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  • 3 Sample Non-Complex Reasons to Leave Christianity

    I’ve noticed that there’s an erroneous perception regarding Christianity — people tend to think it’s an intimidating religion, with many theologians and apologists protecting it, and that leaving Christianity is saying that you’re smarter than a great many people — which is not true.  Very smart people can be obviously wrong  — they just tend to be better at rationalizing it, because, whether you are smart or not, you usually don’t want to admit you’re wrong (and this ability to rationalize can, in many cases, make smart people MORE likely to be wrong).

    So you don’t have to be smart to be right; in some cases, being smart can actually blind you even more to how wrong you are. But as a result of thinking they have to be smart to leave, due to the intimidating prowess of some major apologists, many remain Christian, holding to what seem to be extraordinary views of themselves and the world.  They think it would be complicated to leave, and leaders of their religion often seem to set a high bar to dictate when it’s OK and when it isn’t OK to leave Christianity.

    At the same time, the reasons for becoming a Christian are often fairly flimsy.  There’s not very much you have to enter on the back end to become a convert — almost anything will do, in practice — but there’s a very high bar set for leaving Christianity by apologists (to be fair, the high bare is probably also there because, once you admit you’re right about something, it takes a lot more evidence to convince you that you’re right about it…and the more you have invested in being right, the less likely you are to admit you’re wrong). I’d like to provide three reasons, just as examples, that I think are perfectly legitimate reasons to leave Christianity — reasons that don’t require a genius anti-apologist to defend.  Here they are:

    1.  The Miracles In The New Testament Are Too Improbable

    I don’t think you have to do much more than that  — I mean, really.  Out of the apologist’s context, would you believe it?  As Doug Stanhope indicates, no, you probably wouldn’t believe it. [youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uS5DaTIF1a0[/youtube] Most apologists can argue that the miracle is possible.  Some may try to enhance the probability of some of the miracles by the surrounding circumstances.  Some apologists, like William Lane Craig, are fairly good at this.  And they will say that stating a miracle is impossible is not quite right.  That can be a complicated argument, but you really don’t have to go there. You can look at whether or not a miracle is more probable than any alternatives, and leave it at that.  Regardless of your alternative theory — that Jesus used his secret twin brother, that there was a conspiracy afoot to preserve Jesus’s teachings, that the apostles were willing to die (if they actually did) for the lie of Jesus’s resurrection if they believed in his teaching, that Joseph of Arimathea (the secret follower of Jesus who owned the tomb Jesus was buried in supposedly) put Jesus in a tomb that would make it easier for Jesus to escape, that Jesus was not actually dead, that Jesus was misidentified by a stressed out Judas, that it was all a magic trick by Jesus, that the scriptures are so unreliable we really don’t know WHAT happened…etc., etc., etc.  Several of the former are improbable.  But they are less improbable than someone rising from the dead.  The sheer abundance of alternate possibilities here that are more likely than someone rising from the dead, or being born to a virgin, or walking on water, or turning water to wine, and so on — that’s plenty of reason to walk away from the story by itself.

    2. If God Made Me, He Can’t Blame Me

    God made you, your environment, and all existence in most Christian conceptions of him, and yet, somehow, he’s not responsible for what you do.  That doesn’t make sense.  Now, to be sure, the most weighty rebuttal, by a guy named Alvin Plantinga, basically states that God had to make you with free will in order to accomplish the most good — because otherwise you’d just be a robot.  But that doesn’t mean the bad stuff doesn’t happen, and even if God did more bad than good, he is still just as responsible as you are for the bad that happens if he made you.  He’s even responsible for the free will part, because the free will — everything it is made up of and everything that motivates it — is made by him.  If God made you, then all existence is ultimately his fault, not yours; you didn’t ask to be here and had no choice over what your makeup would be.  You’re completely his design, and the limitations of the choices you could make are his design, too.  Saying “free will” doesn’t change any of that. [youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QX7N58df0j0[/youtube]

    3.  If There Were A God, Life Would Be Better

    The common rebuttal to this statement is that God has a plan, and that he knows what’s best, so that you just need to trust him…but wait a second.  Why did you become a Christian?  Was it a promise that your life would turn out better somehow — that you would experience more joy, more peace, more love, more overall satisfaction in life?  If God doesn’t help you in your life and you were promised he would — that’s a perfectly rational reason for you to leave him.  After all, how can the others be so sure that God will plan your life out for the better?  They aren’t you.  Blindly having faith that God will improve your life isn’t necessary.  Even the thought that God has a plan is based on some current-day evidence, and if you can’t find that evidence in your life, then it’s rational to reject the belief that there is a plan.  Makes sense.  If someone has convinced you that there is a God by saying that there has to be a reason for all the beauty and ornate sources of inspiration that we experience in life, it’s perfectly parallel for you to say there must not be a God — at least one who is “good” — because a lot of bad stuff happens, as Stephen Fry pointed out below. [youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-suvkwNYSQo[/youtube]

    And there are more…

    I could, of course, go on.  And I plan to.  But I thought I’d just give you a small sample — the basic gist is to not take apologists’s words for their statements.  Challenge.  Poke and prod.  And try to be consistent — if the reason you came to Christ is flimsy, you’re not really obligated to stick with it.  You don’t have to be a genius.  You can just, say, look at the virgin birth, walk away, and get on with life.  That’s the common sense you probably already use in most places in your life (if someone told you they were a pregnant virgin, would you believe them on a whim?).  It serves you well in other areas…why not use it here?

