timeimmortal

Oh. My. Goodness. The irony here is just too delicious:

A GROUP of glamour lesbians who believe the world was created by an alien civilisation 25,000 years ago have criticised the Catholic Church for being out of touch.

The representatives of the Gay Raelian society yesterday staged a demonstration outside Parliament House to protest the Pope’s arrival for World Youth Day next week.

Best. Opening. Lines. Ever.

I’m not a convert to Catholicism, so I don’t get deluged with emails urging me to revert to the “true”, “Biblical” faith that I abandoned by becoming Catholic. So in that way, I can’t relate to what Mark Shea is talking about in this article.

But in the web forums I post to, I am unapologetic and open concerning my Catholicism, and I find that on a cycle almost as predictable as the cycle of atheistic commentators here at Time Immortal, I am periodically deluged by well-meaning, if misinformed, fundamentalists urging me to abandon the false, man-made teachings of Rome in favour of true, “Biblical” Christianity and the inerrant, preserved Word of God that is the King James Version of the Bible.

And in such matters, I take Mark Shea’s response as my own:

Almost every other day, it seems, I will open my e-mail and find something like this specimen (culled from my “deleted” file):

Dear Mark, just came from your Web site and have some questions. It sounds like you were a “Protestant” before becoming a Catholic? I don’t know which church you were in but I have to question whether you were ever taught the Word of God there? If you had been in a church which taught the truth concerning Baptism according to the Word of GOD and not the “traditions of men” you would have learned that not only does baptism NOT save nor “grant justification” but it is ONLY for those who ARE BORN-AGAIN by the SPIRIT of GOD by placing their faith in the LORD JESUS CHRIST! It is to be symbolic of the new birth ALREADY ACCOMPLISHED by GOD as Romans 6 clearly teaches! PLEASE READ the Gospel of John and pray asking GOD to show you HIS TRUTH — HE LOVES THE WORLD and DESIRES TO SAVE the LOST — which we all are apart from the New Birth which IS FREELY offered to ALL! Please read and be saved! I will be praying for you in JESUS Name. Carolyn

You have to wonder what is going through the minds of people who write such stuff. What do they think they are accomplishing?

One is terribly tempted to reply: “The Word of God? What’s that? Never heard of such a thing. Is that, like, the Bible? We used to read something called a ‘Bible,’ I think, at our old Church. But that was an awfully long time ago.

“Boy, thanks for setting me straight. I have never ever ever heard before that Jesus Christ loves me and desires to save the lost with His free gift of grace! I always thought that I had to perform magical rituals to make God love me. But now that you have so thoughtfully set me straight, I see clearly that when that big black book we used to read in my old church-that-never-taught-me-the-Bible says ‘Baptism now saves you’ (1 Pet 3:21) what it means is ‘Baptism does not save you.’

“And thanks also for explaining that when Romans 6 says, ‘All of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death,’ and ‘We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life,’ this has absolutely nothing whatever to do with Baptism. I really appreciate your setting me straight on that as well.

“And finally, thanks for making me see that all that stuff in John 3 about being born again of water and the Spirit really means water and the Spirit are complete opposites.

“Golly. It is so good to finally — after all these years — have somebody who really teaches the Word of God clue me in. Who would have thought that all those years of studying . . . what’s that big black book called again? Ah yes! ‘The Bible.’ Anyway, who would have thought that all those years of studying the Bible could have left me so totally ignorant of what Scripture really means? Thanks ever so much for enlightening me.”

Yes, kind of facetious and tongue-in-cheek. But sometimes, that’s all one can do to respond to the misguidedly overzealous persons one encounters on this big, wide internet.

One of the things that constantly floors me is that in the Sacrament of the Eucharist, one arguably stands at the holiest place in all of Catholicism, even if one is just visiting one’s local parish church.

That is because the Eucharist is Christ Himself, of course; there can be no holier place than to stand before the Lord. And we must approach such a reality with humility — the only fitting response by which a lowly, and then sinful, creation should ever hope to approach his or her creator.

Another wave of atheists seems to be upon me; while I can’t quite set my watch by them, at least I can be assured that there will be periodic sources of content not related to doings on any other blog save this one, which I appreciate.

In this case, the amusingly-handled Aspentroll writes in with a few thoughts on this article.

“Atheism will endure, as it has for many ages now. But it will never dominate a free people, and in due course gives way to the spiritual. Falsehood must necessarily give way to truth in the end, or at least to a less severe falsehood.”

The word “atheism” above could be replaced by the word “Religion” or “Christianity” and the rest of the quote would be just as true.

Atheists believe that the Bible is a huge falsehood and to pattern your life on such a nebulous writing is in most cases dangerous. You cannot govern a country using the laws of the bible which seems to be what some “fundies” want. We would all be up in arms if Sharia Law was allowed in the US, because it is archaic and discriminatory against women and free thought.

Atheism, agnosticism and free thought is the only check and balance we have to keep overly zealous delusional people from taking over and spoiling what is a normal modern way of life.

Did the reader note the tacit suggestion that religious people are necessarily delusional? The footnote to this more recent article seems relevant to mention here.

A good first question I might ask is: what checks and balances exist to keep overly zealous atheists from taking over and spoiling what is a normal, modern way of life that, in the West at least (though it perhaps does not always realize it), benefits greatly from reserves of Christian moral capital built up over the centuries? History has demonstrated that those states which have made atheism an explicit policy of the state have inexorably become brutal and bloody-minded, and several examples of the trend persist to this day.

The Mark Shea article I cited previously addresses this point rather directly: it is within human nature to desire to believe, and when force of will fails to ensure that the populace does not stray back toward the spiritual, force of arms is a necessary recourse of the atheistic state. It might be easy to laugh this off as fallacy, but one observes that in the explicitly atheistic regimes in places such as the Soviet Union, Burma, China, and North Korea (an incomplete list of examples, but sufficient for our purposes) did have something of a penchant for murderously cracking down on spiritual movements and religions within their borders. Certain exceptions to the trend exist, of course, but only in those cases where the religion(s) in question — the Orthodox Church in Russia, the “Catholic” Church in China — has allowed itself to be co-opted by the state.

One possible objection is that the generally secular regimes in many Western nations do not actively persecute the religious faithful in their midst. While the statement about persecution is up for debate, it is generally true that secular Western states do not, at least, murderously persecute their religious citizens. But then, even in various Scandinavian nations, the secularism itself is not explicit state policy, and most of those states still acknowledge that there is a Christian aspect to their origins.

As to the quote of mine that Apentroll cites in opening his message, it should be observed that his attempt to gainsay it, in the first sentence of his response to me, really amounts to little more than saying “I know you are, but what am I?” Although it sounds more reasonable than that on the surface — heck, it even sounds somewhat rational — the statement itself can be revealed to be something of a patent falsehood, on several levels, upon closer examination.

