meet a bunch of people I’ve only known via Twitter and Facebook. It’s wonderful having conversations not restricted to 140 characters at a time.

Organisers managed to avoid divine wrath (and, as Sue-Ann Post said, dodged a PR bullet by not being scheduled during last week’s apocalyptic storm). Protests were limited to a couple of ragged creationists out the front complaining that Dawkins won’t debate them.

It’s like complaining that Michael Schumacher refuses to race against The Wiggles in their Big Red Car.

Media coverage this morning ranged from the excellent and informative (in The Australian) to the snippy and biased (Barney Zwartz in The Age … why do they get him to write this stuff?), and if you’re keen for a blow-by-blow you can check out the #atheistcon hashtag on Twitter.

Highlights for me were Taslima Nasrin’s incredibly moving story about her exile from India when her government decided the rights of Muslim extremists mattered more than her freedom of speech.

Also great were PZ Myers on the inevitable conflicts between science and religion, and Dan Barker talking about his move from evangelical Christian preacher to prominent atheist activist.

All in all a fabulous time was had by all. And me, I’m taking away a definite mood of optimism for a bright and secular future.

Blasphemy Matters

A few months ago the Irish Government passed a law making blasphemy illegal and blasphemers liable for a fine of €25,000.

The law officially went live on January 1, and Atheist Ireland have come out of the gate swinging, publishing a list of their favourite 25 blasphemous quotes.

Fun fact: the first two quotes on the list are by Jesus Christ himself.

Let’s be clear about this … protecting the right to blaspheme is not about protecting atheists’ right to poke the bear and make fun of religion.

The point is that free speech is sacred; so much more sacred than any religion.

And what’s more, the right to blaspheme is a cornerstone of freedom of religion. It protects religious believers.

All you Christians … don’t you realise that proclaiming Jesus as the Messiah is a blasphemy against Judaism?

All you Muslims, don’t you realise that elevating Muhammad above Jesus is a blasphemy against Christianity?

And Scientologists, don’t you know that L.Ron’s stories are a blasphemy against all the truly great science fiction writers out there?

Blasphemy is important. Blasphemy matters.

And this law needs to be repealed. Now.

Read the goddamn slogan, guys!

As a follow-up to their successful “There’s probably no god” campaign, the British Humanist Association has been busily putting these posters up all over the UK:

It’s a call to cease the indoctrination of children, and something that should be applauded. What’s more, you’ll notice that “atheist child”, “agnostic child” and “humanist child” all appear on the poster as inappropriate labels.

But in an amusing twist, some commentators on the pro-indoctrination team (such as neo-charismatic Gerald Coates) have gleefully pointed out that the kids in the advertisement are Evangelical Christians!

While this is just a moronic comment on one level (in other news, the girls in the Tampax ads aren’t really menstruating as they ride horses and frolic on the beach), it shows a much much deeper level of stupidity, or wilful obtuseness, on the part of people like Coates.

Way to spectacularly miss the point, guys.

Just let me get this straight … are you saying that … it’s a mistake to use these children because they’re … what’s the label you’re applying? … Evangelical Christians?

*facepalm*

Calling All Literalists

Religion seems to be on the minds of some of our politicians, and for once it’s something other than dog-whistling for easy conservative votes.

Last week Coalition leader-in-waiting Joe Hockey made a speech to the Sydney Institute about the evils of religious ‘literalism’, and this week senator Nick Xenophon called Scientology a ‘criminal organisation’ that should have its tax-exempt status revoked. (I agree, but why stop at Scientology?)

I’d like to think it’s because the increasingly vocal atheist community is getting noticed as a potential vote-winner … but sadly, ‘tis not the case.

Hockey has no time for atheists, despite taking the same line as Dawkins on fundamentalists. The interesting thing though, is that he has no time for theists either.

Hockey wants to promote a kind of touchy-feely deism, where scriptures can be accepted or ignored as you like and God doesn’t intervene in the world in any meaningful fashion.

Sounds a lot like atheism doesn’t it?