  • “I’ll Pray For You”: Seven Reasons It Makes Atheists Angry

    “I’ll pray for you,” when spoken by a Christian to an atheist, often makes the atheist angry. Christians usually incite this anger when they use the phrase to indicate that they are going to use God to influence the behavior or thinking of atheists against these atheists’ will. Several Christians, as well as some more peacefully-minded non-Christians, claim this anger is unjustifiable if the atheist states he or she does not believe in God. Christians may build on this claim by stating – or, at least, privately thinking —that this anger is a sign that, deep down, the atheist really DOES believe in God. But does this claim make sense? If atheists really thought prayer was a good and wholesome activity that gave them the ear of the Almighty God, wouldn’t they pray themselves? There are more plausible possibilities, and here are seven of them.

    1: We’re Concerned About Who You’re Talking To

    Try not to take too much offense at this honesty, but the bare fact is that when you say, “I’ll pray for you,” I, as an atheist, don’t believe in God, so I see it as you talking to yourself. As a result, from my viewpoint what you’re telling me is, “I’m going to go talk to myself about you.” This is particularly frustrating when you do this in a discussion on religion, because you’re basically saying that you aren’t going to listen to us anymore, but that instead you’re going to go talk to yourself to restore your version of who atheists are. Such wall-building makes the context of understanding that many atheists are trying to create impossible, resulting in understandable frustration.

    2: It Seems Arrogant

    When you say, “I’ll pray for you,” you seem to be (and, I would argue, actually are) trying to say that you’re superior to me. Now, atheists don’t believe in God, but when someone is unduly arrogant towards us, we become as angry as the next person. “But,” you say, “Atheists are arrogant towards ME.” OK, then make yourself a test case – did you get angry when they exhibited the arrogance that they, as a fellow human, were somehow superior to you? Assuming a “yes” — next question: Did you really believe you were inferior? No? But yet you claim it bothered you? The parallel is that atheists are similarly (and often more) rightfully angry when the Christian exhibits the arrogance of having a personal line to God that the atheist doesn’t have access to. Not because the atheist believes in God – that would be absurd, because in that case the atheist would simply pray to God himself. No, the anger is frustration at your arrogance, which you are in a position to understand, having experienced arrogant behavior from others towards you, yourself. P.S. If your response to this is, “But why would it bother you if you didn’t believe it,” please read this reason again; I did address this.

    3: We Don’t Think It Does Anything

    Most of these reasons are focused on use of “I’ll pray for you” during a conversation that has to do with religion. A lot of atheists may appreciate the phrase when you use it as they’re going through a hard time — but some atheists won’t, and they have a fairly upstanding reason for why: We atheists simply don’t think prayer really does anything. It doesn’t automatically make our situations better. In fact, in the most recent thorough study on prayer, which was done on cardiac bypass patients in 2006, letting a patient know they were being prayed for actually INCREASED the number of complications, probably because these patients had more stress because of “performance anxiety.” So we may be upset that you are doing what is, in our eyes, an ineffective and potentially harmful activity instead of engaging in practical solutions and real relationships.

    4: There’s No Reason For You To Tell Us…Except…

    We’re often upset that you TOLD us you’d pray for us. Many of us atheists are familiar with Christianity, so we know that Jesus said to keep your prayers to yourself in several places in the Bible. So, we figure, if you sincerely wanted to pray for us, there was no need to tell us. And we don’t believe in God, so why would you need to? We’re not getting anything out of it. Telling us you’ll be praying, then, seems to be a blatant attempt to tell us that you’re not convinced that we don’t need intervening from God (who we often see as, with all due respect, something of an imaginary friend), and to rub in your argument that you think we deserve your pity more than your respect (because, honestly, we think that if you respected us you would be more prone to keeping those prayers to yourself).

    5: It Separates Us

    The phrase often underlines your separation from the atheist. For example, if you knew the atheist before their deconversion, and the atheist is already upset and angry at the way you view them now, saying “I’ll pray for you” may emphasize the fact that the relationship between yourself and the atheist has changed, and the atheist’s anger may be grief. This is not grief that you are actually going to talk to God about them (because the atheist doesn’t believe God exists), but grief that your use of the phrase underlines the difference between you. This angry grief is likely to be even more intense if there is reason for the atheist to believe you used the phrase intentionally to highlight the difference between you and the atheist.

    6: It Seems To Be An Attempt To Manipulate

    For us as atheists, the effect of prayer is purely psychological and social. There is no God making it work, so any changes of mind that may come about due to someone saying “I’ll pray for you” will come through human interaction. If you have no strong reason to back up your statements in an argument, “I’ll pray for you” seems like a cheap trick to psychologically intimidate the atheist into either feeling inferior to you or into feeling he or she is in a position of shame or pity, or to otherwise emotionally manipulate the atheist into coming closer to your position. For many atheists, then, especially those who were formally Christian, this seems like an underhanded move, and they will feel justified in calling you out on it.

    7: You Know These Reasons Already, And You Still Think It’s OK

    Honestly, it often seems to us as atheists that Christians are fully aware that the phrase “I’ll pray for you” bothers us, and at least some of the aforementioned reasons WHY it bothers us, and yet use the phrase anyway. It seems to us that the reason for your use of the phrase is that, in your mind and in much of culture, that phrase has been kept immune from any moral judgment, so that you can use that phrase on the offensive in an argument (fully aware of all the “reasons” on this list) and walk away from the conversation looking like a saint. Due to the “angry atheist” stereotype, the atheist often does not have the same luxury to be seen as morally justified when responding to the phrase “I’ll pray for you.” This unfairness is frustrating, and one of the ways some atheists have dealt with this frustration is by expressing it honestly, in spite of any negative consequences and any perception from Christians that they are “angry.” In any event, the growth of the non-religious and the gradual shrinking of fundamentalism seems to be making the phrase “I’ll pray for you” in an inappropriate context increasingly unacceptable.