First off, Christianity’s aim — and the aim of true religion (as opposed to the various false teachings one can stumble across from time to time*) — is freedom. And by freedom, I don’t mean being free “from rules of conduct or social constraints” (as the all-too talented authors of the character of Durandal in the Marathon series of games so eloquently word it). I do, however, mean being free “to understand, to imagine, to make metaphor.”

Freethinking, a misnomer if ever there was one, actually ruins freedom. “Freethinkers supposedly want “the pursuit of ideas for their own sake,” but no one pursues ideas simply for their own sake, but in order to understand, to act or to believe, or to have some combination of these. Men pursue ideas so that they may understand the world, and they seek to understand the world to have wisdom. Men desire wisdom in order to live well, and part of living well is to pursue and know the Good, and the Good is that which fulfills human nature and causes it to flourish. The desire to know is a natural desire, one implanted in us as part of our created being; we yearn to know and to enter into the unknown because we yearn for unity with the One Who desires that all things be united in Him. If no religion had ever caused men to live virtuously and flourish, religion would have disappeared ages ago. If no religion had produced saints and cultivated the finest aspects of human nature, very few would adhere themselves to it and even then it would only be the mad and obsessive. There is nothing interesting in rehearsing the catalogue of crimes that religious adherents have committed against each other, since men have always been slaughtering and oppressing one another and they have tended to do more of it when they are less in thrall to their religious tradition than when they are strictly obedient to it. What is remarkable is how much at least some religions have contributed to the civilisation and edification of men, which would hardly seem probable if they were not much more than elaborate exercises in self-deception and nonsense.”

One point, in particular, that can be taken out of the above quotation is that “we yearn to know and to enter into the unknown because we yearn for unity with the One Who desires that all things be united in Him.” It is the result of no accident that science and discovery flourished in the Christian West after ending up misfiring almost everywhere else in the world (historically speaking). As David Warren notes, “[to] those who know some history, the modern sciences emerged in an unambiguously Christian milieu. They flourished, over centuries in the West, as the direct result of the Judaeo-Christian teaching that “God does not contradict Himself.” The whole notion of unalterable physical laws, and thus a universal order that will repay inquiry, is the product of a theological position unique to the West. It is a view that has been glimpsed in other civilizations, but could only be doggedly pursued in this one. Science was stillborn in all other civilizations.”

And the same is true of the wider concept of freedom. Nowhere else in the world, save in a West born out of Christendom, did the concept of human freedom, individual liberty, and human rights genuinely flourish. It did not, certainly, flourish in the Islamic world, nor in the castes of Hinduism in India, nor in any of the places where Buddhism took hold, nor in…any other place, really, save for the West that Christendom birthed. Indeed, the ideas that man should be free and that all men are “equal” is, ultimately, only defensible from within a teleological framework, and then a Christian teleology.

And in the numerous examples one could draw out of the 19th and 20th centuries, one can observe that in those regimes where atheism has, so to speak, become the law of the land, not only has human freedom been impaired and/or outright trampled on, but so too has science, to say nothing of human rights.

Now, I will grant that I stand in agreement with Aspentroll’s objetion to governance by “fundies” — fundamentalism leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Equally, though, I don’t think that society has any right to demand that a politician leave his Christianity at the door when he takes office.

Atheists are welcome to consider the Bible a book of falsehoods; I consider it God’s inerrant, infallible revelation to the world**. Who is to say which of us is right? I will grant that many, many people have a poor understanding of exactly what the Bible teaches, and fundamentalists seem especially prone to this unfortunate reality. But is it genuinely dangerous to pattern one’s life on the core teachings of Scripture? Exactly how terrible a place would the world be to live in if we all actually followed what Christ taught? Exactly how terrible a place would the world be to live in if everyone followed, as a bare minimum, the Ten Commandments and the Beatitudes, and patterned their lives on the concepts articulated therein?

I very much doubt it would be a perfect place to live in…but I’ve no doubt that it would be a much better world. But then, Chesterton had it exactly right when he noted that “the Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult, and left untried.”

I also agree with Aspentroll that it would be horrible if Islamic sharia law became the law of the land, in Canada or anywhere else. I suspect that Aspentroll, however, has temporarily taken leave of reason and erroneously assumes that because some types of religious law are brutal and evil, all forms of religious law must necessarily also be brutal and evil. It’s a rather common logical fallacy among atheists to assert this — Christopher Hitchens is particularly vulnerable to it.

The main problem with the assertion is that a thing may be true even if certain individuals don’t accept it as being true. This is easily understood in the case of the fundamentalist objection to e.g. the theory of evolution and the geological research that has revealed the approximate age of the Earth. Young Earth Creationism insists, passionately, that Earth is a mere 6,000 years old, and most creationists of this bent do not accept as truthful or valid the various discoveries made in the fields of geology, astronomy, and evolutionary biology (among others). That doesn’t mean that the theories and discoveries aren’t true, however.

The same is true in regard to atheistic assertions regarding religions. Aspentroll would hardly be the first atheist to look at, say, the evils perpetrated in the name of Islam and declare that all religions are murderous death cults obsessed with paedophilia and suicide belts. That might come as news to Buddhists, and indeed to most Christians, but not everyone can be counted on to let facts get in the way of good rhetoric, especially if it sells books with provocative titles. And yet, a more reasonable, rational person would notice that there are many critical differences between, say, Islam and Catholicism, visible both by a close analysis of doctrine and by taking an honest, objective look at the actions of the followers of each respective faith on a global scale.

As previously noted, the creature we call a human being is wired to be a believer, and the only real question is what said human being will believe in. We’ve seen this played out through history, and we see its logical consequences played out in that movement which denies this very aspect of human nature: atheism. In individual atheists like Sam Harris or Andre Comte-Sponville, we see the beginnings of post-atheistic spiritualism beginning to creep in. The same trend can be observed in Russia, in the wake of the collapse of an explicitly atheistic regime. It’s regrettable that the spirituality that such people are gravitating towards is, quite often, some new form of paganism (or “new” in that Roger Daltry “same as the old boss” sense of the word), although it is good that people are also finding, or rediscovering, the Church.

There seems to be a rather pernicious lie going around that religion and freedom are antithetical to one another; this is not completely true. It is true in regard to specific religions (e.g. Islam), but not in regard to the Christian truth. Indeed, it was a particularly Christian sense of telos that informed the very constraints, concepts, and ideals which enabled the West to value freedom. By contrast, the application of atheistic ideals as the formative values of a state has tended to be the true antithesis of freedom, of science, and of human rights.

