Confirmation of why God and Gullible both start with a "G".

"That message is sold as a quick-fix for a feeling-lost problem. In this context, discovering Jesus is somewhat analogous to a bachelor meeting a spinster at a dance."

Actually, it's more analogous to turning to drugs to dull the pain.

There will always be a number of Australians who deal with our confronting and complicated world by taking refuge in simplistic bronze-age folk stories, but as silly as the Hillsong circus is, Australia is in no real danger of becoming a de-facto theocracy in the way the US has.

There are three main types of religious followers.

1)Those who are indoctrinated into religion at an early age. (Those who force children into religion should be jailed for life)

2)Those who are extremely gullible. (Wake up and get a life of your own) and......

3)Those who have had an extremely negative life experience and become so traumatised they feel the need to grasp at straws in the form of whichever church or religion they feel suits them best. (We have excellent mental hospital facilities these days)

I've studied religion as a scientist might study bacterium under a microscope and found religion to be the most destructive pestilence of all. Kevin Andrews is one of those most virulent strains. Howard is on the same level, made worse by the fact that he runs the country, whilst the Mad Monk Tony Abbott and Peter Costello bring up the rear.

While religious nut cases run Australia and indeed the USA, etc, there will never be a fix for Global warming and climate change. There will never be a weaning off our addiction to oil. Peak oil and destruction of our way of life will be the result of both. The disastrous consequences of what is to come will simply be seen as "God's work" by the followers of religion, but perhaps they should be thinking about their relationship with greed if they truly believe they'll see a judgment day. After all, what does their bible say about passing a camel through the eye of a needle?

Aime, now you have thrown a baited hook to the zealots here on OLO.

Just watch them retaliate ... hope they stay on topic and pare down the chapters and verses that they so often like to unleash.

Amen to that Brian.

Beyond the ability to recite I Corinthinians Ch 13 verses 1 - 13 my knowledge of the bible is sketchy but I think that the fundamentalist Christians are awaiting the rapture as revealed in Revelations. Because they believe the end of the world is nigh they don't see any need to plan for future generations and think its sensible to use up all of the world's resources - N O W. Waste not - want not.

Its strange that these uptight, earnest G*dbotherers pin their belief system on the writings of aesthetes who were mentally deranged due to a combination of malnutrition and administration of hallucinagenics.

Kevin Andrews and his ilk are about control and the abbrogation of individual autonomy, thus their opposition to contraception and euthanasia are opposite ends of the same spectrum. Contrary to church teaching that masturbation will make you go blind there is sound scientific evidence that smoking will make some people go blind and/or get gangreneous extremities.

Euthanasia is one of many, many issues where huge majorities would like to see change. In a democracy legislation would keep up with the people it is supposed to serve.

We've been very unlucky to have a parliament full of extremists making evidence-free decisions on our behalf, but which don't represent our values. Rudd may be a Christian, but he's not an extremist. Hopefully we'll see some change.

Fundamentalist views have had centre stage which gives the impression that their ideas are mainstream. Regardless of how packed these circus/churches get on weekends, they are a small minority of the population.

Survey after survey shows that your average person is way more progressive than the laws or the people who represent us suggest. We are not America, so why are we being treated as if we are?

That's a bit harsh, Aime.

The world is a scary place. We share the world with billions of people with totally different attitudes to us; many countries are armed with weapons which could literally destroy the planet; technology is advancing at a breathtaking rate and we are deluged daily with information we have no time to process.

Under the circumstances, surely you can see the appeal of believing that it all boils down to a simple equation of good versus evil, and that when things are at their worst the creator of the universe will remove you and your frends to paradise while the dying unbelievers get to see that you were right and they were wrong.

We all know it's childish, but they deserve pity, not contempt.

When are the likes of Brian going to pull his head out of the sand and see that his religion (secular humanism) based on the evolution myth has failed our society miserably. Even the most irreligous parents are sending their kids to faith based schools because of flawed humanism that produces people with little to nil morals. It obviously irks him greatly that many if not most Americans have woken up to the fact that the continuous revisions in the science textbooks in regards to evolution has continued to showed what a flawed religion (sorry theory) it is. Brian think its okay for the politicians he likes to impose a death culture on our society (suicide, abortion, drugs, immorality) but I prefer politicians with a bit of moral fibre.

Runner, your comment verifies the truth of the article. You want to impose your values on everyone else, whether they agree with you or not. I can't impose euthanasia on you as it is voluntary, but you wish to impose a possibly undignified, painful death on me by removing my right to choose euthanasia. If, by your rules, suicide is a sin, it is my right to sin as I wish and cop the consequences. It is your right to ask me not to, but it is not your right to forbid me.
This is just one example of how the religious wish to impose their will on others. Just leave me alone to go to hell in my own way

“The sole reason that we have material existence is that the interplay of the physical laws remain absolutely inviolate. It is all the rules obeyed exactly - or it is nothing. This is the essence of reality. It is the holy tabernacle of physics.”

Can’t you see your problem here Brian and friends? Your statement above indicates that you hold to an absolutely materialistic, determinist position – that this is a rigidly clockwork universe – yet you want things to be somehow different to what they are!

If you are correct, you have not chosen your views and neither has John Howard or anyone else. Our beliefs and actions are simply the inevitable end-products of a mindless, uncaring, physical universe.

You can blather on as much as you like about things, but on your own terms there is no logical basis for thinking that will change anything. But of course if you are right you won’t be able to stop yourself blathering on or even becoming a Pentecostalist or whatever, because in a deterministic universe you and everyone else has no control over the apparent choices we make.

It is only if we are genuine free agents that anything makes any sense, but if we are free agents, that is the end of the clockwork universe and the door is also opened to the possibility (dare I say it?), of God.

Don’t like what I’ve said – well, don’t get mad at me because I can’t control what I say – but then you can’t control getting mad at me either.