  • Why I’m Angry: An Anti-Theist’s 78 Reasons

    1. I am angry that little children are told that they will go to hell if they don’t believe in the Bible.

    Contrary to popular belief, and in spite of this long list, atheists are, apparently, not any more angry than the average Joe.  According to the abstract of a recent 2014 review of 7 studies on the subject that was published in the Journal of Psychology:
    The prevalence and accuracy of angry-atheist perceptions were examined in 7 studies with 1,677 participants from multiple institutions and locations in the United States. Studies 1–3 revealed that people believe atheists are angrier than believers, people in general, and other minority groups, both explicitly and implicitly. Studies 4–7 then examined the accuracy of these beliefs. Belief in God, state anger, and trait anger were assessed in multiple ways and contexts. None of these studies supported the idea that atheists are particularly angry individuals. Rather, these results support the idea that people believe atheists are angry individuals, but they do not appear to be angrier than other individuals in reality.
    In other words, the perception that atheists are angry seems to have nothing to do with atheists, and everything to do with believers.  We are not atheists because we are naturally angry people, and our grievances against Christianity are more likely to be actual grievances than expressions of a more taciturn-than-usual tendency.  So…maybe you should listen.
     
    And please, don’t complain about how “unhealthy” it is to be angry.  Waste of time.  If you’re going to comment, tell me that I’m wrong and how I’m wrong.  And if I’m not wrong — why the hell aren’t you angry at these items?  Maybe this is a time to engage in some soul-searching of your own.

    2. I am angry that, according to recent studies, Atheists are more distrusted in society than rapists.

    3. I am angry that churches say homosexuality is a sin, and then deny that the teaching does any damage in the face of many homosexuals who claim the opposite, through tears and suicide.

    4. I am angry that people spend their lives trying to figure out “God’s will,” paralyzing their lives instead of striking out and embracing it.

    5. I am angry that people think individuals who I know don’t deserve it are going to spend eternity in hell.

    6. I am angry parents teach their children that God once drowned almost everyone in the world because they thought like me.

    7. I am angry that wives who are abused are told to submit to abusive husbands in church because that’s what the Bible says.

    9. I am angry that Christianity makes “faith” a virtue, opening the door for parents to trust in prayer as opposed to medicine because of scriptures like that at the end of I Corinthians 5 (“the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well”), and literally allowing children to die, become deeply ill, or experience severe pain. I’ve seen the stories and interviews, and they make me cry and makes my blood boil, and I think they should.

    10. I am angry that Christianity encourages parents to make their children read about the genocides in the Old Testament, which are “OK” because God commanded them through a prophet who just happened to have God’s advice. For me, it’s like allowing children to read about the Nazis and teaching them that God spoke through Hitler, but worse.

     
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    OK, apologies for the interruption. Carry on.
    11. I am angry that the church gives the Bible to drug addicts, as if it is the answer. It works for some, but doesn’t work for others (I’ve seen this in person), and when you see the desperation in their eyes…it breaks your heart that alternatives are not offered to them.

    12. I am angry that the church spends millions of dollars on buildings and salaries for ministry staff that comes from people in the congregation — the people feel obligated to pay for the very people who are perpetuating the fraud of Christianity.

    13. I am angry that churches get tax-exempt status when they are heavily involved in politics.

    14. I am angry that the Bible’s concept of turning the other cheek has been used to convince the underprivileged in society not to fight back.

    15. I am angry that Christianity defines the entire worth of other people based on whether or not they believe one of the most fantastic stories ever told.

    16. I am angry at the way Christianity utilizes verses like 2 Corinthians 10:5-6 that tell people to take every thought captive, effectively making sure its ideology traps minds.

    17. I am angry that Christianity convinces people to love a dead person more than they love their own families.

    18. I am angry that most Christians don’t read their Bibles carefully before sending the treacherous book to third-world countries.

    19. I am angry that the dedication to faith leads many Christians to categorically reject any careful study that disproves any of their faith tenets, and yet many Christians insist they are engaging in rational debate.

    “You give me the awful impression of someone who hasn’t read any of the arguments against your position ever.”

    20. I am angry that people are encouraged to follow Christ for primarily emotional reasons, but when they use that same emotional reason to leave Christ, they are told that they cannot do so. Christianity often highlights people’s emotions and states that hard thinking and rationalization for your stances is unnecessary when you are in Christianity, but when you leave, suddenly your emotions are invalid, and in addition many people’s ability to rationally defend themselves is diminished by decades of encouragement for the rank and file in the congregation to “just trust God.” Furthermore, the emotion to love other people often is a reason people leave Christianity, and it is applauded UNTIL they leave Christianity. In other words, Christianity often develops emotions inside people that it controls through definition (it decides whether you are a loving person or not, for example), and then it often bars people from the rational development that it then requires from people in place of emotion once these people leave Christianity. This seems very cruel to me. I’m not making this up…there are plenty of stories from other former Christians to this effect, and I have experienced it myself.

    21. I am angry that due to years of being brainwashed by Christian ideology, you are given several “trigger” words put in your mind by expert pursuaders and manipulators, and that these trigger words (like “evil,” “mocker,” “sinner,” and so on) get assigned to you immediately upon announcing your deconversion, and that any negative reaction to those trigger words is used to guilt-trip you into coming back into Christian ideology.
     