And in perhaps the most amusingly ironic twist, I just realized that if I re-worded Aspentroll’s message to me and flipped the references to religion and atheism in every instance (and substituted the title of any New Atheist tract for “the bible”), the message itself would not only be a lot more truthful, but also a lot more historically defensible.

* this statement said with tongue firmly implanted in cheek

I suppose it was inevitable, with the popularity of Stuff White People Like, that someone would start up a website devoted to Stuff Catholics Like.

Oh, this is good cheese, O Reader.

To wit:

I. Rome

…

1) Go to a Papal audience and get stuff blessed. If you let your friends know about your trip in advance you will find yourself needing an extra suitcase to carry all the rosaries and medals that they want you to get blessed by the Pope. Extra points if you can get past the ninja nuns and actually shake the Pope’s hand.

2) Visit St. Peter’s and stay for Mass. How could you possibly go to Rome and not see St. Peter’s?

3) Stick your hand in the Mouth of Truth and scream. This isn’t really a Catholic thing but Gregory Peck might have been Catholic so it counts.

4) Go to the bone church. This isn’t something everyone does but you get a lot of mileage out of the stories you can tell.

5) Visit the Vatican Museums. Every. Last. Room.

6) Visit one of the catacombs. Ask if it’s where they filmed the Indiana Jones movie.

7) Stop by the Opus Dei headquarters and ask to see the albino monk.

8 ) Throw coins in the Trevi Fountain. See number 3.

9) Visit the church of San Clemente and ask to see the basement.

10) Get your picture taken with a Swiss Guard. Extra points if he cuts off your head with his hauberk. Maybe they’ll stick it in a box like the Church did with St. Catherine’s.

Or how about:

VI. Babies

…

However, if a Catholic family has 5, 6, 7 or more babies, it is seen as a crime against nature and a sin against humanity. In fact, countless Catholic mothers, who have 5 or more babies, have often received flabbergasted looks after having responded “yes” to the question “Are all these yours?” This encounter normally occurs in public places such as supermarkets, department stores, malls, or any other place that makes it difficult for the mother to keep track of every behavioral happening of her babies. The question “Are all these yours?” commonly follows when another person sees a Catholic mother who, with two shopping carts spilling over with groceries, without makeup on, and hair is tied in a pony tail, has one baby in her arms, another in the shopping cart, a third gripped tightly in one hand, the fourth baby clinging dearly to his mother’s dress, while the fifth baby has just knocked an entire shelf of canned peas onto the floor, which by chance startled the baby in the mother’s arms causing him or her to wail like a banshee. She will unjustly be labeled a ‘bad mother’ by outsiders for not having the grace of being born with 5 arms.

Some good stuff at the site — who says there is no humour in Catholicism? Go thou and read it all!

Update: I might have suspected that the Curt Jester had something to do with this.

James McGrath writes in to provide some alternative commentary on the issue of Battlestar Galactica’s Theology, which I discussed in this article.

I thought I’d draw attention to some of the posts on my blog about BSG and theology (I’m a religion professor who is also a fan), such as :

http://exploringourmatrix.blogspot.com/2008/05/gospel- according-to-gaius.html

http://exploringourmatrix.blogspot.com/2008/04/bartlestar- theodica.html

I’d welcome your comments!

While I could say more for Professor McGrath’s opinions regarding Bart Ehrman (my own views on the “problem” of evil and theodicy are well known; I don’t see the existence of evil and/or suffering in the world as any kind of challenge to the Christian conception of God, and regard those who use said issue(s) as an objection to Religion as being, shall we say, rather deluded themselves), some of his views on BSG and the theology of Gaius Baltar’s new religious movement (itself a derivation of the Cylon religion) are rather interesting.

For example, McGrath remarks thusly concerning the first episode of the latest, and final, season of BSG:

In the BSG Season 4 premiere, entitled “He That Believeth In Me“, a more relevant verse would seem to be “Whosoever seeks to save his life will lose it…” Gaius Baltar moves from an unwilling Messiah disgusted by the gaudy Hindu-style flashing votive lights surrounding his picture, to one who seems genuinely willing to give up his life to save another. The “one true God” has yet to be explored fully as a concept on the show, but in the mean time, interesting questions continue to be asked about how we live our lives and what matters most to us.

I observed to my wife, while we were watching the latest episode of the series to date, that Baltar seems unable to avoid some manner of beating in each and every episode he has been in this season. I’d have to go over all the episodes again (we have them on tape), but I can’t recall yet a time when Baltar has not been pistol-whipped, choked, or punched during the course of an episode since the fleet departed the Ionian Nebula

And in each and every case, Baltar’s personal sufferings have been intimately relevant to the narrative of the show. Indeed, through examples as varied as the knife attack on Baltar in the head to Galen Tyrol attempting to choke him, the series has demonstrated in almost every episode this season that the God whom Baltar is preaching effects His plan for humanity in part through human suffering.
Read the rest of this entry »

BeliefNet has an interview with Ron Moore, the mastermind behind the new iteration of Battlestar Galactica that I have been watching with avid interest. The topic of discussion is the Theology of the show, which is both a timely topic (given the intensifying religious debate that is shaping up as the show continues through its fourth, and last, broadcast season) and also a necessary discussion.

I’ve been trying to ferret out, for months, exactly where Moore is attempting to take the religion in the show, but one consistent thought I’ve had in all that time is that I really do want to applaud how he has handled the issue in its entirety. Outside of Babylon 5, very few science fiction series have ever really handled the issue of religion in any serious fashion (Deep Space Nine, which Moore also worked on, is the one exception I can think of), and indeed too much of science fiction seems predicated on the assumption that religion will go the way of the dodo by the time humanity well and truly takes to the stars.

I guess that’s why it’s called “fiction,” but still.

Some viewers say the show stereotypes fundamentalist Christians as kind of robotic, while others are saying, “This is great…pagans are finally the good guys!”

The parallels between the Cylon beliefs and fundamentalist Christian beliefs, yeah, there are certain aspects of it there, but there’s also the roots of the drama, also contains things such as Al Qaeda’s use of its religious practice to justify what it does. That’s part of who the Cylons are too, they aren’t just really stalking horses for fundamentalist Christianity.

There also seem to be elements of Eastern religions in the show with Leoben Conoy, another Cylon, talking about consciousness and reincarnation. Does each of the different models of Cylons represent a different religious point of view?

I think that’s true. Part of the idea of Leobon was to separate it from easy stereotypes of Christian beliefs. There wasn’t really a hierarchical church, there wasn’t an easy notion of Heaven and Hell. Leoben was starting to talk about things that were more Buddhist — consciousness, Enlightenment and reincarnation. I thought it was interesting to marry those notions to the idea of one deity.

