Declining Christianity, a Moral Force for Good
While this blog has been writing for a decade about the decline of Christianity in the West, the broader media only this week awoke to discuss it widely. That is because a new poll now shows a majority of the U.S. is no longer made up of church members.
Of course the question is raised, "What does this mean for our country?" Is it a terrible thing that affiliation with religious organizations is declining? Or, is it a good thing?
The plain and simple fact is, it is a good thing. It is a positive development. It may save our society. The moral principles of much of Christianity are simply inferior to those of much of secularism. One always has to be careful not to over generalize because there are many kinds of Christianity and secularism.
There are many kinds of governments as well. There have been governments run by secular parties which have been bad. Russia comes to mind. But most of the prosperous counties today are secular and do not repress religion. England, Australia, Scandinavia and others are good examples. These countries do not try to sabotage health care for all and make an honest effort to prevent incomes from going dramatically unequal. The U. S., with its preoccupation with religion falls below those standards.
Our preoccupation with Christianity also holds back equal opportunities for women. When reproductive rights are withheld opportunities for women diminish. Less Christianity will help women.
If nothing else, now is a good time to experiment. We've had a couple of hundred years of too much Christianity. Let's try a while with much less and see how it works out.
With the lies of President Trump fresh in our minds and the full throated endorsement of him by a large segment of the faith the time is ripe for a reevaluation. That seems to be taking place. As people leave organized religion they are finding a higher moral plateau.
As researched and reported by Barak Lurie in his book, "Atheism Kills", the case for atheism being a moral force for good is exactly the opposite. Witness the mass murders, genocide and brutality of Mao, Stalin, Voltaire, Castro, etc. Compare that to the Crusades and Inquisition and you have find the sheer weight of deaths resulting from atheism to vastly surpass even the combined deaths arguably resulting from all of Christianity and Judaism.
ReplyDeleteAtheism contributes nothing to society. It is the bedrock of brutal dictators. It is the starting point for elimination of people who disagree with you, who oppose you, who live their lives with a belief in God.
Today's discordant and violent society is not being run by the Vatican, from Jerusalem or from Salt Lake City. It is communist, socialist and intolerant. In a phrase, it is the Democrat Party and its filthy mix of special interests.
Matt-- "..atheism being a moral force for good is exactly the opposite."
ReplyDeleteYou have a right to your opinion, even if ill informed. More accurate is to compare like countries during similar periods. The link article does this and Christianity comes off poorly.
History and math are my facts. My opinions are irrelevant in this simple piece of arithmetic. Atheists have killed more people in the past 20 years than Christianity has done since 33 AD.
DeleteYou must understand the difference between a "fact' and a "conclusion"?
DeleteThe argument is futile. History has shown us time and time again that a dogmatic approach to any political ideology (and yes, religion is a political ideology) will lead to totalitarianism.
Matt "...Christianity has done since 33 AD."
ReplyDeleteThis is fun. You have made the subjective decision we will start at 33 AD. God killed millions, all the people in the world except Noah and family. If that happened today it would be nine billion. God wouldn't care. Atheists don't have a terrible god like Christians.
So, you are on a level with God. God, who created everything, is supposed to keep everyone alive, in riches, forever, in your world. You should be a televangelist.
DeleteOnly God has the power of mortal life and death. Mankind is not God. We are His creation, not the other way around.
Matt "We are His creation, not the other way around."
DeleteYou have the right to your opinion on that. Evidence shows you have it exactly wrong. It is the opposite. Humans today have many different gods. In the past they had others no longer in use. This tells us humans create these gods. The gods do not create we humans.
Matt--Then there was the chant by Christian soldiers during the Vietnam War, "Kill a Communist for Christ." Maybe that wasn't covered in your book. I wonder what atheists chanted. Maybe, "I don't have any god to kill for. So I'll just kill because I'm a bad person." Not a catchy as the Christian chant, maybe it worked.
ReplyDeleteSupposedly created in the image of a god, humankind is really good at killing. Some say we even managed to execute the son of a god.
ReplyDeleteStalin had a Christian upbringing, even attended Seminary. Voltaire and Castro were educated by Jesuits. Hitler was raised Catholic, was critical of atheism, yet he provided a very competitive body count for the record. We kill our own kind. That’s our mark.
Theists are frightened by the dangers of a world without a god. Atheists are frightened by the dangers of a world with a god. Our dark nature is laid bare when we argue over which asshole is at the top of the murder leaderboard.
“... the Democrat Party and its filthy mix of special interests”, that’s not helpful Matt. In some parts that talk would get your hole kicked. Around here it’s just mindless blather.
The Christian faith is based on the following events which even a staunch atheist will acknowledge took place considering the following:
ReplyDelete1) The birth of Jesus around 2000 years ago still celebrated annually across the globe by billions of people and prophesied around 600 years prior to the event.
2) His well documented teachings (which didn't allow for the killing of anyone) and miracles performed and witnessed by thousands of people ,hence his huge following.
3)The crucifixion of Jesus by the Romans on the insistence of the Jewish pharisees also a well documented event.
4) The resurrection of Jesus which after weighing the probabilities, must have taken place considering that his body disappeared from the grave whilst guarded by the Romans plus the fact that the pharisees would have let no stone ,let alone grave stone, unturned to find his body. I live on a farm in South Africa with a reasonable set of tracking skills and believe that tracking the "stolen/removed "as some have suggested )body of Jesus ,would have been relatively easy since the transportation of his body would have left fresh tracks on the gravel roads eliminating the stolen body theory.
I will gladly entertain any ancient scriptures/books contradicting those of the biblical historians
Etineene May 15th---Thank you for reading my blog and for taking the time to comment.
Delete"...even a staunch atheist will acknowledge..." I acknowledge there are billions of people around the world who celebrate Easter. I know of not one stanch atheist, and I know more than you I'm willing to bet, who believes the accounts (they differ) in the Bible are historical facts. Not one of those who wrote the Bible claims to have seen personally the events described in the Bible. Further, there are accounts of Roman government killing political trouble makers but the practice was to leave the corpses hanging in the poles for all the see. The idea was seeing the corpses would be a deterrent to others. Birds ate the flesh of the corpses. The tale of a "resurrection" was a common one. Other religions passed down from tales about other gods who were killed by enemies and came back to life.
Thanks again for commenting.