    “The hardest thing of all is that when we have exposed modern man to his tension [of hopelessness without God], he still may not be willing for the true solution. Consequently, we may seem to leave him in a worse state than he was in before…. We confront men with reality; we remove their protection and their escapes; we allow the avalanches to fall. If they do not become Christians, then indeed they are in a worse state than before we spoke to them.” — Francis Schaeffer, THE GOD WHO IS THERE, at the end of Chapter Two

    22. I am angry that many apologetics books (especially those written by presuppositionalists in the tradition of Francis Schaeffer) explicitly train apologists to push their potential converts into suicidal shame and despair in order to make them pliable for brainwashing via Christian ideology.

    23. I am angry that some Christian apologists out and out LIE in order to sell books (Frank Turek and Lee Strobel — here’s looking at you), and that the aura of Christianity as fundamentally good in this culture makes them exempt from moral criticism.

    24. I am angry that belief in Christianity has caused many to think the world is going to end in catastrophe and they’ll go to heaven as part of God’s plan, making them less concerned about trying to save this world for their children (God’s got it under control, and He’s planning on getting rid of it anyway). This especially exhibits itself in thoughts on global warming.

    25. I am angry that many Christians simply wear the title without taking the Bible seriously, because they are part of the reason there is so much misery among the confused people who actually do try to live by it. If you don’t take the Bible seriously as a Christian, just be honest and leave the religion instead of disparaging those who do take it seriously.

    26. I am angry that today’s evangelism programs teach social pressure (as opposed to doctrine) as the primary motivator of conversion. The whole campaign to focus on relationships as opposed to doctrine seems to me, upon closer examination, manipulation — a tool to control people that needs very little attachment to doctrine — indeed, doctrine is often demeaned and discouraged in more liberal evangelistic churches, leaving the church to be a unit of specialists in creating cults of social control.

    27. I am angry that children who don’t believe in God have to lie and say they do when they go to school just to keep from getting bullied.

    Penn Jillette with Examples of School Bullying

    28. I am angry at the witch trials that are still going on in Africa, as a result of the Bible, TODAY.

    29. I am angry at the Christian participation in Rwanda, which was the most Christian nation in Africa when the Rwandan genocide occured (and angry at the Old Testament for giving them the idea).

    30. I am angry at the fact that 40% of Americans will simply not vote for an atheist simply BECAUSE he/she would be an atheist.

    31. I am angry that you can post all the derogatory things about atheists and the happy things about God that you want on Facebook, but the moment you are equally honest about your atheist stance, THEN you’re seen as disrespectful — both by people who agree with you and those who don’t.

    Illustration of the Double Standard

    32. I am angry that people don’t understand why the Christian story seems so ridiculous because they’ve been brainwashed with it for most of their lives. Many (though, of course, not all) are taken from a young age and trapped in the ideology until they die 70 years later, and that makes me upset.

    If you had never heard of the Bible…..

    33. I am angry that most churches vote against secular help for the poor from government, making religious charities in charge of who gets fed and who does not.

    34. I am angry at the numerous stories I have heard of atheists’ children who were told by religious teachers and religious peers that their parents were going to hell, causing tear-jerking grief.

    35. I am angry that one of the ways slavery was (and still is) justified is that it at least taught us negro heathens Christianity.

    36. I am angry at the social stigma many single mothers receive because of the Bible’s false sense of morality.

    37. I am angry that the same people who see obvious problems with taking the Bible “literally” have no problem with it being given to people, raw, overseas.

    38. I am angry that Christianity encourages people to rejoice in their suffering, often making them feel guilty for feeling deep pain, hurt, and/or anger.

    39. I am angry for Christianity moralizing the position people are in life — those who make good money often are more respected than those who do not, because they are “blessed” by God, and God supposedly puts every person where they are supposed to be. I am further angry that many of the more wealthy Christians deny this while not denying it every time they talk about how God has “blessed them so richly with a nice house and a good income” and so on in a way that bolsters their standing before other people.

    40. I am angry with the fact that wealthy individuals in churches can and do pay to control their churches and, by extension, the people in them.

    41. I am angry that the Bible licenses male promiscuity in several old testament passages (there are no restrictions agains male polygamy) and has no restrictions on male “modesty,” but speaks harshly against female promiscuity (there ARE strict restrictions against female polygamy) and has restrictions on their dress (according to how the Bible is usually interpreted) — translating to men being respected for their sexual prowess and women being demeaned for theirs, in many circumstances…which results in rape being seen as lowering a woman’s value (as she was probably “asking for it”), while the male’s value often remains unchanged (“boys will be boys”).

    42. I am angry that the stats for how often Christians and Atheists “sin” is about the same (or higher for Christians), and yet Atheists are told they have no morality.

    43. I am angry that Christians insist, in spite of all evidence to the contrary, that Atheism is akin to nihilism simply because the Bible tells them so.

    44. I am angry that Atheists are told by Christians they have no basis for morality, and then say they do because they follow the commands of an imaginary creator who just happens to be right about everything, just because. Morality is a system we made up to help us navigate the world — it can be refined and theorized. WE are the basis for our morality — we would have to be — and I get angry when Atheists are denied input into a moral system because Christians are committed to one that is about 3000 years old.

    45. I am angry that when I am criticizing ideas and am CAREFUL not to demean people themselves, I am then demeaned as a human being AND my ideas are criticized AND I am told that I should not demean people.

    46. I am angry that often when someone ends a conversation on religion with “I’ll pray for you,” they mean to insinuate that YOU need intervention from their imaginary God and THEY are fine. I further get angry when they use the phrase to guilt-trip you into accepting Christianity because they pray for you so often.

    47. I am angry because religion somehow got attached to denying women the right to reproductive help.

    48. I am angry that Christianity teaches that we are so evil that we need to replace ourselves with the self God gave us — taking away our individuality and what makes it unique.

    49. I am angry that the entire, amazing, real universe is so often reduced down to an incredibly small myth that is used to intimidate and control individuals.

