Suit-and-Tie Atheism: And the “Church-ification” of the Godless

Let me tell you about me and my activities on a typical night off work. I wake up around 4 to 5 pm because I usually work nights and those are my hours. I get up and have a glass of iced tea, some sodas, or a few (or more) beers, depending on my taste and mood. Then I’ll grab some take-out food, which usually consists of the greasiest grub I can find (What can I say? My arteries hate me!) I live in a 750-square-foot world where the Fri-Daddy is god, where snacking on chips, whole cashews, chocolate bars, and anything peanut butter is the divine moral order, and where shrimp and bacon are only one step away from being “holy” foods. There are probably more preservatives in me than blood cells! There are as many paper cups, plastic wrappers, and empty junk-food containers in my kitchen as there are strands of carpet in the living room! At my place, it’s an ongoing battle just to keep up with throwing them all away. So it’s safe to say I’m pretty much your exuberant Class-A slob.

When I’m done eating, I go back to doing what consumes most of my pathetically anal and highly obsessive/compulsive life—reading articles, writing articles, and editing articles, both for freelance and for freethought purposes. I spend the first half of the day doing what I want and the last half of the day doing work, which includes maintaining my blogs and answering emails. In between this time, I peruse the web for documentaries, audio clips, and videos, so much so that your typical, shorthand-using, 14-year-old, internet troll has nothing on me! I also love comedy of all kinds, particularly satire, to the extent that I try daily to gratify my ominously dark and disturbing sense of humor.

But I’m always thinking, thinking when my fat ass is hold up on the recliner, thinking when that searingly hot water is running over my head and beading off my back in the shower. And I’m a tactile thinker. I like to feel myself thinking, so it’s not uncommon for me to spend some amount of money on new keyboards that provide a nice, rough feel for the tips of my fingers to motivate me to keep on writing even when I feel like crap (which is often). I love a keyboard just before the keys get shiny as the surfacing begins to rub off from frequent use! I sometimes grit my teeth as I write, whether I’m mad or not. It just feels good. I also spend a decent amount of money collecting flashlights and pens. I love to feel them. Holding them in my hands helps me to think better.

Though not often, I can be moody, but I am always all-or-nothing; what I love I love and what I hate I hate. I love a cloudy or stormy day. I love the wind whipping through my hair. I love hot peppers. I love a well-timed shot of liquor. I love the cold air’s bite on my cheeks. I love the smell of jasmine. I love doing bizarre things, like sharpening backscratchers so that the intensity of the scratch is stronger on my skin. I play with my hair and rubber bands when I’m mind-numbingly bored, and I sculpt when I’m feeling creative. I love a good game of chess. I do other things too that I won’t go into much detail on, primal things that involve members of the opposite sex and me in handcuffs, but you get the picture.

And some days, the futility of existence is just too much for me, so I don’t get out of bed at all. I just lay there until I have a headache and stare up at the ceiling for hours because I can’t find the motivation to get up. I just lay in the dark, groveling on my bed until I can’t stand it anymore. I hate a lot of things too, like cinnamon and heights and mosquitoes and needles. I never lick my fingers and I hate it when others do around me and are otherwise not germ conscious. Unlike so many atheists, I don’t care much for leftwing politics. I am somewhat of a political enigma, being pro-torture and pro-death penalty on the one hand, and pro-euthanasia and pro-abortion on the other. I don’t care about “going green” to save the planet either. It matters about as much to me as that cross on the neck of a hot-legged Catholic schoolgirl you wish you’d banged when you had the chance.

And I am plenty aware of my faults too. I am impatient, selfish, picky, and much like I do life in general, I absolutely despise large portions of the population, especially cattle-like people who never struggle with the meaning of their existence (though, in a way, I’m a bit envious of them.) I don’t really care for the poor, and the mentally deficient tend to bother me, as do most special interest groups and other near-parasitical forces of society (Hey, at least I’m honest about it!) I am a recluse, by and large, and I prefer to keep it that way.

My ultimate desire in this predictably short charade I call life is to pass on my experiences and knowledge by way of the written word. I am a student of this cruel-but-curiously-stimulating universe, and if I can pass on my observations to future generations so that they may live through them or somehow make use of them, that is perfectly delightful to me. But all of this just describes one atheist—me. It doesn’t describe all atheists, but in fact describes very few atheists.

One atheist may have nothing in common with another except for one thing: both don’t believe in a deity. That is all—end of story. There need be no other similarities between them. An atheist may be educated or uneducated, smart or stupid, kind or mean-spirited, a law-abiding citizen or an outlaw. He may be charitable or stingy, morally straight-laced or downright perverted. She may be a republican, a libertarian, or a flat-out Marxist. I keep thinking the point has been made already. It isn’t that complicated, and yet I see so little understanding of this in relations between believers and atheists.

We vocal atheists have dealt with our share of email exchanges explaining to clueless inquisitors that agnosticism is not a halfway house between atheism and theism, but only a degree of atheism; an agnostic or weak atheist is less convicted and perhaps less vocal than a positive or strong atheist. And that is what atheism is—a conviction and not a philosophy, though it is sometimes classified as a philosophy or a discipline for reference purposes in the field of philosophy. But this simple misunderstanding has done leagues to impede the progress of our debates for who knows how long.

You see this royal misinformation at work every time some Simple Simon makes reference to “the church of atheism” or “the religion of the godless.” Since atheism is strictly a negative conviction, it cannot have a church or any institution built on it with creedal beliefs or affirmative regulations that affect belief, identity, conduct, or character (which is what churches and religions have and do). And yet, even amongst my atheist comrades, these same misunderstandings are being unknowingly propagated with what I have come to call “suit-and-tie atheism.”

Suit-and-tie atheism is the vain attempt on the part of some atheists to “churchify” their godless convictions under differing militant and evangelistic banners. They show frantic worry about “making de-converts” to join us in our “fight for unbelief.” The suit-and-tie atheist is concerned especially with “coming off” right (which usually means putting on a smiley face and displaying pretentiously Christian-like behavior). The suit-and-tie atheist’s goal: they want believers to be impressed with them in hopes of winning over an on-the-fence Christian who just might say, “These cats aren’t so bad. Maybe my Christian stereotypes of atheists are wrong? I think I’ll join them in their quest for reason.” But it doesn’t happen that way, regardless of how little profanity an atheist uses or how kind and inviting an atheist is in a written or oral debate, or if an atheist chooses the term “non-theist” instead of atheist to ward off any nasty preconceptions of them.

It is very important to the suit-and-tie atheist that no atheist in their company comes off like a “village atheist”—an unsophisticated, homegrown, “I’ll believe it when I see it” type who does not continually pay lip-service to the glories of Aristotelian logic, and who doesn’t have a big interest in arguing atheism with anyone and everyone he knows. But even worse to the suit-and-tie atheist is the “angry atheist” because the angry atheist makes all other atheists look depressed and grumpy—a cardinal sin in the eyes of so many happy-go-lucky, pro-marijuana, planet-loving, Toyota Echo-driving naturalists.

Since the suit-and-tie atheist is concerned mainly with appearance and getting people to agree with him/her – always careful to be pleasant to a fault – they naturally shy away from atheists like myself who are too edgy, too rambunctious, and just too brutally honest for their taste. The suit-and-tie atheist is more like a politician, distancing himself from bad imagery, shaking hands with a big smile on his face, while patting kids on the head as he works the crowd on the campaign trail. But as noble as it sounds to try and line up atheists as charming and inviting, it’s a bad idea because it creates yet another of what should be forthrightly shunned—an unfounded stereotype.

Atheists far and wide seem to be contributing to this suit-and-tie silliness, like Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett (among others), who have voiced their desire for all atheists to identify themselves as “Brights.” “The New Atheists” is another description that is catching on and becoming increasingly popular. I was always amazed as a preacher at the tendency of churches to wear denominational names and the names of religious leaders, but I am just as amazed as an atheist at how quickly and easily atheists are guilty of the very same thing. The put-your-best-foot-forward mentality, the desire to label and re-label things to reflect excellence and great personal achievement appears to be universal.

As much as I hate to burst the bloated bubbles of these highly publicized and widely adored atheists, this label-wearing malarkey has got to stop. There are no “Brights” or “New Atheists” anymore than there are “New Deists.” The term “atheist” covers everything that needs to be covered. To go further than that only feeds the already fat market of misinformation on the identity of unbelievers and what we are all about. Add to that, the term “Brights” has a mighty arrogant come-off to it, regardless of whether it was intended to have or not. Those who go around saying (by implication or otherwise), “I am bright and you are not!” to them I proudly extend a middle finger, and rightly so! And why do we need “new” atheism anyway? What was wrong with the old? In addition to being a virtual spit in the face to us behind-the-times “old” atheists, gimmicky and trendy names like these wreak of being little more than pathetic sales-pitches for a new age.

Well, how about we get back to the four basic food groups of atheism: 1) Atheism, 2) is a, 3) conviction, 4) only! And being a conviction only, it does not and cannot lead to moral excellence or decay. It is not an idealistic construct. It offers me nothing. It offers you nothing. Like me, it may be the only position you can come to and honestly profess belief in, or it may not be. If you find atheism sound, then great; maybe you already fight at my side to break the rusting and corroding shackles of superstition, but if not, I won’t lose any sleep over the matter. If you believe in God, I have better things to do than to try and get you off that drug.

The truth is, I don’t care whether you believe in a ghost with a capital “G” or not. It doesn’t matter to me at all. I only want to make my experiences available to those who happen to be in a position to benefit from learning about them, and I will only fight against religious beliefs when they happen to be thrown in my face or when some Jeebus-ite starts to wax too missionary in his/her beliefs. But that’s it. Beyond that, I have no interest in “making atheists” out of anyone or putting new and cute labels on those who already identify themselves as infidels. Worship and pray to whomever or whatever you want, or don’t worship and pray at all. See if I care.

As far as the remaining theists are concerned, evolution will take care of them as God-belief ever-gradually continues to fade from the planet. Every time a Sunday school girl makes her teacher mad because she demands to know where Cain got his wife, religion is fading. Every time a young man begins to doubt the veracity of the great flood and the story of Noah’s ark, religion is fading. Every time another college student becomes emboldened enough to throw off his parent’s religion because of what he learned in geology class, we see that the age-old, male-glorifying, monotheistic blood-gods who for so long have vilified reason and promised damnation to those who think for themselves are at last losing the war. They are running for the hills as your eyes finish this sentence.

Atheism is the logical result of knowledge acquired by the sound use of reason. It does not come from pandering to Christians and straightening that proverbial tie to look good for the “camera” of public perception. Instead of worrying about who’s “hurting the cause of atheism,” we should instead see to it that atheism is understood; understanding that will eliminate the illusionary damage that has led to the public’s vilification of the position. The advancement of atheism is not about upholding an image, and it’s not about receiving a message. It’s about mankind being ready and able to accept the truth of her humble origins, her inevitable and hopeless demise, and her limited place in the cosmos. And when she is ready, she will! As the world becomes more enlightened, the atheists are going to be here. I have no doubt about it—unless, of course, a meteor hits the earth and the only ones who survive are the Sean Hannity types, but hey, we’re talking about more realistic possibilities!

