Capt. Ryan Jean wanted to perform well on the Army's psychological evaluation for soldiers. But he also wanted to answer the questions honestly. So when he was asked whether he believed his life had a lasting purpose, Jean, an atheist, saw no choice but to say no.

Those and other responses, Jean says, won him a trip to see the post chaplain, who berated him for his lack of faith.

"He basically told me that if I don't get right with God, then I'm worthless," said Jean, now an intelligence officer at Fort Meade. "That if I don't believe in Jesus, why am I in uniform, because this is God's army, and that I should resign my commission in order to stop disgracing the military."

Jean says experiences such as that confrontation three years ago, when he was serving at Camp Arifjan in Kuwait, have spurred him to seek Army recognition as a humanist lay leader — on a par with the lay Christians, Jews and Muslims who help military chaplains minister to the troops.

Jean is one of as many as a dozen atheists throughout the U.S. military in the process of applying for the status, which they and their supporters see as necessary to secure for nonbelievers the acceptance and support that they say Christians in uniform take for granted.

Continue reading "Atheists in military seek recognition, acceptance" »

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Associated Press correspondent Tom Breen reports:

The cliche notwithstanding, there are atheists in foxholes. In fact, atheists, agnostics, humanists and other assorted skeptics from the Army's Fort Bragg have formed an organization in a pioneering effort to win recognition and ensure fair treatment for nonbelievers in the overwhelmingly Christian U.S. military.

"We exist, we're here, we're normal," said Sgt. Justin Griffith, chief organizer of Military Atheists and Secular Humanists, or MASH. "We're also in foxholes. That's a big one, right there."

For now, the group meets regularly in homes and bars outside of Fort Bragg, one of the biggest military bases in the country. But it is going through the long bureaucratic process to win official recognition from the Army as a distinct "faith" group.

That would enable it to meet on base, advertise its gatherings and, members say, serve more effectively as a haven for like-minded soldiers.

"People look at you differently if you say you're an atheist in the Army," said Lt. Samantha Nicoll, a West Point graduate who in January attended her first meeting of MASH. "That's extremely taboo. I get a lot of questions if I let it slip in conversation."

The decision on recognition goes first to an Army agency called the Installation Management Command and may be reviewed after that by the Army Chaplain Corps. Neither agency returned calls for comment. MASH members said chaplains at Fort Bragg have been supportive of their effort.

Similar groups of non-theists at about 20 U.S. military bases around the world are watching the outcome at Fort Bragg in hopes it will lead to their recognition, too, said Jason Torpy, president of the Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers.

Continue reading "Group seeks recognition for atheists in foxholes" »

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A report from Jay Reeves of the Associated Press:

Stricken with cancer and fragile from chemotherapy, author and outspoken atheist Christopher Hitchens sits in an armchair before an audience and waits for the only question that can come first at such a time.

"How's your health?" asks Larry Taunton, a friend who heads an Alabama-based group dedicated to defending Christianity.

"Well, I'm dying, since you asked, but so are you. I'm only doing it more rapidly," replies Hitchens, his grin faint and his voice weak and raspy. Only wisps of his dark hair remain; clothes hang on his frame.

The writer best known to believers for his 2007 book "God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything" has esophageal cancer, the same disease that killed his father. He is fighting it, but the 62-year-old Hitchens is realistic: At the very best, he says, his life will be shortened.

For some of his critics, it might be satisfying to see a man who has made a career of skewering organized religion switch sides near the end of his life and pray silently for help fighting a ravaging disease.

He has an opportunity: Monday has been informally proclaimed "Everybody Pray for Hitchens Day."

Christopher Hitchens won't be bowing his head, even on a day set aside just for him.

"I shall not be participating," he said in an interview with The Associated Press.

Continue reading "Hitchens skipping day of prayer in his honor" »

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An atheist is suing to force the administrators of a towering cross in southern Illinois to return a $20,000 state grant toward its restoration, saying Thursday it was "blatantly unconstitutional" to spend taxpayer money on a Christian symbol, the Associated Press reports.

