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[Aug. 17th, 2006|08:44 am] |
Story time, kids. Thousands of years ago, an immortal god impregnated a mere human woman, and she gave birth to a baby boy in late December. When this boy grew up, he performed miracles, and was particularly well-known for being able to transform water into wine. He came back from the dead. He wore a halo. He attracted a bunch of followers who had a ceremony wherein they ate bread and drank wine to symbolically ingest his body and blood. I am, of course, talking about Bacchus, the demigod of wine, who was worshipped by Romans centuries before Jesus was supposedly born.
Not that I’ve got anything against Jesus Christ. He sounds like a swell guy, even if you assume all that supernatural stuff in his biography was made up after his death (probably by people who had never even met him before). It’s his fan club I have issues with. Lots of issues. The issue I feel like criticizing today has to do with the stranglehold Christianity has on America, cutting off the oxygen supply to its brain, and leaving the general public stupid enough to reelect Bush (probably because they can now relate with him). Christianity owns a collection of fanciful stories, and if one can be proven false, the entire collection (and, indeed, the entire religion) may be at risk. That’s why Christianity has been at odds with evolution since before the idea was publicly known. Evolution conflicts with the Adam-and-Eve creation myth. Therefore, we’ve got Christians who oppose the theory of evolution in its entirety, despite the fact that evolution is obviously a reality, or else there would be absolutely no danger from so-called avian flu (which wouldn’t be able to affect humans), and we wouldn’t have to keep looking for new antibiotics to combat constantly-evolving bacteria. Here’s a troubling article that came out recently.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/15/science/sciencespecial2/15evo.html?_r=1
Did Humans Evolve? Not Us, Say Americans
“In surveys conducted in 2005, people in the United States and 32 European countries were asked whether to respond ‘true,’ ‘false’ or ‘not sure’ to this statement: ‘Human beings, as we know them, developed from earlier species of animals.’ The same question was posed to Japanese adults in 2001. The United States had the second-highest percentage of adults who said the statement was false and the second-lowest percentage who said the statement was true, researchers reported in the current issue of Science. Only adults in Turkey expressed more doubts on evolution. In Iceland, 85 percent agreed with the statement.”
http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2006/08/14/science/sciencespecial2/20050815_EVO_GRAPHIC.html
The biggest reason why so much of America still denies evolution is because so much of America is Christian. And, as is too often the case with majorities, Christian America wants to make everything better for itself, even if that makes things worse for the minorities. From the Scopes Monkey Trial back in 1925 to the Intelligent Design movement seeping through the modern Bible Belt, Christians have fought the theory of evolution as if Darwin himself nailed Jesus to the cross. To clarify, Christians wanted public schools to stop teaching evolution because it challenged religious indoctrination, but that’s pretty much failed. Now Christians mostly want public schools to teach “alternative theories” in science class, such as the theory that the Christian god created everything. Sure, in this theory, they may refer to their god as an anonymous intelligent designer, but that’s a cheap trick to circumvent the whole “separation of church and state” thing. We all know when Christians mention an intelligent being designing humans, they’re not suggesting we were assembled by advanced alien beings with unusually big heads and gray skin.
It’s clear what’s going on. Convinced that their religion is the correct one, many Christians strive to make this country more suitable for Christians. Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand of Spain had a similar goal in 1492, when they forcibly deported Spain’s 200,000 Jews in an attempt to rule a Christian nation. In fact, some Americans falsely believe that America was founded as a Christian nation. This is certainly not the case. First, I’ll present this Daily Record letter to the editor, which is quite concise but forceful nevertheless.
http://www.dailyrecord.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060521/OPINION02/605210321/1095/NEWS01
05/21/06 - Posted from the Daily Record newsroom
America not a Christian nation
“To the Editor:
A recent letter claimed that the United States was founded on Christian thought. That is a myth. References to gods and religions are purposely left out of the Constitution and Bill of Rights, as well as all amendments; the only exception being the statement ‘Congress shall make no law respecting establishment of religion, or the free exercise thereof.’
The founders purposely designed a secular nation. America is not a Christian nation. It is a nation where many Christians live.
The founders wanted government to leave religions alone and equally wanted religions to leave government alone. The Supreme Court has decided in numerous cases that local, state and federal governments may not promote or finance religion. Religion is belief in a personal God or gods who are entitled to worship and obedience. Neither Franklin, Washington nor Jefferson believed in a personal God. English ‘common law’ predated Christianity in Britain, and the thinking of the American founders was based on the enlightenment, not the Bible.
JEFFREY HUPPERT
Boonton”
For further reading, here is a “nontract” written by Freedom From Religion Foundation, who really know how to get their point across.
http://www.ffrf.org/nontracts/xian.php
( Archival Copy )
http://www.godlessgeeks.com/LINKS/Jefferson.jpg
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