Evangelical Christianity Crucified
by Ian R. Thorpe.
2009-12-14
CREATIVE COMMONS: Attribute, non commercial, no derivs.
KEYWORDS: religion, christian, christianity, evangelical, fundamentalist, belief, faith, hypocrisy, hate, god, satan, evil
What's the difference between a Christian and a stockbroker?
The stockbroker knows he's lying
Jesus died on the cross for your sins.
So why beat yourself up with guilt? Enjoy your sins, they're already paid for.
O.K. cheap shots at Christianity I know. My problem with Christianity lies not in the fact that people are believing something I don't, its their attitude to people who don't share their beliefs.
The Obama effect on American society seems to be the opposite of what was hoped for. Religious fundamentalism, particularly Evangelical Christianity seems to have more influence than ever while Obama's failure as a politician as well as his having proved to be a Messiah with feet of clay has divided American society more deeply than ever. With the Obama Administration in meltdown as they are revealed as a bunch of amateurs and novices there is a big risk that social, political and economic crises in the United States will drive the nation into the arms of a more rightwing candidate than George W. Bush in 2012.
If America is to ever have any chance of getting back on track it must conquer its obsession with religion. The Daily Stirrer will try to help.
Not so long ago I had a Christian complaining in response to my stating a few basic truths about Christianity that "we've heard it all before, you have brought nothing new to the debate." Of course they had heard it all before, there is only one truth and no matter how many times those who choose to live a delusional life will deny it, it is still the truth. It is Christians who bring new stuff to the debate, inventing new evidence for their beliefs as soon as the old batch is discredited.
Now I have no problem with people believing whatever crap they want to. I believe a lot of crap and I try not to have double standards. I believe in King Arthur and Robin Hood, both totally fictional; I believe in The Loch Ness Monster, Bigfoot, The Yeti and all those other lake and forest monsters though I know there is only a very very slim chance of any being real, I believe in the superiority of all things British, that The Beatles are better than Elvis, that beer brewed in the north of England is better than any southern brew (although I have personal experiences to disprove that) and that John Steinbeck is the best modern writer. I do not ask anybody to share my beliefs.
What I do have a problem with is people who proclaim their beliefs, which are even whackier than mine, as truth. And I get really, really pissed off, angry even, when somebody tells me that if only I would stop being so arrogant and open my heart to God, I would understand the crackpot beliefs of fringe Christian sects are in fact some great Universal truths.
In other words these people want me to allay their chronic insecurities by becoming as crazy as they are. Which is quite insulting.
When somebody recently told a humanist friend, "I pity you if you have never known the love of God," I said to myself "right, that's fighting talk where I come from."
So, in this most sacred of all weeks, the festival of the first full moon after the spring equinox at which Ostara, goddess of the swelling corn is celebrated, let's look at how Christian preachers and lay preachers play dirty to avoid rational debate. Fourteen points to mirror the stations of the cross and then we will see what is left of the Christian argument.
(1)
Christians have always dismissed earlier belief systems as ignorant and barbaric superstitions. So all that stuff in the Greek myths about Zeus impregnating Danae in the form of a shower of gold, or appearing to some other girl in the shape of a swan and saying "Take me to your Leda is just fairy stories they tell us. But they want non-Christians to believe God got a virgin pregnant?
(2)
Christians deny the existence of the thousands of Gods of paganism, Hinduism and other traditions.
So why do they get so pissed off when I and others deny the existence of just one God? What proof have thery that their is the one true God. He may be, but we've only his word for it.
(3)
In the comments on this article some Christian is going to tell me evolution is a ridiculous theory and cite an irrational theory known as irreducible complexity to back up their case that the Universe and life are so complex they could only be created by design.
Then they are going to tell me God created man out of dirt. Yeah right.
(4)
Why do Christians make such a big thing about one man being martyred by pagans but rejoice when they read in The Bible about God wiping out whole nations?
(5)
Millions of words have been written by the most intelligent, articulate and highly educated humans to prove the scientific version of prehistory, yet all it takes is some idiot to grab a Bible and start speaking gibberish (in tongues) and Christians offer us that as "proof" God exists.
And they expect us to shout Hallelujah, I was blind and now I see.