Caretakers of the 11-story Bald Knob Cross of Peace near Alto Pass, Ill., some 130 miles southeast of St. Louis, insist the grant was legally awarded to the 50-year-old landmark in mid-2008 by classifying it as a tourist attraction, not a religious symbol.

Rob Sherman disagrees, pressing in his federal lawsuit in Springfield, Ill., that the grant violates the U.S. Constitution's establishment clause used to argue a separation of church and state.

"There has never been any question, outside of southern Illinois, that this state grant is blatantly unconstitutional," said Sherman, who successfully sued to have an Illinois law requiring a daily "moment of silence" in Illinois public schools overturned.

"The job of atheists is to take clergy to court to challenge the epidemic of civil wrongs that they have perpetrated, on the sneak, against the people of Illinois," Sherman said on his website. "It's a big job, but somebody's gotta do it."

Continue reading "Atheist sues to get back public money for cross" »

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Farmers sold pigs to help raise money to build the towering cross on southern Illinois' highest point as a year-round testament to faith. The 11-story monument draws thousands of visitors each year, and supporters say it has promoted self-growth and reflection for nearly half a century.

But over the years, the Associated Press reports, the once-glistening structure about 130 miles southeast of St. Louis began to show its age. The 650 or so white porcelain panels that cover the concrete and steel frame rusted or fell off. Some remained attached with only coat hangers and bailing wire.

A group cobbled together $360,000 of the $550,000 needed to restore the Bald Knob Cross of Peace, including a $20,000 grant from the state of Illinois. Now, AP writer Jim Surh reports, a Chicago-area atheist who objects to the grant as a bit of unconstitutional pork has threatened to sue if the group doesn't return the money to the state.

Pitching the project as the renovation of a major tourist attraction "is a nice cover story," Rob Sherman said in a telephone interview Wednesday. But the retired Chicago-area radio talk show host who successfully fought Illinois' "moment of silence" in public schools said he thinks it would be more appropriate to use the money for such public interests as schools and roads. If it isn't returned, he promised "a long and expensive" lawsuit.

That didn't deter the Friends of Bald Knob Cross. The money was used long ago as a down payment on the renovation of the monument near Alto Pass, Ill., said Bill Vandergraph, a minister and Friends board member.

"We're not shaken in any way," Vandergraph said Thursday. "We're trying to stay low-profile, and that's not out of fear. We're absolutely not intimidated."

Continue reading "11-story cross draws tourists, lawsuit threat" »

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A federal appeals court in San Francisco upheld the use of the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance and "In God We Trust" on U.S. currency, rejecting arguments on Thursday that the phrases violate the separation of church and state, the Associated Press reports.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel rejected two legal challenges by Sacramento atheist Michael Newdow, who claimed the references to God disrespect his religious beliefs, the AP reports.

"The Pledge is constitutional," Judge Carlos Bea wrote for the majority in the 2-1 ruling. "The Pledge of Allegiance serves to unite our vast nation through the proud recitation of some of the ideals upon which our Republic was founded."

The same court ruled in Newdow's favor in 2002 after he sued his daughter's school district for having students recite the pledge at school.

That lawsuit reached the U.S. Supreme Court in 2004, but the high court ruled that Newdow lacked the legal standing to file the suit because he didn't have custody of his daughter, on whose behalf he brought the case.

So Newdow, who is a doctor and lawyer, filed an identical challenge on behalf of other parents who objected to the recitation of the pledge at school. In 2005, a federal judge in Sacramento decided in Newdow's favor, ruling that the pledge was unconstitutional.

"I want to be treated equally," Newdow said when he argued the case before the 9th Circuit in December 2007. He added that supporters of the phrase "want to have their religious views espoused by the government."

In a separate 3-0 ruling Thursday, the appeals court upheld the inscription of the national motto "In God We Trust" on coins and currency, saying that the phrase is ceremonial and patriotic, not religious.

Reached on his cell phone, Newdow said he hadn't been aware that the appeals court had ruled against him Thursday.

"Oh man, what a bummer," he said.

Read the Associated Press story.

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An atheist group asked students at the University of Texas, San Antonio, to trade in their Bibles for pornography.