Gentlemen, lose the jackets. Get rid of the ties. Ladies, let down your hair. And it’s okay to put your feet on the coffee table.

(JH)

Don't be a Dupe!

2005 was a very difficult year for my sister. She was facing a tremendous struggle as she strove to beat drug addiction, the falling out of a relationship, and as usual, unruly bouts of Type-I diabetes. On her way home from work one evening, she saw a well-lit neon sign from the road that read, “Psychic Readings starting at $10.” She stopped and went inside the old, creaky house that had the sign. Sis made it home that day minus $63. A few days pass by and she’s in and out of the house a little more than normal, so on one particular trip out the door, I decide to ask her where she’s headed.

Now crossing brains with her erudite, outspoken atheist brother is not what she has in mind, so she puts off giving a clear answer. “I gotta run an errand. Be back.” This went on for several more days when finally, she burst in the door, sniffling, and with tears in her eyes. I followed her upstairs, and after some prolonged hesitation, she shared with me a tidbit of what had happened—she was duped by the same “madam” charlatan psychic she had begun visiting several days earlier.

Shaking my head in anger, just as I was about to say something chopping and derogatory, she cut me off. With her head still facing the ground in shame, using the side of an index finger to wipe away a stray tear running down her cheek, she said, “I know, I know. I should have known better.” “How much did you lose?” I asked. She said, “$65.” But sis and I know each other too damn well. “Why don’t you tell me how much you really lost?” I said. With gritted teeth, a quivering lip, and embarrassment written all over her face, she said very slowly, “ssssssssix hundred and ninety-two dollars.” I stood there, contemplating how I would reply as I gathered a few more details of how it happened.

This fat-forearmed, spirit-frolicking fraud, this wart-necked, lying lard-ass, toad of a woman found a trusting, vulnerable girl to exploit—and exploit she did! The moment sis entered the room, she was bombarded with, “My, my, the negative energy surrounding you is strong!” From there, it went to “Ah, I see now…a curse has been put upon you by a man and a woman you know.” With some further dressing up, it went from there to the main-course like you knew it would: “I need some money to buy sacred items from Jerusalem so we can begin the ritual and end the curse.” A little butter here, a touch of garlic there, a little dressing down below, and the sale was made! A naïve, unsuspecting person had been stripped of what limited livelihood she had, not realizing the whole scheme was bogus until it was too late. But as much as I’d like to, I can’t really be mad at the psychic! You don’t blame the croc for being a good ambush predator and snatching up the deer that comes to drink from the water’s edge, do you? No, you blame the innocent-but-clueless deer!

I wasn’t the kindest that day. The “I told you so” mentality had me consumed, so much so that I couldn’t resist the urge to say: “Little Miss Bimbo Baggins got taken for a ride, did she? I bet she doesn’t hate the skeptics quite as much now, does she? You got what you deserved, honey!” Before I could say anything else, she looked up at me, and with tears in her eyes and quivering cheeks, screamed, “I’m a trusting person, ok!”

Sis always was a trusting person. She goes through life assuming (a) that people are generally telling the truth and “wouldn’t lie,” (b) that people usually have her best interest at heart, and (c) that the spirits and powers that be are “up there,” looking out for her wellbeing down here. Well, sis got played, and she learned a valuable lesson (I think). But she did deserve to get flimflammed. That’s what happens to “trusting” people.

And hell knows, sis isn’t alone. Many people are taken in Nigeria banking scams, or “get rich quick,” pay-before-you-play programs, like those “work from home” schemes that show a picture on their websites of a young, handsome man sitting in his Porsche, parked out in front a multimillion dollar mansion as his wife sips away at a margarita next to a sparkling-blue, 24-foot, in-ground, swimming pool. Hey, we’ve all been tempted to click on such links occasionally (Come on, now! Don’t deny it!) But just like all that clairvoyant crapola, it’s bullshit made to suck in three classes of pathetic people: the greedy, the gullible, and the stupid. Now the owners of these sites and the perpetrators of these scams, they are the smart ones! They make some pretty mean money in their filthy profession too. And who are their victims?

The elderly are big suckers. They spend their days thinking the world is still a place where the milkman rolls up his sleeves and lays a carton of milk on the doorstep, saying, “G’morning, maam!” before leaving. Then, there are the sheltered suckers. These dupes consist of the young, like children or sheltered people, who’ve lived privileged lives. Some broken-English-speaking, sly fellow, with a ponytail and a yin-yan necklace actually convinces these morons to send their credit card numbers to him in an email to “commid de sum of $2,900,000,000 US doller tu u acount” when in reality, they’re just going to take what’s available in the dupe’s account and get lost on a beach in Maui. And they’ll be saying to themselves, “Stupid Amelwican! Hehehehe!” all the way there!

That just leaves the religious dupes like dear old sis. The religious are the biggest dupes of all. How do you know if you’re a religious dupe? Well, for starters, if you buy prayer shawls or anointing oil from Pastor Hagee’s church, you’re a dupe. If you sit close to the TV during a religious telecast, laying your hands on it in hopes of being healed of whatever ails you, you’re a dupe. If you pray to God to save your child’s life, and God lets your child die, but you keep on praying to him anyways, hoping he will help you through the difficult period of grief to follow, you’re a dupe. If you travel to Lourdes, France to see the famous Lourdes Basilica because 66 healings have been officially recognized by the Catholic Church, or perhaps just because you seek an encounter with The Virgin Mary, yes, (say it with me now) you’re a friggin’ dupe! You get the idea. But religious dupes are even more “duped” than other dupes.

Greedy dupes have their egg-in-face moments and get taken, but from the sting of being played the fool comes a valuable lesson on how not to get taken again! The same lesson is learned by the wet-behind-the-ears chump who started off too innocent and too sheltered in life to know any better. And chances are, even the elderly will learn to be more cautious after being victims of heartless scams. But religious dupes, they are another matter. They never learn because in religion, there’s often no obvious victim. It’s not clear to the believer that they’ve been had, and this motivates the faithful to continue to play that endless, trial-and-error game of “Wheel o’ Prayer.”

When heartfelt prayers fail, the religious dupe keeps on praying. When his business takes a dive financially, the religious dupe keeps on tithing. When Aunt Olga dies of breast cancer, despite the efforts of the “healing ministry” of the local church, the faithful keep on going with the bullheadedness of a flea-ridden mutt, getting zapped by an electric fence. The religious dupe is too stubborn to learn from his or her mistakes and give up what obviously doesn’t work. They choose to persist in the mentally calamitous execution of their insanity—they choose to persist in doing the same things over and over again while expecting to get different results. That’s the textbook definition of insanity, friend! The net result is, the religious dupe rarely ever learns from even the most painful and heartrending of mistakes. Perhaps stubbornness is an unlisted fruit of the Spirit?

Now no one wants to be a dupe, but keeping from becoming one demands that we retain a healthy level of skepticism about absolutely everything—and with skepticism comes another dirty word to some—cynicism. A healthy level of cynicism is necessary too. Even if being a pessimistic, troubleshooting skeptic isn’t your thing, you’d better learn the trick of the trade fast! Yes, people will lie to you about anything, directly or indirectly. No, people very often do not have your best interest at heart. They have their own interests at heart. And no, if the spirits and powers that be are “up there” at all, they certainly aren’t watching out for us down below (or they are, but are doing a terribly suck-ass job of it!)

Using cynical street-smarts, what should our attitude be towards religion of all kinds, including the Christian religion? Christianity is a faith that is 2,000 years old, hailing from a time when men believed in miracles and gods that rise from the dead; knowing what we know of human nature and the all-too-human tendencies to lie, exaggerate, and fall prey to the ignorance of the times in which we live, how can we view the religion as anything but a stupendous fraud of frauds? The handwriting is on the wall! Don’t be religious! Don’t be a dupe!

(JH)

Of Trees and Men

Warning! Read this first! What you are about to see is not an internet prank or a hoax, but is very, very real and VERY, VERY disturbing! Prepare yourself!

In 34 years of life, I don't know that I've seen anything that actually outclasses this in terms of producing horribly unsettling feelings. Worse than blood, guts, or violence from a Hollywood horror flick, and worse than anything that's been shown as an alien virus from outer space invading a human body is Dede's (a.k.a. "Tree man's") condition. This poor man suffers from the typical HPV virus that so many of us get and have without even knowing it. But unlike our bodies, Dede’s body doesn’t have the genetic requirements to fight it off. The result is his freakish appearance as the virus hijacks his cells.

This guy was an Indonesian fisherman whose wife left him because of this condition. He lost his job and even sold himself as a circus freak for a while, but the ridicule became too much. And that's not all; the guy can't work, bathe, take care of his teenage daughters, or do anything without the support and assistance of his family.

He's been begging for help – any help – and when the doctors in his homeland could do nothing, he was out of luck. Then, finally, help came in the form of a skin doctor from the U.S. who volunteered to help him. But still, there are no guarantees. He will never have a normal body, even with the help of modern science, though he might be able to use his hands again.

My question is, what can those who believe in a divine Creator possibly say to this? What was God thinking when he created this man? Where was Jesus and his grace? What would this man have done had he been born in a time before modern medicine? How could he have had any quality of life at all, much less a prognosis for improvement?

It's seeing things like this that never fails to reaffirm my atheist convictions. If seeing children dying from cancer is not enough, if seeing gross bone deformities and massive, out-of-control tumors isn’t enough, just getting a gander at this poor guy is a one-way-ticket to heathen-ville U.S.A. Nope, it's safe to say that no compassionate deity would have allowed such a terrible thing. Our bodies would not be so poorly designed that cells go crazy like this had we been created by a heavenly tailor.

But I wonder what kind of quibbling our Christian readers will offer us when they see this? What excuses for the Almighty will they give us for this genetic monstrosity? And the really sad part is, Christians believe that if this man chose to kill himself to get out of a life of misery and ridicule, he would go straight to hell, having his own blood on his hands. So he’d suffer not only in this life, but in the one to come. I really am glad I'm an atheist!



(JH)

Funny...

Funny how those who boast the loudest, “I’m a patriot. I fight for freedom, God, and country” tend to support ideals that only lead to widespread oppression and fascism.

Funny how those God-believers who boast the loudest of their morality, saying “I have a foundation for my morality” are just as prone as anyone else towards immorality or moral lapses.

Funny how those who boast confidently about how Christianity has the greatest “evidences” in support of it seem to walk on egg shells, fearing day-to-day how some new scientific find may come along and crack the foundation of their faith.

Funny how those who boast greatly about “God’s great healing power” will just as surely depend upon Advil or some other pain reliever to rid themselves of the pain of an ailment.

