God Save Our Wimpy God!

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2iiZSgu5Uqw

Although there were only eight or nine people involved, I think it is reasonable to call them a mob. They came into an area that had been rented and in which they had no right to interfere. But they came to save the chapel for Jesus.

One of the leaders  (Napier) declared, "We didn't go  there out of hatred of these people. We went there because we wanted to make sure the House of the Lord wasn't being disrespected … there was about eight or nine of us… The people in the chapel said they were doing nothing wrong, and I asked if they were there to worship Jesus, and a few started raising the voices at me, so I told him just to get their stuff-that we weren't there to argue and I even help gather the things and pack them to their cars.

... if they want to do that stuff, they can do it in their own homes or buildings or wherever else, but it's not happening in Jesus house as long as I'm around to defend it…"

What was 'that stuff'? It was using the chapel as a retreat and safe space for members to meditate or pray according to their own individual desires and beliefs. Why were the crusading Christians in a panic and defending God from the horrible attack that God could not defend himself against? (It is funny how wimpy and weak their God is.  He can't do anything for himself and he requires mobs to do it for him yet somehow he's all powerful?) Someone had placed an ohm symbol in the chapel in case anyone wanted to meditate in the Buddhist fashion. Obviously Jesus would be totally destroyed by that. You know, kind of like a vampire and a cross.

I would certainly have felt threatened and would not have welcomed this interference in our rented property. It's a public venue but it was being rented by a private organization. This is the kind of fundamentalist activity you expect from the Taliban, but that's not surprising. These individuals are the Christian Taliban.

Also unsurprisingly,  the leader of the mob who is quoted above is an ex-con.

I remind everybody once again that I am not opposed to Christianity. I am a Christian.  But I'm tired of having to say to people that I'm not one of that kind of Christian. The world does not need a single one of that kind of Christian to be found anywhere on the face of the planet.

What Problem?

 Quite a telling discussion, giving insight into the unwillingness to face, much less deal with, the extremism our nation is suffering from today. I haven't bothered to post the link to the article because my post quotes enough of it to make the point clear.

Me:  I don't even remember where in the Bible it says blessed are the murderers or the lynch mobs, but I assure you this Pastor firmly believes that he is a Christian. 

I disagree.

> Hate pastor says trans-supportive parents should be "shot in back of the head"

"We can string them up above a bridge so that the public can see the consequences of that kind of wickedness."<

D:  These hate pastors are apparently all over the country, some working in mega-churches.  According to Wikipedia-

Capital punishment in the Bible refers to instances in the Bible where death is called for as a punishment and also instances where it is proscribed or prohibited. A case against capital punishment can be made from John 8, where Jesus speaks words that can be construed as condemning the practice.[1] There are however many more Bible verses that command and condone capital punishment, and examples of it being carried out. Sins that were punishable by death include homicide, striking one's parents, kidnapping, cursing one's parents, witchcraft and divination, bestiality, worshiping other gods, violating the Sabbath, child sacrifice, adultery, incest, and male homosexual intercourse (there is no biblical legal punishment for lesbians).

Me :   Way back, about 10 years ago or so, I was speaking with the philosophy club out at the VVC and pointed out to them that the Christian Dominionists (started by Rushdoony) were very quiet about it but were heavily influencing the evangelical movement in America. They want to bring back the death penalty including for children who are defiant or "curse" their parents. 

Once again the rise of this extremism parallels the abandonment of organized religion by younger Americans. I refer to them as the anti-evangelicals. Instead of spreading the good word they drive people away from it.

L: And you believe what’s said on media ? There are writers  just dreaming up stuff to stir people up . Remember their medicine show only makes $ when folks watch .

Me: L it's not just on the media. I watched the preacher preach this message. He recorded it at his own church. He's proud of it.

I have watched quite a number of other "Christian" preachers say very similar things. Not reports. Their own broadcasts of themselves. 

I know there's a lot in the world you don't like. I don't like a lot of it either. But at least I can  face it and acknowledge it's real.

Holy Toenails, Batman

 

https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/covid-mask-vaccination-mandates-aren-t-christian-persecution-ncna1278067

It seems that Christians (some of them even in the form of lawsuits) are protesting the requirement to wear masks “because God created us in His image, we are masking that image.”

As the article points out, this will only make sense, ‘When these conservative Christians start mandating nudity, then they might have a claim about not covering up what God has created.’

Maybe these people would accept masks if they were in the shape of fig leaves?

In one particularly interesting case:

> Last year, a Republican legislator in Ohio refused to wear a mask, arguing in a Facebook post that the U.S. was founded on “Judeo-Christian Principles” that include “we are all created in the image and likeness of God.”<

So now we know that God has a face. We are made in the image of God, we have faces, therefore He has a face. Basic logic.

This leads in inevitable conclusion that He has some other parts that I don’t think Christians are entirely comfortable with discussing. Especially when you think of those particular bits and pieces being part of God.

Also, does that mean men or women are created the image of God? Because (surprise Christians!) they are not exactly alike.  Trying to get a picture of God where He has all the appropriate parts to make both males and females and His image gets a bit disturbing.