    “It’s Just Out Of Proportion”

    50. I am angry that if you doubt you need “help” in the Christian scheme — whereas if you have faith, you’re good to go. Faith should not be a virtue. In every other part of life, it’s not — why should it be here?

    51. I am angry that there are so many preachers who push their congregation to their limits as far as following the version of Christianity that they advocate, but will privately disregard the message (one of the ten most attractive jobs of a psychopath is being a preacher, and it is a very popular profession for “former” con artists).

    52. I am angry that the moment you step outside of Christianity, not only do you lose all credibility — you are seen as worse than a regular unbeliever who has never heard the Gospel (due, in part, to scriptures like that in Hebrews 6).

    53. I am angry that many Christians lie (as many former believers have confessed) and insist they are not afraid of hell, which allows them to publically ridicule or demean honest Christians who say that they have a supposedly irrational fear of a place that’s infinitely worse than their worst nightmares that they would be in for infinity if they didn’t believe in God. These same Christians will turn around and say, “The reason I don’t do XYZ is because there are laws against it, and you’ll go to prison.” OK — so you can understand fear of prison but not fear of hell? Either you haven’t given much thought about what hell is, or you’re lying through your teeth.

    54. I am angry that, in many churches, worship is set up like a giant trance session — the room is fairly dark, people are told to close their eyes, they are told to raise their hands, they are told to forget about everything else, the people who are most “lost” in the trance are the models for the rest — effectively brainwashing individuals week by week with a skillfully crafted, nearly hypnotic, environment.

    Example of Hypnotic Suggestion in Religious Setting

    55. I am angry that Jesus’ advice to not worry about life is actually followed by people (to their detriment) who SHOULD worry about life, and that his statement that if you seek first the kingdom of God, “all these things will be added to you” creates, in many segments of Christianity, poor people who think the answer is following God more when it is actually stepping back and being rational about the world. I am further angry that when people who trust in these scriptures most say, “I followed God. Why is this happening to me?” they are told by people whose didn’t invest as much in God as them but happen to be in a better position (partly because they WERE more rational) that they need an attitude adjustment and need to be further dedicated because they are worrying too much.

    56. I am angry that evangelical associations like the International House of Prayer use the squeaky-clean, “revolution”-type, trendy Christianity to take missionaries to countries like Uganda and preach messages about the “crime” of homosexuality that they cannot teach in the United States, resulting in so much anger against homosexuals in Uganda that there are strict laws against homosexuality that many Ugandans are fighting to make stronger (for example, life imprisonment for one homosexual act, and capital punishment for multiple homosexual acts).

    57. I am angry that if I were to die right now as non-Christian, many of my friends and families will think that I was burning in hell every moment of the rest of their lives. Worst funeral ever. I am further angry that this phenomenon has already happened countless times and will likely happen countless more times.

    58. I am angry that the United States has a long history of being seen (falsely) as a Christian nation that is therefore better than other nations and should be protected and have as much control as possible (the “City on a Hill” concept), because this has caused untold destruction to other countries and to people — like Native Americans — in this country. I am further angry that we fail to see our hypocrisy when Muslim nations say the same thing. This mentality goes back to the crusades and it is STILL happening.

    59. I am angry that the military is full of religious chaplains, but literally bars atheists from the job position.

    60. I am angry that the Boy Scouts of America don’t allow atheists to serve as Boy Scout leaders — and only a couple months ago allowed atheists to be Boy Scouts at all (many Boy Scouts who were atheists had to lie).

    61. I am angry at the philosophy that faith — void of science and reason — is not enough to build drones, bombs, or support national security, but is enough to prevent women from having an abortion. I am further angry that about 30% of women will have an abortion over their lifetime, and many of these women do and will feel they have to keep the abortion secret in order to keep friends and escape public shaming — these secrets, according to psychologists, actually PRODUCE shame.

    62. I am angry that the United States has the HIGHEST incarceration rate IN THE WORLD (not just among developed countries, but among ALL countries), and one of its HIGHEST recidivism rates in the world, as well, partly because of the false mentality that “sinners” deserve to be punished, which is a clear implication of the concept of hell. I am further angry when I see other atheistic countries in northern Europe in which the goal is not punishment, but rehabilitation, and look at their admirably low incarceration rates and recidivism rates, and think about how much better off we would be if we got rid of this destructive concept of hell.

    63. I am angry that I Corinthians chapter 1 out and out states that the philosopher and scholar cannot understand Christianity, effectively making it immune in many people’s minds from the critique it needs — if you speak about it you’re often automatically wrong because, “You’re a scholar,” and you get trapped in that box when you really have important things to say.

    64. I am angry at the fact that a major reason so many people are Christian today is because there were several inquisitions, forceful conversions on entire tribes, and aggressive punishment and laws against speaking against religion that were enforced by government because of no separation between church and state.

    65. I am angry that atheists are not allowed allowed the same privileges as religious individuals, who are allowed to go into the prisons as chaplains and convert the inmates – and that prisons in the United States often become a Christian conversion mill for individuals due to the conditions there, the powerlessness of the inmates, and the exaltation of Christian principles.

    66. I am angry that the Christian answer to doubt is that it is Satan testing you, but that God wants to use it to strengthen your belief. If doubt, then, brings you back to God, it’s fine, but if it doesn’t it is hard proof that Satan is winning. This ingenious device has trapped people in Christianity for years, because I know from experience that (almost?) nothing is scarier than thinking you are being decieved by Satan and that Satan is winning. I am further angry that people who doubt and are manipulated into coming back to God from that doubt often see people who have this fear of being decieved by Satan like individuals who have a mental illness, and as somewhat inferior religious people who they need to pray for and pity.

