Burnt Orange Report:
"Nothing makes me sicker to my freaking stomach than hearing 'Christian' politicians bellyaching about how much Christians are persecuted in the US. You want to see persecution of Christians? Why not swing by East Timor where Henry Kissinger facilitated and supported the liquidation of 200,000 Christians by the Muslim government of Indonesia. Then take a stop in the Sudan where George W. Bush has been content to occasionally lob rhetoric at the government he should be dropping bombs on for slaughtering 2 million Christians. Maybe make a stop in to visit our 'ally' Saudi Arabia, whose leader the President holds hands with as the man continues to enforce laws that make it a crime to be a Christian. You could swing by the People's Republic of China after that, where the same government whose premier gets to cool his heels in Crawford breaks up house churches that seek to escape the stifling politics of official state churches. Not being able to threaten some underclassman cadet into joining your prayer group is hardly persecution."
I almost went and pasted this into a thread over at theatreport...
someone had posted an audition notice looking for born again actors, and damn near started a religious war (well, what do you call the agnostics/atheists vs. the christians?)...
and of course one of our conservative theatre folks started jabbering about liberals being intolerant of Christians...
what is it?
love the sinner and hate the sin?
well I love me some Christians...
it's just Christianity I ain't fond of...
like Islam, or Zoroastrianism, or Voodoo,
or any of that nonsense...
they all limit human potential by allowing folks to rely on/blame something else
for the state of the world, their actions, limits on their freedom, etc...
Just started reading Paine's The Age of Reason last night...
he's always been my favorite founding father, but I've actually never read this...
and it is pretty brilliant...
gonna go up there with Hume's Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion in my list of essential humanist works...
look, believe what you want...
really...
but don't expect me not to think it's silly.
What there is is what there is.
I'm smart enough to know I don't know all the whats what is,
but I don't feel that postulating imaginary whats helps the situation at all...
just accept we don't know it all...
what could be more awe inspiring than accepting mystery?
Thursday, June 23, 2005
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3 comments:
I totally agree with you: people can believe any crazy crap they want. What gets me, though, is how Christians think it's just fine to go around and "witness" or tell their "testimony," all aimed at persuading people to adopt their philosophy, but freak out when atheists do the opposite, running around telling people why they shouldn't be religious. I mean, are they thin skinned, or what? I figure, once they open their mouths in polite company about their sacred beliefs, they've got to be ready to face some philosophical opposition. It's only fair.
it's just hard to even discuss sometimes...
I sent someone a link to Bertrand Russell's "What is an Agnostic?" because they were asking about morals in the absence of God, and they replied well, he looked at what religious people do, not what they believe...
if yr beliefs don't inform yr actions why are you wasting headspace believing anything?
Most folks have their minds made up...and if they hear something that would make them think otherwise, well, it's actually easier for them to pretend they heard something else...
still I'm ready to go door to door preaching secular humanism, agnosticism, or anything similar as soon as we get funding...
seriously,
what do we do to get prosletyzing for the humanist/agnostic point of view really moving?
I just don't even know what to do.
I do know that we need to start laying the ground for: The Enlightment II - Electric Boogaloo - The Wrath of Khan.
At this point I really do fear the pendulum has swung so far to one side that you and I are on the wrong side (short term) and the best we can do is get through it and provide some kind of inspiration for those who fight the future...
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