KENS-TV in San Antonio reports that the activists set up a table on campus with a sign advertising "Trade in Holy Text 4 Porn" -- a deal they described as "Smut for Smut."

Some students gathered nearby to pray, KENS-TV reports.

After the event, the atheist group posted on their Twitter page, "Too often are we ignored this seems to get people to actually talk to us instead of ignore us."

The atheist group told KENS-TV it would donate its Bibles to local libraries.

http://www.kens5.com/news/local/Smut-for-smut-Bibles-for-porn-offer-draws-protesters-at-UTSA-85857462.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter.

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Political liberalism, atheism and sexual exclusivity among males may be reflections of intelligence, according to a study of Americans by an evolutionary pyschologist at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

CNN reports that the study by Satoshi Kanazawa correlated data on these behaviors with IQ from a large national U.S. sample and found that, on average, people who identified as liberal and atheist had higher IQs. This applied also to sexual exclusivity in men, but not in women. The findings are to be published in the March 2010 issue of Social Psychology Quarterly.

From the CNN report:

The IQ differences, while statistically significant, are not stunning -- on the order of 6 to 11 points -- and the data should not be used to stereotype or make assumptions about people, experts say. But they show how certain patterns of identifying with particular ideologies develop, and how some people's behaviors come to be.

The reasoning is that sexual exclusivity in men, liberalism and atheism all go against what would be expected given humans' evolutionary past. In other words, none of these traits would have benefited our early human ancestors, but higher intelligence may be associated with them.

"The adoption of some evolutionarily novel ideas makes some sense in terms of moving the species forward," said George Washington University leadership professor James Bailey, who was not involved in the study. "It also makes perfect sense that more intelligent people -- people with, sort of, more intellectual firepower -- are likely to be the ones to do that."

Bailey also said that these preferences may stem from a desire to show superiority or elitism, which also has to do with IQ. In fact, aligning oneself with "unconventional" philosophies such as liberalism or atheism may be "ways to communicate to everyone that you're pretty smart," he said.

Read the story at cnn.com.

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Investigators have seized books on demons and atheism as well as rifles and knives from in a home linked to one of the men charged with setting an east Texas church on fire and suspected in a string of similar blazes, the Associated Press reports.

Jason Robert Bourque, 19, and Daniel George McAllister, 21, were arrested Sunday and charged with a single count of felony arson in the torching of the Dover Baptist Church near Tyler about 90 miles east of Dallas.

Court documents link the suspects to the Feb. 8 Dover Baptist fire and another the same day at the Clear Spring Missionary Baptist Church in nearby Lindale. The churches are among 11 that have burned in Texas this year in suspected arson attacks.

Investigators searching a home Sunday in rural Grand Saline where Bourque's girlfriend and family live discovered paperback books titled "Demon Possession" and "The Atheist's Way," according to an affidavit filed Tuesday by Texas Ranger Sgt. Brent Davis. Also found were four rifles, three knives and a GPS device at the double-wide manufactured home, the affidavit said.

Read the Associated Press story.

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And Lindsay Lohan becomes the latest celebrity to fray Christian sensibilities with a crucifixion pose.

Bill Donohue of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights has demanded that Lohan apologize for her appearance on the cover of the French fashion magazine Purple with arms outstretched and a crown of thorns around her head.

In a statement, Donohue called the pose inappropriate and the timing, on the eve of Lent, offensive. (He also squeezes in a shot at Tiger Woods.)

“Lohan, an ex-Catholic who is spiritually homeless, recently said, ‘I’m all about Karma … what goes around comes around.’ If she believes that, then it behooves her to apologize to Christians before it’s too late.

“Looks like Tiger Woods is not the only celebrity who would benefit by converting to Christianity these days. Forgiveness occupies a central place in Christianity, but the predicate to forgiveness is repentance.”

Taking exception is American Atheists President Ed Buckner, who said Donohue is “no civil libertarian and no fashionista.”

"Actors, film makers and writers have a long history of being attacked by the churches, and this is just another example," Buckner said in a statement. "Ms. Lohan is in good company – many pop stars have been the target of the Catholic League's indignation, including Madonna and Britney Spears. What Donohue seems to forget is that no one is being forced to buy albums or magazines, and that in America, churches do not dictate the content of popular culture.”