    67. I am angry at the social alienation many in the Bible belt physically experience when they say they are no longer able to believe the Bible’s incredible story — often losing friends and family in truly disturbing ways.

    68. I am angry that Christianity states people should follow a certain behavioral code that NOBODY follows — but Christians are seen as still squeaky clean in significant segments of Christianity when not following them, because grace. Atheists, on the other hand, are often denigrated wherever they break the code, and it is used as proof that they are “still in their sins.” I am further angry that the socially constructed guilt that comes from this denigration is used to say that atheists who were formerly Christian left Christianity solely because they wanted to sin and not for any justifiable reason — which immediately causes them to stop being heard by those in church (while those in church who sin regularly but are forgiven by “grace” still keep their credibility). I am further angry when the concept of “sin” is used by evangelists using the Bible (like Ray Comfort) to shame people into thinking they are fundamentally terrible, evil people, a shaming that is used to manipulate them into Christianity.

    69. I am angry that many Christians, including the parents of atheist children, blame the child’s atheism on the deeply religious parents’ bad parenting. Christians regularly use this to shame the parents of atheist children, as I have seen in my own experience. I have awesome parents, and my atheism is a result of what they did right, so that makes me furious — and I am not alone there.

    70. I am angry that many atheists and Christian doubters are told that their problem is that they are putting their ways above God’s ways — when human beings have crafted every “way” they follow in the first place. In other words, the false humility of, “Unlike you, I’m humble…it’s just that this all-powerful deity who both you and I should accept without question happens to agree with everything I say, and you should submit to Him and, if you don’t, justice demands that you are tortured for eternity because that’s what you deserve” is absolutely infuriating, especially when I see it used as a manipulation tactic. That is, in my mind, one of the proudest positions you can have, especially if you believe that with no evidence and take pride in your “faith.”

    71. I am angry at the number of atheists who are shamed into silence and, as a result, try to shame other atheists into silence regarding the things we have every reason to be angry about in society. It is difficult being an atheist and much easier to have the “nice atheist” persona, but if you care about the world, like many of us do, it is frustrating to be told that the most caring thing we can do is NOT care or voice our concerns regarding religion’s effects on society.

    72. I am angry that the verse, “If a man does not work, he should not eat” is used to moralize employment situations. If a man does not work, maybe it’s because he has a hard time finding work. Maybe this is an opportunity to have compassion on him instead of thinking the Bible defines his situation and what he deserves.

    73. I am angry that the Old Testament stories of Abraham sacrificing his son Isaac at God’s command (even though he was stopped) and Jephthah killing his daughter after making an oath to God (Judges 11) are stories that teach Bible-readers that a nonexistent God is more important than the lives of their children. It seems clear that this conviction has been a source for several parents who have claimed that God commanded them to kill their kids (cf. Deanna Laney, Carlos Rico, Jennifer Cisowski, LaShaun Harris, and several others).

    74. I am angry at the concept of demon possession in the Bible, which has resulted countless times today and throughout Christian history in traumatic exorcisms instead of the medical treatment and understanding that the mentally ill individuals need.

    75. I am angry that the concept that homosexuality is an abomination in the Bible is the ONLY reason why Christians refuse to see gay relationships as legitimate ones that can be christened as marriages — when the Bible, at the same time, seems to have no problem with polygamy (on the man’s side, not the woman’s) and the taking of multiple concubines — who aren’t wives, but are there for sex purposes.

    Varieties of Biblical Marriage
    Varieties of Biblical Marriage

    76. I am angry that circumcision — the cutting of a person’s genitalia — is regularly performed without a male’s consent when he is an infant.

    77. I am angry at the Biblical concept that what you have, you should thank God for — because the implication is that God has “blessed” you with it. Saying God blessed you with something is a way of claiming a right to it that other people, whom God hasn’t blessed in the same way, don’t have. I mean, the clear, logical implication of this thinking is that one person is “blessed” with riches while another has been “blessed” with poverty and malnutrition — and the subtext is that each should be grateful for what he has. Paul’s statement that he’s learned to be content in every situation (Philippians 4:11-12) indicates that it’s a virtue for the poor to be as satisfied with their lot as the rich. This thinking masks very real social changes that need to take place for the suffering to be cared for, so it makes me, at times, absolutely livid.

    78. I am angry that Christianity creates the very problem of sin and the concept of the sinner, along with all the psychological damage that problem and concept causes, that it then claims it is the solution for.

    Note: A different list has been recommended in the comments, and I thought it would be helpful to include it here:  Greta Christina’s book Why Are You Atheists So Angry: 99 Things That Piss Off The Godless.  As of writing this note, I have not read it, but it comes highly recommended and Greta Christina is an excellent author.

     

  • Why I Hate God’s Grace: An Atheist’s Three Reasons

    Of all the concepts in Christianity, the concept of God’s grace is arguably the most harmful, destructive, insulting, and psychologically crippling. The tragedy here is the number of people who would probably be surprised by that statement; most seem to laud grace as the best thing about Christianity. But the moment you examine it, the moment you take an outsider’s view of what grace is and think carefully about its implications for the lives and value of individuals, the more dangerous and diabolical the concept seems.

    “Grace,” in popular Christian theology, is the term for God’s act of giving you something (like “forgiveness of sins” or “eternal life”) you don’t deserve. The concept here, in many cases, is that we have offended God or broken His moral code. And although we supposedly deserve hell as a result, God has decided not to punish us with hell (or let us go to hell, depending on your theology) and has given us “eternal life” instead.

     

    And for this, the story goes, you should praise God for this great gift of grace that He has given to you and all of humankind who will accept it, a gift He gave because He loves you so much that He was willing to have His One and Only Son to give up His life for you. How humbling. How exhilarating.