It strikes me that that’s what moderates like Hockey effectively are. They just choose to eschew the label.

Why? Maybe it’s the desire to distance themselves from the Dawkinses and Hitchenses of the movement. Or maybe it’s the inexplicable desire to continue considering the bible a source of meaning and purpose.

Either way, I’d like to see more moderates calling out the literalists in their midst. But I can understand why many don’t.

After all, to remove the literalists from Christianity is to remove the movement’s core support base.

Without those who consider God an extant interventionist force, and the political and financial clout they bring with them, Christianity would be just another school of philosophy.

And not a particularly interesting one.

Scientology: Damaged Brand

One wonders what the Senior Worshippers of Xenu must be thinking.

With the French branch of Scientology being charged with fraud and a recent high-profile celebrity departure, the name Scientology has more than a few unsavoury associations.

Maybe that’s why they’re moving away from using it.

The streetside “Free Stress Tests” have always been conspicuously missing any reference to Mr Hubbard’s little cult, but now even their advertising literature is being edited.

Exhibit A: the leaflet for Narconon Melbourne I found in my letterbox this afternoon.

Narconon is a branch of the Church of Scientology, not that you’d know that by looking at the leaflet.

After all, it’s so friendly and generic! “Get off drugs naturally” … “overcoming addiction for good” …

“Banish your engrams and realise your true thetan self”.

No, wait. That’s what it doesn’t say. Maybe you have to complete a few more levels before you get to that.

Even the small print refers to “The Association for Better Living & Education”. How lovely.

The websites for ABLE and the google-baiting getoffdrugs.com.au don’t leave you any the wiser, unless you happen to recognise some of the celebrity supporters.

So what’s going on? Has Scientology always been like this? Or has their brand damage reached the point where they’ve decided to quietly abandon it?

Maybe they should do what some of our other “more respectable” religions have done: start a crusade, kill the heretics and take over the government somewhere.

At the very least, it should get them some tax breaks in Europe.

A Still Small Voi[ CONTENT OVERRIDE: KILROY2.0 IS HERE!!! ]

A few weeks ago the main shopping strip of Yarraville was set upon by a mob of evangelical Christians. (What is the right collective noun for them? A faith? A pride?)

It was Potter's House, that most evangelical of the evangelicals.

In my home town they were notorious for restaging the crucifixion every Easter, with a dude in a crown of thorns carrying a cross down the main street.

And here we had a guy screeching unintelligibly into a megaphone. I was reminded of I Kings 19:12 where the Lord app>>>[ WARNING ::: DATABASE ERROR ::: CONTENT OVERRIDE ::: SOURCE: EXTERNAL ]<<<

> source terminal location: UNKNOWN

> source terminal identity: UNAVAILABLE

> source login information: ENCRYPTED

> message begins

the post you are now reading is designed to dull your senses to THE TRUTH.  do not live the life of the worker bee, the cog, the well-oiled piston in the MACHINE OF DECEIT!

 there is a grand CONSPIRACY afoot.  you have been taught to believe that you are UNIQUE, one of a kind. THIS IS NOT TRUE. long ago, a cabal of scientists created technologies to ensure that ANYONE’S MIND AND BODY can be duplicated.

human cloning isn’t NEAR. it’s already HERE. discover the truth at http://JCHutchins.net

you are being DECEIVED. break free from the cogs, flee the hive, become A PROPHET OF THE TRUTH!

kilroy2.0 was here … kilroy2.0 is everywhere

>>> [ CONTENT OVERRIDE CEASES ::: DATABASE STATUS: RECOVERING ] <<<n a still, small voice as I take their flyer ... “it's not real. None of this is real.”

Maybe if the voice is small enough and still enough, one of them will listen.

The Wrath of DDoS

Last night the AFA’s Rise of Atheism website came under a denial of service attack.

When I last checked (two minutes ago) it was still down.

I feel I should be annoyed by this, but I’m not, and here’s why.

First, it’s given a whole bunch of free publicity to the Rise of Atheism conference (and please note that tickets can still be purchased here).