Continue reading "Lindsay Lohan's imitation of Christ" »

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Categories: Atheism, Catholicism, Christianity, Culture, International, People
        

The decision of a Michigan manufacturer to remove coded references to New Testament verses from the rifle sights that it sells to U.S Marines and Army for use in Iraq and Afghanistan is winning praise from Muslims and Atheists.

Trijicon, which has a $660 million contract to provide up to 800,000 sights to the Marines, has long inscribed its products with codes such as 2COR4:6, an apparent reference to a passage from the Second Letter of Paul to the Corinthians: "For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ"

Military officials said they were unaware of the inscriptions when they were revealed this week by ABC News.

"This is a serious concern to me and the other commanders in Iraq and Afghanistan," said Gen. David Petraeus, chief of U.S. Central Command. In a statement issued by CENTCOM, Petraeus said "cultural and religious sensitivities are important considerations in the conduct of military operations."

Trijicon announced that it would remove the codes.

American Atheists President Ed Buckner, who had warned that Islamic extremists could take advantage of what he called "a major blunder that seriously risks efforts to reach out to people in Muslim countries threatened by groups like the Taliban and al-Qaeda," praised the decision to remove them.

"By eliminating these 'Christian crusader' references, we are no longer handing al Qaeda and other Islamic religious fanatics a priceless propaganda vehicle," he said.

Added Ibrahim Hooper, spokesman for the Council for American-Islamic Relations: “This is a responsible move by Trijicon that will help reduce or eliminate a potential danger to our nation's military."

Kathleen Johnson, military director for American Atheists, wondered why this issue even came up.

Continue reading "Muslims, atheists praise removal of NT verses" »

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An atheist group is objecting to coded references to New Testament passages that a Michigan manufacturer is inscribing on rifle sights it provides to U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Trijicon has a $660 million contract to provide up to 800,000 sights to the Marines, and other contracts with the Army. ABC News reported Monday that the manufacturer, founded by a Christian, had long marked its products with what ABC News called “secret ‘Jesus’ Bible codes:”

One of the citations on the gun sights, 2COR4:6, is an apparent reference to Second Corinthians 4:6 of the New Testament, which reads: "For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ."

Other references include citations from the books of Revelation, Matthew and John dealing with Jesus as "the light of the world." John 8:12, referred to on the gun sights as JN8:12, reads, "Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life."

Trijicon confirmed to ABCNews.com that it adds the biblical codes to the sights sold to the U.S. military. Tom Munson, director of sales and marketing for Trijicon, which is based in Wixom, Michigan, said the inscriptions "have always been there" and said there was nothing wrong or illegal with adding them. Munson said the issue was being raised by a group that is "not Christian." The company has said the practice began under its founder, Glyn Bindon, a devout Christian from South Africa who was killed in a 2003 plane crash.

American Atheists President Ed Buckner warned that Islamic extremists could take advantage of what he called "a major blunder that seriously risks efforts to reach out to people in Muslim countries threatened by groups like the Taliban and al-Qaeda."

Continue reading "Objections to Marines' Bible-coded rifle sights" »

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Over at Religion Dispatches, Austin Dacey has an interesting rumination on the death of an Atheist.

At the funeral of Herbert “Sibanye” Crimes, Dacey, a fellow nonbeliever, felt compelled to point out that according to his friend’s beliefs, he had not gone on to “a better place.”

“The person I knew and admired, having had no hope for a life hereafter, devoted most of this life’s energies to making this world that better place,” Dacey writes. He goes on:

Believers in the beyond often ask unbelievers how they can accept the prospect that death is the end. Some even confess they are motivated to believe by their wish to vanquish the grave. It is true that the atheist has nowhere to go in death but to the “mankind making/Bird beast and flower/Fathering and all humbling darkness,” as Dylan Thomas puts it in his astonishing poem to end all eulogies, “A Refusal to Mourn the Death, By Fire, Of a Child in London.”