     

    Except…not really. For three reasons.

     

    1. If God is our Father, His Grace makes Him a terrible parent.

    It’s pretty nice to buy a three year old ice cream. It’s terrible to tell the child that he deserves poison and then give him ice cream. Especially if the child does not deserve poison. I mean, it seems that the reason grace is so wonderful, in much of Christian theology, is that we don’t deserve it, supposedly. But the best “grace,” it seems, is the kind that isn’t grace, the kind you receive simply because the person has your and society’s best interests at heart. To be sure, that viewpoint is not grace, which is why it’s awesome. I mean, think about it. When an infant is born, it doesn’t deserve anything. There’s nothing anyone automatically deserves. Deserving things isn’t the point — the point is trying to build a decent society filled with decent people. So we don’t help our kids because they deserve it or in spite of the fact that they don’t deserve it — or, at least, we shouldn’t. It seems that a good parent helps us because they want us to enrich ourselves and society; obsession with what we do and don’t deserve can distract us from that and give the child guilt trips that impede its social development.

     

    The infuriating thing about this whole deal is that there is no God. So when someone is told they deserve eternity in hellfire — they’re not remotely telling the truth. That’s a completely made up guilt trip, there to instill fear and shame in other people, to control them and to maintain power by twisting their psychology and convincing them to believe fantastic stories that force them to behave in disturbing ways. Indeed, the only thing that makes grace beautiful, it seems, is fear of hell, a fear that depends on a conviction that hell is what people deserve hell. The fact that people don’t deserve hell makes grace a horrific concept, because it makes people apologetic for being in a world they belong in without any apology.

     

    2. The Christian concept of God’s grace encourages psychopathic tendencies in those who believe in it.

    In Christian theology, grace is based mostly on what you believe, not what you do, as everyone has sinned and supposedly deserves eternity in hell. But there are a couple major problems with this. Some “sins,” such as same-sex marriage, are taboos in the Bible and in much of Christian interpretation of it, and yet there is no logical social reason as to why we should have the taboo outside of a supposed God’s say-so. This is an example of how the concept of sin encourages us to ignore very real circumstances people are in, ignore the love people may have for each other, and simply believe that people are immoral in spite of evidence to the contrary. In other words, the arbitrary labels of “sin” — or, in this case, “sins” made up by bigots six thousand years ago — force people to see people as sinful where no sin exist, often leading to maltreatment of these misunderstood, “sinful” people. And this is maltreatment that Christians don’t have to feel that bad about because, after all, these people are sinners.

    Second, to be grateful for the concept of grace you have to think that everyone who doesn’t have it is going to hell, and be OK with that. No matter what the person does, they deserve hell and will get it if they don’t follow arbitrary rules God supposedly set up, and/or don’t believe a fairly fantastical story that has very little evidence backing it up. This mentality dehumanizes the person who is not a Christian. No matter how much we tell our Christian friends and family members that we’re human and that we don’t deserve nor are going to hell, the Christian has to think we are sinners headed for hellfire if we don’t believe their fantastic story. So no matter what we say (outside of stating we believe in outrageous 2000 year old stories), we are forced into the stereotype of an unsaved sinner, trapped in pity and low moral standing that we can’t escape from. And these stereotypes have and do affect the way we are treated on a personal and societal level in extremely disturbing ways that are ignored because of reason 3.

     

    3. Its major function is to allow the church to abuse without culpability.

    “Grace” is often used to say we shouldn’t take the past actions of those who have it into account, as much — if God has forgiven people, who are we not to? Although sometimes people insist that grace doesn’t dismiss actions — in point of fact, it often seems to.

    For example, when I was a Christian, I used to see unsavory parts of church history and present action as proof FOR a God because, I thought, if things were so terrible, grace had to exist to make things less terrible. The fact that the church was abusive was proof that people in general could be abusive, which meant we all needed grace, which came from God, which brought me back to the church, no matter how dark its past or present deeds were. No matter what the church does, the concept of grace eventually launders its reputation so that it comes out with squeaky-clean moral currency that’s often proof, among those dedicated to the church (and often those outside of it), of God’s supposed blessings.

     

    So when the atrocities — past and present — of the church are discussed, the answer comes back that yes, the church is terrible, but God has forgiven it. If any other organization stated it had an imaginary friend who similarly gave it grace, and was at the same time engaging in all the control the church has on people’s lives, everyone would be in uproar. The reason why everyone is not, it seems, is that the church is a major source of power that gives it great power in protecting and enriching its good reputation.

    Thus, throughout history, the church has been able to enslave, colonize, and abuse individuals both physically and psychologically because 1) it has the moral authority to state that those it puts through this deserve it and much worse, so it can treat people in terrible ways without moral censure in cultures whose moral system it infiltrates and controls, and 2) it controls the concept of grace so that it can give it to itself and to those it needs to maximize its power and control over others — and thus uses the concept of grace to force less powerful individuals in the church to excuse, ignore, or justify its abuses, no matter how horrific they may be. Grace is truly the worst concept in Christianity, and as long as it stands, Christianity will perpetuate itself, controlling societies and lives without having anyone to answer to but a God of its own making who is — oddly enough — in the habit of giving it blank checks for grace.

  • Why I’m Intolerant of Religion’s Intolerance: A Reaction to Obama’s Recent Statements On Religious Violence

    I am somewhat stunned these days when someone tells me I am speaking too strongly against Christianity.  I frequently worry that I am not speaking strongly enough. I do believe that it is usually, if not always, unhealthy to insult individuals – I think that it’s healthy to respect individuals, and I think that we should do our best to ensure that the stances we have reflect that respect.  But I think that ideals are there to help people; people aren’t there to help ideals.  So I generally don’t respect ideals when they get in the way of respecting people.