(Just in case you’re not getting the picture completely, I’m referring to that which Brits often refer to as the “naughty bits”.  I just have a hard time thinking that Christians would be really upset to find out that God had, let’s say, toenails.  Though I suppose nasal hairs might also be a bit troubling in their own peculiar way.)

¡Calmate, hombre!

 

A Facebook post and its responses.

https://www.salon.com/2021/05/26/historian-of-fascism-wonders-is-joe-biden-a-speed-bump-on-the-fascists-march-to-power/

Me:  A most interesting in-depth analysis of our current situation. It is good to hear that people are finally recognizing the danger that the Republican Party presents to democracy in America because by recognizing the danger we can deal with it. It’s like getting a very frightening diagnosis from your doctor. It is disturbing, but it’s better to know and take action to treat the condition that it is to remain in ignorance and be destroyed by something you didn’t even know existed.

I agree with most of what the article has to say and have excerpted one paragraph and added a comment to the last sentence of that paragraph:

> As I see it, Trump's coup attempt was a great success for the far right. Too many professional smart people and hope peddlers want to claim that it was a failure because many of Trump's followers were arrested. Anyone who argues such a thing does not understand storytelling and the political imagination. The Trumpists and other neofascists won the presidency and were in power for four years. They left an indelible stain on American society. They now have the imagery of overrunning the Capitol to draw strength from. It was an impossible dream come true, and it happened in a very short amount of time.<

My criticism of this quote is its last sentence. It happened in a short amount of time? No. I was calling the Republican Party the American Hezbollah, the American Party of God, when Ronald Reagan was sitting in the oval office.  My friends, although generally respecting my opinions, deeply felt I was overreacting. Now it is 40 years later. And it turns out that I was correct all along.

I know I keep saying that but I spent 40 years of being told I was overreacting. Please indulge me a little bit of, “Told you so! Told you so!”

M:  I agree with you, Jim.  The brain-washing techniques have been visible for quite a long time and continue to this day.  Trump has total control and there is no Republican party any more.  The more we try to control him, he cries "victim" and his minions rush to his defense.  I have to wonder how this is all going to end.

Me:  It’s a battle and struggle and there’s no way to tell who’s going to win. Oh, eventually the Republican Party will lose. I stand by a statement I’ve been making over those decades that the insanity of the new conservative movement as founded by William F. Buckley will inevitably lose because it’s a minority movement and that demographics are against it. I said, and I will still say, it’s just a question of how much damage they can do before they lose. Where I was completely and utterly wrong was in not realizing how much damage they could accomplish. We may yet go through a period of religious fascist dictatorship before the end of the nightmare.

I simply could not see that it could ever have gotten this bad. And it may get even worse!

M:   Yes, I used to say, "how much damage can one man do in four years", thinking that the next election would turn things around.  Well, I never expected a "Trump" and for people, that I thought were thinkers, would fall for him.

MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN

 

An interesting discussion with my friend Bobby, which I am re-posting here because I think it’s interesting.

Hey Jim! How are you feeling after the booster of covid juice?

My friend, J, whose philosophies have driven him into a bout of nihilism, is struggling to find why anything matters. I briefly shared with him my personal 'aesthetic case' for meaning and significance in the world, basically that human being is an interesting phenomenon in the universe and could 'look' a lot of different ways - some 'better' than others and we influence that in some way.

It may be good fodder to chat about sometime -

He replied this morning clarifying his meaning of 'purpose' as meaning "to what end?" I replied:

-

I just saw your clarification, "to what end?" This is the right question to focus on precisely because I believe it's the wrong question we all hold.

"To what end?" showcases our expectation that the universe is teleological; it, and stuff among it, is designed according to purpose and if it doesn't, it is arbitrary. This, I believe, is a grave error we have all adopted since Aristotle asserted it as one of reality's four causes. It also allows the notion of an ultimate purpose, which drives smart men to nihilism, partly because answering with God doesn't solve the arbitrariness. Plato had Euthyphro underscore this. 

My view:

If the universe is computational in nature, then the question isn't "What is?" but "What's happening?" It views each moment of reality as a frontier of cycles of computation, processing forward. Reality describes a generative, self-evolving engine. A lot of stuff looks like it stays the same because some computation ensembles generate an equilibrium state, locations of homeostasis. Likewise, interacting frontiers can render new niches of reality for other computations to exploit, generating stuff that never was.

I think for us humans, our instincts to create and protect some stuff and stop others who'd impair that stuff betray our Aristotelian philosophies, and that's good. When we, say, want to stop the Woke or Puritanical Religiosos from infecting culture, for example, we see their potential impact on a destiny yet to be made. We see ourselves on the frontier of human being continually being written. I think this is right. 

I see you as a distinctive hypothesis of human being; your each enactment in the world entails your distinctive signature that just may become indelible upon the next cycles. 

And, those early humans who lacked these instincts never arrived. Nature selected them out. We are the inheritors of the instincts that change the future. We matter.

So, for me, when considering Purpose, instead of asking "to what end?," the question I prefer to ask is, "What's next?"