This non-destination makes every death an infinitely greater loss, and makes unmitigated grief the only appropriate response. In this, only the secular way of death fully honors the dead, where “better place” platitudes betray him. Thomas’ paradoxically titled “Refusal to Mourn” is in fact the refusal to mitigate grief, to paper over the universe’s forever-loss of singular person in guaze-promises of eternity: “I shall not murder/The mankind of her going with a grave truth.”

Yes, dying may be harder for the atheist. But what I cannot understand, and reject totally, is the further claim that the life stopped short of eternity is thereby robbed of sense or worth: If it all comes to an end, what’s it all for? The first thing to observe about this existential anxiety is that we can’t resolve it just by postulating an eternal afterlife. Consider the sorts of good things that might possibly await us in paradise: knowing and loving other persons (including God), being known and loved, apprehending truth, experiencing beauty (and, in the afterlife of some, fine food, drink, and other sensual delights). These goods worth wanting in the next world are goods that we already have in this one—things like love, knowledge, beauty, and pleasure (even praising an Almighty!). If a life there is worth having, then a life here is worth having. Every treasure laid up in heaven has been stolen from earth, and the joys of paradise are parasitic on the joys of the world.

Yes, having more joy is better than having less, all else being equal. And that is why death is a loss. It takes away the possibility of participating in any goods whatever. But that is not the same as showing them to have never been goods at all. When our participation in a good is cut short, we may wish it could go on, but the wishing is a sign that it was worth pursuing after all. The recognition that we missed out on some of its value is evidence that the value did not lose all of its sense.

Read the complete piece at religiondispatches.org.

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In no particular order, as selected by the brain trust at In Good Faith world headquarters, and barring any unforeseen developments in the hours that remain. Comments?

Jewish Community Center opens on Saturdays, over objections of Orthodox community

Maryland priest becomes first lesbian Episcopal Bishop

Baltimore Hebrew University closes; reopens at Towson University

Muslims meet in Baltimore, denounce terror

Episcopal nuns join Catholic Church en masse

Catholic Diocese of Wilmington declares Bankruptcy

Death of Rabbi Mark Loeb

Towson Catholic High School closure surprises students, parents

Ecumenical Patriarch, head of Orthodox Christianity, visits Maryland

City Council passes first-in-nation regulations on faith-based crisis pregnancy centers

Atheists target Baltimore, ask: Are you good without God?

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

In the months since we started In Good Faith, we've attracted readers and commenters from all over the world. Ties to the Baltimore area will be helpful in spotting some familiar faces in the video above (the list appears at the end).

I wanted to take a moment to say a sincere thank you to all who have stopped by, and particularly to those who have joined in the spirited debate taking shape on these pages. During this holiday season, we wish the very best to everyone of every faith, and no faith at all.

I expect to be posting only lightly over the next few days as I take time off to spend with my family. As my father would say: Talk amongst yourselves.

Best,
Matt

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Conservatives in Asheville, N.C., are looking to use a mostly forgotten clause in the state’s constitution that blocks those who “deny the being of Almighty God” from public office to oust an atheist from the city council.

Alysia Patterson of the Associated Press has turned a fine story:

Asheville City Councilman Cecil Bothwell believes in ending the death penalty, conserving water and reforming government — but he doesn't believe in God. His political opponents say that's a sin that makes him unworthy of serving in office, and they've got the North Carolina Constitution on their side.

Bothwell's detractors are threatening to take the city to court for swearing him in, even though the state's antiquated requirement that officeholders believe in God is unenforceable because it violates the U.S. Consititution.

"The question of whether or not God exists is not particularly interesting to me and it's certainly not relevant to public office," the recently elected 59-year-old said.

Bothwell ran this fall on a platform that also included limiting the height of downtown buildings and saving trees in the city's core, views that appealed to voters in the liberal-leaning community at the foot of the Appalachian Mountains. When Bothwell was sworn into office on Monday, he used an alternative oath that doesn't require officials to swear on a Bible or reference "Almighty God."

That has riled conservative activists, who cite a little-noticed quirk in North Carolina's Constitution that disqualifies officeholders "who shall deny the being of Almighty God." The provision was included when the document was drafted in 1868 and wasn't revised when North Carolina amended its constitution in 1971. One foe, H.K. Edgerton, is threatening to file a lawsuit in state court against the city to challenge Bothwell's appointment.