Crazy!!

runner,

How has 'secular humanism' failed society? In the reasons parents send their children to private schools, the faith basis of the school would be but a small footnote. The fact that the public school system is grossly underfunded is probably the main reason and not the lack of religious teachings.

Science is about what we know, something which we are ever increasing and refining. Thus science textbooks need to change to reflect these changes. Scientific theories are based on observation and experimentation, so as we gather more evidence the theories can be refined to better match what we observe. It addresses the material world and doesn't attempt to explain spirituality or answer the question 'why?'. Science and secular humanism attempt to explain that which can be demonstrated to be common to us all, and leave the questions that can't be answered with evidence or rational argument to the individual's faith. It's about recognizing that even if what you believe is the real truth, that attempting to force those beliefs on others results in a decremental outcome for us all.

Religion, (using Christianity as a case study) takes a collection of ancient texts and blindly assumes them to be true. Only since there are so many obvious absurdities and contradictions they need to be 'interpreted', or sections outright ignored. Ultimately I'd like an answer to this questions: What fundamental underlying reason is there for people to believe in your religion over all the others in the world, not why your religion is 'better' but why your religion is 'true'?

The religious like to claim that the only reason that morals exist is because of religion, and that without these morals (and hence religion) that society will fail. However if it can be demonstrated that certain behaviors (ie morals) are necessary for the stability of society, then they will have the support of 'secular humanists'.

There's a lot of anti-religious sentiment here, both in the article and comments, which is fine - its a free country, people can think & believe what they like.

I do think though that Brian has crossed a line here. When he was talking about Kevin Andrews imposing his personal beliefs on legislation I totally agreed with him. I'd agree with a similar analysis of Tony Abbott's actions. Not so when Brian starts slamming religion in general and Christianity in particular. He's accusing religious people of trying to force their beliefs on others, yet in his derision he's showing no tolerance of his own - it seems to me that he's doing exactly the same thing.

Also, I can't count the number of times I've heard an evolutionist throw scorn on "creation science", and maybe it is justified. Never yet though have I seen published anywhere a comprehensive scientific demolition of creation science's ideas. Brian seems so concerned with sticking to the facts, so he should provide some references.

Brian implies (correctly) that if religion gains acceptance in a government, then it will enshrine its beliefs in law and "penalties for heresy handed down by the courts will eventually follow". From what he's said though, if he were in power we'd soon have penalties for religious belief being handed down by the courts.

Aime, to tar all of religion as "the most destructive pestilence of all" is also a one-sided and extreme viewpoint. It ignores the great good that churches have done in creating charities, social services & overseas aid organisations. As much as I hate to play the "Hitler card", it also ignores the fact that the Nazi genocides were a logical expression of evolutionary eugenics doctrine. Sure a lot of wrongs have been done in the name of God, but a lot of wrongs are done that aren't in the name of God too.

We all have different beliefs & viewpoints. Can't we all just get along?

runner, you have made that claim regarding schools time and time again, and each time I've pointed out that it's false and outlined why.

Parents aren't sending their kids to religious schools because there is a desire for religious values.

As I pointed out to you last time and the time before, the recent census shows a marked decline in the number of people identifying as a religion, or as a christian.

I am one example of a person who ended up attending a private christian school for my last two years of schooling - not because my family desired the christian parts, but because private schools get better funding, and due to the nature of private education it is likely more private schools are run by religious groups.

It isn't about the education being better because it's christian - it's about the christian education being better because it gets more money. Ironically, that's a distinctly unchristian state of affairs.

Try to register that this time.

Why is it fair to allow the theory of evolution to be studied at schools and not creation science? Why should students NOT be allowed to make an informed choice? If they are not allowed to do so they are just being indoctrinated. Students should be allowed to make an informed decision not a biased one. Evoloution is only a theory, an unproven theory. Rather than bothering about whether or not creation science should be taught you should be looking around for evidence to support the theory! Only if it really is true should be taught as fact! And if it is a theory it is wrong to disallow other "theories" from being taught.

Depisis you ask

'How has 'secular humanism' failed society? Secular humanism has led man to believe that he is the master of his/her own destiny (become or are gods). It has led to moral relativism that has rubbished absolutes put in place by God to give the human race dignity and protection. Secular humanism has taught that we are just another species of animal which leads to people acting like animals.

TRTL
You are usually honest with your arguements however you must or should know that per head of population private schools receive a lot less funding than State schools. The productivity commission has found that it costs the Government around $10000 per year for a student attending a public school as opposed to around $6000 per year for a private school. The difference is that parents are willing to pay fees and volunteer time and labour to a much larger degree than State schools. Kids attending private schools are a far less burden on the tax system. The funding is not the problem with the State system, it is its philosophical base.

Calling TV and radio reporters

What I would most like is for a media person to ask the PM and Rudd whether thay actually believe in a supernatural being, and if so whether this being will be consulted about political decisions.

You won't do so because all you fearless reporters are just too timid

calling Merry

why not teach tooth fairy theory while you are at it. This has more devout followers than creationism!!

AIME all those categories of 'religious' people are quite true.

But you left off the list a very important one.

"Those who's hearts are touched by the message of love and forgivness, and on that basis repent of their sin, and embrace Christ as Savior"

Now.. the article headline was:

We vote for people to represent us - not to represent the Lord.

THE REAL TRUTH.
1/ The community is made up of a variety of mindsets, including Christian.
2/ Christians vote.
3/ They are entitled to the democratic process as much as anyone.
4/ They/we will vote for those who we believe will best reflect the values we stand for.

welcome to democracy.

the idea of our parliament not representing 'The Lord' is shallow, artificial and totally misunderstands the concept of democracy. It also seeks to 'de-humanize' Christians and religious people in general.
The most the author can rightly way is "We (our mob.. our way of thinking, our pressure group, my family etc) don't vote for Christian values" FULL STOP. If others DO...then 'get over it' as they say.

Now..finally the 'silly ritual' of the Lords prayer.. is not silly to many of us. In fact taking just the nominal religion census based statistics I'd reckon its not 'silly' to around 68% of the population.

