Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Religion and Secularism

Written by John Pickard
Wednesday, 27 April 2011


Ariane Sherine and Richard Dawkins at the Atheist Bus Campaign launch, London, January 2009. Photo: Zoe Margolis

As the twenty-first century progresses, there has been an increasing interest and not a small amount of debate on the role of religion in society and particularly on advances in secularisation. Richard Dawkins’ book , ‘The God Delusion,’ was a best-seller in the UK and novels like ‘The Good Man Jesus and The Scoundrel Christ’ by Richard Pullman have touched raw nerves in Church hierarchies.

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8 comments:

Ross Wolfe said...

As long as the working masses blindly accept the false promise of justice in a heavenly afterlife, such that they can passively endure present injustices with a faith in a future, divine redemption, they are paralyzed in their efforts to end injustice themselves. It must be seen as an ideological expression of an underlying material basis.

The vulgar atheism of recent years may be just as intellectually shallow as blind faith, but it is at least more rational than the religious belief in the supernatural. Every religion, insofar as they posit this supernatural divinity, deserves to be equally denounced. Religion may provide some comfort for those too weak to accept living in a godless universe, but in the end it just gets in the way of humanity taking its destiny into its own hands.

Craig Bardo said...

Jesus said, I came that you might have life and have it more abundantly.

That's hardly blindly accepting a false promise of blah, blah, blah, etc.

It might be helpful to speak with an adherent of the various faith traditions to gain understanding.

Thersites said...

There's nothing more revolting than a bunch of holier-than-thou atheists thinking that THEY "know the Truth" with absolute certainty. It's MUCH worse than any "believer" who admits that his own beliefs are personal and merely "faith" (not "THE truth").

SecondComingOfBast said...

The reason commies tend to hate religion is because most religions tend to oppose commies. That and they provide services to the poor, dispossessed and the sick that commies want to do so they can take all the credit for it. It doesn't in reality have a damn thing to do with helping people overcome their belief in falsehoods and delusions, it's all about getting rid of another obstacle to communist power. Let's just call a spade a spade for once.

Frank Partisan said...

Ross: I would call the New Atheists arrogant, nor vulgar.

Hitchens has really gone downhill. He is completely trite.

CB: I have no problem with your comment.

Thersites: It's not "revolting." Marx acknowledged religion is the heart of the heartless, and the soul of the soulless.

Pagan: When I was a kid, rightist Evangelical Carl McIntyre complained the National Council of Churches was run by communists.

SecondComingOfBast said...

I don't know about communists, but they are run by left-wingers.

roman said...

Marx acknowledged religion is the heart of the heartless, and the soul of the soulless.
What the hell does that mean?!?Anyone, anyone ?? Bueler?
Marx commenting on religious matters is like a blind man trying to describe color. He was and is completely out of his element in this regard.

Frank Partisan said...

Roman: The actual Marx's writing beats what it's proported to be.