"My father was a Baptist minister. I'm a Christian man. I have problems with people who don't believe in God," said Edgerton, a former local NAACP president and founder of Southern Heritage 411, an organization that promotes the interests of black southerners.

As Patterson notes, the North Carolina provision is unenforceable, owing to the supremacy clause of the U.S. Constitution. In 1961, the U.S. Supreme Court reaffirmed that federal law prohibits states from requiring any kind of religious test to serve in office when it ruled in favor of a Maryland atheist seeking appointment as a notary public.

Seven states, Maryland among them, still have provisions barring atheist officeholders.

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Maher Kharma is president of the Islamic Society of Annapolis.

Living in America, people came to realize one great thing that entices them to favor life in America over other places: the prevalence of the law of the land. When many countries around the world suffer corruption, bribery, inefficiency, the citizens of union see the super power of the law to be a protective gatekeeper of their rights, and a source of guidance that they can use when they go around taking care of their earthly business.

The dialogue that has erupted following the rise of the billboards carrying the statement “Are you good without God? Millions are,” has led many to think about the role that religion plays in our lives, and even to think if faith has a role in it. In looking back at the three Abrahamic religions, many commonalities arise: the claim of the followers that those religions are divine, moral-based systems, and a vehicle that followers are to use in order to secure peace of mind after death.

In recalling a recent discussion with a friend, he spoke about the days when people had to travel across the country without using maps or GPS systems. Thousands of miles of roads lay ahead of a traveler, from which one has to choose the one correct direction. Now, thanks to available technology, traveling has become much more convenient as it is no more a hit-or-miss kind of an experience. In the same manner, religions are intended to provide a road map for life. While humans do not land on earth with a manual, the manufacturer of humans provided the holy books to assure success and continuity of humankind in best possible format.

In attempting to encompass what religions provide humanity, it appears that much of known faith-based scriptures are intended to act as a platform for clarifying the rights of people on one another, obligations and responsibilities towards others, towards their wealth, life, intellect, as well as towards the most sacred resource humanity has, environment.

Continue reading "Guest post: God or no God" »

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Ed Buckner is president of American Atheists, Inc.

Claims abound that both Thanksgiving and Christmas are Christian in origin, but in fact both are grounded in non-Christian ideas and rituals that the churches have co-opted for their own purposes.

CHRISTMAS. Christianity is not the first, nor even the tenth religion to co-opt the Winter Solstice as their own holiday. For example, the Pagan festival of Yule (as in 'Yuletide') was a celebrated winter event centuries before Jesus' alleged birth. Indeed, nearly every tradition currently associated with Christmas has non-Christian roots. As an educational organization, American Atheists urges all Christians to ask their ministers why December 25 was chosen to celebrate Jesus' birth (enjoy the hemming and hawing).

WINTER SOLSTICE, The celestial event that started it all has been measured and celebrated since man first looked up. The solstice affects all life on earth, and the human traditions surrounding it are rich and plentiful. While Christmas is a Christian holiday, the Solstice is the real 'reason for the season', and it belongs to everyone.

A small, well-funded, and vocal minority of Christians are unhappy with the fact that their holiday has not totally eclipsed all others. They want all other celebrations squashed out, in an effort to make the season uniquely Christian, and organize protests and boycotts against any company which promotes an all-encompassing tolerant attitude ("Happy Holidays" vs "Merry Christmas"). American Atheists acknowledges that such views are only shared by an ignorant and bigoted minority of Christians, but at the same time we look to the more tolerant Christians to quell this attitude. As it is with Islam, the health and growth of Christianity depends on those within the church.

Atheists and others who demand strict separation of church and state seek only to prevent government agents from deciding, for anyone, whether or how to celebrate the season. The multitude of seasonal celebrations underscores the importance of the government's neutrality.

Atheists enjoy parties, celebrations, presents, and life. To those who celebrate America's diversity, we extend our heartfelt wishes for a wonderful season. To those who selfishly try to claim the whole season as their own, we wish a lousy one.