So..if I might say rather stridently and passionately WHO THE HECK DO YOU THINK YOU ARE? to suggest the 'we' in that headline is anything but a small minority?

Sure...lets abandon the silly rituals and have nihilism as the basis for our legistlature... read Neitczhe and Satre to see where that would lead.

Commuter said...... "We all have different beliefs & viewpoints. Can't we all just get along?"

Yes Commuter, yes we can all get along, but not before people of religious creed stop using their power and beliefs to pervert the course of political democracy! It's not just Australia, it's happening all over the World.

Also, as another poster rightly pointed out, people of most religious persuasion have this misguided view (in my opinion) that the World is facing major upheavals as described in the Bible or Koran or whatever book they live by and that it has been caused by evil versus goodness, but that soon their "God" will return to take the good to better place (call it what you will) while the evil suffer accordingly. So, they then proceed to make the most of what we have before their God comes to claim them. They take no stock of the fact that we need to conserve for future generations, they don't care about Global warming. In their narrow view, they don't need to. Their God will come back before peak oil causes destructive energy wars, or their country fries.

I'm beginning to see now just why John Howard's policies are so anti-environmental. Go for Growth he cries! Use up all the resources! Who cares. God won't let us suffer too much. He'll be back before climate change bothers us greatly!

By the way, has anyone ever taken a look at the preachers in those "happy clapper" churches? One might have cause to ask as to why many of them drive expensive imported cars, wear the best cut suits and wear their hair done in that slick, US evangelist style. The answer is simple. Their religion is their life blood. They make obscene amounts of money in many cases, while their gullible congregation keeps on giving.

And yes Commuter, my post was harsh, but if it makes just one person take a good hard look at his religion and decide that I'm right and his "mob" are wrong, then I've just saved one person from a wasted lifestyle.
Aime.

To last word: The tooth fairy has nothing to do with how the universe came into existence. Use your noggin!

Aime, I appreciate what you're saying. There _are_ many religious people who think that climate change, peak oil (less so though because its not as well known) and environmentalism in general are wrong because they can't reconcile them with their beliefs. Also there is plenty of behaviour in the happy clappies that so out & out materialistic it personally makes me shudder.

I can only speak for christianity - I don't know the Koran that well - but I do know that the problem isn't with christianity at all. The Bible teaches that man is to care for creation, not exploit it. It also teaches self sacrifice and caring for other people's needs rather than chasing a life of selfish greed. Hence a Bible-believing christian should be an environmentalist and certainly not a capitalist. Less like Peter Costello & more like Tim. Personally it astounds & alarms me why the churches in the US are so right-wing.

The problem is that the people you've described are not behaving as Christians, but rather as "religious" people who are choosing to believe whatever fits their world view. They wear a Christian, or a Muslim label but ignore whole swathes of teaching from their holy book, prefering to cherry-pick what they like & twist it until they think it says what they want. Despite this, they're somehow called "fundamentalists".

Btw, I don't think John Howard believes in anything much other than rampant free-for-all, survival-of-the-richest capitalism. Oh, and getting re-elected.

GP, your critique of materialism is highly simplistic and just a tad out-dated (by a good century or two). In both the natural sciences and philosophy, deterministic theories such as Newtonian Physics have been well and truly superseded by theories that use the paradigm of ‘chance’ and ‘necessity’.

That is to say, the theory of evolution (and the facts that support the theory), together with the knowledge of modern chemistry, micro-biology, geology and physics, provides overwhelming support to the idea that humankind owes its existence to nothing more than a roll of some cosmological set of dice.

Furthermore, necessity in the form of non-random processes is always involved, but this is largely reducible to further rolls of the dice and so on. The great philosophical-scientific mistake is to attempt to trace these random processes back to an almighty demiurge – some kind of ultimate (Christian-Platonic) realm of pure Being (or God) that is the final, ultimate cause of all things. Yes, it is generally acknowledged, there has to be SOMETHING driving these random processes, but I (and many others) think that it is much more plausible conceiving this ‘something’ in terms of a ‘force’, like ‘energy’ or ‘power’, for example.

Thinking in terms of ‘force’, ‘energy’ or ‘power’ has the advantage of explaining causal relations and events (such as human action based on will) without the need to posit an ultimate beginning or source – which inevitably takes the flawed and anthropomorphic form of a God or realm of ultimate Being (like Plato’s Forms).

Ironically, if anything, it has been revealed that strict determinism is simply the flipside of religious thinking, insofar as it relies on precisely such an ultimate beginning to give coherence to its claims.

This, GP, is the new materialist paradigm (well, it was new about 100 years ago), and I’d advise you to go and do some reading before you launch your next anti-materialist rant.

Personally I couldn't care less who made the world. The immediate thing for all of us is that we have to live in our particular part of it, and our particular part is supposed to be a democracy. Ideally that means that everyone gets a say, but the people elected by the majority are supposed to govern according to the will of that majority, not according to who they think made the world.

The article puts science up against religion as determinants of policy, which confuses the issue. We'd be better off arguing over whether science or God gave us computers and the internet to enable these brawls in the first place. The main point is that our elected representatives have been listening to religious doctrine instead of the people who elected them, which is contrary to their job descriptions.

Individuals can choose to believe whatever they want, school their kids wherever they want and spend their Sundays wherever they want. As individuals, politicians are entitled to make those same choices. But as politicians the choice is not supposed to be theirs, but ours. And our collective choices are not being taken into account by our government.

LSH - you need to try and explain yourself more clearly. You say you disagree with me yet I don't see where you have refuted my position and in a way you sort of even seem to be agreeing with me!

You say that "humankind owes its existence to nothing more than a roll of some cosmological set of dice". My point exactly! The materialist says we are just chance events, having no freedom or control. Therefore it makes no sense to crticise others as they cannot help saying or doing what they say or do. In fact, in a materialistically determined world nothing makes any sense.