Funny how those who boast so loudly about the “fine-tuning” of the universe have so little to say about all the ways our planet can kill us and how so much of our universe is lifeless and hostile to even the possibility of life.

Funny how those who testify most fervently about the sublime happiness that service to God brings depend on the usual 30 milligrams of Prozac a day and the latest best-selling Christian book to ease their minds of life’s many sorrows.

Funny how those who most loudly proclaim peace and religious liberty will be the most zealous to take life in the already heavily blood-soaked name of the cross.

Funny how those who publicly proclaim the truth of Christianity and tell us that we should “give to the Lord” and “sacrifice” for the kingdom’s sake are among the richest men alive.

Funny how those who tell us we should focus living lives “more abundantly” on earth are themselves focused on leaving this world for one to come.

Funny how those who tell us that the body is “the temple of the Lord” and how “God don’t make no junk!” are constantly seeking better, heavenly bodies in the resurrection.

Funny how those who talk the most about selflessness and “doing good for God” are always interested in their own destinies and putting another star in their heavenly crowns.

Funny how those who boast that “God is love” and that God “brings peace that passes all understanding” and tell us that “there is no fear in love, but perfect love casteth out fear” are always seeking to scare the populace into obedience by the merciless threat of unquenchable hellfire.

Funny indeed!

(JH)

Alzheimer's and God's Wrath

March 3, 2008 – At the top of the list of debilitating, incurable diseases humankind seeks to eradicate is the disease we call Alzheimer's Disease. In the quest to cure the ailment, an interesting find has been made by Dr. E.J. Jacobson, PH.D, M.D. and Dr. Jesus Christianson, PH.D, M.D. Both men reside and work in the city of Columbus, Ohio, home to the renowned Columbus Center for Alzheimer's Research. In addition to being medical doctors, these men are Baptist ministers and personal friends of fellow pastor and Republican presidential hopeful, Mike Huckabee.

When asked about their progress in search for a cure to Alzheimer’s, Dr. Christianson said, “Alzheimer’s disease is caused by blockages of a certain protein called beta-amyloid that accumulates between nerve cells of the brain. While there is still much to learn, we are confident that one day the disease will be better understood, and possibly even cured.” Dr. Jacobson then added: “But physicians for so long have been looking to modern medicine for a cure. We should have been looking to God’s Word to consider why the disease surfaced to begin with. The answer was right there all along.”

As our investigating team inquired further, the doctors continued to impress us with their immense medical and biblical knowledge. The most memorable moment during the interview came when Dr. Jacobson handed us a letter, in which was explained the position of both Dr. Christianson and himself. The letter was a response to an email inquiry. Reprinted here with permission from the fundamentalist Christian quarterly known as Christian Medicine Today, we have the position of the doctors…

”Dear Dr. Jacobson,

As a woman of faith, I find it especially trying to face Alzheimers disease and what it has done to my family. It stole my mothers’ identity over a six year period. She passed away last year at age sixty six. Too early for her to go.

It has been hard on us. It was hard to watch my mother deteriorate like that. Facing the usual trials that come with life, like for example why God allows this to happen, is bad enough.

Can you give me a laymen version of what Alzheimers is and why it attacks some people and not others? And can you tell me how much closer you are to finding a cure? Thank you ahead of time.

In Christian love,

Tina Richards, Lovelady, Texas”

Dr. Jacobson responds…

Dear sister Richards,

I am delighted you took the time to write me about this gravely important topic, and I am more than happy to give you an answer.

Alzheimer’s Disease is caused by a build-up of proteins in the brain over time. But there is more to this story than just medical knowledge and terminology. Being that we are not secular, but Christian doctors, we are obliged by God to reject any evidences for anything that even remotely contradicts the Scriptures and any notion not already found in the Scriptures. We have done countless hours of scientific research on this disease, but since we are bound to the Bible as our sole authority, none of the scientific findings are important. Fasting, prayerful meditations, Scripture readings, and supplications to God are all that is important. As we have done on the issue of creation science and determining the age of the earth, so we have done here: we put our research away and just consulted the Bible and let that be our guide. What we found amazed us!

As you well know, Alzheimer’s disease takes away a person’s knowledge, will, and resolve of moral character, as well as their relationships with their family and everyone they know (or knew). This seems to put God in the position of not being able to judge victims of Alzheimer’s for their actions, thoughts, or words. But the Bible says we are always judged by our actions, thoughts, and words (2 Corinthians 5:10; Hebrews 4:12; Matthew 12:37)—and God’s Word cannot be wrong at any time (John 10:35). In the Bible, no one is ever unaccountable to God at any point or under any covenant, and that hasn’t changed today.

Unaccountability is a myth, just like a so-called “age of accountability,” an alleged “grace period” for children wherein God waits to start judging them until they are older. No such grace period exists. It’s not found anywhere in the Bible. Everyone is accountable to God at all times. But Alzheimer’s wipes out the rational faculties of the brain, so how can those afflicted with the condition still be held accountable? Has God forgotten about these poor souls? No, God forgets nothing. Everything He does is done for a purpose, and what this means is that when someone gets Alzheimer’s disease, God intentionally gives it to them for the express purpose of making them unable to repent.

You might be asking, “Where in Scripture do we have an example of God not letting someone repent?” We have a number of examples, one of which we'll look at here that parallels your mother’s case closely. It is the case of Hophne and Phinehas, whom God kept in a state of impenitence so he could feel justified in killing them for their sexual perversion…

“Notwithstanding they hearkened not unto the voice of their father, because the LORD would slay them.” (I Samuel 2:25)

When rebuked, God made sure of it that both Eli’s sons would not be receptive to the words of their wise father. Why? Because God wanted them dead—plain and simple. God took away their resolve to repent, and we had the same situation with your mother. She got Alzheimer’s and couldn’t repent anymore than Hophni and Phinehaz could.

Now your mother sounds like a sweet person. I’m sure she was. But you may have to accept that she had a side to her that you never saw.

Being a Christian, you know the kind of God we serve. The slightest little mistake sends him into a soul-crushing rage. He even keeps a logbook of every single sin we ever committed and won’t erase a single one without a holy bloodbath, siphoned from the veins of a Jewish zombie who hung on a tree all day. So it wouldn’t surprise me if, like sexually immoral Hophni and Phinehas, God struck your mother with a case of Alzheimer’s for an immoral phase, or a single immoral act committed earlier in her lifetime. Perhaps she served as a mild-manored sex-toy for soldiers in the Armed Forces? Perhaps she danced on tables in Reno, shaking her behind for the menfolk to the “hip” tunes of Little Louie and The Shoeshine Boys? I’m afraid we’ll never know the specifics—and maybe that’s for the best.

That your mother was a promiscuous trollop seems to be the only logical explanation we can draw as to why your mindless mother could no longer respond to the command to repent and confess her sins of go-go girl harlotry from years back (or any other sin for that matter). Too bad for her, just one unwashed sin will be enough to keep her out of heaven. Because she couldn’t continually repent and pray for forgiveness like the Bible demands (I John 1:7), and because she no longer had faith to please God anymore (Hebrews 11:6), she left this life to fulfill her destiny of being ripped apart in the ravenous jaws of hungry, Kujo-like demons in the lowermost bowels of Hell.

Nothing can be done for your mother now. It’s too late for her. But it’s not too late for you to learn from her errors by repenting of any skanky “catting around” you did in your youth before you end up losing your mind and are turned into a hell-bound automaton like she was. But don’t despair. Truth be told, we’re all in a lot of trouble—with the kind of God we serve, we all better hope we don’t die between prayers!

As to how close we are to finding a cure for the disease, we’re nowhere close. But that may well be a blasphemous question on your part – just as our trying to find a cure for Alzheimer’s may be a work of the devil on our part – since it is a known fact that God very often punishes his people with plagues.

Pray for us and we’ll pray for you. The more we beg, the happier God is!

In His Grace,

Dr. E.J. Jacobson

(JH)

Lee's Rejoinder To "Atheism is not rational".

Brian asked me to comment on a link that asserts that Atheism is not Rational. My rejoinder follows. This started as an email and I hastily posted it to get it on the table.
I cannot afford the time to defend this as well as I should, but if any one wants to take me to task on it, there will be ample time in the future. I'm hoping that it is coherent enough that it won't need much defending.

My rejoinder to "atheism is not rational".
First lets look at what is considered rational.
Rationality is a process that uses logic and logic makes inferences from data. Inferences are correlations and experiences between objects or things whatever you want to call them. The more correlations and dependencies in a relationship between two objects the more inferences we can make about them until we can get to a point of some 'understanding' where we can make accurate predictions about it.

A large part of that process is the criteria we use for data and evidence.

As I see it, the whole debate between Christians and atheists calling each other irrational boils down to the criteria for evidence.

So now lets look at Atheism. Atheism is not subscribing to the authority of a god.
Show me what is irrational about this viewpoint.
I do not know if there is a god,
therefore I do not act like there is one
therefore I am an Atheist.

Now what is the definition of atheist? I think some want to include anti-christian or anti-religious activity in the definition but that is unwarranted.

I do not know if some crystals have healing power,
therefore I do not act as if they do,
therefore I am not a person that 'uses' crystals.

What is irrational about that?

Lets look at Christians.

- Christians assume god inspired the bible. Christians don't agree on how much inspiration that means, but some of them think it was so much that he helped write the bible in some fashion. Indeed I argue, that if a Christian does not take this position to attribute some "quality assurance" then there is no warrant to giving the bible any more authority than the Hindu Upanishads or Bagavadgita, or Islamic Quran.

Here are four assumptions that Christians must make to get Christianity off the ground.

1. Assume god exists to get him into position to help write the bible.

2. Assume that all other scripture purported to come from a god is false.

3. Assume God is the first cause when there is no precedent for any 'first cause' or "spontaneous existence"

4. And assume that the soul correlates to consciousness but does not use the brain and is not affected by any consciousness altering brain trauma. At that point why infer any correlation to consciousness at all?

Now to make these the result of a rational process, they need to follow the rational process. They are a conclusion, based on using the principles of logical inference about the relationships of data/evidence. How many correlations do the data have outside the sphere of Christianity? Not as many as the data that atheists have for their world view. How is a conclusion sound if it is based on an assumption? It is not.

There is an alternate hypothesis to how the universe got here that is based on empirical observation and inference that is consistent with the laws of physics as we understand them. Thats a lot of correlation. We can see that larger more complex things depend on smaller simpler things. This principle spans every category you can think of. It is a sound principle with many correlating examples in unrelated fields. That is its strength. Correlations across categories. It is used to make accurate non-supernatural or non-metaphysical predictions about things.

Atheists do not ascribe to any of those assumptions, and we have more strict criteria for our evidence. Our strict criteria for evidence are comparable to the strict criteria used in science and law. If you use the Christian criteria for evidence in science and law, it wouldn't work very well. Just look at how much regard the four gospels are given by Christians, and then think about how you would feel if you were convicted on testimony as uncorroborated as that.

