Monthly Archives: April 2011

God, Genocide and William Lane Craig

Greta Christina has already taken William Lane Craig down for his defence of genocide, but it seems to me that a bit more needs to be said, if only to keep alive the spectacle of the smug Christian apologist William Lane Craig trying to justify genocide. Genocide is alright, says Craig, so long as God commands it, for the simple reason that God is the source of all value, and if God commands genocide then, not only is it okay, it is an obligation! The interesting thing is that Craig calls his website “Reasonable Faith”! Who does he think he’s kidding?

Craig’s answer is to two questions, one having to do with Islam and violence, the other having to do with the commandments of God to slaughter the Canaanites. Craig thinks that the problem with Islam is that they’ve got the wrong god. Well, since there isn’t one, there’s no right one either, so the really interesting question is how he sets about trying to justify the wholesale murder of whole populations, men, women, and children, combatants and non-combatants. He might have added livestock as well, since this was also often required, that all human beings and their domestic animals should be consecrated to destruction (to use the language of the Bible).

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Assisted suicide abroad puts families in legal limbo

 

Elizabeth and Eric MacDonald, shown in their 1989 engagement photo. The couple travelled to Switzerland in 2007 so that Elizabeth could commit doctor-assisted suicide.

By: Bethany Lindsay, ctvbc.ca

Date: Friday Apr. 29, 2011 7:00 PM PT

Family and friends who travel to Switzerland to be with their loved ones as they commit assisted suicide enter legal limbo when they return home — they may have committed a crime, but have no way of knowing if the police will come calling.

British Columbians Lee Carter and Hollis Johnson filed suit against the federal government this week for legal changes that would allow doctor-assisted suicide for people suffering from incurable diseases. As it stands, helping anyone commit suicide is a criminal offence punishable by up to 14 years in prison.

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Roger Scruton’s Big Mistake

I like Roger Scruton. I don’t always agree with him, but I like him; he writes clearly, and very often insightfully about philosophy, art and society. I think his support for blood sports is completely off the wall, but his introduction to modern philosophy is a little masterpiece for anyone looking for an engaged survey of philosophy since Descartes. A few years ago he wrote an interesting book on the state of play in the “clash of civilisations” entitled The West and the Rest: Globalisation and the Terrorist Threat. In the course of this insightful little book Scruton points out in some detail the difference between representative democracy and the kinds of theocracies which still dominate much of the world, and the problem that people who have known only theocratic forms of life face when they come to countries governed by representative democracy.

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£1,000,000 Worth?

Templeton looks for value for money. For every dollar spent, it expects to get some benefit for its message that god and science belong together, that belief in god is not only harmonious with science, but that science actually provides support for belief in god. In prosecuting this mission it has grown more and more cautious when awarding the £1,000,000 Templeton Prize. This year it was awarded to Lord Rees, the Astronomer Royal, a position in the Royal Household which was first awarded to John Flamsteed in 1676 by King Charles II.

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The Irrationality of Atheist Opposition to Atheism

The New Oxonian has a new guest post by Stephanie L. Fisher, who quotes from D.H. Lawrence words that I have repeated again and again over the years. I choose the words that still resonate with me, fifty years after I first read them (especially the words in italics):

For man, the vast marvel is to be alive. For man, as for flower and beast and bird, the supreme triumph is to be most vividly, most perfectly alive. Whatever the unborn and the dead may know, they cannot know the beauty, the marvel of being alive in the flesh. The dead may look after the afterwards. But the magnificent here and now of life in the flesh is ours, and ours alone, and ours only for a time. [my italics]

Of course, for Lawrence, the word ‘man’ refers almost entirely to the male sex, and for him woman is, in a very real sense, as St. Paul held, the glory of man. But even allowing the word ‘man’ to range over women as well, the words are still powerful. They point out the importance of humanity and human vitality, and the beauty and wonder that at least some of those who live will know. Sadly, this wonder will not be known by all who live, and for all who live it is known, as Lawrence knew, only for a time.

