Three Points About the Dark Ages

Christians, and especially the Catholic Church, love to whitewash their own failings by creating a revisionist history in which they are the heroes - the shining exemplars of virtue and wisdom, the light by which mankind emerges from the darkness, and the source of all good things that we have today.  Even in the 20th century, the church has (fairly successfully) created a revisionist version of their relationships with the fascist regimes of Hitler and Mussolini, covering up the fact that many church officials actively cooperated with and supported the fascists, and that the pope stood by in silence while the atrocities raged in Europe.  While there is plenty of documented evidence to dispute their modern revisionism, things become less clear-cut in the more distant past, when (at least in Europe) the church had more complete control over what could be published, and what should be suppressed.  The most obvious example of this historical revisionism is the New Testament, which is still believed by millions of Christians, despite modern historical and scientific advances that make it increasingly untenable.  And in between the modern era and the ancient, things were no different.  Christians also want to paint a revisionist picture of the time when the church dominated virtually every aspect of life and culture in Europe - the period that has come to be known as the Dark Ages.

On Human Rights

I have been thinking about the topic of human rights lately.  Victor Reppert has raised the issue recently, first by pointing out an article in The Guardian from 2010 titled Do human rights exist? that denies the existence of human rights, as if to note the absurdity of the idea, and then writing a short post of his own that continues the same line of reasoning.  Victor says:

We might ask what evidence there is that rights exist. You have a feeling that everyone ought to be treated equally. Isn't that just your social conditioning? If you grew up in India, and were raised to believe that people occupy different positions in the caste system based on the Law of Karma, wouldn't you think that the idea that everyone was created (or evolved?) equal was slightly ridiculous? - Reppert

It is clear, at least in Victor's case, that this is intended as a kind of satire.  Victor is slaying two dragons with one arrow.  First, he seems to be ridiculing the notion that human rights might not exist, since they are self-evident by his way of thinking, even if some cultures may not agree.  Second, if you can accept that argument, then you can agree with him that John Loftus' Outsider Test for Faith is faulty as well.  I won't address the merits of Loftus' OTF in this article, but I would like to consider the question of human rights.

Wall of Separation

It seems to be a common trope among religionists that the First Amendment to the US Constitution is designed to keep government out of the affairs of the church, but that in no way should inhibit the church from meddling in the affairs of state.  They say the so-called "wall of separation" is just a myth, mainly due to the unfortunate wording of Thomas Jefferson, in his famous letter to the Danbury Baptists, which has been misunderstood.  In their misguided view, Jefferson was not describing anything like an actual wall that separates two things from one-another, but rather something more akin to a pen that keeps the government within bounds, but places no restrictions on the church.  But that raises the question: If that's what Jefferson meant to say, then why didn't he say that?  One answer that seems to elude them is that Jefferson actually meant what he aid.

The Harm of Same-Sex Marriage

I have often claimed that same-sex marriage does no harm to anyone, and shouldn't be prohibited.  In this video, Jennifer Roback Morse, a Catholic, presents her religious-based views describing the supposed harms of same-sex marriage.

This is yet another case of piety as a cover for bigotry.  There is absolutely no factual, objective information in this presentation.  For the most part, it just appeals to the emotions of fellow bigots.  She makes plenty of assertions about what's right, but doesn't support those assertions with facts and data.  I'll examine her claims and show that it's nothing more than hot air from someone with a religious-based anti-gay agenda.

The Politics of Religious Freedom

Recently, three Republican presidential candidates took the stage at a rally is Des Moines called the National Religious Liberties Conference, targeted toward conservative evangelical voters in advance of the Iowa caucuses.  It was organized and hosted by firebrand pastor Kevin Swanson.  One of the major topics of this conference was the recent Supreme Court Ruling for marriage equality.  But listening to Swanson speak, it was obvious that this was a platform for fear mongering and to spew hatred and stir up sentiment against gays.  The web site for this conference asks these questions:

Pinning Atrocities on Atheism

It seems to be a truism among Christians that the greatest atrocities in history were committed by atheists.  And not only that, but they are a consequence of atheism.  Many, if not most, Christians believe that atheism implies a lack of morality.  Prominent Christians like David Marshall endlessly repeat the assertion that atheism and Soviet-style Communism are essentially equivalent.  Even the crimes of the Nazis are blamed on atheistic beliefs.  These tropes are echoed so often by Christians that most of them are convinced that they're true.  It is interesting to note that they follow the the playbook of the Nazi Propagandists.  As Joseph Goebbels is thought to have said, "If you repeat a lie often enough, people will believe it, and you will even come to believe it yourself."

What's the Deal With New Atheists?