Atheists do not make any of those assumptions. One can assert that atheists do make all kinds of assumptions till they are blue, but those are PRESUMPTIONS. They depend on Evidence in some way. And once again our criteria for evidence is different than Christians. So if the Christian wants to say that Atheism is irrational, they are saying that it is derived outside a rational process. This argument can just as easily be turned around on the Christian.

So obviously a Christian can say anything she wants to about Atheism, but she cannot say it is irrational without convicting herself.

God's Gift of Freewill

Okay…this is hard for me to say, but here goes; the time has come for me to accept God and quit fighting Him. I have resisted Him long enough in this fist-shaking charade called atheism. It’s time for me to go back to my Lord and Savior. I have decided to re-convert because the powerful arguments of the Christians who visit Debunking Christianity have persuaded me that freewill does indeed exist, and this alleviates God from his responsibilities of running a universe in what the average critical mind would consider a piss-poor and most miserable fashion.

I am hereby re-converted to Christ! I now know that it is wrong to deny freewill. God would have violated his own will to not allow freewill, and that is why the world is such a bad, terrible, filthy, stinky, rotten, putrid, vile, revolting, wretched, and horrifying place—but none of that is God’s fault because God thought it was worth it to allow perverts in trench coats to rob children of their innocence in public restrooms with the lure of pornography.

You atheists may be smart, but you’re not smarter than God. Yes, you are very intelligent. This is seen by the systematic rigidity of your breaking down and handling of the freewill debate, but in your debating, you aren’t considering the “God’s gift” aspect of freewill. Freewill is a gift from God, and God does nothing in vain, which means moral or immoral, when human beings use the wonderful gift of freewill, it should be seen as a good thing—no matter the ghastly outcome. Freewill is a great gift and we must be thankful that God has given mankind the ability to exercise it.

I am thankful to God for murderers, for those who take life callously and unjustly. I admit; it’s hard to appreciate murderers, men like Jimmie Reed Jr. (31) of Pontiac, Michigan, who shot his wife as she slept, and then doused their baby with gasoline, burning the child alive as he rested on his mother’s corpse. It’s so easy to get sidetracked feeling for the victims, thinking about how sad the families of the deceased will be to go through each Thanksgiving and Christmas without their loved ones. Yes, it brings a tear to one’s eye to think of the sadness and the loss of the families as they are forced to relive the nightmare of the deceased’s murder through long, drawn-out courtroom trials and sentencing phases of the offenders in hopes to finally see some justice done. I know, it doesn’t sound fair or justifiable at all, but that is selfish thinking. Murder happens all the time, and when it does, we must remember that the freewill of the murderer had to be preserved. God has so decreed! Praise God for freewill and praise God for murderers!

I am thankful to God for prostitutes, for rapists, and for all sexual deviants/predators. Morally, this crowd may go a different route than I, but they are exercising their freewill. And freewill, as we have seen, is a gift from God. This is very hard for me to accept. I must regularly ask God for strength on this matter because I keep seeing horrified faces of raped women, of traumatized children, bleeding orifices, multiple contusions, and unsightly facial bruising, and my instinct is to blame God for these horrible deeds. But what I have to remember is that it would be wrong to blame God! I feel so sorry for the victims that I want to lash out at the human scum who made them victims. Then I recall God’s wonderful gift of freewill and my mind is eased. Thank God for freewill and thank God for sexual predators!

I am thankful to God for wife-beaters, substance abusers, thieves, and for violent street thugs. Yes, they may go a different route than I go when it comes to human values, but they are exercising freewill—God’s greatest gift to mankind. And tell me something, atheists: If mankind doesn’t use the gift of freewill, how can they ever come to need the gracious gift of salvation??? A part of me really wants to feel sorry for beaten wives who must seek solace from their husbands in battered women’s shelters to save their own lives. I want to sympathize with businesses that take terrible financial hits annually because of valueless thieves, and I even want to stop them if I can. But then I remember how I am not commanded to judge anyone. God gave abusive husbands and conniving thieves a gift – the gift of freewill – and they are using it as they see fit. How can I find fault with those who walk by God’s plan?

I am thankful to God for ambitious men, dictators like Hitler, Stalin, and Mao Zedong. These wayfaring men have taken so much flack from believers and atheists alike. Well, it’s time to set the record straight. Most of us don’t approve of these leaders’ actions at all, but who can deny that they were most ingenious and unorthodox in their usage of freewill? No one can deny that. Depending on the figures you consult, Hitler killed six million Jews while Stalin killed as many as sixty million. Zedong killed perhaps thirty million people. While a part of me wants to look at these men as blood-bathing, murdering tyrants, I also want to personally hand out to each of them freewill trophies. We have freedom of speech awards—why not freewill or freedom of action awards? Praise the Lord for freewill and praise the Lord for bloodthirsty despots!

In any case, the conclusion of the matter is this: No matter what our personal views are, and no matter what we believe about morality, we can’t force that morality on others because that would be to deny others their freewill. This means that we must never intervene in the actions of someone else—if God’s not going to stop a murderer, rapist, thief, thug, or despot, why should we? Thank God for his glorious gift of freewill! Oh thank Him!

(JH)

*** P.S. Now that I have repented, I want everyone to know that I am celebrating my re-conversion to Christ by selling autographed pictures of Jesus for love gifts of $100 U.S. or more. Contact me for more details.

Apologies Not Accepted!

I once had a friend named Mickey. He was a great guy, though underappreciated at the time. Like so many friends who grow up and part ways, we don’t see each other anymore. Oh, how the ages fly by—that is one lesson you learn from life. But I learned another, a more important lesson from my friend Mickey.

Mickey was one of a kind. He would come over and lounge around the house with the rest of us kids who occupied ourselves with less-than-constructive activities all summer long. We had great fun, but more than anything, Mickey got on our nerves because he broke half the things he touched. He was like “Chunk” from The Goonies.

He once stepped on our cat while walking upstairs. Another time, he crushed two Christmas lights that lit the walkway to our house. He broke two expensive lawn chairs by leaning back too far in them—and these are just a few things. Cassette tapes, tools, and dishes also came to be demolished with the calamitous touch of this oversized, Snickers-eating chum. Mickey was a Class-A klutz.

But Mickey was funny; just after every little mishap, he would say, breathing heavily and in a nerdy, fat boy’s voice, ”Oh, uh, sorry! I’ll pay for it!” He had a few other yucky tendencies too, like sweating profusely all over everything – and farting with the force of a category-1 hurricane – but this was all harmless fun in retrospect. It was actually hysterical. Mickey was a good guy. He still is, I hear.

But the other thing I learned from Mickey was that God must also be a pale-skinned, clumsy, fat kid with an eating disorder and a gland problem. No, just kidding. What I really learned from Mickey was that sometimes saying, “I’m sorry,” is not enough! When Mickey broke an expensive piece of stereo equipment we owned, mom and dad were furious. It took more than an apology to fix what was done—it took money from Mickey’s mom, which we got.

Now an apology is only good when it is followed by a resolution not to commit the same offense again. In Mickey’s case, he improved a little, but then again, he was still Mickey and always would be (what are you going to do, right?). As was the case with Mickey’s meaningless apologies, so it is with Christians and Christianity. We infidels get lots and lots of apologies for Christian shortcomings, but these apologies are totally un-redeemable.

My inbox is filled with emails from evangelical Christians making apologies for this, that, and the other. It’s always something as they apologize that I rejected Christianity without having a chance to know the “real Jesus,” that I was “soil with little root,” that I was ruined to Christianity by the radical Church of Christ from which I came, that I was not raised in or around family or friends of religion x, that I was driven away from the church by “cruel and divisive brethren,” that I was not taught well in preaching school, that I never had anyone take me to see a “real miracle,” that I was hurt inside from a personal tragedy, etc. The list is incredibly long.

Every step of the way, Christians are apologizing for something—for everyone else’s failures and for their own, but never for their deity’s failures. The apologies don’t mean a thing because no improvements can be made. Apologies for “bad Christians” are worthless because human nature is what it is. Humans will keep making the mistakes they make. There is nothing that can be done about that. And what about apologies from God? Well, of course, we get no apologies from that mystical being. God (if he existed) would owe the human race the biggest apology of all for bringing us into such an abhorrent existence. However, because the God of the Bible is like a big chemical company who refuses to be culpable for poisoning a small community’s water supply, you’ll get no apology from him. Allowing sick babies to stay on ventilators may move you and I to tears, but it doesn’t move God. So don’t expect an apology of any kind.

And what do we get in place of apologies from God? We get from Christians the ever popular “we’re all sinners” contention. That sickening gab never ceases to weary me. I’m tired of Christians apologizing for their failures, for the church’s failures (both today and in the past), for my supposed failures, for my parent’s supposed failures, for my preaching school’s supposed failures, and for the alleged failures of the whole human race. I want accountability, damnit, not meaningless apologies! Christians, your apologies are NOT accepted! And don’t tell me that you’re sorry I feel that way!

(JH)

Christian McDumb Defends Creationism

Christian McDumb, attorney at law, may seem like just another dime-a-dozen litigation lawyer from the South, but he’s much, much more! Author of “One billion and one reasons why Archaeopteryx is just a bird and Lucy is just an ape,” “The Face of Jesus on Mars,” and “The Verdict Is In: T-rex was on the ark,” McDumb holds a “BS” degree in precisely that. He is making waves in the world today. As a proud defender of the Intelligent Design Movement (a.k.a. creationism), he donates his time and abilities to skillfully bootlegging his Lord Jesus Christ into the classrooms of America through the court systems of our land.

McDumb’s greatest joys are when states like Kansas (which happens to be his favorite state) accept creationism, and when science textbooks have disclaimers put in them that deride evolution and science. McDumb boldly writes “scientific” pamphlets that use big, scientific-sounding words, like “probability,” “hypothesis,” “postulate,” and “irreducible complexity,” and he is always careful to leave the word “God” out of these pamphlets so that they have a better chance of being seen as scientific by an infidel judge.

McDumb was crushed, devastated in fact, when the ID movement suffered a great setback in Dover, Pennsylvania in 2005. He and his best friend Pat Robertson didn’t know what to do with themselves when that dark, dark day came over our nation. Handkerchiefs in hand, they stood united and strong, pronouncing God’s judgment on the wicked city of Dover. And McDumb keeps on fighting the good fight. He is stubborn and has a gift from God for not knowing when to quit.

He is a smooth operator. He says things like, “Teach your children they come from monkeys and they will act like monkeys.” He makes arguments against evolution, like, “If evolution is true, why are monkeys still around today?” He understands perfectly well that evolution must be fought, for if not combated, it will lead to homosexuality, the most heinous and blasphemous sin in the eyes of all his friends—churchgoing Republicans over the age of 45.