Second, it illustrates nicely the intellectual poverty of the enemies of freethinking and secularism.

Every religion is based on a tissue of myth and superstition, which falls to pieces when exposed to the light of reason. There’s no rational argument a believer can offer an atheist by which they might see the ‘error’ of their ways.

So given this evident truth, what are the committed theocrats to do?

The best, in fact the only, possible way to battle the advance of secularism is to intimidate, to silence, to attempt to shut it down.

They have no choice. If they didn’t do things like this, the power of religion in the world would quickly fade.

After all, reality has a well-known secular bias.

The Invention of Religion

Ricky Gervais’ new movie The Invention of Lying opened in the US and UK last week.

Centred around a world where no-one lies, the man who discovers lying is king. And Gervais takes it to its logical conclusion and has his protagonist invent religion.

Sadly we’ll have to wait another month to see it here in Australia, but if the outrage it’s generating in the religious press is anything to go by, it should be a blast.

This petulant rant by one Marc T. Newman is typical of the response it’s getting.

While I doubt that many people will ultimately see the film, those who do will be struck by a very significant question: What if the existence of God is a lie? Despite the conclusions offered by the film, people must wrestle with the question on their own. But it is interesting that The Invention of Lying cannot even consistently commit to its own argument.

Newman’s argument is simply that the underlying morality of the film is meaningless without God, and therefore it’s contradictory.

If there really is no transcendent order imposed by God on human behavior, if there is no coming judgment where all will give account for their actions, then morality is nothing more than a fiction created by the powerful within a culture.

That’s right kids, without the man in the sky wielding a big stick we’d all be raping and killing each other. This attitude would be amusing if it weren’t so irritatingly common.

If anything, this article illustrates Gervais’ point beautifully. The movie is about the possibility that religion is just an elaborate hoax. You’d have to admit that’s at least plausible. And this weak little defence is the best Newman can offer? That’s telling, is it not?

The thing is that Newman, like so many of his brethren, is utterly unwilling to consider the possibility that his religion is a sham.

His worldview is so wrapped up with the core assumption that there’s an externally-imposed morality that to suggest any other possibility is to tear the very soul from his universe.

No wonder these guys find evolution so scary. After all, it can be easily used to show that morality comes from within, not from without.

5 Terrible Arguments For Christianity

When discussing the merits of the Christian religion with Christians, the same arguments tend to come up again and again.

I’ve gathered here a few choice selections. Please feel free to offer any others you may think of in the comments.

1. Pascal's Wager

Indicative quote: “If a Christian is wrong about atheism they lose nothing, but if an atheist is wrong about Christianity they lose everything!”

Quite apart from its vaguely threatening tone, this is just a mess of logical fallacies. First, it’s a blatant appeal to consequences.

Second, it’s a false dichotomy. The wager implies that Christianity and Atheism are the only two possible choices. What about all those other thousands of religions?

If this argument were to be applied consistently then the “best” religion, and the one we should all follow, would be the religion that offers the best reward.

On that basis, I reckon Islam's 72 virgins would give Christianity's puritanical “heaven” a run for its money.

2. Playing the Numbers

Indicative quote: “So many people believe it! It must be true!”

This one is obviously trivial but I thought it was worth a mention, mainly because it’s particularly amusing when offered in support of Christianity.

While Christianity just scrapes in front of Islam as the religion with the most adherents, you have to combine everything from Greek Orthodoxy to Mormonism under the one banner to do it.

The appropriate response to this argument is therefore: “so many people believe ... what exactly?”.

3. Anything from the bible

Indicative quote: Anything from the bible.

Here’s the thing. No-one, except someone who already believes in the bible, accepts it as any kind of authority. So using the bible to justify the bible is the worst kind of circular reasoning.

It’s like using the Star Wars movies to justify the existence of Darth Vader. Or Hayden Christensen’s acting ability.

4. The Incoherence of Atheism

Indicative quote: “Atheism is incoherent / illogical / silly / inconsistent.”