My reply:

Interesting problem and interesting timing. First, I have been a bit down from the second shot, though it didn’t hit me as hard as the first vaccination.

As for the problem of what’s the meaning of existence? Very interesting question. I’m going through a tough period right now for a wide variety of reasons. Much of which is that my life went so utterly differently than I planned and intended it to be.

I had a very difficult night last night struggling with those feelings. Most animals are well content with their existence is as long as they are comfortable and fed. That is enough. We humans seek a deeper meaning. You’re right that Aristotle made it a critical part of our general philosophy, but after all, he was just reflecting the reality of the human brain. We are so good at seeking patterns that we seek patterns and meaning in everything, including our own lives.

When we lived in Oklahoma, which means I was either five or six, I had a terrible meltdown and I remember standing in the doorway of the bedroom shouting at my mother, “I wish I’d never been born.”

The woman was shocked that a child so young saying that and told me, “But then you wouldn’t be here.  There wouldn’t be a you. And I said,”Yes that’s what I wish.”

I understood full well what I meant, but I didn’t know how to articulate it at that young age.

All my childhood I was torn by the fact that the world was such a vile horrible place and I didn’t want to live in such a vile horrible place. It was also during that period in Oklahoma that I first suddenly realized that I was going to die and it was evitable and it was no escaping it.  That despair was the most significant contributing factor.  This is the sort of thing that usually gets to a person in their 20s or 30s. But for me it when I was five or six.

Even I remember the moment it happened. I was dreaming one of those very vivid dreams I’ve had all my life which are so real that they are as real as any other memory.  Dreams I called dreamtime dreams in my own distorted version of the indigenous religion of Australia. In the dream there was a beautiful hill, which I was gazing down upon from above, as a group of mourners were going up carrying a casket. And I knew in the dream that I was dead. They were burying me. Two beautiful angels came down from heaven to carry my soul up to heaven because that’s what I’ve been taught happened, They reached down to hug the soul drifting up from the coffin. And nothing happened. They reached down to strain and struggle, but nothing happened. There was no soul. They turned to heaven and I woke up in terror.

Young as I was, I realized that if I had never been born I would never exist and then I would never have to go to the horror of getting old and dying. Of course, it was also clear to me that it was too late. I wasn’t suicidal. After all, I feared dying. However, if I had never been born, I wouldn’t be there to be afraid.

As a parent now after all these years I realize how hard this must have been my mother, especially since she had told us when we were older that she was never supposed to have another child. The doctors had told her not to. My brother’s birth had been difficult for her and she was told not to take the risk of getting pregnant again.

(Interesting side story there because I think this contributed to her poor relationships with both my brother and me when we became adults. I think she wanted to take the chance to have another child because she was rather desperate to have a girl. This would explain how she could turn away from her sons and toward their first wives, and at the same time reject their second wives. Her first daughters-in-law became the girls she always wanted.)

So with this despairing situation so critical a part of the human psychology, we all seek to have some meaning and purpose in this horrible existence. We feel lost and desperate. However, as you pointed out, if we could only be warriors for God fighting a mighty battle suddenly we are incredibly significant and powerful beings.  Joining a religion is like joining a militia. Suddenly you’re not a nobody or a loser, you are part of the glorious crusade to… fill in the blank.

The other side of it is that if you do accept the universe as a material reality in which the random fluctuations of probability and chance rule, then what’s the point of our existence? Even if you were William Shakespeare or Franklin Delano Roosevelt, what does it all matter a million years from now?  Or two million. Or one billion. Or many trillion after the heat death of the universe?

I’ve struggled with that issue and answered it in various ways at different times of my life. Ultimately what I’ve come to conclude is that you simply must create your own meaning. The happiness and joy you feel is real. It may be fleeting, but it is real. So are the pain and grief. The function, the purpose we have is to make the world as much a better place as much and as much more enjoyable a place as we can. Not just for ourselves and our own, but for everyone. All right, in a billion years who will remember? Nevertheless, we added to this cold and indifferent universe, even if for a brief time, real joy, real pleasure.

From many this will not be enough.  However, I think it must be enough.

Let me repeat once again that if we are highest perfection in this world that God could create then God is an incredibly bad creator and we are an incredibly hideous failure.

On the other hand, if we are apes who have risen up by pulling on our own evolutionary bootstraps, what we have accomplished is remarkable and we have reason to be proud of it.

Of course, I would rather be part of a great heroic crusade and lived my life as I intended it, but even if those options had been accomplished, would it really matter in the history of the universe? There really aren’t any good answers, except that everyone must make their own sense of purpose and reality. One of the reasons I am offended by what I refer to as the fundamentalist evangelical atheists is that they insist on taking away the comfort that some people have found. They want to strip them of their meaning of life because the crusading atheist extremist is seeking his own meaning by destroying the meaning of others.

I doubt this will be of any help to anyone. It’s just the story of how I worked things out.   However, I think you’ll find it interesting.