As to Moore’s own religious views:

Do your own religious views shape the story lines?

I’m an Irish Catholic, not practicing. It probably just reflects my interest in my movement from Catholicism to atheism to agnosticism to interest in Eastern religions. I think the show is a reflection of my acknowledgement that faith and Religion are a part of the human experience, even if I’m not quite clear on exactly what it all means and what I truly believe. The most direct reflection of me in the show is this idea that when the Cylons became self-aware, when they became sentient, when they became people, they began to ask themselves the existential questions: “Why am I here? What is this all about? Is this all that I am? Is there something more?”

My view is that that’s fundamental to a thinking person. And that inevitably leads you to questions of faith and religion and “what will happen to me when I die?”

…

There’s been a lot of chatter on the message boards about the spiritual character of the show, with many people saying they enjoy it.

It’s fun to do a science-fiction series that isn’t just dealing with secular matters. I’m really glad people are responding to it.

I might not agree with Ron Moore’s personal religious convictions, but I applaud him heartily for putting things in this way. The show sets up very nicely many religious discussions, and even in the last couple of episodes there is a great example that one could draw upon.

In looking at Gaius Baltar’s newfound zeal for preaching monotheism amongst the Colonial population, one can draw certain parallels between that monotheism and Christianity. And yet, at the core of the monotheistic sentiments is a doctrine which is actually a logical inversion of Christianity. For whereas Baltar teaches that…

God only loves that which is perfect and he loves you. He loves you because you are perfect. You are perfect. Just as you are.

…Christianity teaches that God loves us in spite of our imperfections, that God — through Jesus — perfects that which he loves.

Things like this motivate a lot of thought, I find, and I think that’s something to be applauded in a television show, especially a science fiction show. Religion is an inescapable part of the human condition, and always has been; it is folly to think, like Gene Roddenberry did, that religion will disappear in due time. It won’t, and more importantly will continue to serve as an impetus for human action and reason for all ages yet to come.

Update: Welcome, WebElf readers!

Does the Roman Catholic Church teaches that faith alone in Christ is all that is necessary for salvation?

Does the Roman Catholic Church not teach that according to Roman Catholicism, man cannot be saved by faith alone in Christ alone?

Do they not teach that a Christian must rely on faith plus “meritorious works” in order to be saved?

Is it essential to the Roman Catholic doctrine of salvation that one participate in the Seven Sacraments, which are: Baptism, Confirmation, the Eucharist, Penance [also called Reconciliation], Annointing of the Sick, Holy Orders, and Matrimony?

These will be the first four questions answered in what I hope will become an ongoing series. In truth, I’d prefer to answer only the first three at this time, but there’s a problem with that. Catholic doctrine is not a series of atomic statements, but rather a unified body of teachings that build off of, play into, and complement and enhance each other. In other words, and more plainly put, it would be impossible to discuss what the Church teaches about salvation without discussing, at least in brief, the various Sacraments of the Church.

But before we begin, let’s look at the short answers to each of the above questions:

1. If you mean: do Catholics acknowledge sola fides as it is commonly articulated? No.
2. If you mean: do Catholics reject sola fide as it is commonly articulated? Yes.
3. No. A more appropriate term would simply be “merit.”
4. No, not all of those seven.

Now, let’s unpack those answers a little bit, shall we?

Read the rest of this entry »

That’s what it looks like, at least — Cardinal John Henry Newman, the English convert to Catholicism who established himself as a prominent theologian and inspired a wave of Catholic youth groups across North America, has been approved for beatification by the Vatican.

Very cool.

Joel responded fairly quickly to my last post about him. He feels that I’ve missed the point. Interestingly, he doesn’t exactly do a great job of citing an example, preferring instead to approach it thusly:

He’s decided that I think all religions are the same.

Which is not what I said.

My point was that they are all equally crazy. Medicated or not, violent or not, oppressive or not. They are all people who hear voices from dogs. The difference in how far you must stretch believability between Scientology and Christianity is negligible.

(Actually, I think scientology is much more believable)*

I’m not sure how you can deny that.

Equally, O Reader, it could be argued that the statment above isn’t defensible either. It has not been conclusively established that belonging any Religion is a form of being “crazy.” That remains a matter of opinion (obviously not one which I, nor around 5 billion people world-wide — if not more — share).

As to the matter of stretching believeability, there’s still a gulf of difference between believing in Xenu and levels of mental proficiency, and believing in God and Jesus. With all due respect to L. Ron Hubbard, at least a few historical records (from different authors, even!) concerning Jesus’ life. Scientologist fiction might be interesting, to some, but it’s far harder to swallow and accept as factual than are the Gospels.

And the Gospels are better corroborated by external historical sources.

Before we get too far ahead of ourselves, let’s refresh our memories with what Joel said about schizophrenia:

For example, lets suppose I’m schitzophrenic. And I believe that the dog is talking to me telepathically. Would you see any real difference between me and the other schitzophrenic that believes the dog is talking to him vocally?

Now, Joel is kind of trying to have his cake and eat it too; he asserts that I am incorrect in saying that he thinks all religions are the same. And yet, what is he saying above? From here, at least, his statement would seem to be saying that in his view, there isn’t any tangible difference between the two schizophrenics; they are “the same” for all intents and purposes. Except that they aren’t, as he later assures us.

Which is it?

And as much as Joel chides me for missing his point, he has missed mine:

He thinks that, since I don’t believe in god, then thats a religion as well since, of course, it has the word ‘god’ in it.

That is similar to saying I have a significant belief that there is not a gorilla in my closet.

Now, I am not currently looking in my closet, so I suppose there MIGHT be a gorilla in there.

But I have zero reason to believe there is.

Thats one of the tragic mistakes most theists make. They believe that there’s a decision to be made. Do you believe in god or not, in short.

In my experience, it tends to be atheists who adopt the “either/or” stance; most theists I know tend to first approach things from a “both/and” perspective (for example: the dialogue between science and Religion). Now, I admit that I’m the victim of a somewhat biased sample; most of my religious friends are Catholics. And I further admit that where belief in God is concerned, it’s hard to take a “both/and” stance — if one doesn’t believe in God, one can hardly be said to believe in God, can one?

Still, in my experience, it is atheists who tend to prefer dichotomy.

To be fair, I have talked about atheism — being just one more entrant on the spectrum of beliefs — from an angle that suggests decision-making. And I do think that there is a decision to be made. But it is not whether to believe, because belief is an unavoidable part of the human condition. We are all believers, even if we aren’t all members of religions according to the dictionary definition of the word.