You need to explain how you have any control over what you say or do, assuming you believe you have such control. (And if you don't believe you have, then you are just wasting yours and everyone's time.)

runner,

"... he is the master of his/her own destiny."

How is this different to the Christian notion of "free will"?

"...moral relativism that has rubbished absolutes put in place by God..."

We mere mortals have rubbished a creation of God? Not much of a supreme being.

"Secular humanism has taught that we are just another species of animal which leads to people acting like animals."

People have always acted like animals. Secular humanism simply acknowledges things that have been observed to influence our behaviour.

I find it interesting you chose not to answer my main question: "What fundamental underlying reason is there for people to believe in your religion over all the others in the world, not why your religion is 'better' but why your religion is 'true'?". Perhaps someone else could try...

"The difference is that parents are willing to pay fees and volunteer time and labour to a much larger degree than State schools."

Yep, nothing to do with faith and everything to do with general attitude to education.

BOAZ_David,

You make a good point that the majority can vote in a religious leader if they chose. However I think the point made by the article isn't that people don't have that right, but rather that religion didn't play a major role in who they voted for. Thus if the representative(s) overly focuses on religion they are not representing their electorate and this is a reason for them not to be re-elected. Hopefully in the desire to be re-elected, the representative would change to better represent their electorate.

Of course the reasons behind the way people vote is certainly open to speculation.

GP,

The fact that our thoughts are bound by the behaviours of sub-atomic particles doesn't change the nature of how we think and act. While a determinate universe may limit the blame placed on your spiritual self, your material self is still responsible for it's actions, and the motivations that cause others to react to what you do and say are still the same.

Nice article, Brian Holden. You cover much ground that we've been over here before, provoking many of the same kinds of comments from the Christian fundies and the rest of us.

One point that hasn't really been discussed is that constitutionally, people in geographically defined electorates vote for someone to represent their electorate in parliament. In reality, of course, most electors tend to vote for political parties rather than people, but the reality remains that the Australian Constitution is silent on the matter of political parties.

This raises the question of whether, for example, Kevin Andrews introduced his private member's bill at the behest of the majority of his electorate - or, as seems far more likely, on behalf of his party or indeed (as Brian suggests) on behalf of his imaginary friend. Or whether those various Christian MPs who take a Christian position in so-called 'conscience votes' are reflecting the views of their electorates or the dictates of whichever Christian sect they are adherents.

I think it's fine that Christians, Muslims, Buddhists or believers in any of the assortment of available mythical beings stand for election to Australian parliaments, but it irks me that electors are dumb enough to vote for some of these (overwhelmingly Christian) idiots without appraising themselves of the extent to which their putative representatives attach a greater priority to their religious beliefs than to the views of their constituents.

As for the reading of the Lord's Prayer at the start of each day's sitting - surely that discriminates against the very large percentage of Australians who are either non-practising Christians or who are not Christians at all?

I have no interest in religion, and the only spirit I believe in is rectified spirit. However I know that religion is so emotionally necessary to a vast number of people to enable them to carry on in life that if God didn't exist it would be necessary to invent him.

In addition, I believe that the horrendous problems associated with peal oil and global warming will be so traumatic that there will be a tremendous increase in religious observance throughout the west over the next few decades.

Please remember that in a democracy, religious people are just as entitled as anyone else to exercise their vote, and to vote in accordance with their convictions.

For thousands of years before the desert tribes in the middle east created the semetic mythologies, my ancestors in the Daintree Rainforest believed in the spirit world, reincarnation and the rule of Law as seen by my people prior to invasion.

Then came christianity which decided that because we were not of its faith it was fine to steal our land and kill our women and children and then try unsuccesfully to make us more like them all in the name of their so called god. Now the decendants of this same religion have now gotten us into a religious war over in iraq, whilst convienitly refusing to send their own children to fight these wars because of the possibly of death or injury.

So isn't it time we introduced the same laws the yanks have on tax breaks for religious groups who interfere in domestic politics, you break the law you loose your tax exempt status. Seems to have a big effect on preaching over there, which we should introduce to reduce the hillsong,brethern catch the fire and other ratbags groups influence on our politicians.

Absolutely my own sentiments. I have in previous forum railed against the hypocrisy of politicians reading the lord's prayer and then proceeding to carry on so disgracefully, violating their own creeds.
I have no doubts that Kevin bloody Andrews acted upon his own religious prejudice which suited his own party and probably quite a number of his constituents with anti-abortion and rights-to-life sentiments.I am hoping this election will see him sacked for the mess he has made of the immigration portfolio and his careless handling of the truth in the Haneef case.

This subject has been debated before with the usual run of intelligent design adherents plugging for the creationist theories and wanting I.D. to be taught in schools as a Science. However, there have been many more thoughtful and positive responses this time. I wholeheartedly endorse Brian's article and the merit in C J Morgan and Plerdsus contributions.

In my experience as a former crisis counsellor,I agree that if there was not the option of a 'god' out there, someone would invent one, particularly in circumstances where people need a crutch in times of adversity or grief. That does not mean that those with a strong religious conviction should impose their beliefs on others.

We should all learn from the American experience in having a society that is driven by leaders who claim to have divine guidance.

I find I agree with the general thesis of the article. Unfortunately it is a rambling diatribe which does the cause more harm than good in allowing the various god-botherers to get in cheap shots. I also must take exception to the comment "The chance that the principle of the evolution concept could be wrong is so vanishingly small as to be, for all practical purposes, zero." This is scientific nonesense; such nonsense that I'm amazed the god-botherers haven't really torn into it.

I'm unclear what the evolution "concept" is, to begin with. However let it be quite clear that today's understanding of evolution will almost certainly be wrong sometime in the near future. Our understanding of evolution is changing day-by-day as new evidence - both based on the fossil record and on molecular genetics in particular come to hand. While Darwin was on the right track he was wrong in so many ways. That, of course is not to denigrate his great step forward.