When McDumb gets wound up, it’s hard to slow him down. He’s a sharp cookie, making powerful arguments in debate. Atheists run from him like Mercedes-driving sophomores from Virginia Tech. He tells them: “You haven’t found the missing link yet!” Then he asks tough questions like, “What good is half an eye?” McDumb knows his stuff, especially about halves and monkey-men. “Show me an ape/man, Mr. Evolutionist! You can’t, can you?” He knows that if evolution were true, there would be half-ape/half-men everywhere…and also half-mosquitoes/half-elephants, half-crocodiles/half-zebras, and half-gnats/half-brontosauruses. This subject is deep for McDumb and it took him the better part of a year to struggle through the issue of why there isn’t a half-broccoli/half-pregnant woman, but I suppose that’s another matter. So the next time you DON’T see a half-mollusk/half-eagle, you’ll know why! It’s because God created everything in wholes. If the cosmos had evolved, there’d be halves of every combination of things in the universe!

McDumb is open-minded too, just as he is intellectually keen; he goes before a judge and argues passionately that ID is not about God or religion in any way, and then he stresses that the designer of the universe could have been anything…but not an alien race or any non-eternal entity because that only begs the question of who created them, so he’s right back to assigning God as the creator! So McDumb is trying to get God into the classrooms, even though he says he’s not but is only trying to teach an alternative scientific theory!

Now McDumb says he’s open-minded, but he can’t be too open-minded; he tells the judges and the large audiences he addresses that he just wants all sides of the debate to be heard, that he wants more information put out there so that everyone can make an informed decision about their origins, but when asked if he’d like Astrology to be taught in schools alongside Astronomy, he declined because that doesn’t agree with his beliefs.

Well, OK, so maybe McDumb isn’t always fair or consistent, but God loves the McDumbs of this world—the McDummies, as they are called. McDummies are not ashamed to defend The Nazarene through devious means. They are good soldiers for Jesus. They’ll tread right into the heart of enemy territory to bring victory for the Lord, so they really don’t care if anyone likes them or not, especially non-churchgoing scientists in white coats with real degrees.

As for McDumb, he will persevere. The spirit of Michael Behe carries him on. He sleeps with a copy of Darwin’s Black Box under his pillow at night. McDumb’s other heroes, Sean Hannity and Michael Medved, pave the way for him. What would Jesus do without the McDummies of this world?

(JH)

To The Boiling Point...

In 1984, my family experienced something I will never forget. I was just ten years old at the time. It was somewhere around eight o’ clock on a Monday morning. Brother and I were getting ready for school. He was at the kitchen table munching on a bowl of Captain Crunch, and having just finished scarfing down mine, I sat on the couch, watching cartoons.

We were running late that morning, and since we had already missed the bus, mom was preparing to drive us to school. It was only a matter of putting her shoes on, grabbing her keys, and getting in the car. Just then, there was a knock at the door. I was going to answer it, but mom ran over and answered it first.

The door swung open to reveal a thin, black-haired man with a small, muscular build and several indistinct tattoos running up his forearms and biceps. He was wearing a midnight blue t-shirt with what looked like some kind of nightclub logo on it and tight-fitting blue jeans. It was like I could smell the thinning, oily hair on that almost peanut-shaped head of his from the couch—that and the overpowering whiff of cologne and cigarettes. He had a bottle of spray cleaner in his right hand. He said to my mother in a very high-pitch, scraggly voice (I don’t remember exactly, so I’m paraphrasing here): “Hi, I’m selling these bottles of spray cleaner. It’s a good cleaner. If I can come in and demonstrate on a piece of laundry or dirty surface in your house…”

Something just felt wrong about the guy, even before he said a word. The way he wasn’t holding up the cleaning bottle so that it could be examined was odd. He was a terrible speaker who obviously hadn’t put much work into his sales pitch, and just like that, he seemed so interested in coming inside! This guy didn’t come off like a salesman. He wasn’t charismatic or persuasive like a salesman, and he sure wasn’t dressed like one. Even my mother, being the nice and entreating person she sometimes can be, looked a little puzzled and interrupted him in mid-sentence: “Well, thanks, but not right now. I’m just walking out to take my kids to school.” The man said – this time with more creepy energy in that scratchy voice of his – “It’ll only take a minute.” Mom replied, “Well, I gotta say no. We’re already late as it is. But thanks. Maybe another time.” The man seemed to look down for a second before leaving our porch as though fighting himself on what to do next. He then unenthusiastically left, stiffly walking away like he really didn’t want to go. He left, and that was that.

The pungent scent of cheap cologne and menthol smokes still lingering, mom looked at us, then rolled her eyes, making a comment or two on how weird that fellow was, but being that we were in a hurry, we forgot about it. In less than five minutes, we were in the family’s 1981 Ford Escort and on our way to school. We didn’t even make it down the street before seeing two police cars parked against the curb out in front of a neighbor’s house and several police officers forcing the man against the trunk of a squad car. One officer searched his pockets and another put cuffs on him. As much as mom could without getting too much attention, she slowed down to get a better view of what was transpiring. When we saw the man, all mom could say was, “Oh…my…God! I almost let that man in!” Brother and I pivoted on our knees in the rear-most bench seat to watch as the man was lowered into the patrol car. It was chilling to see the spooky man meet our gaze just before we drove out of view!

Watching the 6 o’ clock news that evening, with curiosity and a still present disconcertedness in the air, we discovered just how lucky we were. The man that was arrested was a serial rapist, who sometimes pretended to sell door-to-door products. He would introduce the product and then ask his female victims for the opportunity to demonstrate their effectiveness indoors. Once he was let in (or if he could force his way in without being seen), he began beating his victims with his fists. When the unfortunate traumatized were sufficiently bloodied, he tied them facedown to their beds or couches and raped them in that position. Then he fled the scene of the crime, leaving the victim bound. We learned that on at least one of the six rapes mentioned in his confession, he gave a boy my age two black eyes and some broken ribs and then bound him to watch his obese mother be viciously sodomized.

We narrowly missed having our worlds turned upside-down that fateful day. Had mom not been so diligent as to keep him outside, things would have been much, much different! In a flash, all those McGruff “take a bite out of crime” films we saw at school made a whole lot of sense!

Accompanying the shock and lively conversation this generated among the family were the customary platitudes of divine thanksgiving, ”The angels were looking out for you,” “God moved your mom’s heart not to let that man in,” “Jesus was watching over you,” “God must really love this family!”, and on and on it went. I can remember this being repeated when I became a minister. God just had to make sure I wasn’t hurt so that things would fall into place later in life, allowing me to become a preacher. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but today I definitely think about it and am beside myself at the arrogance of such self-serving sentiments.

With only a slight inclination towards rationality one is compelled to answer the question of what happened with the previous six victims of this brutalizing maniac, this sick, twisted beast of a man, unworthy even of a Chinese zoo. Did God not like them? Why would he not send his angels to protect them, or if no one else, just that eleven-year-old boy who had to be hospitalized for his beatings? We can scrape the bottom of the barrel asking what “plan” a divine being could possibly have had for allowing some lying pervert – fit to be put into a wood chipper – to violate these families, but no answer will surface. Those poor women, that unfortunate child; the nightmares they must have had, the horrible flashbacks brought on by this short-circuited toaster of a man; the mental agony, the engrained trauma, the irreparable damage done must have been unbearable.

One can be forgiven for letting the imagination run wild, seeing in the theatre of the mind this loathsome individual restrained, with honey on his genitals, and thrown facedown on an anthill. But there is something else that’s loathsome here; it is the believer’s conceited conviction that he is somehow indispensable to the universe. There is nothing more selfish than to assume that those who narrowly miss tragedy are spared from it by a watchful deity. These prized souls must have a special destiny, whereas the rest of us are getting the “sloppy seconds” of God’s providential care. I am ashamed to say that I used to think like this, but I have thankfully come to my senses, and I can think of nothing more haughty, more gloatingly advantageous than to think that because tragedy hasn’t stricken me that it couldn’t have because of preferential heavenly factors. Just because I wasn’t bum-rushed on a subway train and robbed doesn’t mean I was saved from that fate by a god, and yet this big-headed belief on the part of those who feel too cosmically important to face the music of life’s mayhem are yapping on like schnauzers of stupidity about their blessings all the time. Just watch the news as some bible-thumping buffoon walks away from a car accident and gets on TV and thanks God for it.

A believer thanking God for his deliverance from catastrophe is like one of two siblings thanking his abusive stepfather because the retrograde scoundrel chose to beat his brother with the steel pipe, and not him. When one thanks God for his deliverance, the person is in effect saying, ”Jesus, as a person who hates violence, I don’t understand why you allow it, but if you, God, in your infinite wisdom, must allow someone to die or suffer, I’m glad it wasn’t me.” This unstated line of bloated, self-preserving thinking I renounce as among the worst of mental convictions brought on by a gangrenous spirituality.

How dare you, believer, rejoice because you think your life was spared by a deity when no one had to die to begin with, when loss of life or injury was as needless as an air conditioner in Barrow, Alaska.

How dare you, believer, give thanks to a being who saves a few and slaughters many, many of the slaughtered being god’s own faithful.

How dare you, believer, thank a god who orchestrates his sovereign will so unpredictably that a sane, non-religious mind can only view it as the work of blind chance.

When God blesses some, he curses others by leaving them to endure their calamities, and it makes sense; if god is to be glorified by puny patrons, he must save only a few, and naturally, leave the rest to rot. My family was not “blessed” by God to be delivered from this sicko-path anymore than the others were “cursed” who were subjected to him. Like many other chance-favored, would-be victims, we were fortunate. Our location, the order and times in which the human-meat-monger picked his prey, and our very admissible porch were the factors that put us out of harm’s way. It brings me to the boiling point to think of those who consider themselves bodyguarded by the Big Man Upstairs, while the rest of us get to know life’s tales of terror firsthand—God’s arms crossed and folded nicely all the while.

(JH)

An Invitation to Atheistfest '07

To whom it may concern...

As everyone knows, there are a lot of atheists here at DC, and we’d like to take this time to invite everyone who is likeminded to come to our next festive event, Atheistfest ‘07 (specific locations and times revealed privately for safety and security concerns).

What is Atheistfest? The yearly meetings (held just after the fourth of July) conducted by the godless for the purposes of worshipping Satan, sacrificing cats, having group sex, and making blood pacts with our glorious father, Lucifer.