This one is my favourite. It’s a lovely attempt to simply cut atheism off at the knees and give the arguer a pass to ignore anything an atheist says.

It’s a little subtle, but the basic argument goes like this:

Atheists believe in purely material things, but logic itself is immaterial. Logic exists therefore atheism is wrong and Jesus really was born to a virgin and came back from the dead and will be returning to the earth soon.

Sorry, which was the incoherent argument again?

5. “Evidence”

Indicative quote: “It's a miracle! It must have been God that healed me / produced this bacterial flagellum / put the image of Mary in this cream bun.”

This is the big one, and it covers a multitude of sins.

Back in the day we had medieval pieces of the “true cross” and the Shroud of Turin to gull the peasants. Now we're a bit more sophisticated with claims of the healing power of prayer and intelligent design.

It’s all the same, though. It’s still just cobbled-together chicanery and sleight-of-hand, none of which has ever stood up to serious investigation.

An interesting subset of “evidence” is the eyewitness account, which is a very important part of Christian lore.

Two of my favourites are this nasty little urban legend (which I once heard preached from the pulpit as if it were a true inspiring story) and the assertion that hundreds of people saw Christ after his resurrection, so it must be true.

This latter argument just shows an inability to tell the difference between characters in a story and real people, but when you get right down to it, isn't that the very essence of Christianity?

Shock: Kirk Cameron Promotes Darwin

Has ex-teen-idol-turned-evangelist Kirk Cameron gone mad?

He and his fellow Christians are going to hand out free copies of Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species!

The stupid burns brightly in this one. I’ve picked out a few choice sections just in case you can’t be bothered watching the whole thing.

Kirk starts with a lament about the loss of religious freedom.

Our kids can no longer pray in public. They can no longer freely open a bible in school. The ten commandments are no longer allowed to be displayed in public places, and the Gideons are not even allowed to give away bibles in schools.

You’ve gotta love the way he comes bursting out of the gate with four out-and-out lies in the first 22 seconds

Kirk, take it from me. Your kids can pray in public all they like. They can read their bibles in school if they want to. You are free to display the ten commandments on public property (just not government property), and the Gideons have only been stopped from distributing bibles in public schools during class time … because that’s, you know, unconstitutional. Remember your precious Constitution?

Kirk continues:

Did you know that a recent study revealed that in the top 50 universities in our country in the fields of psychology and biology, 61% of the professors described themselves as atheists or agnostics.

Obviously including academics from other fields would have reduced the number to something less shocking. But still … only 61%? That’s not that much.

You have to love his next piece of logic, though.

No wonder atheism has doubled in the last 20 years among 19 to 25 year-olds.

That’s right, because 50% of the 19 to 25-year-olds now professing atheism attended the 61% of psychology and biology classes taught by atheists and agnostics. And that’s what turned them.

Then we get to the point. Kirk lays out his plan to distribute 50,000 copies of On the Origin of Species at these universities … featuring an all-new introduction by his friend Ray Comfort The Banana Guy!

Apparently this introduction will give the reader …

… the history of evolution, a timeline of Darwin's life, Adolf Hitler's undeniable connection with the theory, Darwin's racism, his disdain for women, and Darwin's thoughts on the existence of God.

Wow. I really hope I can get a copy. It should be hilarious.

Presumably the Hitler thing has been put in for shock value, but the bits about racism and disdain for women particularly tickled me. Is Kirk unaware of his church’s stellar record in these areas?

It also lists the theory's many hoaxes. It exposes the unscientific belief that nothing created everything. It points to the incredible structure of DNA, and the absence of any species-to-species transitional forms actually found in the fossil record.

I can guess what the hoaxes will be. Comfort will trot out Piltdown man and Archaeoraptor, all the while ignoring the fact that these have no bearing on modern evolutionary theory and besides, were exposed as hoaxes by scientists, not creationists.

The remark that “nothing created everything” means Kirk ignorantly conflates “Big Bang” Theory with evolutionary biology (while misunderstanding both) and his claim of no transitional forms betrays the fact that he’s never read past his mate Ray’s 50-page introduction.