Christians these days are sounding the rallying cry against "new atheists".  They are waging a pitched battle against them, turning everything they say into a grossly distorted straw man, and making them out to be dishonest, hateful, immoral, and even dangerous.  Where does all this antipathy come from?

A few years ago, I decided to enter the fray of discussion with religious believers in an attempt to learn more about their beliefs, and to understand why they believe what they do.  I quickly earned the label of "gnu".  It was a term that I had never heard before, and I wondered what distinguishes a "gnu" from other atheists.  I have been asking that question ever since, but I never got any kind of satisfactory answer from the theists.  But after all this time, and many arguments and discussions, the real answer is evident.

How Do Liberty and Equality Arise?

There is no end to the ridiculous claims made by Christian apologists.  We've heard the argument before that Christianity is responsible for the rise of science, despite the fact that when science was starting to emerge from the shadows of religious orthodoxy in the late middle ages, the church did everything in its power to suppress it.  Now Victor Reppert and some of the cultists at his blog are making the claim that the concepts of freedom and equality for mankind are also products of Christianity.

Mourning the Death of America

I just arrived back home after traveling through the deep south for the past two weeks.  My posts have been sporadic during that time, but I hope to settle back into a more normal schedule in the next few days.

I wanted to comment on my observations on driving through rural countryside of Alabama and Mississippi.  The thing that struck me the most was the prevalence of religious symbols, everywhere you go, everywhere you look.  There were lots of churches, of course.  I think there were more churches than houses.  I saw at least a dozen of them along a single mile of road.  There were signs saying "Jesus loves you".  There were billboards, many of them advertising a church, but more often simply making a statement about the glory of God or the wages of sin.  Some asked me where I want to spend eternity, and some even provided me with a stark multiple-choice answer.  But never did they mention a possibility that some other reality might be true.

Establishment of Religion, Again

Kim Davis, the elected county clerk of Rowan County, Kentucky, refuses to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, in defiance of court orders going all the way up to the US Supreme Court.  She has been jailed for contempt of court.

In her absence, several gay couples have received marriage licenses issued by her deputies, which Davis claims are null and void because they don't bear her signature.  When offered a chance to be released from confinement on the condition that she not interfere with the issuance of licenses, she refused.

Kim Davis calls herself a born-again Christian, and believes that marriage should be between one man and one woman.  She is currently in her fourth marriage.  If Davis' reasoning is correct, perhaps the clerk who issued her fourth marriage license should have refused, on the same grounds used by Davis.

Let Freedom Ring

This 4th of July, Christians are moaning and groaning.  "Our freedom is lost", they cry.  "The constitution has been trampled upon."  As they predict the end of the United States as we know it, and liken the current situation to the fall of Rome, they bellow out the most ominous of warnings:  "Those who are ignorant of history are doomed to repeat it."  How dire their predictions are.  How dismal the future they foresee.

Get a grip, guys.  There is a class of people who now have the right to get married in all states, and the federal government will give full recognition to those marriages.  That's it.  I defy any of you to tell me what right has been taken away from you.  What freedom have you lost, aside from telling these people that they're not allowed to marry?  Please tell me.  I'd really like to know what all this infantile whining is about.

On Liberalism and the Fall of the Empire

As conservatives continue to lament the court decision on same-sex marriage, we hear ever more desperate cries of doom and gloom.  And none are crying louder than Catholic officials who are trying to paint the crumbling of their church as the destruction of America itself.  This article by Fr. Dwight Longnecker was cited by Catholic commenter planks length in my previous post on this topic.

Longnecker plaintively moans:

Hello  America! One of the most severe warnings that has come out to last week’s Supreme Court ruling was that from Justices Roberts and Scalia who observed that the will of the American people had been usurped by a handful of non elected lawyers.

The Myth of the Myth of Separation Between Church and State

It has been fashionable among Christians lately to promote the idea that Jefferson's concept of separation between church and state is really just a myth - that the constitutional prohibition exists only to keep government from interfering with the church, but not to keep churches from being involved in the affairs of government.

That view is espoused in this paper from Tim Greenwood of Tim Greenwood Ministries, from which I have taken a few quotations:

Intelligent Design - Lying for Jesus

Ask any Intelligent Design adherent if ID is creationism, and he will invariably tell you that it isn't.  Discovery Institute says:

Does Discovery Institute favor including the Bible or creationism in science classes or textbooks?

No. Discovery Institute is not a creationist organization, and it does not favor including either creationism or the Bible in biology textbooks or science classes.

Is intelligent design theory the same as creationism?

No. Intelligent design theory is simply an effort to empirically detect whether the "apparent design" in nature acknowledged by virtually all biologists is genuine design (the product of an intelligent cause) or is simply the product of an undirected process such as natural selection acting on random variations.

Of course, the ID adherent is lying.