What is an atheist? An atheist is a teeth-gritting hater of God who spends great portions of his or her life urinating on crosses, setting churches on fire, and stealing like it’s going out of style. Everyone knows that atheism is just another religion, so let me define for you what our religion is about…

Our earthly idol and hero is none other than Joseph Stalin. Our holy trinity consists of Pol Pot, Mao Zedong, and Karl Marx. Our goals in life are murder, rape, and, yes, world domination! Our houses of worship are the beds of fornication, awash with every bodily fluid known to man, upon which we sleep till noon on Sundays to spite the Christian God. Our bible is The Origin of Species, by Charles Darwin, and on a regular basis, we do what all good atheists do: we charge into churches and throw canisters of biohazard over the pews and into the baptistery; we startle Christian women by running up to them and getting in their faces – with our tongues out and our middle fingers extended – as we scream the vilest of obscenities at them; we walk up to random kids on the street and piss on them, sending them screaming back to their mother’s arms; we decorate our houses with the latest and most hip pentagrams on the market; we sodomize sheep, pigeons, and puppies for hours on end in pagan sex rituals wherein we scream out in knee-weakening, erotic delight. Anal rape is our most treasured pastime—and believe me when I tell you, you haven’t lived until you’ve tried baby raping! As we pulverize the seats of our victims, we yell out licentious chants like, “Almighty Prince of Darkness, guide my enormous, throbbing cock!”

Why do we do all this? We conduct ourselves so because we are atheists and have no moral standards, and it is common knowledge that without an angry sky spirit in the clouds, looking down on us and telling us what to do, reminding us that he will torture us if we get out of line, we humans are so recklessly base and primal that we’re bound to do the stuff we atheists do—like invite college-age kids back to our places with the lure of alcohol and porn, where we subdue them, torture them, and consume their flesh in place of a far too ordinary Nighthawk Steak Dinner.

Now you might be saying, “Even if you don’t believe in God, shouldn’t you atheists find at least a few reasons to live good and moral lives?” Nope, there are none! You might think we would learn to love and be happy and have some sense of compassion, but we never do. For some strange reason, we became villainous vipers the very moment we embraced atheism. No one can explain why, but every ounce of goodness suddenly left us, even our home-raising and good manners! Poof! Went right out the window, flew away—all of it, just like that!

We slam our hands down on tables and say,“I hate life. I am an atheist. Damnit, I’m bored! I’m going to stab someone with an ice-pick!” So, as you can see, we are nothing but grumpy, soulless, boneheaded, billy goats, who are way beyond the hope of saving.

You best avoid us…or if you’re one of us in spirit, join us at another fun retreat. This year promises to be even better than last year, where – if we can avoid the authorities – a brunette virgin will be sacrificed when the sun reaches Zenith.

Be there!

Diabolically yours,

(JH)

The Grape of Wrath

There are times when I wonder what life would be like without the gustatory pleasure of barbeque, but from the looks of it, I don’t think I will ever have to find out! I was at work, sitting in my car in the middle of a windless night. I was listening to the crickets as I consumed a delicious pork sandwich. The sweet and tangy barbeque sauce tantalizing my taste buds, my teeth pulling apart layer upon layer of deliciously stringy and fatty pig intestine, my mouth was in a state of what could have been called – from a very Gentile and hedonistic perspective – “heaven.” With endorphins of delight released like Venezuela Falls from my temporal lobes, I was savoring every moment of it. Then, in a flash, I was rudely interrupted by my own diaphragm.

Inhaling at precisely the wrong moment, my dinner sent me into a coughing, chest-pounding fight to dislodge the swine’s flesh that had just taken up residence in my windpipe. It wasn’t long before my airway was freed of its obstruction and life went on as normal. The only lasting effect from the scary event was getting yet another reminder that the universe in which I live is not my friend, but my enemy.

Every natural thing with which we humans have to do has a deadly side to it. Death is only one step away from any of us at any particular time—and it is time itself that allows for our growth, healing, and maturity, but on the same note, gives us arthritis and kills us. We learn to go through our anally cautious lives, reading warning labels, checking the expiration dates on packages of food, holding onto banisters as we traverse a flight of stairs, looking both ways before we cross a street, and signaling before we reservedly change lanes on the express way. When we head outside, we spray ourselves with OFF bug spray to avoid getting West Nile Virus from infected mosquitoes. And yes, a good portion of us live long enough to learn to chew our food extra slowly to keep from choking on it because of the dangerous way in which evolution has jimmy-rigged our tracheas!

No matter where we look, the entire world stands ready to kill us—and the aforementioned are not even a fraction of the list of deadly things on this planet of ours. We haven’t begun to consider the woes of spaceflight; the poisonous gases that are plenteous on lifeless worlds afar, like methane and ammonia, brutal temperature extremes, crushing gravity, and deadly radiation that would cause us to literally rot on our feet…they are all out there, standing ready – like a well-funded assassin with a shiny, new rifle – to send us back to the cold elements of our origins. It’s as though the entire world hates us. Life on our planet is like a “bubble boy” or girl, who is forced to live out his or her existence quarantined due to a defective immune system; only one little blue bubble called Earth is habitable for us—and even inside our small, accommodating bubble we are met with frightening hostilities.

Believers want us to see this world (and even more amazingly, the
universe in its entirety!), as a colony for soul-making and worship.
But our world is more like a bandana-wearing gang of street thugs from a crappy, 1980s karate flick, where big-haired fighters seek to attack their opponents without cause. The abounding death, the random showering of tragedy, the needless waste on a cosmic scale, these are the things that surround us—hardly an environment for soul-making and worship.

Atheist or not, we two-legged bovines carry on through the daily regime with fears of potential disasters in the back of our minds—and we don’t miss a beat! We don’t let our children out in the front yard alone to prevent their being abducted by some gaunt sicko in a Camel cigarettes baseball jersey, driving a yellow, ‘79 Trans Am. We are constantly aware of our little ones trying to stick something metal into electrical outlets, or what babycakes might yank off a hot stovetop and onto themselves, resulting in third degree burns. Police, fire, and emergency medical services will never want for business in our “Shit Happens” world.

Now as an atheist, I have long since accepted the reality of my
estrangement as a living organism from the forces of this dead, godless universe. I have accepted that the chaotic occurrences that make life possible will forever serve to bring about my demise. What I cannot accept is the plea of a believer when he tells me with a straight face that such a world as ours was created by a loving deity who has the sole interest and wellbeing of humanity at heart. It is one thing to believe in a god who allows disasters to prevail, and quite another to expect someone else to believe in that god for the same reasons you do. The older I become, I find myself less tolerant of hearing that I am without justification for disbelieving in the so-called “benevolent” god of the modern religions.

Now let me tell you a story. It’s a sad story about a proud, young American boy in the U.S. Army who died last year in service to our country. You might be thinking right now of a bold soldier – gun in hand, geared in green for war – who died on a battlefield in Iraq, drenched in blood, glittered with sand in open wounds. You might suppose I am writing this piece, mourning the loss of a friend who
perished before I had the chance to say goodbye. Not so, to both assumptions. I didn’t even know the man, but my brother who is a medic in the army knew him, and was right there with him at the time of his death. The fellow died in the mess hall, joking around and laughing with his friends. How did he die? He died a meaningless death; he choked on a grape!

My brother watched a brave, battle-worthy soldier’s face turn red, then blue, and then purple, as he gasped for breath. A table full of soldiers did everything in their power to save the man’s life, but it was to no avail. What a bullet from the enemy’s AK-47 couldn’t accomplish, a small piece of fruit managed to do. Flailing his arms, his bloodshot eyeballs popping out of his head, staring up at the ceiling, the man died a most horrific death.

Though I wasn’t there, I see the man lying on the floor in uniform, his body motionless, his mouth still open like an expired trout on the cracked bed of a dried-up pond. Then my mind drifts away from the unsettling scene, from the frantic faces of shock on those around him. I’m coming back, back to myself, back to my life, now looking at my dashboard; it’s just me again, sitting in my car, staring at what’s left of the pork I almost choked on only moments earlier. “Whoa! I could have choked!”, I thought to myself.

And now it’s back to work, shining the strobe, patrolling for trespassers, vandals, and thieves. But unfortunately, I now have this terrible recollection in my head to spend the rest of my shift rolling over.

Believers put aside the magnanimous issue of human suffering, choosing to trust their God to one day reveal to them the answers to the big “why” questions of life. If a believer can maintain their faith in the sight of the soul-raping atrocities of our cosmos, then good for them. But the fact remains that for people like myself, our atheist convictions are only strengthened by the Christian God’s decision to permit the death of a Christian man – of a soldier who was more noble and brave than I will ever be – and to allow a fat-ass, foul-mouthed blasphemer like myself to continue to breathe God’s air, to bask in his sunlight, to live another day to keep sharing wrist-slashing atheism with the world—on the web and by the pen in my forthcoming book, Project Bible Truth: a minister turns atheist and tells all.

(JH)

Framing Science and Atheism for the Public

A bit of a bomb has gone off in the blogosphere. I refrained from posting earlier on the precursor -- the "framing" debate sparked by a Science article and discussed at length here -- but I think there are sufficient disparate issues at play here to tie together into one coherent argument. My argument is simple: people are talking past each other because of a lack of focus. Now, the same issue hit the WaPo, and the blogosphere is buzzin' again.

The larger issue is fundamentalist religion, plain and simple. In Chris Mooney's own words,

In the Post, we focus on one of the most obvious examples of badly framing the defense of evolution--tying it to criticism of religion. Richard Dawkins is the most prominent example in this regard, and we single him out accordingly. I want to emphasize that I grew up on Dawkins' books; they really helped me figure out who I am. But nevertheless, over the past several years I've grown increasingly convinced that his is emphatically not the way to make many Americans (people very different from me) more accepting of science.

It isn't only defenders of science who feel the way Mooney and Nisbet do -- humanists and freethinkers have recently decried "angry atheists who hold down our movement".

While some progressive Christians maintain that Christ was divine, they nevertheless manage to agree with us on principles of human rights, reason and science. If we refuse to build alliances with people who do not agree with us on every single issue, we will never be strong enough to stand up to the Religious Right.

The media, by its nature, interviews figures whose views are diametrically opposed. News has morphed into entertainment, and the masses cry for gladiators of words and ideas to step into the ring and let mental blood. Sophisticated viewpoints don't conform to soundbytes. Therefore, why waste a perfectly good 30-second interview on an atheist who refuses to call names and instead wants to discuss transcendental arguments for a god's existence?

When Elaine Pagels was interviewed by Salon, we see this common theme resurface:

What do you make of the recent claim by the atheist Richard Dawkins that the existence of God is itself a scientific question? If you accept the idea that God intervenes in the physical world, don't there have to be physical mechanisms for that to happen? Therefore, doesn't this become a question for science?

Well, Dawkins loves to play village atheist. He's such a rationalist that the God that he's debunking is not one that most of the people I study would recognize. I mean, is there some great big person up there who made the universe out of dirt? Probably not.

Are you saying that part of the problem here is the notion of a personal God? Has that become an old-fashioned view of religion?

I'm not so sure of that. I think the sense of actual contact with God is one that many people have experienced. But I guess it's a question of what kind of God one has in mind.

So when you think about the God that you believe in, how would you describe that God?

Well, I've learned from the texts I work on that there really aren't words to describe God. You spoke earlier about a transcendent reality. I think it's certainly true that these are not just fictions that we arbitrarily invent.

Certainly many people talk about God as an ineffable presence. But if you try to explain what transcendence is, can you put that into words and explain what it means?