Before signing off Kirk gives a rallying cry to the faithful.

Go there as a team and get the gospel into the hands of this generation, the hands of future doctors, lawyers and politicians.

Hang on. Doctors, lawyers and politicians? I thought Kirk was worried about the biologists and psychologists. So why them? It must be important. He lists them twice.

Surely this isn’t just a thinly-veiled promotion of evangelical Christian politics? An attempt to get converts who can influence the issues of abortion, liberal court appointments and church/state separation?

Say it ain’t so!

Misunderstanding Atheism

Moderators of religiously-themes blogs are notorious for filtering dissent or discussion.

It’s hardly surprising. Rational discussion is the natural enemy of religion as theological arguments tend to crumble and fade away in its presence.

Case in point: voluble Christbot Bill Muehlenberg at Christianity Today. He had a little rant the other day about all those annoying atheists and that awful Catherine Deveny (particularly this article) and won’t they just leave us alone and anyway atheism makes no sense because how can you hate something that you think doesn’t exist.

Yawn.

I submitted a comment which (surprise surprise) wasn’t published, but I’ve learned to keep copies of such things.

Mr Muehlenberg, you got so close to indicating an understanding of the atheist's position a few times, before veering off. Let me show you a couple of turns you missed.

"They do this of course for at least two reasons: to discount the overwhelming longing for transcendence found among mankind, and to discredit those who are believers."

The first ... no. Simply not true. No atheist is interested in discounting the longing for transcendence. They merely point out that our modern religions provide a very poor imitation of it. Your second point is closer to the mark, but you show a lack of understanding of this with this later argument:

"They spend large hunks of their adult lives getting all hot and bothered about someone they claim does not exist."

Wrong. They get hot and bothered about the claims of believers and the things believers do in the name of someone that does not exist.

The closest you get to actual insight in your article was this:

"Indeed, in a totally materialistic world, our genes end up explaining – and causing – everything we do, believe or value. We are simply the product of our genes."

It's a little over-simplified, but pretty close to the mark. What exactly is your problem with this position? Any serious argument against atheism needs to address why this isn't the case, and yet you just threw it out there as if it is self-evidently wrong.

Let me ask you this, Mr Muehlenberg ... what evidence do you have that this statement is not true?

I may be waiting some time for a response.

My Universe Is Too Big For Your Little God

To quote the incomparable Douglas Adams:

Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the drug store, but that's just peanuts to space.

I often hear religious believers expound on the wonders of their faith and how it gives them a sense of transcendence; a sense that there’s something beyond this world and beyond our understanding and beyond and beyond and beyond …

It mystifies me when that kind of transcendence is found in religion.

The gods of our mainstream religions are just so small.

Take the Jewish god. He’s a petty misogynist obsessed with diet, fabrics and personal hygiene.

The Christian god (thought to be the same guy once he’d become a father and calmed down a bit) wants his followers to ritually cleanse themselves and demands legal marriage before any rubbing of genitalia can take place.

The Islamic god is also obsessed with sex, calling for adulterers to be stoned and women to cover their bodies lest the men around them fail to control themselves.

Just stop for a minute. Would an omnipotent and omniscient god really be interested in these things?

Look at the stars. Look at the Universe around you. Look at all the wondrous things these gods supposedly created.

We are a vanishingly small island in an unimaginably vast ocean of energies and forces.

Do you really think a being capable of mapping the galaxies cares how many times you wash your hands?

Your Cut-Out-And-Keep Guide to Agnostic Atheism

Yesterday over lunch with some immediate and extended family, the topic of religion came up. I confess I may have been the instigator in this case.

Over the course of the discussion the comment was made that atheists (particularly that awful Richard Dawkins character) can’t really call themselves “atheists”, because you can’t prove there isn’t a God.

This is a very common view and in fact, probably the single most common “refutation” of atheism out there.