Even today there are great battles raging about the process of evolution, with major figures on either side. (And here I think particularly of Dawkins and the gradualists vs Gould and the punctuated equlibriants.) This is good science, and is how science moves forward - through open enquiry and robust debate. Unfortunately the god-botherers will try to use these scientific battles as a claim that evolution is disputed among scientists.

Dawrin is in many ways like Neils Bohr. Bohr proposed the first model of the atom that involved a nucleus of protons and neutrons with electrons whizzing around. Bohr's model of the atom bears little resemblance to today's received wisdom - but it was a massive advance on what went before, and it laid out a new path of scientific enquiry. Just as Darwin did for biology.

Runner and other creationist supporters.
Biology, geology, astronomy and archeology each individually destroy many of the arguments of creationism and combined the destruction is total. We live on an unusual smallish planet (some of which appears to be the remnants of a supernova) in orbit around a minor reasonably young sun, one among billions of other suns in our galaxy which itself is one galaxy among billions of other galaxies, some of which existed 13500 billion years ago. Creationists offer no testable evidence for their hypothesis.
Our forefathers developed their empathy and essential ethics long before modern religions were created some 200,000 years after those forefathers first walked this earth armed for the hunt. Some of those ethics are no longer appropriate.
The article was an excellent assessment of how religious fundamentalists of all persuasions are deluded into believing that they and their religion alone are correct and being so deluded they assume that they have the right to try and impose their own foolishness on everyone else.
Foyle

“Secular humanism has taught that we are just another species of animal which leads to people acting like animals.” (Runner)

No, Science should cop the blame for that. And there is little point in complaining about it, because that is just the way it is.

There isn’t much attitudinal difference between a pack of African Wild Dogs tearing the guts out of a Wildebeest, and Joshua following God’s orders in Jericho where he put every man, woman, and child to the sword.
Morality balances favourably towards the dogs: at least they’re out for a feed.

There is something to be said for those members of our species having the moral sensitivity to notice compassion exhibited by a bird keening for its just-killed mate - all so similar to the desperation of disconsolate humans.
For those who will not acknowledge such similarity, get your nose out of the temple of your particular God and His human-interpreted book. Observe what is going on in the real world beyond them. Get to know what morality is really about.
Take enough interest so that you can see that cares and concerns are manifest by sensitive individuals across the boundaries dividing the numerous religious faiths, and non-faith; and also within many other animal species.

Morality in its bright and its ugly shades has been brushed widely, and somewhat evenly, across a wide canvas. Christianity, as with most others of the great range of the world’s religions, has a history of exhibiting the full range of colours.

A pox on politicians trying to unravel a peaceful tangle of incompatible beliefs by imposition of unauthorized superiority of personal religious belief. Taking a step back towards the seventh century attitude of “There is but one God, and Allah is his prophet”. It had its day then – one that was intolerant, bloodthirsty, immoral. Let it remain there, we don’t want to give it a re-run. Keep human decency as part of the political arena and religious intolerance out of it.

Colinsett,

"Taking a step back towards the seventh century attitude of “There is but one God, and Allah is his prophet”. "etc

Is your statement correct.

I thought it was something like: "There is but one God called Allah and Mohammed is his prophet."

Other than that I would entirely agree with you.

Ah yes, Bigmal. It is all too easy to bog down in the fuzzy imprecision created by the Whirling Dervish dance where Gods and Profits are all mixed up.

runner - your claim that private schools get less funding is false. The federal government picks up the slack where the states leave off.

Your assertion is fatally flawed in that it would require the most wealthy people in our society to willingly send their kids to private schools, which are less resourced than public schools. This state of affairs is unlikely.

Merry - in relation to your creationist argument:

The key difference between evolution and religious argument is that evolution is not a religion. Because creationists see the world through a religious prism does not make it so.
Evolution is simply the best explanation we have in the absence of religion, which is unprovable. As science progresses, we make changes to evolutionary theory.

The moment you and others of your ilk push for creationism in Australian schools, you validate every single religious theory being taught as fact - in which case, I would have to demand equal rights for pastafarianism. The Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster would therefore deserve its place as well.

http://www.venganza.org/about/open-letter/

I have just noticed my own number error in my initial posting. I wrote that some galaxies existed 13500 billion years ago. It should have been 13500 million but even the smaller number makes the creationist idea that some figment of human imagination created it all a few thousand look the absurdity that it is.

merry

if it wasn't the tooth fairy, then who was it?

At school I learned:

"In the beginning the Tooth Fairy created the heaven and the earth
And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of the Tooth Fairy moved upon the face of the waters.
And the Tooth Fairy said, Let there be light; and there was light.
And the Tooth Fairy saw the light, that it was good: and the Tooth Fairy divided the light from the darkness.

Then seeing that there were no teeth, he begat Adam and Eve and gave them teeth and gave teeth to all who needed them and that was good: and lo he begat dentists and amalgam, toothbrushes and high speed drills and that was good too"

Firstly.. a warm welcome to all the various newbys here.

FOYLE.. down to business :) I noted your comment about confidence in the origins being due to a roll of the cosmic dice kind of thing..but it ain't as simple as that mate.

I've seen similar expressions of probability 'such as to be zero' referring to evolution as a viable explanation of the origins of life.
In fact at first I thought I was reading just that statement until I looked more closely.

To me... there is no real difficulty with the first verse of the Bible and science.

1: "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth"

2: "Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters."

Hmmm.. how long was the earth 'formless and emtpy' ? perhaps it was 'forming' during this time ? How long between verse 1 and verse 2 ?
Perhaps the 2nd verse is referring to the period after the initial creation.... but it was not all brought together as "God said 'let there be light'...and there was light"

The text is really quite broad. It's not a scientific treatise. Verse 1 is the main point. "God created"

If one considers the mighty things done by God in history, the miracles and His dealings with the Israelites etc.. over such a long period of time, and ultimately in the Resurrection of Christ.... then I feel jubilantly confident that the simple statement "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth" to be very easy to accept.