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Religion is about Control

Let me begin with a quote from a recent Paula Kirby piece in the Washington Post:

Religion is one lie after another: the lie of original sin, the lie of eternal life, the lie of hell, the lie of answered prayer, the lie that life can have no meaning without religion, the lie that religion is the source of morality, the lie of creationism, the lie of a spy-in-the-sky who hears your every word and reads your every thought. And to this list we must add the lie that it views men and women as equal. It has got away for so long with the kind of lunatic word-games that allow death-by-torture to be presented as an act of love, and eternal torment in the flames of hell to be seen as a necessary act of justice, that we should perhaps not be surprised that it has also managed to dupe its followers into seeing the systematic suppression and silencing of women as an act of liberation and equality. Nevertheless, it is a lie, like all the others: a cynical and wicked lie. It is time women everywhere woke up to it.

This is an important place to start. Religion is a cynical and wicked lie. In a comment on a recent post Tim Martin asks the question about Gregory Paul’s piece on the Man Cult of the Roman Catholic Church:

A question I have after reading this and Gregory Paul’s piece is, what is the evidence that the church is all about control? I know that they do control people a good deal, and issue moral prescriptions that prescribe how people should act, but how do you distinguish an organization that is “all about” control from one that is not? What would a church look like that is *not* all about control?

What would a church look like which is not about control? Well, the answer is simple. First of all, it wouldn’t tell lies. Second, if it made claims to speak the truth, the question of truth would be seriously asked, and answers to that question would be considered as contributions to an ongoing conversation. Third, it would not exclude from its ranks one half of the human race. Fourth, it would not attempt to have its moral or other beliefs instantiated in law. Fifth, its image would be less important than justice and right. Sixth, no one would be extruded from its fellowship just because that person believed, on reasonable grounds, that certain things are true. Seventh, it would not ossify its beliefs, by claiming them to be contained within a given text or a tradition. If, in fact, critical thought shows such texts to be inadequate in terms of fact or morality, the church would not insist on its indefectibility, but would adjust its beliefs to the findings of critical rationality. To the degree to which any organisation or institution is unresponsive to the demands of critical reason, to that extent that organisation is about control, for it will be necessary to force people to abandon critical reason, and what they understand to be true, in order to maintain the unity and continuity of the organisation so understood.

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B.C. civil liberties group sues to legalize euthanasia in Canada

SUNNY DHILLON

Vancouver— From Wednesday’s Globe and Mail
Published Tuesday, Apr. 26, 2011 2:56PM EDT
Last updated Tuesday, Apr. 26, 2011 10:45PM EDT 
Nearly two decades after the country’s highest court ruled against a B.C. woman who wanted to be euthanized, another B.C. woman’s case has laid the groundwork for a challenge to Canada’s assisted-suicide laws.

The B.C. Civil Liberties Association – along with a daughter who helped arrange her elderly mother’s death – announced the lawsuit at a news conference in downtown Vancouver Tuesday morning. In a notice of claim filed in B.C. Supreme Court, the parties argued that Criminal Code provisions against physician-assisted death are unconstitutional because they deny individuals the right to control their physical, emotional and psychological dignity.

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The New Inquisition – the Roman Catholic Man Cult’s modern War on Women

By GREGORY S. PAUL – RDFRS
Added: Monday, 20 December 2010 at 7:04 PM – An RDFRS Original

This is the first of several semi-abstracts from an upcoming book about the history of the Catholic church.

While working on a manuscript on the dark side of the Catholic patriarchy, which I hope will become a book, I realized that the modern anti-abortion campaign is the misogynist descendent of the Inquisitions that are supposed to have ended in the 1800s. To understand why, we need to take a look back at when the Holy See operated a system that enforced a state of terror upon the good peoples of Europe. The below consists largely of extracts from the manuscript.

Read more …. — a must read!

Roman Catholicism: The Sick Soul of the World

The whole purpose, aim and intention of the Roman Catholic Church is injustice and control, all the while pretending that it is about justice. But it is unyielding in its effort to maintain its control over law and the freedom of citizens. It’s main aim is to control the weakest and the most vulnerable members of society, and it is completely ruthless and conscienceless in its efforts to maintain this control. Wherever the Roman Catholic Church is found, this relentless drive to exert and maintain control will be found. What makes it so dangerous is that the more strenuously it seeks to establish its control, the more it speaks the language of love and justice. We should not be deceived.