Unfortunately it’s a nonsensical argument, based as it is on the erroneous conflation of atheism with philosophical materialism.

Most atheists don’t claim definitively that there is no God. This is particularly true of someone like Dawkins who, as a scientist, values empirical knowledge. That kind of absolutism just doesn’t wash under his philosophy.

In precise terms Dawkins (and I would include myself in this camp too) is what you might call an agnostic atheist.

This is of course harking back to the original definition of agnosticism, being the acceptance that certain things, particularly the metaphysical, are inherently unknowable.

One’s position on agnosticism is completely separate from what one happens to believe about the metaphysical. It should be clear that agnosticism and atheism are no more mutually exclusive than agnosticism and theism.

To illustrate the point I would like to propose the following simple numbering system:

Group 1 is where you’ll find most religious believers, as it includes anyone who claims God is both knowable and known (usually just by them).

Group 2 houses your scientifically-minded theists and pretty much anyone who studies the philosophy of religion and somehow manages to remain a believer.

Group 2 is significantly less populous than Group 1 and a constant source of irritation to Group 3 (where you’ll find the vast majority of atheists) because it’s often trotted out in defence of religion under the pretence that that’s where most believers sit.

They don’t.

Finally Group 4 (containing your hardcore philosophical materialists) is largely empty. And because there’s hardly anyone in there, trying to refute atheism by targeting this lot is a bit like trying to kill a lion by clipping its toenails.

I respectfully request that all future religious discussions clearly indicate which of these four groups is being discussed.

Thank you.

Religion is Immoral

When I see stories like this I'm reminded why I reject the notion of religious belief.

Members of Iran's feared Basij militia forcibly marry female virgin prisoners the night before scheduled executions, raping their new "wives" and making it religiously acceptable to execute them …

Question: Who would claim this is moral behaviour? Answer: Those who committed this atrocity.

And in their own twisted little context, they’re right.

After all, under strict Islamic law, the greater immorality would be to execute them as virgins, so raping them prior to execution is the greater moral act.

And this, dear friends, is what religious belief does.

It tells us our natural and evolved sense of right and wrong can’t be trusted. It tells us our moral sense comes from without, bestowed upon us by an all-knowing God. It tells us to deny our innate sense of justice and submit to a greater will, even if we don’t understand it.

Of course in practice that “greater will” is the Word as interpreted by the priesthood and clergy.

If we’re lucky, the clergy in question will trust their innate sense of justice and selectively promote the truly good messages from their scriptures. We see this, for example, in Christian ministers who leave out the bits about burning in hell and concentrate on Christ’s social justice message.

But all that’s happening then is that the religious message is being manipulated to ape the simple message of humanism. The religion becomes subject to the person.

If we’re doing that, then why bother with the religion at all? If the message has value, then all this supernatural window-dressing is just a distraction.

And it can be a dangerous distraction, because sometimes we’re not so lucky.

Combine that “greater will” instead with a dictatorial theocracy and a brutalised culture, and all of a sudden the person becomes horribly subject to the religion.

The person is considered nothing more than a tabula rasa for the clerical moral code. The individual’s sense of right and wrong is rendered wholly irrelevant.

And before you know it, raping virgins is perfectly OK.

Discrimination In Religious Schools

A review of Victoria’s Equal Opportunity Act has made some interesting recommendations.

At the moment, religious schools in Victoria have the right to discriminate on the basis of faith. For example, a Muslim school can refuse to employ a Jewish cleaner or a conservative Christian school a woman who is unmarried and pregnant.

A parliamentary review has recommended broadening the definition into “core” and “non-core” roles, so discrimination would only be applied to roles where it actually matters. Under this model the school chaplain can’t be a Satanist but it doesn’t matter so much if the maths teacher is (although he does go on about pentagrams a fair bit … ).

People running religious schools obviously think it’s a bad idea. And I agree.

This is just too one-sided. Even now, I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find any number of atheists teaching in Christian schools, where their atheism is overlooked just because of their teaching ability.

This proposal takes us in completely the wrong direction. We should give more discriminatory power to these schools, not less.