The question is what we believe. We may not believe in God, and we may not believe in many gods. We may not believe that the Bible, the Koran, or the Torah contain the answers we are seeking after. But we may believe that science holds those answers. We may believe in reason. We may believe in rationalism. The point is: we all worship something, whether a transcendent divinity or our own wallet and/or genitals.

That is why truly, genuinely non-believing atheism (if it exists) can only, at most, be a temporary fad in the transition between Christianity and whatever belief system follows it down the way, whether that’s the same or another form of Christianity or some sort of paganism. Humanity can’t not believe; it’s in the very fabric of our being to worship. As I’ve noted, the only question is what we will worship. Will we worship what is true, or merely a simulacrum of the truth?

And here’s the rub: we all believe in things that “the evidence” cannot explain. Joel’s atheism is no grounded in empirical realities than is my Catholicism, and I do hope that Joel can appreciate that just because something is not “seen” does not mean that it is not real; it may mean that we lack the means to see it. The point, then, is that atheism is as much a “faith” — in the sense of being a philosophical conjecture and a belief in a metaphysical reality (or, perhaps more correctly, the lack thereof) that cannot be defended from evidence. It’s not necessarily accurate to call it a religion, but neither is it wholly inaccurate to do so.

Consider:

I don’t actively think there isn’t a gorilla in my closet. It would be INSANE to think that I had to make a choice about whether or not there’s a big old beastie in my closet. The default position is for me to not believe in such a thing in such a place. Assuming that my bedroom isn’t part of the gorilla migratory pattern.

No one would say that one of my characteristics is that I believe my closet to be gorilla-free.

This is technically true. Equally, though, the fact that there is no gorilla in Joel’s closet does not mean that there are no gorillas. And the presence or absence, in Joel’s closet, of something we have the capability to detect with one or more of our five senses says nothing at all about the presence or absence of something we lack the capability to detect in the same area.

Nor, would anyone say, as a another example, that a significant trait I hold is that I don’t believe squirrels talk, or that my mother walks through walls, or that men rise from the dead.

These are, I think we can agree, aberrations from the norm. Without evidence to say that these aberrations are occuring, the default position is that they aren’t happening. But given that this is the default, the significant aspect is choosing to believe in them.

The norm is to not.

Of course, you can’t have these conversations with many theists because they believe there is evidence of god. No one has shown me any.

There is one word, I think, that applies to Joel’s beliefs here: Positivism. I’ve written about that many, many times, and see no need to re-hash prior content here. Suffice to say that if Joel’s atheism is based primarily on a lack of empirical evidence for faith, his atheism is weak indeed, and possessed of a fundamental illogic.

And as I have noted above, the fact that we don’t have evidence for a thing does not necessarily mean that the thing in question does not exist; equally, we may lack the ability to perceive or otherwise detect the thing. Certainly that was true of atoms until recently, and most stellar phenomena as well. Over time, we have developed methods of seeing those things, but other things yet remain unobserved: gravitational waves, for example, or the Higgs boson. Or, for that matter, extraterrestrial life. Perhaps, in time, we will observe these things as well. Then again, perhaps we won’t ever observe them directly.

The existence of a thing is independent of whether we have seen it. If there are aliens on some planet way out there in the depths of space, we don’t know it. But if we (and they) die out before either of us ever has the chance to meet the other, that does not mean that we both did not exist, does it?

Yes, there isn’t any hard evidence for the existence of God or Jesus — not anymore, at least, since Jesus hasn’t taken an Earthly stroll in nearly two thousand years. But then, if there were evidence, it wouldn’t be “faith,” would it?

They only thing they ever do is show examples of things we can’t explain…yet.

But they don’t like that last word.

These closing sentences of his illustrate, yet again, why Joel’s refusal to distinguish between different religions and/or denominations thereof hampers his ability to argue effectively. Methinks that he is too used to debating Evangelicals — personally, I take no issue with the word “yet” (as in, say, “Christ has not returned…yet,” perhaps?). It is, after all, just a word to describe a possible future.

Joel also seems to assume, erroneously, that a dichotomy exists between the sciences and religion, and seems to assume that given sufficient time, science will enable us to completely do away with religion. Obviously, I don’t share that viewpoint; there is no inherent contradition between religion and science, and in fact both are pathways of revelation. And as science continues to discover new and exciting things, I do not find my faith weakend — if anything, it is strenghtened as I become better able to comprehend the magnificence of the works that God has wrought.

We cannot know everything about how God works in the Universe, but it does serve to note that there is nothing to say that God, having built the Universe in a certain way, cannot effect his plans for the Universe and those living in it via the natural processes that are at work within creation. There is nothing to say that God didn’t forge humanity out of successive generations of progressively more complex lifeforms. Nor is there anything that says that God, having devised gravity, could not have used gravity to fabricate the stars and planets that now pepper the cosmos.

Atheists seem to expect that everything about God necessarily has to involve whiz-bangs and lightshows. It isn’t necessarily always so.

* perhaps this statement tells us all we need to know?

Most of the media coverage of the Pope’s visit to the U.S. seems to focus on his addressing the sexual abuse scandals that have rocked the Church. And I for one am not going to complain that Pope Benedict XVI has chosen to address this issue as thoroughly as he has — it needed to be done, and Benedict himself is a great person to have in charge of handling the situation.

The folks at GetReligion, however, point out that the Pope also took time to speak out against the dangers of secularism and relativism — this, it seems, has been woefully underreported.

Pope Benedict XVI visited the White House on Wednesday, his 81st birthday, and praised America as a nation where strong religious belief can coexist with secular society.

But he later warned, in a speech to American bishops, of the “subtle influence of secularism” that can co-opt religious people and lead even Catholics to accept abortion, divorce and co-habitation outside of marriage.

“Is it consistent to profess our beliefs in church on Sunday and then during the week to promote business practices or medical procedures contrary to those beliefs?” he asked in a lengthy address to the bishops. “Is it consistent for practicing Catholics to ignore or exploit the poor and the marginalized, to promote sexual behavior contrary to Catholic moral teaching or to adopt positions that contradict the right to life of every human being from conception to natural death?”

“Any tendency to treat Religion as a private matter must be resisted,” he said.

What’s interesting is that the Pope approaches the issue from two directions; he confronts secularism directly and opposes it directly, but he also confronts and opposes the creeping influence of secularism — including the spread of moral relativism — that afflicts members of the body of the Church. He reminds us all that if one yokes oneself to the Catholic Church, one necessarily accepts Catholic teaching in matters pertaining to, among many other things, sex, marriage and abortion. And he then follows that up with an admonishment to the non-religious: religion cannot kept out of view.