Let me end by noting that, for all the depression, trouble, and stress that I sometimes feel, when I’m with my family or friends and times are good, life is joyful and beautiful and very worth living.  At those times there is no question in my mind.  It is good to be alive. It is good to be here.

There’s a reason that I enjoy the philosophy of Epicurus and the book of Ecclesiastes.

Now to put it a bit more poetically,

The moving finger writes; and, having writ, moves on: nor all thy piety nor wit shall lure it back to cancel half a line, nor all thy tears wash out a word of it.

-- Omar Khayyam

The Flood Receeds

 Facebook post in regard to the following article:

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/04/gallup-poll-church-gop-christian-right-2024-democracy.html

Love them or hate them, the facts are clear and obvious. America is well on the way to ceasing to be a religious nation.

>On the eve of the 21st century, 8 percent of Americans identified with no religion in Gallup’s polling. Today, that figure is 21 percent.

... Two-thirds of Americans born before 1946 belong to a religious institution, according to Gallup. That drops to 58 percent among baby boomers, 50 percent among Generation X, and 36 percent among millennials (the pollster’s limited data from zoomers indicates that they are roughly as irreligious as their cooler, wiser immediate predecessors).<

Three data points mark a trend. Four data points plus a strong fifth indicator = Withering on the vine.

This is not a slight decline in religion, this is falling off the cliff.

Emotionally, nostalgically, I found this sad.  Considering how religion has perverted the political process and even rational thought in America, I find it comforting. Not unusual for me, finding two opposing positions well contained within my scope of self.

 As for the political aspects, I’ve been saying since the days of Reagan that Republicans  have lost the war of demographics. America is changing. The only question is how much damage can the Republicans do before they’re finally forced out?

The answer is, much more than I thought they could!

The article concludes:

> Thus, the coming decade of U.S. politics may be defined, in part, by the struggle to prevent conservative Christianity from taking democracy down with it.<

12th Century Georgia On My Mind

 Copy of a Facebook post. I’ve been really neglectful of the blog I’ll try to keep up with it although a lot of it for a while maybe simply re-posts. They tend to be short but, I think, valuable.

In response to Georgia’s attempt to pass a law giving special privileges to right wing religious extremist Christians I posted:

Special laws for the religious, well, at least for the religious who are members of the exactly correct sect in the exactly correct religion. Sounds familiar for some reason. Oh, I remember. The Dark Ages.

From Wiki:

> In English law, the benefit of clergy (Law Latin: privilegium clericale) was originally a provision by which clergymen could claim that they were outside the jurisdiction of the secular courts and be tried instead in an ecclesiastical court under canon law.

...Over time, this proof of clergy-hood was replaced by a literacy test: defendants demonstrated their clerical status by reading from the Latin Bible... <

It all started with Henry II murdered St.Thomas and eventually went so bad that the illiterate could memorize a single Bible passage and pretend to be reading it so as be exempt from civil law.

Just as, thanks to right wing media and Q anon, we are returning the middle ages as we hunt imaginary devil worshiping cannibals, we are also returning to civil versus canon with special rules for the clergy.

I’ve been warning since the days of Reagan that if we didn’t watch it we would follow the same path as China and the great Islamic empires. Once the wealthiest and most powerful countries in the world, they became Third World countries is they turned inward, away from reality and into fundamentalism.

We’re still making “progress“.

The Butler And The Book

I have been thinking about how to effectively explain the difference between the way that professional creationists approach reality and the way that the same is approached by a rationalist. Having a certain taste for BBC murder mysteries, I think the best way would be to look at the careers of two chief inspectors.

Let us begin with Chief Inspector Creationist.  On his first day in his new position, the sergeant assigned to assist him enters and declares, “Here’s our first case, sir. A man has been found murdered.  Forensics has just arrived at the scene. We can be there in a few minutes to gather evidence.”

Chief  Inspector Creationist: No need. It’s obvious who committed the crime.

Sergeant: Excuse me me sir?  You don’t even know the victim’s name. How could you possibly solve the crime?

Chief  Inspector Creationist: There is only one possible answer, Sergeant. The butler did it.

Sergeant: But we don’t even know if there is a butler, sir!

Chief  Inspector Creationist: Of course there is. The butler always commits the murder.

Sergeant:  How could you know that sir?

Chief  Inspector Creationist: The Book, Sergeant. Haven’t you ever read the Book? It has all the answers to everything.

Sergeant:  Don’t you think we should at least go take a look at the scene?

Chief  Inspector Creationist: (Exasperated) If you must, do so. But I shall not waste my time, for the crime has been solved...by the Book.

Later that day the sergeant returns. The conversation resumes.

Sergeant:  Well, sir, it’s quite an interesting case. We do know however, that the butler could not possibly have committed the crime because there was no butler.

Chief  Inspector Creationist:  Don’t be foolish, man!  If there was no butler, he cannot have committed the crime.

Sergeant: Well, yes. That’s exactly my point. The family was on the dole. They were quite poor. They live in a very small flat. They could not possibly afford a part time cleaning lady, much less a butler! 