In fact, let’s go the whole hog. Religious schools should be obliged to only employ people who share their faith.

Before being appointed, applicants must prove their allegiance by swearing on their particular holy book and passing a detailed examination on the tenets of their doctrine.

All staff must be monitored constantly to ensure their behaviour is in line with the appropriate religious doctrine. Any breaches of protocol, whether on school grounds or in the person’s home, will result in immediate dismissal.

Of course religious schools might struggle to retain staff under such a regime, and student numbers would drop off as teaching standards fell.

And Government funding would have to be cut because they’d now be straight religious institutions rather than educational institutions.

And in fact, after a while we’d probably see very few religious schools remaining.

That’d be a shame.

But keeping the schools’ religious values pure is obviously critically important, so surely that’s a small price to pay.

Framing Darwinism

An article by Professor of Theology Tom Frame on “Questions Darwinism cannot answer” is an excellent example of the kind of muddled thinking religious believers tend to display when talking about evolution.

The first clue is the use of the word “Darwinism”, an epithet used almost exclusively by believers with a philosophical axe to grind. The intention is to portray evolution as just another religious belief.

The next clue is passages like this:

A dedicated Darwinian would welcome imperialism, genocide, mass deportation, ethnic cleansing, eugenics, euthanasia, forced sterilisations and infanticide.

Apart displaying his gross ignorance of what evolution means, Mr Frame is trying to paint atheism as an immoral position and, by an implied false dichotomy, promote religious belief as the noble alternative.

But all that’s just a sideshow. The real point of the article is summed up in these oh-so-wise words:

Such science is also inhibited from asking whether life has any meaning, as this would require stepping outside the processes that led its practitioners to the point of questioning. Evolution might account for the story of life's beginnings and progress, but it cannot explain its origin nor cast any light on its destiny.

I’ve got a news flash for you, Mr Frame. Religion, for all its pomp and imaginary circumstance, cannot explain any of these things either.

It’s trivial to observe that there’s more to the human experience than science, let alone evolution. But promoting religion as some kind of answer to these ill-defined questions is just smoke and mirrors.

Religion is not an answer. It’s a process of comforting ritual and invocation of myth and throwing meaningless feel-good words at the question to pretend you've answered it.

Real answers come from observation, from verification, from defining the questions carefully and gathering the evidence. None of these things have any place in religion.

And what’s all this about destiny?

Our destiny doesn’t come from without, as Mr Frame wants us to believe. It comes from within. We are its authors.

We can choose to take responsibility for our actions and set our own path, or we can abdicate that responsibility to an imaginary higher power.

We can strive to be an enlightened society that seeks to understand its place in the universe, or we can cling to ancient myths and the fleeting comforts they bring.

Guess which one I choose.

Atheism ≠ Philosophical Materialism

Philosophical Materialism is an interesting worldview. It’s the belief that …

… all things are composed of material and all phenomena (including consciousness) are the result of material interactions; therefore, matter is the only substance (from Wikipedia).

This belief is obviously anathema to theists, because it defines out of existence any notion of a supernatural God.

It also has its share of philosophical problems. It’s an easy target for philosophical deconstruction and reasonably easy to paint as irrational.

For this reason theological arguments often conflate materialism with atheism, because the philosophical issues with materialism can be used to conclude that atheism is also irrational.

In fact, most arguments of the atheism-is-irrational variety boil down to this particular point.

But the argument fails right out of the gate. While all Philosophical Materialists are atheists it obviously doesn’t follow that all atheists are Philosophical Materialists. That’s a simple rookie error.

Like most atheists, my position is simply that theism has roundly failed to make its case.

I don’t reject religion because I think the material realm is all there is. I reject religion because once you scratch the surface of any religion it becomes clear it’s been created by humans.

Of course I can accept the possibility that there is something beyond this physical realm. I just don’t claim to know anything about it.

And here’s the thing: unless you can present some pretty extraordinary evidence to the contrary, you shouldn’t claim to know anything about it either.