    I used to think that it was inconsistent to say that one was intolerant of intolerance.  But there’s a difference between being intolerant of ideals, and being intolerant of people.  As has been said in various forms in an anonymous quote that’s been circulating around the Internet recently, a healthy stance is this: I’ll respect your beliefs so long as your beliefs don’t disrespect my existence.

    And Christianity has a long history of disrespecting the existence of humanity, because at the heart of it is the doctrine that there is something so fundamentally wrong with us that we deserve eternity in torment.  To get out of what you deserve you have to believe that a flawless water walking god-man born of a virgin died and suffered in your place as a sacrifice for how terrible you are, and you have to live the rest of your life dead to who you really are and trying to live the life He would like you to live – no matter how much this life goes against your sensibilities, your desires, the natural beauty in your heart, or the aptitude of your mind. It’s easy to forget that Christianity has that effect, because so often you’re encouraged to respect it in many cultures (like the Bible Belt of Texas).

    To be completely fair, there are plenty of people who get along relatively well with Christianity; somehow they’ve gotten used to the norms — perhaps they don’t have any tendencies that don’t line up with the ideals of the manifestation of the Christianity they chose, they have a tight-knit group of similar thinking religious friends and/or family they get along with awesomely, the concepts fit their learned preferences like a good pair of broken-in Wranglers, and it works.  So, because of that, it’s a little hard to see that there is an issue here, for some — both Christians and non-Christians — who see people seeming to get along with their Christian lives without significant negative side effects.  You hear individuals say that we should just respect religions like Christianity, and move on.

    But at the same time, I think it would be missing the elephant in the room to ignore the clear reality that Christianity has a long record of hurting plenty of people.  Especially Fundamentalist Christianity.  And the pain it inflicts, I think, makes it necessary to force honesty about the negative aspects of the religion.  Rather than supporting it blindly, it seems conducive to look at Christianity as the harmful thing that, in many ways, it actually is if we want to infuse an inherent respect and dignity in our view of humanity that does not disrespect people for the very fact of their existence, nor add any moral weight to faith in very consequential propositions that don’t have strong evidence behind them.

    When you have an ideology that denies you of your personal, basic human identification with dignity and worth if you don’t believe in it, you create a group of people that you can do many things to.  You can think they’re going to spend eternity in hellfire, you can call the love they share sin, you can torture heretics, you can declare war against infidel countries, you can stone them to death…the list goes on.  Take away the dignity of someone’s humanity, and subordinate that dignity to an ideal, and you can do anything to that person an think you’re right. I wish it was as easy for people from my former religion, Christianity, to see this principle in their own religion as clearly as they can see it in the religion of Islam. Which is why I was grateful for Obama yesterday, when he took a step towards showing how religion often has problems…

    There’s no two ways about it — the religion of Islam has, in many places, led to some very disturbing actions.  But so has Christianity.  What they have in common is a mechanism to dehumanize individuals who don’t accept their beliefs.  Don’t get me wrong — of course, some forms of Christianity and Islam are much more tolerant than others.  However, the truth remains that there is a long history of violence in Christianity, and that this violence is instigated by the concept of there being a difference between God’s chosen people, and those who are infidels.  It is highly hypocritical for us to see the results of this dynamic in other religions, and yet fail to see it in the current and past events instigated and justified within the arenas of Christendom.

    The fight for human dignity and respect does not stop with Islam, or Christianity, or any ideology, for that matter.  It requires a strong criticism of any ideals that get in the way of respect for our existence.  Such criticism is difficult, and at times must be strident to have an impact, especially in places where morality has been twisted so that ideals cruelly create oppressive experiences for individuals.  It can be difficult and discouraging at times.  But if we are going to break the barriers that deny respect to unjustly marginalized parts of humanity, such criticism is necessary.  Which is why, on Wednesday, I was proud to support much of Obama’s criticism.

    I think it’s healthy to fight strongly against a lack of respect of humanity wherever it is found — in religion, or outside.  The reason I do not support religion is because of the institutionalized regularity with which it marginalizes or seeks to eradicate perceptions of the inherent value within human existences as opposed to their mere ideals.  I think this marginalization is inherent to the ideals of several faiths, including both Christianity and Islam, which is why I think Obama’s statement that the problem is a perversion or distortion of religion — I would beg to differ that the disrespect of humanity, the subordination of human desires and existences to the tyranny of ideals set into place by imaginary beings, is inherent to both of these religions.

     

    It would be remiss, however, for me not to openly admit that atheism can have the same tendencies.  I think it is perfectly fine to argue strongly and insistently against the ideals that construct dividing barriers in our culture — even, at times, necessary.  I often litter descriptions of disdain for these ideals with expletives and rather firm denials to pleas for me to apologize for insulting these barriers.  I think that ideals need to be insulted to respect individuals, at times.  However, wherever — in religion or outside of religion — the inherent value of a human’s existence is denied, I draw the line, because this protection of value governs the way I orient myself in relation to ideals.  Because, for me, the absence of God in my thinking led for me to replace what didn’t exist with that which did; it was an opportunity for me to express a concern and love and passion for humanity that was unbridled by the strictures of religion; to replace a virtual friend with a world full of flesh-and-blood ones.  So that’s one major place I disagree with Obama.  God does not compel me to combat the tyranny of religion, He IS the tyranny of religion.  What compels me to combat the tyranny of oppressive, dehumanizing ideals that devalue human existence is the love I have in my heart for those around the world who do exist, not the tyrannical love of an imaginary being who doesn’t.

    Hopefully that makes sense.