I’ve always been offended by those who insist that religion is merely a private matter, because…well…because it isn’t. After all, if there is any truth to the religion I am a member of (Catholicism, natch), then what is at stake is not merely some temporary thing, but an immortal soul that resides within my being. If in fact we Catholics have it right, then it can only follow that the most important thing in our lives, above all other considerations (including family and friends, jobs and leisure activities) is our faith.

Simply put, we can no more be expected to set that aside than we can be expected to set aside our skin colour, because our religion is even more important than the biological realities at work in our bodies. Especially for Catholics — who experience Christ both directly, in the Eucharist, and in the context of community — religion cannot be relegated to the realm of “the private.”

And to suggest that it should be thusly relegated is laughable.

Joel writes in again with some additional commentary. While I usually excerpt messages in their entirety, I’m going to respond to this one in a more “interlinear” fashion, as it covers several points in brief, and I feel these would be best responded to “in the moment.”

Here’s sort of my point.

I’m not a car guy. If you tell me technical things about your car, I probably don’t care and don’t udnerstand. Mileage, sure, but cam shafts? Nope.

This is a fair enough standpoint for as far as it goes, but there are certain limitations to it as well. I too, O Reader, am not a “car guy” — as long as the car gets up and runs, I’m not all that interested in the technical details of what is under the hood. On the flip side, I am a “computer guy” — I’m obsessive about the ins and outs of computers. I am also a “camera guy” — I’m obsessive about the inner workings of all manner of digital imaging devices, cameras first and foremost. I love Photography.

The astute Reader will note that, in keeping with my interests and areas of expertise, I often discuss computers and cameras on this site. The Reader will also note that I never discuss cars on this site. That is because I do not wish to be caught up in an obvious attempt to exceed my “academic authority”; I don’t want to discuss things I have not made at least some attempt to become familiar with at a level above “basic.”

Reciprocally, if I enter into a discussion about something on another person’s website, I take pains to become familiar with the issue at hand at a higher level than “passing familiarity” — I try to learn at least a few “technical things” before I begin to comment on a subject.

It would, I think, be more than a little boorish and arrogant to enter into a higher-level discussion at The Car Blog without first taking pains to become somewhat familiar with the inner workings of an automobile, or at least the ins and outs of the auto industry. Similarly, it is more than a little boorish and arrogant to enter into a higher-level discussion of religion on a blog that is open about its religious foundation if one is not prepared to discuss, in detail, the distinctions between different Religions or denominations thereof. Especially when the discussion is, in part, about the validity of a religious conjecture and its application to everyday life.

Bitching about Fords because one’s Chevolet blew a gasket is meaningless, silly, and irrational. Bitching about religion without bothering to engage or acknowledge the substantial differences in “technical details” between religions or religious denominations is likewise meaningless, silly, and irrational.

That Joel is opting for an approach which I have just finished describing as meaningless, silly, and irrational is somewhat disappointing, especially because Joel himself seems to be a nice enough guy as far as correspondence goes. One hates to speak in generalities, but this sort of presumptive arrogance — the assumption that one can freely and openly pronounce all manner of things about religion while at the same time refusing to engage such technical details as, say, the differences between the Mu’tazilah and Ash’ari schools of Islamic theology — is something one has come to expect from atheists.

In some contexts, I might care about the distinctions between Mormons and Catholics and so on. For example, if we were debating how best to alter relationships between governments and various christian denominations, the centralized power of the catholic church versus the more decentralized authority of protestants (if I’m getting that
right) might be relevant.

But in the context of this discussion (who proseletyzes and who doesn’t) the various denominations are virtually identical. You all believe in a supernatural sky-god and his divine son. Whether christ rose bodily or only in spirit are not particularly relevant (as an
example).

This is, O Reader, exactly what I’m getting at — the second paragraph, in particular, drips with all manner of presumptive arrogance that describes absolutely nothing about the reality of the situation.

To his credit, Joel does note a key difference between most flavours of Protestantism and Catholicism — Catholic teaching flows through a centralized office of doctrine, whereas Protestant teaching tends not to have any such central doctrinal body.

But any credibility that suggestion might have leant to his argument is all but destroyed by the paragraph following it (to quote XKCD: “while the author’s wildly swerving train of thought did at one point flirt with coherence, this brief encounter was more likely a chance event…”).

It would be enough to simply laugh off as inconsequential any argument that attempts to framework an objection to religion by beginning with the observation that “the various denominations are virtually identical” (despite the fact that in my previous response to Joel, I pointed out how seemingly minor differences between some Christian denominations are, in fact, rather large gulfs of difference when considered in light of what Christ actually taught. Add in even a brief consideration of religious denominations from other, non-Christian religions, and the absurdity of Joel’s claim becomes readily apparent.

As to specific beliefs, as I have pointed out, these are the most important thing at issue in the discussion of who proselytizes, because virtually every Western philosophy proselytizes (including, as I have noted, atheism). Several Eastern philosophies do likewise. And when everyone proselytizes, the issue of who does it becomes less relevant than the issue of what each evangelist is offering — in terms of philosophy, teaching, and doctrine — to those he or she is attempting to convert.

I don’t believe in a “sky god,” for example; I believe in a God who transcends the physical limitations of our empirical Universe. Nor do I believe God is wholly “invisible” any more than I am invisible. That I do not always see God no more means He is invisible than it means that I am invisible because some farmer in Africa cannot see me with his own eyes. If I cannot see God, it is because I lack the capacity to see Him, not because He cannot be seen.

And here Joel again demonstrates the fundamental illogic at the center of his argument, for already he has made an assumption that is incorrect. Were I a Hindu attempting to win a friend over to my faith, I would not regale him or her with tales of a solitary sky god. Hinduism is a polytheistic faith (or, perhaps more accurately, a henotheistic faith); my discussion with my friend would center primarily on the supremacy of Ishvara, but would also verge into discussions of Brahma and Vishnu, and perhaps even into talk of Shiva, the destroyer. We would talk about Dharma, Samsara, Karma, and Moshka.

And even if we only talked about Ishvara and his primacy as God, above other deities, we would still not be talking about a “sky god,” because Ishvara is, alternatively, interpreted as being without a fixed realm of any kind, or as incorporating all creation into his realm (Hinduism, then, also flirts with pantheism and panentheism at times).

Moreover, were a Muslim attempting to evangelize me, he or she would run into a major brick wall by insisting that God is unary and solitary (that is, arguing that there is no God but Allah, and that the Christian Trinity is actually a form of polytheism — that’s something which is specifically stated in the Koran). Muslims say “God is One” while Christians say “God is One but also Three.” It’s not the same thing, despite the fact that from the outside it all looks like monotheism.

To say nothing of the fact that were I not a Christian, my evangelism would have absolutely nothing to do with Christ or the notion that He died and rose from the dead, except perhaps in the sense that I would be attempting to refute that claim.