Gawd spare us. Boazy's preaching again.

(Half) serious question Boazy: Have you ever considered getting a proper education? It's never too late, you know.

You seem to have an active and impressionable mind, and I hear that universities will accept just about anybody these days :)

Q&A asks Christians to try and stay on thread. Brian’s article is (as usual) such a long winded ramble that it would be hard to mention anything vaguely to do with religion that wasn’t on his topic.

Though we are looking at it from other sides of the fence, the whole article is well summed up by Plerdsus, who suggests that Christians too have a right to vote in a democracy. In fact, the point is so obvious, you have to wonder why Brian bothered to tap out his meanderings.

Brian aims his pot shots largely at the pentecostals and creationists.

I wonder why he and the others on this thread are so concerned by these mobs. It’s not exactly the tall poppy syndrome, as these groups and their ideas have not yet entered the mainstream of public thought.

At the mention of the word ‘creationism’, out come these verbose attempts at defining science, which angle themselves carefully at defining creationism out of the contest. In fairness to these attempts, concisely defining science is not such an easy task. What satisfies me is the number of highly qualified scientists (both past and present, with numbers increasing) who unashamedly (despite threats and vilification) are happy to describe themselves as creationist. I don’t think they could have got their PhDs without having a fairly good idea of what science is and how it works.

If it is not the tall poppy syndrome, maybe we could call it a simple phobia, or a fear of the unknown. Please, take the advice of Commuter, who I would interpret as suggesting that we could try learning a little of what these guys are really saying before taking the usual pot shots.

Desipis, who is obviously no fool, asks "How has 'secular humanism' failed society?"

In a recent talk Archbiship Chaput (Denver?) made the following observations. I place them here as I think secular society can go to certain heights and then will implode if it sticks (and is true) to its manifesto.

"This society is advanced in the sciences and the arts. It has a complex economy and a strong military. It includes many different religions, although religion tends to be a private affair or a matter of civic ceremony.

This particular society also has big problems. Among them is that fertility rates remain below replacement levels. There aren't enough children being born to replenish the current adult population and to do the work needed to keep society going. The government offers incentives to encourage people to have more babies. But nothing seems to work.

Promiscuity is common and accepted. So are bisexuality and homosexuality. So is prostitution. Birth control and abortion are legal, widely practiced, and justified by society's leading intellectuals.

Every now and then, a lawmaker introduces a measure to promote marriage, arguing that the health and future of society depend on stable families. These measures typically go nowhere.

I've just outlined the conditions of the Mediterranean world at the time of Christ. We tend to idealize the ancients, to look back at Greece and Rome as an age of extraordinary achievements. And of course, it was. But it had another side as well.

We don't usually think of Plato and Aristotle endorsing abortion or infanticide as state policy. But they did. Hippocrates, the great medical pioneer, also famously created an abortion kit... we rarely connect that with his Hippocratic Oath."

So was Christianity a positive, or would we have got to this point without it? Was this because it 'ruled' society or despite it? Would Kevin Andrews have succeeded in the Roman Senate and would the indigenous be better off under Roman rule?

Reality Check,

Good comment!

I’m interested that you mentioned Hippocrates, as medical students in many western countries are still required to take the ‘Hippocratic Oath’. However, my understanding was that the original Hippocratic oath originally condemned abortion, though they’ve conveniently, or tragically for many little ones, dropped that bit in Australia.

This is what I thought it said, ‘I will neither give a deadly drink to anybody if asked for it, not will I make a suggestion to this effect. Similarly, I will not give a woman an abortive remedy.’

Desipis, you ask,

“What fundamental underlying reason is there for people to believe in your religion over all the others in the world, not why your religion is 'better' but why your religion is 'true'?"

I’ll try and give your question a whirl.

The answer probably has to do with the authority in Jesus’ words, as he spoke not just as one sent by God, but as God himself. His final mark of authority was when Jesus rose from the grave (as he said he would). He showed himself to many witnesses as the conqueror of death, someone who has power over life and death.

Many believe that the resurrection of JC demonstrates his deity. Others would rather deny that the resurrection happened than attempt to say that it is not confirmatory of the truth of his words.

The truth of the Christian faith is demonstrated in many ways, but I would say none more clearly than in Christ’s resurrection. You could choose to accept it or believe it, or not. And like any other assertion of history, it is impossible to prove one way or the other. But this is the testimony of Christians.

Dan S de Merengue: "...I would say none more clearly than in Christ’s resurrection."

I'm not saying that the resurrection story isn't compelling, and if believed would put a lot of weight on the words of Jesus, however my question aims below that level to ask why is the story any more believable than the story of Mohammad, or Buddha, or any of the other equally compelling religious stories?

Dan S de Merengue: "You could choose to accept it or believe it, or not."

That's pretty much it. There are hundreds of religions out there, and the choice to believe in a particular one is completely arbitrary. How can you be so committed and passionate about something that is simply the result of chance? Some claim that God's will put you in the situations that would lead you to believe; if you this, how can you been so self centered to deny that it is Allah's will that another person follow Islam?

To take an example of Christianity vs Islam:
Both have a long history.
Both have a large collection of historical texts supporting their cause.
Both have a large number of followers.
Both have a collection of compelling stories about the love of their god.
Both have people that claim a direct connection with their god.

What has your all mighty lord given to tell me or show me that will convert me to Christianity? Where is this "Holy Spirit" that empowers you to speak in tongues and convince me of the truth of your words? For a supposedly divine cause, you seem strangely limited to the same material world of other religions when trying to spread your "Good Word".

Reality Check: "This particular society also has big problems. Among them is that fertility rates remain below replacement levels."

Secular Humanism seems to be the only segment of society that recognizes the limits of the material world, and that the endless growth of civilization may not be possible. A reduction of population levels is not a bad thing. Some claim that it may die out as other cultures are breeding faster, however they fail to realize that the cultures that have grown the fastest have done so through people changing rather than basic reproductive growth.