The first thing we need to be clear about is that Roman Catholic ethics has no foundation. It speaks of the moral law, of natural law ethics, of God’s will and purpose; it speaks of love, compassion and justice; but it serves its own purposes, and has no intention of upholding values of love and compassion; its fundamental purpose is to maintain its control over people. Let there be no misunderstanding here. The ethics of the Roman Catholic Church is bankrupt and without foundation. Its continued failure to deal with the sexual abuse scandal appropriately should be a clear enough indication of that. Even now, years after the scandal broke like a tidal wave over the church, the failure of the church to deal with its multiple failures to protect children is plain for all to see. A Belgian bishop within the last few weeks spoke publicly about the sexual abuse of his nephews without being either disciplined in a significant measure, excommunicated, or defrocked. In what way is this an appropriate response to the admission of repeated sexual abuse of small boys?

Yet it is this organisation that dares to instruct the world about morality. The present pope is ready to beatify John Paul II, and yet it is now well known that this pope, for all his apparent righteousness, protected from attack a sexual predator, the Mexican priest Marcial Maciel, founder of the Legion of Christ and Regnum Christi. Not only did he abuse young men in his charge, he fathered children with numerous women and sexually abused his children as well. And yet John Paul II continued to give him support and protect him from his detractors. The present pope, Benedict XVI, was involved, as Prefect (or head) of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, in a massive cover up of sexual abuse by priests, who were only removed from positions where they could carry on their abuse with great reluctance, and often after more damage was done to children. To suppose, for one moment, that this corrupt organisation has the right to teach morals to the nations is ludicrous and presumptuous.

And yet that is precisely what it does. It’s main emphasis lies in what it calls the sanctity of life. In an article dealing with the churches’ voices in the current Canadian election campaign, the Roman Catholic voice has this to say:

The church election guides don’t explicitly name issues in order of importance. The CCCB guide “Making our Voices Heard” (available at http://www.cccb.ca), comes closest, reminding Catholics that the right to life from conception to natural death is a precondition for any just political order.

This is preposterous nonsense! It is, in fact, a recipe for injustice, massive injustice against women and against those who suffer, and yet the ridiculous claim is being made that this comes closest to expressing the order of importance of moral and justice issues facing Canada today! The absurdity of the suggestion is simply mind-boggling!

How could any organisation have thought that these are the justice issues of most importance before the Canadian electorate?! Only an organisation that has lost its soul, and seeks to maintain its control over people despite the erosion of faith, could make such a claim. People are increasingly of the view that the dying or those suffering from debilitating degenerative conditions should have the right to assistance in bringing their lives to a close should they so choose. And wherever laws are in place which make abortion illegal, women are victimized again and again. There are such places, and a brief look at how women fare in these places, forced to bear children of rape and incest, forced to bear children despite illness and danger of health to the woman, will convince any sane person that such laws are contrary to the interests of women and their health and well-being. And yet the church continues to spread its poisonous message under the banner of “pro-life” and supposed justice. It is not pro-life. It is pro-religious theocracy, and it is time that the media began to identify it as such, instead of playing along with the pope and his minions.

The Roman Catholic Church, more than any other religious organisation in the world, aside from the multiple expressions of Islamic radicalism, is a sick religion, and it is determined to spread its sickness throughout the world by means of the ballot box, ignoring the foundational principles of democracy, that no law should be enforced which cannot be accepted by those with other religious beliefs or none. The Roman Catholic Church continues its insistence that its “pro-life” agenda is merely a matter of universal morals. Nothing could be further from the truth. It is a continued attack by the church on the weak and the vulnerable, and especially an attack on women, and it is time that we told the church to pack up its pretended universals and began to know its place, as a fringe fanatic movement of no more interest to humanity than the Jehovah’s Witnesses.

Prose Poem on the Terrible Wonder of Life

Why the empty pretence that there is more than this,
when the answer should be that there is at least this much?

Instead of imagining glorious realms that transcend the world
let us flourish by living life fully in this one.

Let us care for other people who suffer,
but not demand that they stay beyond their endurance.

Let us cherish the world enough
that we do not overwhelm it with our children.

Spurn those who would bind you with false promises
and triumph in your own freedom and reason.

Life is wonderful and terrible
and nowhere else but here and now.

by Discovered Joys

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