My Blurb for Dr. Karen Garst's Newly Released Book "Women Beyond Belief" And More

Why would anyone embrace a male-dominated religion in today’s world, or any religion for that matter? Specifically, why would women embrace the religion of their male oppressors? Given the stories told in this wonderful tell-all book they shouldn’t. It’s one of the main reasons I argue against the Christian faith. I bid all readers to follow the reasoning and examples of the authors in this book. Their stories are quite revealing and fascinating. Highly recommended! --John W. Loftus.
I encourage my readers to check out Dr. Garst’s blog at www.faithlessfeminist.com and to order this excellent book, now available on Amazon and other online stores.
Reading the Bible is like playing the game of telephone: One person whispers a sentence to another person. The second person whispers it to a third, and then the third person to the fourth, and so on. By the end the original message has been garbled and often bears little resemblance to the sentence announced by the last person. “I haven’t got a gun,” for example, can end up as “I have bought a bun.” But in the biblical game of telephone, the original message is further garbled by the time that has passed between the life of Jesus and the time the New Testament was written, the foreign culture that filtered the message of the biblical writers, and the human fallibility of those who chose the books of the Bible and designated them asthe inspired word of God.

The writings included in the Bible are thus marred by the biases of superstition, by the cultural viewpoint of each writer, by the passage of time from the date an incident occurred and the date it was recorded, by the inescapable loss and distortion of information as it is passed orally from one source to another before it was written down, and by the fallibility of human memory. I cannot make a leap of faith from such a tenuous platform. -- Nancy J. Wolf
Nancy grew up as a Lutheran in Minnesota. She left her faith after a careful analysis of the Bible and other readings. She is one of 22 women who have written essays about their journeys away from religion in “Women Beyond Belief" edited by Karen L. Garst.

Here's a good description of Karen and her goals with the book:
Dr. Garst became incensed when the U. S. Supreme Court issued its decision in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby in 2014. This decision said that because of its religious views, Hobby Lobby, a craft store, would not be obligated to follow the dictates of the Affordable Care Act and provide certain forms of birth control to its employees. “Will we never end the fight for women’s reproductive rights?” Garst stated. Once again, religion has influenced the laws of our land. Politicians cite their religion in supporting restrictions on abortion, banning funding for Planned Parenthood, and a host of other issues that are against women.

The first leaders of the New Atheism movement that arose after 9/11 were men: Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens, and Daniel Dennett. They came with backgrounds of science and philosophy. They launched a renewed effort to show people how destructive religion can be and how all Abrahamic religions are based upon an Iron Age mythology, borrowing from other mythologies of the time.

Dr. Garst wants to add a focus on women and the role this mythology has played in the culture of many countries to denigrate and subordinate women. She states that “Religion is the last cultural barrier to gender equality.” And she is right. More and more women atheists are speaking out. And as we all know, if women leave the churches, they will collapse. As more women leave religion, more children will not suffer the shame and guilt associated with most major religions.

She has received support with reviews by Richard Dawkins, Valerie Tarico, Peter Boghossian, Sikivu Hutchinson and other atheist authors.

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