To briefly summarize, then: we’re not a third of the way through Joel’s one sentence, and already there are gaping holes in the logic.

Continuing on, Joel is right: I do believe in God’s divine Son, Christ Jesus, who died and rose again. Joel seems to dismiss as a minor issue the debate as to whether Christ rose literally or only in spirit, and in so doing betrays his ignorance yet again. For as St. Paul reminds us, if Christ did not literally rise from the grave then the Christian faith is meaningless, and Christians are fools who are to be most pitied. Victory over death in spirit alone is no victory at all.

And were I, a Catholic, attempting to evangelize someone, the literal nature of Christ’s resurrection would be a very big issue indeed, if in fact it came up as a subject for debate. One cannot deny the bodily resurrection of Christ and be a Christian…not, that is, if one is honest with oneself.

*shrug* again, my basic point was, and remains, Christians run the U.S., as a rule, if there’s a crossing of church and state, it involves some flavor of christianity. My atheism may hold all religions in much the same light (at least in that I believe they are
all equally delusional), but its Christianity that most often causes problems here. On a global scale, certainly, in this timeframe, radical Islam is a much bigger threat.

As I have before, O Reader, I observe that in a nation where over 70% of the population is Christian, it should come as no surprise that Christians should have a high level of participation in an elected, ostensibly “representative” government. That’s not to say that Christians “run” America, however…at least, not in the sinister, “implication of looming Christian theocracy” sense of the term that Joel’s statement would seem to be implying.

If one went to Sweden and complained that white people “run Sweden,” or that one’s objection to white people in government was in any way based on the fact that the majority of Swedish politicians were white, one would rightly be derided as a laughingstock. Sweden is a Caucasian nation — it is really only to be expected that its government would have a lot of white people in it.

Similarly, it is meaningless to complain about the quantity of Christians in government in a nation where most people are Christian, unless one is openly advocating that only persons of a secular bent should be allowed to govern a nation. In a nation like the U.S., which prides itself upon its representative democracy, such a notion is unthinkable.

I do, though, believe that all religions should be treated equally. In the U.S., for example, I don’t believe that schools should have Hannukah celebrations but not Xmas ones, etc.

That’s about as open-minded as anyone could be asked to be; personally, I do see value in people learning about the traditions of other religions. I would agree that all religions should be treated equally, for the most part — I disagree, obviously, that all religions are equal. And for the record, I include atheism in the previous sentence when I say “religion,” because it is as much a metaphysical conjecture as is my own Catholicism.

Sorry if this email seems random, its something of an unfortunate and scattered day here.

I am genuinely sorry to hear that. I will pray that Joel will find the strength to move past the pitfalls and confusion of today, and I encourage the good Reader to do the same.

Joel writes in again (twice!) to follow up on my previous response to him. I observe that the host for the communication was at atc.army.mil — the Aberdeen Test Center. Very interesting; the last atheist-in-uniform I tangled with was a fellow who went by the handle of Cartese. His arguments were that theists should, at best, be declared mentally unfit to vote/drive/own property…in his worst moments, he advocated for the open slaughter of the religious.

Joel seems substantially more moderate, which is good. Still, it has been my observation that debates with atheists can very quickly become ugly affairs; time will tell if this discussion goes down that all-too-familiar road.

At any rate, here is the first of two responses Joel sent in:

I appreciate your response to my email.

Apparently, given your reply, I didn’t make something clear.

I can only intelligently speak about atheism in the U.S.. Were I to speak about atheism in China or the Middle East, I would surely be a fool since I have never lived in eithr region, nor spoken with any atheists from those areas. Hence my points 1 & 2.

I suspect that atheists in various areas focus their efforts on the dominant Religion. But, again, I can only speak about atheism in the U.S.

Next, I consider Mormons and jehovah’s witnesses to be christian sects. They believe in Jesus and the Bible. Christian. I’m not sure there’s any meaningful distinctions here. God, Jesus, Bible.

Hence point #3.

I don’t know actual statistics, however if you know that Muslims proseletyze more than Christians, I’ll concede the point.

If I am myopic, I am at least honest about it. I believed, perhaps incorrectly, that my email made it clear I was only speaking about the U.S.. If that wasn’t clear, then I apologize.

Joel is quite welcome, of course, O Reader. And in turn, both for remaining reasonable into the second round and for the chance to discuss topics that I haven’t directly engaged in a while, I’d like to offer my thanks in turn to Joel. This is good…this is really good.

When religion is at issue, I think it is — or should be — necessary for any would-be commentator to keep firmly in mind the global picture, because religion transcends regional boundaries; Catholicism is represented on every continent and in almost every country on Earth, for example. So, for the most part, is Islam. So, for the most part, is atheism, and one would hope that it would be apparent that philosophical conjectures of every flavour are far larger things than the raw limits of a national boundary.

To put it another way, consider: if one based one’s opinions about American Christians solely on one’s observations of Christians in the state of…say…Utah, one would be left with an inaccurate picture of Christianity in America. Similarly, if one based one’s opinions about global Christianity solely on one’s experience of American Christians, one would be left with an inaccurate picture of Christ’s followers world-wide. For example, one would probably have a very inaccurate picture of the expanse and teachings of Catholicism, which is the majority Christian religion world-wide and yet a minority in the U.S.

I submit that the same is true of atheism. Therefore, limiting one’s consideration and disucssion to the peculiarities of a philosophical conjecture such as atheism to those found only in one small region of the globe is indeed rather myopic, and perhaps even borders on willful ignorance. The atheism of Sam Harris (an American) is related to, but still very different from, the atheism of Richard Dawkins (a Briton). And to be perfectly fair, the atheism of Richard Dawkins is related to, but still very different from, the atheism of Michael Onfray (a Frenchman).

However, what is most interesting about what Joel has said, O Reader, is his demonstrated ignorance where even American Christianity is concerned, for there is a great deal more to being Christian than simply “God, Jesus, Bible.” While the various Christian demoninations disagree sharply on different points of doctrine and the source of justification in Christ (i.e. faith vs. Grace), anyone who professes to be a Christian must, at minimum, acknowledge the following:

We believe (I believe) in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, and born of the Father before all ages. (God of God) light of light, true God of true God. Begotten not made, consubstantial to the Father, by whom all things were made. Who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven. And was incarnate of the Holy Ghost and of the Virgin Mary and was made man; was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate, suffered and was buried; and the third day rose again according to the Scriptures. And ascended into heaven, sits at the right hand of the Father, and shall come again with glory to judge the living and the dead, of whose Kingdom there shall be no end. And (I believe) in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of life, who proceeds from the Father (and the Son), who together with the Father and the Son is to be adored and glorified, who spoke by the Prophets. And one holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. We confess (I confess) one baptism for the remission of sins. And we look for (I look for) the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. Amen.