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Dr. Chris A. Brammer is pastor of Hampstead Baptist Church.

In the 1960’s there was a young school boy who refused to read the Bible in a classroom in a Baltimore public school. Rather than taking his turn to read the Bible, he threw the Bible out the window. Later in life, this self-proclaimed atheist had a change of mind and a change of heart. We had him speak at our church in 1993 to an overflow crowd.

Having personal knowledge of this man’s experience, I am not alarmed at the “new” atheism that is promoted by men such as Victor Stenger in his book, "The New Atheism," or Christopher Hitchens in "God Is Not Great." However, I am concerned about the promotion as to how it will damage young people who are seriously looking for answers and direction regarding life and eternity.

If the Baltimore Coalition of Reason wishes to have an affirmative answer to their question they will need to rephrase their thesis. Their question that is literally put before us is, “Are you good without God? Millions are.”

I would first need to ask, does anyone really know a million people, let alone know them all well enough to know that they are good people? We are not saying that they don’t do good things, but are they good people without God? Many good things have been done for selfish, self-serving, self-centered motives. These motives would certainly discredit any person’s good deeds from contributing to a reputation of being a good person; actually this person could be considered wicked -- for the religious or non-religious thinking person.

The question they should ask is, “Can you be good without believing in God?” The answer to that is an obvious yes. However, that does not mean that a person is good without God. This simply states that the good person doesn’t believe in God.

Continue reading "Guest post: Goodness without God?" »

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We posted on Tuesday about the launch of the Baltimore Coalition of Reason, a group of atheists, agnostics and others that is introducing itself to the area this week with a billboard campaign aimed at reaching out to nonbelievers while telling the religious among us that it's possible to be good without God.

Now there's a full story in Thursday's paper, an interesting part of which is the reaction among local religious leaders. We reached out to several in the course of reporting, and heard back from two.

"Of course we know that someone can be good without believing in God," said the Right Rev. Eugene Taylor Sutton, the Episcopal bishop of Maryland. "We don't believe in God in order to be good. We believe in God in order to connect with the holy within us, which helps us to love everyone in the world, even those who don't believe in God, even those who don't see the point of religion, even those who would harm us. As is it says in our Scriptures, 'God is love.' "

The Rev. Danny O'Brien, senior pastor of Grace Fellowship Church in Timonium, said the local campaign "underscores the notion that we have all been created with a yearning to be part of something bigger, something noble.

"As a follower of Christ, I would love for everyone to not only experience this yearning but to also know the creator who imbued us with it," O'Brien said. "But, being part of a free, pluralistic society is living in community with people who have different faith commitments or no faith commitment at all and to work together to find common ground in working toward the common good."

Read the story at baltimoresun.com.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 7:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (24)
        

A coalition of atheists and agnostics is hoping to get Baltimoreans talking with a billboard campaign that poses the question: “Are you good without God?”

The effort, which includes signage on I-895, I-95 and near M&T Bank Stadium, is part of a campaign that has hit states blue (New York, California, Massachusetts), red (Texas, South Carolina) and purple (Virginia).

"The point of our national billboard campaign is to reach out to the millions of humanists, atheists and agnostics living in the United States," Fred Edwords, national director of the United Coalition of Reason, said in a statement. "Nontheists sometimes don't realize there's a community out there for them because they're inundated with religious messages at every turn. So we hope this will serve as a beacon and let them know they aren't alone."

An additional goal is promoting understanding of non-theistic ethics, Baltimore Coalition of Reason coordinator Emil Volcheck said. The complete text of the billboards read: “Are you good without God? Millions are.”

"It is often assumed that one can't be moral without belief in a deity," Volcheck said in a statement. "In actual fact, we humanists, freethinkers, agnostics and atheists make moral issues and social activism primary. Now we'd like others to be aware of that."

The billboards are located on Russell Street in front of M&T Bank Stadium, on I-895 South after Childs Street, on I-95 North after the Ft. McHenry Tunnel and I-95 S before Caton Avenue.

The campaign coincides with the release of "Good without God: What a Billion Nonreligious People Do Believe," by Greg Epstein, the Humanist chaplain at Harvard University. Epstein is scheduled to speak at 4 p.m. Sunday at the First Unitarian Church at 1 W. Franklin St. A reception and book signing begins at 3 p.m.; the event is free and open to the public.