Chief  Inspector Creationist: Sergeant, I really wonder how you possibly could have attained your rank. Simply ignoring the facts is no way to conduct an investigation!

Sergeant: But these are the facts, sir.

Chief  Inspector Creationist: Is it really necessary for me to repeat myself? The Book says the butler did it. Therefore the butler did it. The Book is infallible, inerrant, and literal. 

The only possible conclusion is that there was a butler and that he is the guilty party.

Which leads to another question. How could a poor family afford a butler? Obviously, they couldn’t. Therefore they were somehow forcing the man to be their servant. And now we have a motive!

Sergeant:  Sir?

Chief  Inspector Creationist: Don’t you see it, man? The only way they could force a butler to serve them without pay is blackmail. They were blackmailing the butler to be their servant.  Finally fed up with it, he turned to murder in order to gain his freedom and revenge.

Sergeant: However, sir, the wife has already admitted that she couldn’t stand the victim’s snoring and smothered him to death in his sleep.

Chief  Inspector Creationist: So she’s covering for the butler. Perhaps he’s blackmailing her. Unless she is his lover...

As the investigation proceeds, Chief  Inspector Creationist closes all ports of entry and sets officers watching every bus station, train station, and other method of transportation searching for the butler.  When the murdering manservant is still not captured, he issues an international alert to Interpol. The butler must be found!

Years later, at his retirement party,  Chief  Inspector Creationist bemoans the fact that he spent his entire career hunting for that wicked man and never found him. In fact, he never took another case, having devoted all his efforts to solving the first and only crime ever presented for his investigation.  But he does not feel that he has failed in his duty, after all, he did defend the Book.

As for Chief Inspector Rationalist; on his first case, he went to the crime scene. He examined the forensic reports. He checked out the alibis and motives of every suspect.  He developed numerous hypotheses as to who was in fact guilty, discarding them when the evidence contradicted his conclusions.. In the end, a suspect confessed in the face of overwhelming evidence. Chief Inspector Rationalist and his sergeant moved on to solve many cases.

(A few of them even involved a butler.)

Burke And Hare Or DaVinci And Franklin?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/trump-ban-on-fetal-tissue-research-blocks-coronavirus-treatment-effort/2020/03/18/ddd9f754-685c-11ea-abef-020f086a3fab_story.html

Fetal tissue research is very creepy and discomfiting. However, the abortions have already taken place.  What is done is done and cannot be undone. Or, to put another way; the moving hand writes, and having writ, moves on.

For centuries medicine was held back by the creepy, discomfiting feelings we held toward the dissection of corpses. This is exactly the same situation.

Reverence and respect for the dead should not cause the living to join them.

As Xenophon put it, “Excess of grief for the dead is madness; for it is an injury to the living, and the dead know it not.”

Footnote:  I shall confess my embarrassment. I tried to find the exact quote and I couldn’t understand what was wrong with Google. Why couldn’t I find it? The answer is because I was looking for the quote by Xenophenes, not Xenophon.  In self-defense I point out that the names are very similar, and their life spans were fairly close to each other.  Not to mention, they were both Greek philosophers. (All Greek philosophers sound alike to me.)🧐

Anti Evangelicals

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/millennials-are-leaving-religion-and-not-coming-back/



Again, a brief post, but in the light of the previous comments I have made on the subject it is simply confirmation of what I have been saying for decades.

The more churches become secularized and politicized the more they drive away their future members. Just as happened in Europe in the past two centuries, it is coming to pass in America. In many ways this is sad, but all in all I believe we will be a much healthier nation as a result.

Inevitably as churches lose more and more ground, they will become more and more fanatic and more and more political. They will become more and more determined to create an atmosphere in which their particular sect is the law of the land in a desperate attempt to ensure their survival. This is a positive feedback loop. It inevitably leads to self destruction.

> ...”we came to see all of this negativity from people who were highly religious and increasingly didn’t want a part in it.” This view is common among young people.

...research has suggested that the strong association between religion and the Republican Party may actually be fueling this divide. And if even more Democrats lose their faith, that will only exacerbate the acrimonious rift between secular liberals and religious conservatives. <

Come Nineveh

Very brief post but I’ve covered this topic so many times over the last few decades I don’t really care to add repetitive commentary. I started complaining about it in the days of Ronald Reagan. Still, here is more evidence that what I said would happen is actually happening.

> For the first time, China has taken the Nature Index crown as the biggest producer of high-quality research in chemistry, knocking the United States down to second place. <

Once Chinese science was the greatest in the world. Then the fundamentalists and the China First/China Only groups took over. China was quickly surpassed by much tinier nations who had stayed on the science road. Eventually those tiny nations bullied China any way they wanted to as China descended into Third World status. Now the United States, long the producer of the greatest science in the world, is turning to fundamentalism, America 1st/America Only belief while China turns back to science. We are slipping. They are gaining.

Is anyone really surprised?

https://www.natureindex.com/news-blog/these-ten-countries-top-the-ranks-in-chemistry-research?utm_source=Nature+Briefing&utm_campaign=bf160736fb-briefing-dy-20191212&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_c9dfd39373-bf160736fb-44635989

Cry 'Havoc!,' And Let Slip The Dogs Of War!