That is the Nicene Creed, promulgated in 381 as a definitive articulation of what Christian faith is, at its very minimum. It is all well and good that Joel personally considers Jehovahs and Mormons to be “Christian sects,” but the truth is that they are not particularly Christian, despite the invocation of Christ. Specifically, Jehovahs deny the trinitarian unity of God and Jesus; they believe Jesus is a wholly separate entity from God. They further believe that Jesus also appeared, in the recorded text of the Bible, as the archangel Michael and as Abaddon (c.f Revelation 9:11).

Some might dismiss this as a minor difference, but since Jesus — in his own words — claimed “oneness” with God the Father, the fact that Jehovahs do not acknowledge the Trinity renders them effectively non-Christian, despite the fact that they recognize Christ*.

Mormons likewise dispute the Nicene Creed’s concept of the Trinity, and so render themselves non-Christian in the most honest and basic sense of the term. Obviously, there are a lot of disputes around this, and obviously most mainstream Christians recognize at least some kinship of faith between themselves and both Jehovahs and Mormons. At the end of the day, though, Jesus and his apostles both spoke plainly enough (c.f. John 10:30, 20:28) about the unity that existed between God the Father and God the Son.

As to who proselytizes the most, I don’t have concrete numbers. But then, I’m not sure that the raw numbers are the important factor for consideration; most Western (and some Eastern) religions, faiths, and philosophical conjectures have an evangelical aspect to them…even atheism. The question, then, is not simply about who proselytizes, but about what religion the one who proselytizes follows — i.e. what religion is being “sold” (to use a crude term for it).

When an atheist attempts to evangelize, he or she is obviously not “selling” the same “stuff” as a Christian would be during an evangelical enterprise. And neither of them are “selling” the same “stuff” as a Muslim would be during an act of evangelism. The act of evangelism is not the important consideration; the “stuff” being “sold” is. What is each person “selling” by their efforts? What are the tenets of their faith? These are the more important questions to ask, because not all faiths are the same. Atheism is not the same as Christianity, which in turn is not the same as Islam, which in turn is very different from Judaism or Hinduism.

It is not enough to simply consider that something is being preached, then; what must be considered is what is being preached. What is being preached by Christian evangelists? What is being preached by atheist evangelists? What is being preached by Muslim evangelists? Which denominations of each faith or philosophy are the most active in terms of their evangelical efforts?

Setting aside pseudo-Christian sects like Jehovahs and Mormons, I can’t put my finger on exactly which strain of American Christianity is most active in its evangelical efforts (my mind tends to drift toward thinking it’s either the Baptists or the non-denominational “free” Evangelicals, who are rooted primarily in Pentecostal teachings).

As a Catholic, I obviously have my disagreements with both Baptist and Pentecostal theology, and certainly I disagree with members of those churches who…say…oppose the teaching of the theory of evolution in schools. On the other hand, I agree strongly with them when they stand up in favour of the traditional definition of marriage, or when they oppose embryonic stem cell research.

And I have to say: though I disagree with them over the evolution issue, their proselytism is, on the whole, generally not a bad thing. Most of them are earnestly convinced, as I am, that Christ is the Way, the Truth, and the Light, who died and rose again for the salvation of all mankind from their sins. Take a look again at the Nicene Creed (above), O Reader: that’s what a Christian evangelist is attempting to bring into the lives of others. It’s not a bad thing to bring at all; it is not antithetical to reason, it is not dark or sinister — indeed, it is joyous news. A genuine Christian evangelist brings first and foremost this message to the unbeliever: “You are loved.”

Atheists the world over are, of course, welcome to dispute specific tenets of the various Christian faiths, and are encouraged to dispute the silly opposition some Christians have to the teaching of the theory of evolution in science classes. Indeed, atheists are even welcome to dispute the central thrust of the Christian evangelical message — they are welcome to deny that some transcendental divinity loves them, personally, as an individual.

But there is no inherent threat or danger in the Christian evangelical message; there is no subversion of reason, no need to abandon all other things that one knows, and no need to sacrifice one’s freedom (except perhaps in the sense that, if one’s conversion is true and motivates a change of heart, one might give up certain aspects of one’s lifestyle that one comes to realize are immoral — but even this is not a negative thing). And even when Christian evangelists focus on negatives — for example, the impending danger of eternal damnation — one cannot say that their hearts are not still in a good place; I wish Hell upon no man, nor on any woman, and no earnest Christian ever should. One can hardly fault Christians, then, for wanting to try and convince as many people as they can to turn away from something so horrible, even if it means that their evangelical rhetoric is not the most…palatable.

Now, I’ll grant that some Christian evangelists (a minority, thankfully) go astray from the above — Jack Chick fans are an easy example here. That is a pity, and such men and women do Christianity no credit. But it has to be observed, on the other hand, that most mainstream Christians look at such men and women and shake their heads; many also vocally denounce the errors such men and women make (I certainly do, as the long-time Reader will doubtless know).

What of Muslim evangelism? What is being “sold” therein? While moderate strains of Islam do exist, it has to be noted that the majority of Islamic schools, lobby groups, and evangelical ministries seem to be funded by either the Iranians (on the Shia side) or the Saudi Arabians (on the Sunni side). That in turn means that a goodly number of Muslim evangelical efforts are “selling” a more radicalized form of Islam that, while it may not be as vocal in opposing the teaching of the theory of evolution in schools, harbours substantially darker things beneath its surface — misogyny, violent rhetoric, the infidel/non-infidel hostile dichotomy, and the dar-al-Islam/dar-al-Harb conflict model view of the world. In many parts of the world, and America is not exempt, Muslim imams call for a new global caliphate and the subversion of all world governments under one Islamic order.

There is, then, something of an inherent threat in the main form of Muslim evangelism in the world today. And the peculiar myopia of atheism, as I have noted previously, is that atheists prefer to heap their opposition and condemnations upon benign Christianity while simultaneously ignoring (to the point of actively denying, as Joel did in his first letter, that other religions even engage in proseltyism to any meaningful extent) more malignant religions in their midst. I cannot be certain why this is; fear of seeming racist, perhaps? The only atheistic author I can think of who has devoted any meaningful amount of attention to the threat of Islam is Christopher Hitchens, and even then he goes somewhat astray by attempting to framework his objections to Christianity based on the transgressions and violence of Islam.

I got that Joel was speaking primarily about America in his first e-mail, and perhaps I was not clear enough in turn: that he limited himself thusly was one of problems. The other, of course, is that he seems to be sorely misinformed about both religious trends in America and in the world, and that he is woefully ignorant about what Christian