Photo courtesy of Baltimore COR

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 11:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (61)
Categories: Atheism, Culture, Events
        

The atheists are on the move in New York.

Beginning next week, The New York Times reports, a coalition of local groups will run a monthlong advertising campaign in a dozen Manhattan subway stations with the slogan “A Million New Yorkers Are Good Without God. Are You?”

The campaign, funded with $25,000 from an anonymous donor, follows a similar but unrelated monthlong campaign on buses by New York City Atheists in July, The Times reports. Jane Everhart, a spokeswoman for the New York City Atheists, told The Times that that campaign brought in many new members, and the group is trying to raise money to do it again.

Read more at nytimes.com.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 8:46 AM | Permalink | Comments (70)
        

 In 1966, Time religion editor John T. Elson posed the question that gave the magazine its bestselling issue since World War II, and still reverberates through popular debate more than 40 years later:

Is God Dead?

The Canadian journalist, whom former Time managing editor Jim Kelly described to The New York Times as “catholic with a capital C and a small c in his interests,” has himself died. He was 78.

Elson’s story, in the words of Times obituary writer William Grimes, “remains a signpost of the 1960s, testimony to the wrenching social changes transforming the United States.”

Entitled “Toward a Hidden God,” the story – which was the result, Grimes writes, of a yearlong effort involving 30 correspondents and 300 interviews – begins with the question.

Is God dead? It is a question that tantalizes both believers, who perhaps secretly fear that he is, and atheists, who possibly suspect that the answer is no.

Is God dead? The three words represent a summons to reflect on the meaning of existence. No longer is the question the taunting jest of skeptics for whom unbelief is the test of wisdom and for whom Nietzsche is the prophet who gave the right answer a century ago. Even within Christianity, now confidently renewing itself in spirit as well as form, a small band of radical theologians has seriously argued that the churches must accept the fact of God's death, and get along without him. How does the issue differ from the age-old assertion that God does not and never did exist? Nietzsche's thesis was that striving, self-centered man had killed God, and that settled that. The current death-of-God group* believes that God is indeed absolutely dead, but proposes to carry on and write a theology without theos, without God. Less radical Christian thinkers hold that at the very least God in the image of man, God sitting in heaven, is dead, and—in the central task of religion today—they seek to imagine and define a God who can touch men's emotions and engage men's minds.

Continue reading "Is God Dead? writer dead" »

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 9:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (207)
        

What happened? Used to be you could safely equate communist party membership with atheism because, well, wasn't it always that way? Was that not much of the reason why various various churches during the United State's Cold War struggle with the Soviet Union were famously opposed to communism? Didn't the U.S. put the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance during the Cold War just to show which of the two chief antagonists in that struggle was closer to the Lord? Didn't the movie director and avid anti-communist Cecile B. DeMille help to put up those Ten Commandments monuments in public places as a political statement as well as some nice PR for his movie starring Charlton Heston? And, of course, was it not Karl Marx, co-author of 'The Communist Manifesto' who called reglion the "opium of the people"?

Now comes the Communist Party USA to complicate the matter. According to the Peoples' Weekly World, the party argues that the association of communism and atheism is a misconception, notwithstanding the original Bolsheviks' official atheist position arising from its conflict with the Russian Orthodox Church for its alliance with the tsarist state. Going a step further, the party announces that it has formed a new "Religion Commission"  to "welcome people of faith into the party."

The chairman of the commission, Tim Yeager, identified as a 'Chicago trade unionist and member of the Episcopal Church,' says “We invite questions and responses from people who would like to dialogue with us on matters pertaining to religion, Marxism and the struggle for more peaceful, just and secure world.”

Yeager sidesteps that whole unpleasant "opium" business, and instead closes his remarks by quoting Marx otherwise: “As Marx said, the goal is not merely to explain the world, but to change it. We hope that the new Religion Commission will help build greater unity toward that end...We welcome people from faith communities to join us.”

Posted by Arthur Hirsch at 5:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)