"Promiscuity is common and accepted. So are bisexuality and homosexuality. So is prostitution. Birth control and abortion are legal, widely practiced, and justified by society's leading intellectuals."

And I don't see it causing the end of the world.

"So was Christianity a positive, or would we have got to this point without it? Was this because it 'ruled' society or despite it? Would Kevin Andrews have succeeded in the Roman Senate and would the indigenous be better off under Roman rule?"

I think you'll find that the Roman empire converted to Christianity in an attempt to homogenize it's culture to assist in the centralized control. In fact during it's epic rise to dominance it was a pagan empire leaving locals to follow their own faith, and during it's downfall it was Christian.

The vast majority of cultures that came in contact with Roman, or Roman based cultures saw value in and absorbed significant amounts of the roman culture within their own, however you would really need to classify what you define as 'better' in order to be able to answer that question properly.

Desipis, the Roman conversion to Christianity (and also the Roman Empire’s fall) could equally be attributed to their love affair with plumbing. They were enthusiastic plumbers, which as the word indicates, had its origins with lead (Latin - Plumbum - lead as any dictionary will tell you).
Pipes were of lead; boiling-down vats – lead. Grape and other fruit juices were boiled down to sweet concentrates in lead vats.
And in these modern days we know what lead does to mental development.

Yes, the times of lead did lead to the Vatican.
And the Vatican continues with a leaden attitude to change until the present day.

Desipis, thanks for your comments.

Why is the Christian gospel story any more believable than the story of Mohammad?

The choice is not arbitrary (to a thinking person). It would be arbitrary only if the stories were equal or the same.

For one thing, the miracle of Christ’s resurrection and the events that surrounded it did not happen in a corner. There were many witnesses. From what I understand, Mohammad’s biggest claim to fame in the miracles department, was a claim that the angel Gabriel visited him when he was alone and revealed to him the Scripture. In other words, we just have to take Mohammed’s word that it happened.

For another thing, Mohammad never claimed to be deity, Jesus did.

I am not aiming at one-upmanship; I’m just trying to point out that not all events are the same and not all are equally attested to.

If there were a single, simple argument, proof, miracle, or demonstration of the one true faith, then such proof would be declared and we would all be adherents.

However, the world just isn’t like that. Instead, the world in which the Holy Spirit dwells is one where people are free to follow their conscience, and the Spirit acts in a gently persuasive manner. And we are free to seek out the truth.

In terms of gentle persuasion, there are many good books around. One that comes to mind is “More than a Carpenter” by Josh McDowell. It’s an easy read, dealing with the historical evidence for Jesus’ resurrection.

I am glad you thought the story of Jesus’ resurrection was compelling. I did too. I don’t know of any one else that has willingly died to help me. No other religious leader I know of did.

Where is the Holy Spirit? Perhaps it is like the wind. You’ll never see it; you only ever sense its effects. But it is a good question. If no one is seeing God’s Spirit truly at work in the church, then I’ll admit that we are failing.

I would like to post my views. Note that I mean no offence to anyone with these, and any offence caused is accidental.

Many religious people claim that their God is all-knowing, and that mankind cannot comprehend what their God thinks. If this is really so then why attempt to understand if mankind never can understand? Why attempt to decode the meaning of the religious texts, if it is impossible? Quite frankly, why bother?

Dan,

You make some interesting comments about the 'contents' of the religious stories. However from my point of view in today's world I see the same thing with both: people claiming to know the truth using ancient documents. The fact that some stories involve witnesses to miracles is not significant given they aren't alive to testify today. One can just as easily make up a story with witnesses as one can make up a story about solo contact with a god.

If you're going to examine the contents of the stories, you run into further trouble. Even assuming that Christianity is the true religion, there are literally hundreds of information sources many of which have contradictory facts, rules, messages, etc. So essentially the religion is 99% about having faith in a group of old robed men and their biased selection, translation and interpretation of texts.

While the Jesus story was 'compelling', I think the dying bit is a bit overplayed. It's not much of a sacrifice to make when you're a god who can resurrect themselves a few days later. Compare this to the permanent mortal sacrifice the ANZACs made and I don't see it as all that great.

Additionally there are also the core philosophical contradictions that I find with Christianity (possibly applicable to others).

One is the significant portions of the faith that is unknown, how can someone have such a strong belief in something when they don't even know what it is they believe in.

An other is the conflict between the notion of an all-powerful being yet somehow we're supposed to have free-will.

If one takes the line that there is an all knowing, all powerful god then such a god would have known of the evils, pain and suffering that would result from the creation of our world. An all powerful being could have created a world without such issues, and thus must have deliberately chosen to create such things. Hence, any "god" cannot be both all powerful and purely good, and thus is not worthy of worship as if it was.

Simple logic... don't even think about the contradictions. In summary:

1) We can't possibly hope to understand god's plan.
2) The goal of christianity is to truly understand and be one with god.
3) God made man in his own image. (This raises the question as to whether god has a penis and what He uses it for, but I dare say that's blasphemous).
4) Thou shalt not make craven images.
5) God is love, god is mercy.
6) God is also horrific vengeance.
7) God believes it's important we have free will.
8) Though he'll cast us into hell if we exercise it too far outside his dictates.
9) We all have original sin, but we don't really. Jesus cured that when we crucified him. But now we carry sin for that instead.
10) Jesus was Jewish.
11) Jesus was Christian.
12) Jesus was the son of god.
13) Jesus was god?
14) There can be only one god.
15) Jesus had no father, except maybe god. (Was he the world's first clone? or God DNA?)
16) Mary had a virgin birth... despite being married to Joseph.

I dare say there are plenty more, but when you're operating with 'god' logic, you can pretty much trump any quandary with either a) god's mysterious plan or b) god did it.

Merry, I've not read through all the posts yet so may have missed part's of the discussion regarding the teaching of creation alongside evolution.