(6)
Women are denounced as evil and not so long ago were imprisoned, tortured and burned to death for believing in a threefold Goddess, the maiden, the mother and the wise woman, yet your own "One True God" is in fact three gods in one and echoes the aspects of the threefold Goddess so closely "those who have eyes to see" (John 16, 12-14) will understand God is just a transvestite who borrowed his sister's clothes.
(7)
Though Christians are very fond of talking about "the truth" we do not have to look very deeply into The Bible to catch God lying. In the creation myth God tells Adam: "Of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it, for on the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die."
The Serpent however tells Eve: "Ye shall not surely die".
Adam and Eve both ate the fruit of the tree and neither of them died on that day. According to the story Adam lived until he was over 900 years old. God lied. The serpent told the truth.
(8)
Christians, ordained preachers and laity alike, tell us theirs is a tolerant faith and their God a good, forgiving God. And yet only last week when I told someone I would never believe in the God of Abraham it earned a response that I had better change my mind or would burn in the eternal fires of Hell. Kind, forgiving God, tolerant faith. My arse!
(9)
Christians like to say that morality can only come from belief in God. Atheists do not believe and therefore are immoral. "You think it is OK to kill me and my family," Christians are fond of accusing.
Strange then that in the U.S.A. it is the Bible Belt states that are most enthusiastically in favour of the death penalty. A majority of humanists oppose the death penalty.
Morality it much older than Christianity of course and far too complex an issue for most Christians which is why they reduce morality to sex, drugs and property rights.
(Its an interesting statistic that of America's burgeoning prison population 76% are Christian and most of these were Christian before they committed their crime)
(10)
Christians like to claim the moral high ground in discussions on slavery. In fact the established churches in the early nineteenth century, Anglicans, Roman Catholics, Calvinists and Lutherans all opposed abolition of the slave trade. The churches that did join the abolitionist cause were The Quakers, Unitarians and Moravians. Of these I know beyond doubt that Christians deny Quakers and Unitarians are actually Christian faiths as neither believes in the divinity of Jesus.
(11)
Fundamentalist Christian preachers like to claim that evolutionary science has us evolving from monkeys. Were they blessed with a measurable IQ of any sort, even in single figures, they would understand that while we and the great apes (not monkeys but similarish) have a common ancestor, all life forms (yes, fundies too) are evolved from microscopic blobs of jelly.
(12)
Many Christians like to make a big thing of their pro - life, anti - abortion stance. This is a bit hypocritical though when we look into what God has to say on the subject:
Hosea, 13:16 Samaria shall become desolate; for she hath rebelled against her God: they shall fall by the sword: their infants shall be dashed in pieces, and their women with child shall be ripped up.
Numbers 31:17 "Now therefore kill every male among the little ones, and kill every women that hath known man by lying with him." Well it does not actually call for abortion, just the murder of all women who might be pregnant.
2Kings 15:16 Then Menahem smote Tiphsah, and all that were therein, and the coasts thereof from Tirzah: because they opened not to him, therefore he smote it; and all the women therein that were with child he ripped up.
So we can surmise then that God has no problem about aborting the babies of non-Jewish women. If we accept that Christians succeeded the Jews as God's chosen people why are they getting so uptight about non-Christian women seeking humane, medically supervised early stage abortions.
(13)
As we have seen The Biblical God has no qualms about telling his followers to murder small children and pregnant women but if we look further there are calls for genocide and for the ritual murder of one's nearest and dearest. Examples are too numerous to list but you might like to look here to get the picture. The Evil Bible where you will find it is written that:
Nobody is exempt but homosexuals and women are the main targets fingered by God for his hit men.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't one of the ten commandments go something like "Thou shalt not kill?"
(14)
And now we come to the crucifixion.
Actually I have done this one before, so if want to gain an understanding of what might really have happened (Crucifixion was NOT a death punishment in The Roman Empire at the time, those sentenced to death went to the arena) and you live in a state where Monty Python's Life of Brian is still banned, read The True Tale Of The Easter Bunny.
Is there anything left of Christianity now we have shown the faith to be deceitful, dishonest, hypocritical and based on a false premise and a fairy story no more factual than the legends of Robin Hood and King Arthur.
All I ask of Christians is that they just stop trying to impose their beliefs on the world. Christian beliefs are no more sane than any others, just a lot more dangerous to non Chistians.
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