Friday, March 12, 2010

Atheism

A recent article in the on-line magazine Salon, concerned atheism. It is one of the very few articles I have seen written to explain atheism in terms not connected with devil worship. The author wrote kindly about atheists, noting that they are generally ok folks, who largely are open to many points of view, who do good, just because it's the right thing to do, as opposed to doing good because otherwise God will punish you. While the article drew many comments, mostly kindly ones, one comment on the article seemed to me to be representative of many good Christians (surely not all, but too many I think). The comment was as follows:


"Atheism is actually a primitive form of religion in which the monotheistic deity is replaced with worship of self, money, idols, material objects, status, power, etc. The atheist conforms to the rules of society and is law abiding in order to avoid punishment, not because of a belief in a greater good. Atheism as a form of primitive religion has been with us since the beginning of human civilization and hasn't really changed over the past two or three thousand years. What is the most popular TV show? American Idol. We are a nation of idol worshippers." Jeffrey Dach

Mr. Dach reveals himself to be an insecure person, angry, and holding a rather dismal view of himself and humankind in general. He believes that people only act to do good because otherwise God will get them. In other words, humans are essentially evil, and need an overseer to keep watch over them. What a sad view of life. It makes me wonder how people like him, presumably educated in good Christian churches, manages to get through life, and even get through each day.

How sad.

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