People have put it into words, but the words are usually metaphors or poems or hymns. Even the word "God" is a metaphor, or "the son of God," or "Father." They're all simply images for some other order of reality.

I own two of Pagels' books. I respect her scholarship greatly, but she seems to have missed a very large point: Dawkins (and Harris) are aiming for exactly the sort of god that is most dangerous to believe in, and the one that the overwhelming majority of anti-scientific anti-gay bigots cling to. Dawkins doesn't put the intelligentsia in his sights because they are not the ones whose stance against science has led to the current stem cell veto, and the battles over teaching sound biology. These Christian academics instead resort to, *gasp*, reasonable and long discourses.

She mentioned Dawkins as "village atheist," and this same term was reserved for him by Novak in his recent "Lonely Atheists of the Global Village." Novak is no dummy, and I commented a month ago that I was looking forward to reading this. In fact, I enjoyed reading this article, and then a couple more, especially his response to Heather McDonald's article in TAS in November. The exchange was typical of the sort of dialectic that doesn't make newspaper headlines and can't seem to find its way into a split-screen on FauxNews. It was complex and engaging to someone who honestly wants to learn.

Some Christians have already commented on Novak's new article, but without in-depth analysis. I agree with both he and Pagels on some of their criticisms regarding the shallow treatments given god(s) by Dawkins and Harris, as I've said previously, but Novak, especially, seems to dismiss Dennett very lightly, which I find telling. Those who try to lump Dennett in with Dawkins and Harris are those who haven't read the books. His critiques are philosophical and scientific in nature, not polemical, and not directed at any one particular religion.

There is a tension between the god of the philosophers and the god of the layman, and I think it has always been there. When I say that I'm an atheist, for example, I don't mean towards an abstract concept of "the grounding of existence" or "the nexus of causality" or "the first cause". While the "tri-omni" god is beyond my capacity to believe or findreasonable, these rather abstruse theological ideas I constantly engage my faculties in contemplation of -- I am a freethinker, after all. While I'm an atheist towards Yahweh, and Zeus, and Thor...etc., and while I think there are adequate responses to many philosophical arguments for theism, I find some of them lacking, especially with respect to cosmology and those along moral lines (not that I find the religious alternatives on the latter subject any more coherent). There are a lot of atheists who completely disregard philosophical arguments for a god's existence, and think that the Todd Friels of the world represent the best of intellectual Christianity. That's unfortunate.

I agree completely with PZ and Larry Moran that atheists and scientists must continue to criticize superstition and fantastical thinking in order to preserve scientific knowledge in our culture. If we muzzled our "angry" and "militant" voices, then the angry, militant fundamentalist Christians and Jews and Muslims would gladly step into the void. They would love nothing more. And I agree with them that appeasement has not worked. These people believe any ground-giving to science is "compromise," punishable by brimstone. But the question I want to ask is whether we should consider religious liberals and moderates our friends, and refrain from insulting them, as PZ thoughtlessly does to Ken Miller in that latest response.

The sorts of people that we need Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris for are the Falwells of our culture: the unthinking lynch-mobs whose readiness to rapture lauds them (they're showing 'great faith!') in ignoring the perils facing our grandchildren. The sorts of people who use deceit and fraud and millions of dollars to erode our civil liberties into their vision of theocracy and oppose sound science education because their small brains can't encompass the theologians' alternatives, or Gould's NOMA.

I also agree with Elaine Pagels and Michael Novak -- we cannot paint religion with such a broad brush as to attack all forms of religiosity and call names and hold to the old, insulting phraseologies ("reality-based community" and "I live by reason" are tacit insults). We must remind ourselves that there are voices of reason in the religious community, no matter how silly we feel some of their views are. And the Pagels of the world are those we atheists and we scientists need to sit down and have more discussion with. If that happened, there would be a great deal more respect on each side of the fence.

While Pagels (and intellectuals like her) are focused on getting the fundies to grow their brains a little to encompass the more sophisticated aspects of theology, and PZ et al on getting the fundies to stop their anti-scientific crusades, perhaps they could realize that 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend'. Perhaps more honest discussion between the "evangelical", "uppity", "angry" and "militant" atheists and liberal/moderate Christians would yield a rich reward in finding the assistance we can afford each other in reaching mutual goals.

I want to "frame" science and atheism together, because that's my perspective. But I want to hear every possible (logical) framing as well -- I also want to hear and have heard Elaine Pagels' view of evolution from a theologian's perspective. Am I saying I want her teaching biology courses? Of course not. I want her views heard in the same media mine are, and PZ's, and Dawkins --in the 'sphere, or the MSM. The creationist hordes need to have their stupid false dichotomy (my version of Christianity or atheism) irreparably damaged by the critical words of god-believing theologians. The demagogues like Falwell and Pat "Midas Touch" Robertson hold sway over the sheep precisely because of the false picture they present --that their own views of God are the only/most valid. When more Christians see that the huge majority of scholarly Christians are moderate or liberal in their theological views, and especially towards Genesis (sometimes they find this out with much chagrin), perhaps more credence will be given to evolutionary biology, and this would be a win for "both sides". Or perhaps no change will be affected.

Let's face it: we're both minorities and we're both intellectually-centered. Our common enemy is the anti-intellectual, theocratically-wet-dreaming, rampantly superstitious Christian/Muslim/Jewish right that work tirelessly to render America into Jesus' Iran -- replete with a new "creation-based science" and the conversion of our secular institutions into "godly" ones. They're a huge voter bloc, well-organized and well-funded.

We need all the friends we can make in our "coalition of the unwilling" -- those quite unwilling to participate in theocracy or pseudoscience at our species' own peril.

Why atheists should go to church

Yes, it may surprise you, but even we atheists might just have reason to visit church every once in a while. The reason: free stuff and some decent stimulation. Eternal life isn’t the only thing that’s free! The church has always been in big business. Now it’s time we put it to work for the godless!

1) Scratch paper: that soon-to-be-thrown-away piece of trash you get handed to you when you walk in the door called a church bulletin, it can serve some practical uses, like being folded up and put under the leg of a wobbly table to level it. Who knows how many other odd uses junk like this could have if we really put our minds to it?

2) Free note cards: upon being seated, there will be attendance cards in the pews in front of you and nice little half-pencils that could be used to make out a grocery list or a “to do” list for the coming busy week.

3) Soft-core porn: church provides views of pretty, revealingly dressed young women with parents who don’t seem to mind their college-aged daughters dressing up to become eye-candy for the congregation. Not many of us will let this go unnoticed!

4) Potluck meals: nothing beats potluck Sunday! Show up then and you’ve got a belt-buster meal and the generosity of strangers encouraging you to eat it all. Go on…eat it up; they’ll be offended if you don’t!

5) Canned foods or bags of groceries: poor? Nothing wrong with being the subject of a little charity now and then—at the church’s expense, no less! Who said a church can’t be useful?

6) Bill pay: having hard times? Can’t quite make ends meet? Don’t mind using an organization for strictly financial purposes? Well, then let the church help you out. They may be willing to pay a bill for you, freeing up some money to get cable TV turned back on.

7) A place to send the kids away: church can also be a place to send the kids away on camping trips for a few days so you and the spouse can have some good, old fashioned, conjugal fun. *Of course, you’ll want to do a background check on whoever’s heading up the camp first. The clergy doesn’t always have the best track record when it comes to integrity and young people. It is also good to warn the youngsters not to believe the lies they will be told while they are there.

8) Good horror stories: an unexpected treat! Freddy Krueger doesn’t have a thing on Jesus Christ and his hot-tempered daddy. In the Bible, you can find more stories of unsurpassed cruelty than in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, the Amityville series, and every Friday the 13th movie ever produced. Murder, rape, incest, torture, slavery, cruelty to women and children, witchcraft, angry gods, lighting bolts, natural disasters, plagues, wars, duels, mutilations, crucifixions, more blood than you can shake a stick at, and of course, eternal torment! Freddy Krueger? Jason? The Nightflyer? Puh-leaze!

9) Free stand-up comedy: whereas in a secular comedy club, it would cost you upwards of $20.00 to get in. In the church, the comedy is free, plus you get a read-along script called the bible to stay up with the action yourself. It sure is a riot to hear the funny things these preachers are willing to say from their pulpits! And the comedy doesn’t end there either. Debating people who take this humor seriously is also funny. To see them affirm with a straight face their belief in a Noah’s ark, or that the sun was “stopped” until some Jews won a battle, is hilarious! Yes, churches can provide hours and hours of knee-slapping entertainment!

10) Free bibles: to serve as classical ancient literature, not to mention funny papers and comics.

(JH)

A Review of David Mills' Atheist Universe

A review of David Mills, Atheist Universe: The Thinking Person's Answer to Christian Fundamentalism (Berkeley, CA.: Ulysses Press, 2006).

As an atheist author myself, I'm always curious to read other books written by fellow atheists.

I noticed that Mr. Mills advertises his book on the Secular Web, which, I understand, gets nearly thirty thousand hits every month, and that his book was the top selling atheist book on amazon.com at one time. This is impressive.

However, the number of books sold doesn't always tell us whether a book is a good one, and Mr. Mills acknowledges this (p. 14). The sales of a book may be due to the publisher's (or author's) marketing campaign strategy. One marketing strategy can be found on the back cover of Mr. Mills' book. Clearly some exaggeration is going on there of what this book actually accomplishes. There it's claimed his book "rebuts every argument that claims to `prove' God's existence," and as "a comprehensive primer" to answering religious dogmatists, it "addresses all the historical and scientific questions." This is all fluff and hype, at best. Only the ignorant would walk away from reading this one book by concluding every argument for God's existence was addressed and rebutted. Such misleading language is unbecoming of an author of a book that claims to be a "Thinking Person's Answer to Christian Fundamentalism," or anything else for that matter.

But since Richard Dawkins calls it "an admirable work", and since the late Carl Sagan's son, Dorion, wrote a "Foreword" to it, I thought it probably must be a good book. So I went ahead and bought it.

As I considered buying it I couldn't find any detailed reviews of it from people I knew were knowledgeable. So after reading it I thought I would do people that service, here.

Mr. Mills writes very well in a conversationalist tone, as if the reader were sitting down over a cup of coffee talking with him, for the most part. He also seems to be somewhat well read.

His book is intended for "open-minded readers who are not afraid to learn about the many conflicts and controversies between science and the Christian Bible." It's not intended to convert the "religious right-wingers," who think they belong to the one "true" religion. "Their ears and eyes and minds are closed forever. No amount of science or logic will make any difference to them." Since they know God exists, "anyone who disagrees with them is evil" (p. 21).