As conservatives once again freak out about the imaginary war on Christmas in the last few decades that never actually happened, it pays to ask a serious question. Who has actually waged a war on Christmas in America?

The answer is:

The Puritans.

You know. Those evil, liberal, atheist, latte loving, avocado eating, socialists. Wait a minute. Weren’t the Puritans ultra conservative, ultra religious, ultra Christians? They could not have been the ones to ban Christmas…could they?

May 11, 1659
The General Court of the Massachusetts Bay Colony issued the following order.
For preventing disorders arising in several places within this jurisdiction, by reason of some still observing such festivals, as were superstitiously kept in other countries, to the great dishonor of God and offense to others:
It is therefore ordered by this court and the authority thereof, that whomsoever shall be found observing any such day as Christmas or the like, either by forbearing labor, feasting, or any other way upon any such account as aforesaid, every such person so offended, shall pay five shillings as a fine…”

(FYI: They also banned Easter.)

Why? Because God said only the Sabbath should be kept holy and they thought that it should be honored with solemn, long, grim church services. Anyway, people are notorious for doing fun things at Christmas. I mean they played games! So wicked! Not to mention they drank!

Cotton Mathers’ father declared, “The generality of Christmas-keepers observe that festival after such a manner as is highly dishonorable to the name of Christ. How few are there comparatively that spend these holidays (as they are called) after an holy manner. But they are consumed in Compotations, in Interludes, and playing at Cards, in Revellings, in excess of Wine, In mad Mirth.“

To enforce these restrictions the authorities, “… dispatched town criers on Christmas Eve to shout "No Christmas, No Christmas" through the streets of Boston.” (https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/54131/time-boston-banned-christmas)

Great! But it gets better. Although the law was repealed, the attitude that Christmas was a bad thing lasted for a very long time.

All the way up to the year before Ulysses S. Grant declared Christmas a national holiday (1869), school children in Boston who decided not to attend public school on Christmas Day were severely punished. They were punished by up to expulsion from school for such a heinous offense.

I’ve known about the banning of Christmas by the Puritans for decades but I want to give thanks to the Internet channel Today I Found Out for these details.

So if you do insist on making declarations about the war on Christmas please remember that war was waged by ultra conservative, ultra religious, ultra Christians. Not by liberals. In fact it was liberals who overturned the law and declared Christmas a national holiday.

The war on Christmas? Yes there was one. Because the Liberals won, we can all still joyfully say, “Merry Christmas!”

By The Power Of Numbskull!

So I’m not the only one who feels the need to explain that yes, I am Christian, but I’m not one of those Christians.

I really blew this one! I’m trying to put the link to the article into this post, but I wrote the post yesterday and I wasn’t feeling all that great so I failed to put it in. Now I’m having trouble relocating the article. I will include the link below, if I can find it. If not my apologies to the authors and to readers who would really like to read the original.

I’ve quoted excerpts from the article more extensively than I normally do, this is not to say that I have summed it up in it’s entirety. It is well worth reading in its original form. However, the points were so cogent I felt that these expansive excepts were appropriate.

> For years they exchanged pleasantries with the pastor, before stumbling into a political discussion in which they discovered he was not, to their surprise, a right-winger. “Oh, I get it: You’re not those Christians,” the husband exclaimed. The couple soon became regulars at our church.
I mention this anecdote in connection with new research showing that the political views of conservative Christians — notably the militant Christian right composed mostly of white Evangelicals though with some Catholic “traditionalists” in harness with them — are pushing people who strongly disagree with them away from Christianity (or any other religious faith).

...Researchers haven’t found a comprehensive explanation for why the number of religiously unaffiliated Americans has increased over the past few years...But a recent swell of social science research suggests that even if politics wasn’t the sole culprit, it was an important contributor.

... In a paper published in 2002, they offered a new theory: Distaste for the Christian right’s involvement with politics was prompting some left-leaning Americans to walk away from religion.

...The more non-religiously-affiliated Americans think Robert Jeffress or Mike Pence or (shudder) Donald Trump speak for God in this country, the less likely they will ever darken the door of a church, where it is assumed those Christians are stewing in their cultural pathologies. < As I have commented in a previous post, these ultra conservative, ultra religious groups are violating the teachings of their own Gospels (one of which directs them to be in the world, not of the world) and the principles of the foundation of the United States (which was designed according to the majority of the Founding Fathers, to be a secular religious-neutral system of government). By their fruits you shall know them, declares the Bible, and the fruits of these fanatic individuals who are so fiercely evangelical is that what they are actually evangelizing is that people should turn away from religion. As an article in Salon noted, >"Rising none rates are more common in Republican states" in the years between 2000-2010, researchers write. "Moreover, when the Christian Right comes into more public conflict, such as over same-sex marriage bans, the rate of religious nones climbs." ...The more the religious right engages in politics, the more people get fed up and abandon Christianity. And the more they do that, the easier it is for them to embrace socially liberal policies. ...Robert P. Jones of the Public Religion Research Institute told Salon that it's "young, white people leaving Christian churches that is driving up the number of religiously unaffiliated Americans."

