|
New
Orleans
Secular Humanist Association |
|
THE NEAR-LIFE EXPERIENCES OF THE GODS By William Sierichs Jr. In a newspaper column (July 10, 1999, in my paper), Garry Wills attacked reports of the "death" of God. He means the Christian god, not the more general concept of theism. Like most Christians, he does not acknowledge that the majority of people on this planet are not Christians and have totally different concepts of the word "god." In this he shares a bias with theo-Nazi propagandist Cal Thomas, with whom Wills otherwise is usually at odds. Wills quotes various books arguing that god died in the 19th century or is dead among scientists, then argues to the contrary. "But haven’t any of these morticians of the deity wondered why, if he is dead, he doesn’t stay dead? He has to keep getting up so he can die again? ... What is normally meant is that certain elites, in certain of their moods, decide that they are better off, or are forced to consider, getting along without God." Wills comments favorably about the increase in Anglican colleges, clergy and parishes in England in the 19th century, and adds that nonestablished sects were even more vigorous. Wills doesn’t mention that as late as the 1840s in England, freethinkers such as Abel Heywood, John Cleave, Henry Hetherington, Edward Moxon, Charles Southwell, George Holyoake, Thomas Paterson and others were prosecuted - and often fined or imprisoned - merely for selling materials that criticized Christianity and/or theism. This was only a few years after American patriot Tom Paine’s critique of religion, "The Age of Reason," was banned and burned in England. Further, freethinkers often were forbidden to pass their property on to their heirs. Meanwhile, the government subsidized religion in a variety of ways. By the 1880s, English law had mellowed enough that Charles Bradlaugh could publicly announce that he was an atheist without immediately being thrown into prison. Yet he had to win five successive elections in six years - and endure one brief term in jail - before Christians would allow him to take his seat in Parliament representing the people of Northampton. The long, brutal history of Christian repression of dissent is recounted in Leonard W. Levy’s "Blasphemy" (1993). It’s easy for Christians to win arguments when they can throw the opposition into jail, thereby keeping people ignorant of what skeptics say. As repeated surveys show, however, the vast majority of scientists - the people most knowledgeable about the natural world - are agnostics or atheists, and the minority of theistic scientists are mostly Deists or vaguely naturalistic pantheists. Few are devout, traditional Christians. Full intellectual freedom and education are extremely destructive to Christianity. It’s obvious why Christians had to jail dissenters, since repression was the only thing that kept Christianity alive. Of course, Bradlaugh, Holyoke and their fellow freethinkers were lucky to live when they did, for the sufferings they endured were minor compared to what non-Christians suffered in the past. For example, in the 8th century, after three decades of brutal crusades by the Christian Franks, the surviving pagans of Saxony submitted to Frankish rule. The Frankish King Charlemagne then issued two edicts - the "Capitulare Paderbrunnense" (785) and the "Capitulare Saxonicum" (797) - that forbade the practicing of the traditional pagan religion, and required that every Saxon be baptized, abstain from meat at Lent, attend all church functions and pay tithes. The penalty for violating these theocratic laws was death for some, heavy fines for others. As late as 1610, in the English colony of Virginia, the law mandated the death penalty for anti-Trinitarianism, blasphemy, opposing God (i.e., Christianity), failing to attend church whenever called, the "horrible and detestable sins of sodomy," adultery and sacrilege. (See footnote) In the centuries after Saxony’s forced conversion, Christianity spread across the rest of Europe like blood jetting from a severed jugular vein. Christians left a series of bragging accounts - notably the "History of the Archbishops of Hamburg-Bremen," "The Chronicles of the Slavs" of Helmold of Bosau, "The Chronicle of Henry of Livonia" and the anonymous "The Livonian Rhymed Chronicle" - about how they forced pagans to convert to Christianity, after millions of other pagans had been brutally martyred for their faiths. The recent Christian crusade in Kosovo was only the latest of many such atrocities. Christians also took so many pagan Slavs captive that the word "Slav" became our modern word "slave." On a number of occasions, notably in 1492 in Spain, Jews also were forcibly converted, being executed if they refused. The Holocaust was only the latest of many Christian atrocities against Jews. These forcibly-converted peoples and their immediate descendants were so "sincerely" Christian that the church-dominated governments had to pass numerous laws similar to Charlemagne’s to ensure that Christianity remained the only religion in practice. Even then, pagan tribes successfully rebelled more than once. After a few generations of hearing nothing but Christian propaganda, however, the captive populations finally forgot their native faiths and adopted the Church’s. Good modern histories of this theocratic genocide can be found in "The Northern Crusades" (1997) by Eric Christiansen and "The Barbarian Conversion" (1997) by Richard Fletcher. Of course, these pagans were polytheists, whereas Christians are monotheists. (Well, sort of, since the Trinity, angels, the Virgin Mary and Satan are polytheistic concepts. Honesty has never been a Christian virtue.) In fact, the majority of people in history have been polytheists. Christians are among the minority of (sort of) monotheists. It’s customary for Christians to deride agnostics and atheists as being spiritually "blind" to the reality of their god. The majority of humanity would say that Christians are vision-impaired to the reality of the many gods and goddesses that guide our affairs. To nontheists, the mere fact that theists cannot agree on the number, nature, characteristics, goals, pronouncements, holy books or prophets of their deities is conclusive proof that these entities are strictly figments of the imagination, with no objective existence. Then there are such questions as how any gods came into existence (Who made Zeus?); how can incorporeal supernatural entities interact with a corporeal natural universe; why science has never detected even the slightest hint of divine interaction (Einstein’s equation is not: E=mc-squared+Woden); why science is even possible if gods are constantly interfering with reality (Yahweh’s vengeance ought to trump penicillin every time, yet it’s vice versa); why revelations of these gods appear only to believers, never to skeptics (On one side, Billy Graham, Oral Roberts, Pat Robertson; on the other side, Carl Sagan, Isaac Asimov, Richard Dawkins; Q.E.D.); etc.? Regular church attendance now is down to about a quarter of the American population, and much lower in Europe. How much longer can Christianity survive when an educated public mostly rejects or ignores it? Another totalitarian system, the Soviet Union, survived several decades after popular support for it had effectively collapsed. Christianity will probably do better - it’s had longer to sink its totalitarian grip into society - but its days are still obviously numbered, Wills’ argument to the contrary. Wills usually writes very intelligent columns, often the best in the paper. His failed defense of theism adds one more piece of evidence to the miles-high stack that religions survive only because they successfully brainwash people, even some of the most intelligent, into turning off their critical faculties the moment the subject of religion arises. Fortunately, enough people escape their childhood theocratic brainwashing that a freethought movement persists. Unfortunately, most newspapers that printed Wills’ column are controlled by Christians. So readers will encounter his failed defense of theism but will never see the successful rebuttals that many nontheists can write. That’s one reason Christianity will survive a bit longer. As I said, it’s easy to win arguments when you can silence the other side. But Christianity lost its biggest argument in 1787, and no censorship can save it in the long run. Please excuse me now, I must go post this on the Internet.
|
|
Home |
|
Contact
Info: Website
comments: |