I don't like caricaturing people like he does here. Who is an "open minded person," for instance? Maybe there is some sense in which people are open-minded, but he never articulated what that sense is, except to say they are "eager to learn." Are these uncommitted people? Liberal Christians? Those who reject the inerrancy of the Bible? Agnostics? I just don't know. Moreover, which minds "are closed forever?" My mind was a closed mind for over two decades. Now I am an atheist. I suspect no one's mind is "closed forever" as he suggests. Besides, how does he think "open-minded" people got that way in the first place? Like me, some of them were former religious right-wingers. Since there are many people who leave the Christian faith, including himself (pp. 57-58), the question is when it can be said of a Christian that his or her mind is "closed forever?" We never can know.

I write to the Christian. That's who I aim my arguments toward. I figure if I can write to those who are supposedly "closed minded" in ways they can understand and appreciate, then others who are "open-minded" (however understood) will see more force to my arguments, and be better prepared to deal with the arguments of evangelical Christians. There are a lot of books that do nothing but "preach to the choir," on both sides of the fence. Someone has got to try to cross the great divide and try to speak so that those on the other side can see what the atheist universe looks like. But that's not a task Mills is attempting, and that’s okay.

Mills is going to write about “the tough issues.” In so doing, he admits there is nothing in his book that the reader does not already have easy access to in any local library. It’s just that he will bring those scattered bits of information and put it all together to show that “we live in an atheist universe” (p. 21-22). This is another way of saying there is nothing original in his book, which is something that can probably be said of most books. Originality for most books has to do with how the author organizes his material, and how well he expresses himself. Originality also has to do with how well the author researches into a topic. If, for instance, an author summarizes ontological arguments for the existence of God since the time of Anselm, he has produced an original work if he does this more extensively and in a greater depth than others, even if that's all he does.

Mills claims the chapters in his book are "independent and self-contained" ones. That is, there is no real flow to the book. They could just as well be separate essays in a periodical about "Atheist Topics."

Right he is about this. The first chapter is a "fun filled give-and-take" interview, in layman's terms, which claims to cover "almost every aspect of atheism," (p. 22), which it doesn't do. While I very much liked his short answers to some of the interview questions aimed at an atheist, this chapter reflects what we see in the book as a whole. In this chapter we see him dealing with mostly unrelated questions about atheism. Here we see Mills briefly and astutely answering questions about everything from his definition of atheism, to why an atheist would quote the Bible, to why people believe in God, to why believers have the burden of proof, to why he doesn't believe in God, to whether Jesus existed, to whether Jesus arose from the dead, to the existence UFO's, to the Supreme Court ruling on prayer, to whether he is afraid to die, to whether religion encourages moral conduct, to his getting arrested once for protesting a faith healer's "Miracle Crusade," to whether he celebrates Christmas, and what he'd say on Judgment Day if he is wrong, plus many more, all in the space of 39 pages.

As I said, I liked his answers. He has a way of succinctly and memorably coming up with sentences that resonate with the reader. And since he's writing to those who are "open-minded," I cannot overly fault him for the lack of in-depth answers here. It’s only when an author actually tries to write to the “close minded” that his arguments become deeper. This kind of writing requires more effort and study. It requires knowing what people who disagree with you will say in response, and in providing counter-arguments.

For example, in chapter six Mills deals with the impossibility of reconciling the Genesis creation stories with modern science. He doesn't show an awareness that there are actually two creation accounts in Genesis, containing four models of creation. There are at least nine different theories used by Christians to reconcile the creation accounts with science. He deals with just three of these theories, although, I'll grant that he does a fairly good job in dealing with these theories in the short space allotted for this in his book.

At the beginning of chapter seven, Mills claims that even if the reader has only casually read the first six chapters of his book, then he or she has become "somewhat of an expert" on the inspiration and reliability of the Bible. He goes on to claim that the reader of his book up until this point is not only better informed than most Christians about such things, but that he or she is "more knowledgeable than 90 per cent of the professional clergy in America (p. 156). Well, having been a preacher I can emphatically deny that what he wrote in the first six chapters does what he claims it does for the reader. There isn't any single book out there which will make the casual reader more knowledgeable than 90 percent of the clergy on anything.

When it comes to chapter eight, on the "Myth of Hell", the same things can be said. There are at least four conceptions of hell and many variations within evangelical thinkers, and Mills shows little evidence he understands these differences. His focus is mainly on why God should punish sinners after they die, and concludes quite reasonably that there is no good reason for God to do so. He neglected to deal seriously with the Christian argument that retribution is a good reason for punishment, which is the notion that punishment is what a criminal deserves, and something for which C.S. Lewis has argued. Besides, many Christians argue that Hell isn't a punishment for sin so much as it's finally giving sinners what they want. Furthermore, the reason Christians believe in some kind of hell after we die is because they believe the Bible is God's word, and the Bible says there is a hell. The reason why Christians believe the Bible is because they believe Jesus arose from the dead, a belief which Mills cannot effectively deal with in one page (p. 38), or two (p. 164).

Included in the "Myth of Hell" chapter, Mills offers a very brief critique of the substitutionary atonement theory, and he does a fairly good job of this (pp. 180-182). However, there are up to four major evangelical Christian atonement theories, not the least of which is Richard Swinburne's relationship theory. Mr. Mills doesn’t show how one could effectively argue against them.

I'll have no comment on why he inserted chapters on Internet porn, and on whether America was founded upon Christian principles. I'm not sure why these two studies are so important to include in a book on atheism, when he doesn't deal seriously with the problem of evil, divine hiddenness, religious diversity, and several other more worthy topics.

The main strength of his book is with the scientific basis for the evolution of life on this planet without the need for an explanation in God. No wonder Richard Dawkins and Dorion Sagan recommend it. It's because Mills is at his best when it comes to science and the origins of the universe. Whether or not you need to read Mills' book will depend entirely on how much of this literature you've read. I myself found what he wrote to be very good in this area.

If this book merely contained the chapters that dealt with the science of origins (chapters 2,3,4,5, and 11), this would be a good book. Because of these chapters it is definitely worth the cost. Mills speaks best in the area of science, not theology, and not philosophy.

When is comes to theology he misunderstands what Christian thinkers are supposed to be doing. In chapter eleven on "Intelligent Design," for instance, I find Mills rhetorically mischaracterizes ID theorists as a "cult" simply because they reject some traditional literal Christian understandings of the Genesis accounts. When it comes to a literal interpretation of the Bible, the literal interpretation is always going to be the correct one according to the particular genre of the passage in its wider context as understood by the original readers of the text. A literal interpretation of the book of Revelation, for instance, would mean we should to take it as it's intended to be taken, and that means taking it as apocalyptic literature. Christian ID theorists can further claim their interpretation of Genesis is the literal one that the true author behind the human authors of the Bible intended.

When it comes to philosophy Mills isn't any better. Mills doesn't understand some aspects of the Kalam Cosmological Argument of William Lane Craig, such that what he writes in opposition to it has only a modicum of merit. Mills uses an example reminiscent of Zeno's paradoxes (p. 237) which is supposed to show why Craig's "mathematical infinities" are "empirically ridiculous." What Mills fails to understand is that Craig distinguished between "Actual" and "Potential" infinites, although, in Mr. Mills defense, Dr. Nicholas Everitt thinks such a distinction is a bogus one, and I agree. Dr. Craig’s thought experiments about traversing actual infinites are to show that one cannot count to infinity, nor can one have an actually infinite set of books, nor can there be an actual infinite number of events stretching into the past. And it's not "special pleading" to say these rules don't apply to God since according to Christian theology God is not matter-in-motion, but a spirit. That being said, Mills does offer some good questions in opposition to Craig, such as asking what it means for God to be outside of time prior to creation, and raising the question of whether quantum mechanics "flatly contradicted" the first premise of the Kalam argument.

Again, Mr. Mills’ science is very good. However, I think he draws some conclusions from science that may not be warranted, a typical problem for scientifically minded people. Mills thinks the law of the conservation of mass-energy leads us to only "one conclusion." Since mass-energy is neither created nor destroyed, but only changed from one form to another, and because no experiment has ever invalidated this law "under any circumstances," therefore "our universe of mass-energy, in one form or another, always existed."(pp. 76, 232-233). The problem here is that there is no reason why the laws of physics, including the law of the conservation of mass-energy, apply to what I describe as the VOID ("before the Planck era"), prior to the existence of anything at all. Besides, the law of conservation of mass-energy says nothing to a Christian about whether a creator God exists, since if he exists, God would be the one to create this law in the first place, along with the stuff of the universe. If God created the universe, then he also created this law at the same time he created the universe.

I don't see why scientists think science can show us why this universe exists. Many scientific minded atheists fail to understand what the philosophy of science from Thomas Kuhn, Michael Polanyi, Frederick Suppe and Ian Barbour have all shown us. There are no uninterpreted facts. Complete objectivity is a myth. All data are theory-laden. There is a reciprocity between scientific cold hard evidence and presuppositions, assumptions and biases; all of which I call "control beliefs." Control beliefs, control how we view the evidence, especially when it comes to metaphysical and religious beliefs. That's why I'm not sure science can solve the religious questions. They must be dealt with historically, theologically and philosophically. Science plays a role, no doubt, but only as a part of the whole cumulative case against religious beliefs. Even at that, scientifically minded atheists don't seem to be able to articulate exactly why science is, in Sagan's book subtitle, "a candle in the dark." It's not just because of scientific experiments. It's because of the scientific method behind them, which is based upon a control belief that defines us as modern people. It's known as "Methodological Naturalism." We assume a natural cause for any unexplained event. This modern bias does more to undermine religious belief than any experiment does.

At least Sam Harris honestly acknowledges "no one knows how or why the universe came into being. It is not clear that we can even speak coherently about the creation of the universe, given that such an event can be conceived only with reference to time, and here we are talking about the birth of space-time itself. Any intellectually honest person will admit that he does not know why the universe exists." - Letter to a Christian Nation (New York: Knopf, 2006), pp. 73-74.

I especially liked three chapters in Mills' book very much. I liked the author's description of how the solar system developed and how he concluded this is what "we would expect to observe if the solar system formed naturally" (pp. 87-104), his various and rigorous supports for evolution (pp. 105-135), and the fact that "Selective Observation" is a perceptual error that believers use to count answers to prayer as evidence for God, but fail to count unanswered prayers as evidence against the existence of God. (pp. 158-169). These three chapters form the best parts of the book. They are well worth reading.

There are some good arguments in the rest of the chapters, but because they are a tad brief, they distract from the greatness of the best chapters.

In the end, no single book can contain all of the arguments on behalf of atheism and against religion in general, or Christianity in specific. The more you want to know about these issues the more you’ll just have to read different books. I think The Atheist Universe is a great compliment to my own book which deals with the theological and philosophical problems with Christianity. Taken together our books demolish Christianity, although there will be plenty of Christians who will still disagree.

The Atheist Universe is a good book. It just does not live up to the exaggerated claims made about it, that's all.

David, I don't know if or when you plan on revising your book, but from reading it I know you still have a lot more to say, and I hope you say it.

I hope we are able to meet someday. We have a lot in common. We can learn from each other.