Now there's more evidence that Jones is right: By organizing politically, the Christian right may be winning elections in the short term, but it's also driving people out of the pews, which is likely to lead to long-term defeat. <

Talk about self-destructive behavior! As the Republican Party purified and rarefied its membership through it’s “RINO” purge, so this worldly politicized group of Christians are shrinking their membership in their desperate search for purity and power.

Please remember that “none” does not mean atheist or agnostic. It means not associated with any organized religion. Most of the “nones” are in fact theists who believe in God, but not in organized religion; much to the dismay of those who insist otherwise, like Mr. Trump, the Republican Party, extremist atheists, and others of that type.


The Salon article: https://www.salon.com/2018/05/14/how-the-religious-right-is-shrinking-itself-overzealous-christianity-is-driving-people-away/

Posted

Mainlining Creationism

https://quillette.com/2019/09/09/david-gelernter-is-wrong-about-ditching-darwin/

If you are unfamiliar with the efforts of religious extremists to force their views upon the American public, this is an article well worth reading. The arguments being debunked here are yet another attack on reality. Yet another attack on science. Yet another refusal to acknowledge facts.

Creation “Scientists” are a strange and distasteful mishmash of true believer, outright liar, and astoundingly gullible fool. As with all addicts, one can only hope that eventually they will reach such a wretched level that they finally become disgusted with their acts of self degradation and turn away from their addiction.

It is a sad and forlorn hope.

Nevertheless, I must greatly respect and admire those open minded clear thinkers who continually expose themselves to these diseased minds in the effort to at least prevent the spread of the plague, even if curing those already afflicted is unlikely.

> ...every one of those arguments has been soundly rebutted over the past few decades...I suspect he, like all ID advocates, is susceptible to religious blandishments, immunizing him against the scientific truths that rebut faith. And so he asks us, “How cleanly and quickly can the field get over Darwin, and move on?” The answer, I suggest, is “We don’t need to.” < And the most apropos excerpt of all, > Rebutting such arguments is a perpetual and tiresome battle, useful only for those sporting open minds rather than religious blinkers. <

Well said, Professor Coyne. Well done.

The Religious FreedomTo Persecute

https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/world/mississippi-wedding-venue-refuses-to-rent-to-engaged-interracial-couple-because-the-owners-say-its-against-our-christian-beliefs-to-do-mixed-race-and-gay-weddings/ar-AAGEPUL

ME:  We knew this was coming. Conservative Christianity is an now an excuse to break the law and deny people their human rights. Thank you Republican Party.  Back when Ronald Reagan was president I referred to Republican Party as the New World Hezbollah, the American Party of God.

     I was predicting the future more than describing the current reality at that time. And I was right.

S:  Uh oh. Shades of Hitler.  Many of Germany’s 30,000 Roma (Gypsies) were eventually sterilized and prohibited, along with Blacks, from intermarrying with Germans. About 500 children of mixed African-German backgrounds were also sterilized. New laws combined traditional prejudices with the racism of the Nazis.

ME:  We must remember that from the very beginning many have pointed out it’s not make America great again, it’s make America white again.

S:  True, true, true.

S:  Another consequence of Hitler’s ruthless dictatorship in the 1930s was the arrest of political opponents and trade unionists and others whom the Nazis labeled “undesirables” and “enemies of the state.” The mere denunciation of a man as “homosexual” could result in arrest, trial, and conviction. Jehovah’s Witnesses, who numbered at least 25,000 in Germany, were banned as an organization as early as April 1933, because the beliefs of this religious group prohibited them from swearing any oath to the state or serving in the German military.

ME:  Auschwitz was started as a camp for political prisoners, including journalists, who, of course, were enemies of the people.

S:  Could it happen here?

ME:  Not by that incompetent dolt, Trump. 

     Just as back in the days of Ronald Reagan I was seeing where the Republican Party was headed and was deeply worried about it, I can see that as Reagan laid the groundwork for what’s happening today, what Trump is doing today is laying the groundwork for what could very well be the turning of the United States into a fascist-theocratic dictatorship.  Back then I was saying the danger was of these fundamentalists turning America into a Third World country, just as they did to China, just as they did to the great Islamic empire. These once technological and cultural leaders of the world degenerated once they turned inward and began believing in their own superiority and purity and the fundamentalist beliefs of their religions.  Science is not at war with religion, with the exception of a few fundamentalist evangelical atheists. Neither is religion at war with science, except for a few fundamentalist evangelical Christians.  

     In spite of the minority status,they are a very powerful group in the United States.  Courts are being packed all across the country up to the Supreme Court with ultra conservative judges who believe in their theology. Elections are being rigged in favor of the ultra conservative and religious fanatics. And behind it all, of course, are the ultra wealthy. Those who wish to turn us into Mexico — a tiny ruling class of the Dons  and all the rest of us their peons, barely more than an other herd of cattle or sheep for them to exploit.

     I knew then that I was regarded back then by many as being foolish and extreme in making this prediction, but time has borne me out.