Would you be happy if aboriginal dreamtime stories were taught in geography classes as a scientific explaination of how the landscape was formed? An alternative to discussion of continental drift, techtonic uplift and erosion. If students were left with the impression that the scientific evidence for the dreamtime version of events was just as compelling (or more so) than that other stuff.

Should every creation myth be given equal weighting or just the christain one?

R0bert

TRTL,
the Scripture says that God made mankind in his own image, both male and female. So your question should read, 'does God have a penis and a vagina?' Then again, the creation is only on page 1 of the Bible. We would have hoped that you’d read that far before launching your criticism.

R0bert,
recently when my son was 5 years-old, he did get a bit of Aboriginal dreamtime stuff in his Prep class. That’s all part of the fun of State school.

In science class, as kids get older, I would hope they get some understanding of the scientific method and principles. That is, I wish they were taught how to think and not just what to think. Raising different theories and comparing them can be a good method of teaching critical thinking. By the way, it was a creationist who first proposed the continental drift theory in 1859, suggesting the continents broke apart during the flood. It was about a hundred years later that it became widely accepted that the continents were moving.

Simple Logic,
don’t worry about the apologies. Aussies generally have pretty thick skins and Christians are supposed to have backbones. We live in a free country where you can say what you like. Only in Victoria they’ve enacted strange Religious Vilification laws. But no one has been convicted yet, and I think the government there is feeling pretty silly and embarrassed about the confusion they created regarding freedom of speech. (What you said was pretty friendly anyway).

“Why attempt to understand if mankind never can understand?”

Indeed, why try to penetrate the mysteries of science or the arts? There are some things beyond explaining: the contents of a lady’s handbag, the longevity of Richie Benaud.

So too, the tension between human freedom and God’s sovereignty, Jesus being simultaneously God and man, and the problem of evil.

Like a primary school student with Einstein as a teacher, our only hope is if God takes the initiative, and he has.

The Bible is not silent on any of these issues (well, most of them).

My point, Dan, is that the whole 'in his image' phrase is utterly meaningless.
Image refers to, well, the image. If the scripture had said 'nature' then perhaps I could understand it as meaning his behaviour - but again, that would hint at the imperfect nature of humanity, which christians say isn't a part of their perfect god.
So, both man and woman as image? so god has arms and legs then? eyeballs? what about the interior? lungs and heart?

Does god have a pancreas? Nasal passage? If he has legs, what's he walking on?

Didn't god use a spare rib to create woman well after Adam? Then how can god be both man and woman if he hasn't created woman yet?

The overall point I'm getting at is there is too many contradictions for a literal interpretation of the bible to be taken seriously - I can understand an overall message or belief being taken from it, but the hardcore literalists really need to apply a little more critical insight.

Last week a dentist married to a minister of the crown, who is a trained lawyer, wrote a pamphlet vilifying muslims. the minister of the crown thinks its a joke, well it wasn't anti-jewish. with our sedition laws in place what's the difference between Howard's Australia and Nazi Germany in 1932? where will it end?

I thought I cast my vote for someone to represent me in Parliament. I am aware that I was voting for someone of a different religion to me but I expect them to do their job fairly and look after all the constituents in their electorate.

The idea that some citizens must be excluded from addressing that great political question “how ought we order our lives together?” because their arguments are religious, or that others should be excluded because they are areligious or antireligious is an idea deeply alien to our democracy.

Religion cannot be separated from politics because a person’s deeply held moral convictions cannot by definition be excluded from politics. As soon as we have an ought we have a moral judgment. Having said that making explicitly religious statements isn’t so helpful and public reasons accessible to all ought to be used.

It was a long difficult journey to the freedoms we enjoy and these do not exist in many other countries, the most dramatic contrast being Islamic countries.

The author's illiberal and uncivil contributions to the public square will not help maintain the freedoms he clearly wants to preserve.

We live in a pluralistic society and all citizens are on an equal footing as we bring our diverse and sometimes conflicting moral visions to bear on that great question.

Aside from the caricatures, blatant prejudice, and circular arguments the author seems to want to discuss things like:

-The very public principle of ‘the inherent dignity of the human person’ which is the basis for prohibitions on euthanasia. If another workable principle that can be used to deem ‘life not worthy of life’ then please put it forward.Different doctrines about what a human is have been adopted over the last century or more. If the author thinks our Judeo-Christian principle is dispensable then in bio-ethical questions please put forward a workable alternative.

-Philosophical materialism. Which is by no means necessarily true and disputation about it continues in the academy today, a great many eminent physicists reject the dogma.

-The Lord’s prayer. Given by Jesus himself, who may or may not have been God incarnate (probability of his divinity based on the evidence is quite good). At the very least Jesus, the greatest example of humanity to have ever lived, prayed often - so if its good enough for him its good enough for me, humility seems to demand it.

-Evolution. A very good scientific theory, one of the greatest, but its poor author never meant it to bear cosmological weight, as if it could explain its own existence or the existence of life itself. We are certainly missing something and we have more to learn.

If the author is genuinely interested in the reasons for belief, rather than caricatures then Mere Christianity by CS Lewis has always been a good book for that. Frances Collins the leader of the human genome project and the last well known person I can think to have read it, found the book well argued and ultimately persuasive.

Interestingly, I studied biology at a faith-based school and was told, as reported in the article, that this was one explanation of the way things happened. I did not, however, study creation science; never in my Catholic education did I have the creation myth presented to me as anything other than a Bible story. Perhaps this article misrepresents things with its juxtaposition of Joh's suggestion that creation science is taught at school with the 'disclaimer' placed before evolution studies.

Furthermore, the suggestion that evolution could be wrong was followed with a brief history of the changes in the theory itself. This wasn't intended to show us that the theory is unreliable, but rather a lesson that science itself is an ever-evolving corpus of knowledge and understanding.

In Queensland, at least, I don't think creationism COULD be taught alongside evolution. The biology syllabus - and junior science syllabus - doesn't allow for it. I can't speak for other states, but on this point, at least, I disagree with the overall message of the article.