     There are times you really don’t want to be right. Even when you are certain that you are.

On Abiogenisis And Creationism

Philosophers comprise a group in which I feel I belong. Having said that, It should be noted that I think that not all philosophers were terribly wise. In fact, I must conclude that a great many were willfully, and quite deliberately, self-deluded. One can only conclude that they are, after all, merely human.

For example:

"Let's say you're walking around and you find a watch on the ground. As you examine it, you marvel at the intricately complex interweaving of its parts, a means to an end. Surely you wouldn't think this marvel would have come about by itself. The watch must have a maker. Just as the watch has such complex means to an end, so does nature to a much greater extent. Just look at the complexity of the human eye. Thus we must conclude that nature has a maker too."

So declared William Paley in one of the most famous procreationist arguments in all of human history.  These words are used again and again today, indeed, ad nauseam,as an acid test, an undeniable proof that abiogenesis and evolution could not possibly be correct, that science itself must be merely a religion -- and a foolish one at that.

But it should be noted that Mr. Paley missed a few points. This is what he should have said:

"If you're walking along and see a watch, you know it must have had a creator. Looking how complicated it is! See how it has exactingly machined parts...it had to be carefully manufactured. This is especially confirmed when you see the watch having sex with a female watch. Then, when she has a litter of little baby watches, you see how they are preyed upon by…Grandfather clocks? Only a few of them survive…Oh, that's right. Living things are very, very different from watches."

 How odd that  Mr. Paley never noticed these details.

William Paley was an idiot.

After thoughts on creationism.

I know I can be quite sharp, even acerbic, in my criticisms of creationists, but it should be noted that what I am primarily opposing is the hypocrisy, intellectual deceit, and spiritual failures of so many in that community.

Again and again one is presented with an endless series of individuals who first proclaim that the one and only test of truth is the Bible. Then they proceed to torture, chop up, and superglue together a hideous Frankenstein Monster of “evidence” and “facts” to support their positions.  The resulting creation is so pitiful that it cannot even be brought to life. It can only lie there and rot.

I've listed three points that I find particularly offensive; hypocrisy, intellectual deceit, and spiritual failure. I will take a look at each one of these individually.

Hypocrisy.  

We are presented time and again with a declaration that the only the test of truth which is acceptable is absolute faith in the Bible. Blind, unquestioning faith in the Bible. Then the individual attempts to create a whole network of physical evidence to support their supposedly faith based position.  

Epistemology is a philosophic term which relates to the nature of human knowledge. That is to say, what can we humans know, and how can we know it? If your epistemology is faith, then it is faith which is relevant to any discussion. The facts are irrelevant.  Either your faith is complete and sufficient or it isn’t.  This both begins and ends any and all discussions. You have declared that the truth has been revealed to you by a higher authority, that you accept that, and that is all there is to say.  

To add a series of complicated and deeply flawed arguments regarding objective reality to this argument is to say that you lied, and were in fact being profoundly hypocritical, when you said that faith was all that mattered.

Intellectual deceit.

The supposed facts and evidences which are presented are ludicrous, when they are or are not outright lies and deliberate falsehoods.  Endless ridiculous exaggerations and other distortions of what scientists and students of science actually believe constitute a mainstay of creationist apologists.  One particular extreme individual reported on his website that Darwin thought that men and women lived side-by-side as separate species for millions of years before they finally evolved sex. He declared “Darwinists” thought that men and women prior to that reproduced by fission.  When this error was pointed out to him in no uncertain  terms by a critic, he pulled that statement off his website and then posted another one declaring “Darwinists” believe that elephant males and females had lived for millions of years… Etc. etc.

Maliciously and deliberately misstating your opponents’ positions in order to make your opponent sound ridiculous is intellectual dishonesty in its most blatant form.  There are many more examples of deliberate lies and deceit spread by these individuals, but I don’t care to go into them in great length at this point. If you are interested go to YouTube, type in creationists and debunkers, and you will find an amazing list which is stunning in its breadth.

Spiritual failure.

This may sound identical to the first point, but it differs in that hypocrisy is to be found in your relationship to others (“I say this, but do that.“) while spiritual failure is deeply personal.  The individual claims that faith is all that matters to him, yet feels he must desperately thrash about to create some mishmash supposedly empirical evidence to shore up his shaky position.  He does this because he knows his own position is not believable—not even to himself.  Having loudly declared himself to be a man of faith, he then demonstrates that he has no real faith at all.

I will never agree with creationism. I think it’s silly superstition. I think it’s a serious misinterpretation of the meaning and purpose of the Bible and religion in general. Nevertheless, I will respect the moral, intellectual, and spiritual honesty of an individual that says faith is what I have, faith is all I need, that is the end of the discussion.

As I have been watching creationists on YouTube I did see one for whom I have this respect. He said flatly that he knows all the evidence shows that he is wrong.   He then went on to say that he believed in creationism because the Bible said so and his test of truth was faith in the Bible.

I think he is terribly wrong and very misguided, but I am compelled respect his honesty.