America doesn’t need more God. It needs more atheists.

[CoffeeTiger 5,109]

(NOTE: THIS ARTICLE IS PRO-ATHEIST AND IS ANTI-THEIST IN NATURE AND MAKES SOME NEGATIVE CLAIMS AND OBSERVATIONS ABOUT RELIGIOUS PEOPLE AND BELEIFS IN AMERICA. IF YOU WOULD BE OFFENDED by that OR DO NOT WANT TO READ SOMETHING OF THAT NATURE THEN DO NOT READ THIS ARTICLE OR DISCUSSION.)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/10/03/kate-cohen-atheism/

@homersapien Wanted to especially point this article out to you. As It really resonated with me, and we were kind of discussing this in the other topic on the political smack forum). As probably 90%+ of all the posters on here are pretty committed Christians I don't expect much discussion or interaction on this post, but I wanted to put it out there all the same as it made me think more about my own beliefs and religious journey. 

I think it's a good article for anyone who wants a deeper look into the thoughts and mind of an American atheist who's trying to navigate the world as it is. This is an interesting counter to the thousands of articles we've all read from religious sources who write about how more God and more religion is the answer to improving America and the worlds ills and nastiness, and this is just the flip side of that coin. 

Here's the article in its entirety if you don't have a WAPO sub. 

 

Quote

I like to say that my kids made me an atheist. But really what they did was make me honest.

I was raised Jewish — with Sabbath prayers and religious school, a bat mitzvah and a Jewish wedding. But I don’t remember ever truly believing that God was out there listening to me sing songs of praise.

 

I thought of God as a human invention: a character, a concept, a carry-over from an ancient time.

I thought of him as a fiction.

Today I realize that means I’m an atheist. It’s not complicated. My (non)belief derives naturally from a few basic observations:

 

1. The Greek myths are obviously stories. The Norse myths are obviously stories. L. Ron Hubbard obviously made that stuff up. Extrapolate.

 

2. The holy books underpinning some of the bigger theistic religions are riddled with “facts” now disproved by science and “morality” now disavowed by modern adherents. Extrapolate.

 

3. Life is confusing and death is scary. Naturally, humans want to believe that someone capable is in charge and that we continue to live after we die. But wanting doesn’t make it so.

 

4. Child rape. War. Etc.

 

And yet, when I was younger, I would never have called myself an atheist — not on a survey, not to my family, not even to myself.

 

Being an “atheist,” at least according to popular culture, seems to require so much work. You have to complain to the school board about the Pledge of Allegiance, stamp over “In God We Trust” on all your paper money and convince Grandma not to go to church. You have to be PhD-from-Oxford smart, irritated by Christmas and shruggingly unmoved by Michelangelo’s “Pietà.” That isn’t me — but those are the stereotypes.

 

And then there are the data. Studies have shown that many, many Americans don’t trust atheists. They don’t want to vote for atheists, and they don’t want their children to marry atheists. Researchers have found that even atheists presume serial killers are more likely to be atheist than not.

 

Given all this, it’s not hard to see why atheists often prefer to keep quiet about it. Why I kept quiet. I wanted to be liked!

 

But when I had children — when it hit me that I was responsible for teaching my children everything — I wanted, above all, to tell them the truth.

Their first atheist lesson was completely impromptu. Noah was 5, Jesse was 3, and we were sitting on the couch before bed reading from “D’Aulaires’ Book of Greek Myths,” a holdover from my childhood bookshelf. One of the boys asked what a “myth” was, and I told them it was a story about how the world works. People used to believe that these gods were in charge of what happened on Earth, and these stories helped explain things they didn’t understand, like winter or stars or thunder. “See” — I flipped ahead and found a picture — “Zeus has a thunderbolt.”

“They don’t believe them anymore?” No, I said. That’s why they call it “myth.” When people still believe it, they call it “religion.” Like the stories about God and Moses that we read at Passover or the ones about Jesus and Christmas.

The little pajama-clad bodies nodded, and on we read.

 

That was it — the big moment. It was probably also the easiest moment.

 

Before one son became preoccupied with death. Before the other son had to decide whether to be bar mitzvahed. Before my daughter looked up from her math homework one day to ask, “How do we know there’s no God?”

Religion offers ready-made answers to our most difficult questions. It gives people ways to mark time, celebrate and mourn. Once I vowed not to teach my children anything I did not personally believe, I had to come up with new answers. But I discovered as I went what most parents discover: You can figure it out as you go.

 

Establishing a habit of honesty did not sap the delight from my children’s lives or destroy their moral compass. I suspect it made my family closer than we would have been had my husband and I pretended to our children that we believed in things we did not. We sowed honesty and reaped trust — along with intellectual challenge, emotional sustenance and joy.

 

Those are all personal rewards. But there are political rewards as well.

 

My children know how to distinguish fact from fiction — which is harder for children raised religious. They don’t assume conventional wisdom is true and they do expect arguments to be based on evidence. Which means they have the skills to be engaged, informed and savvy citizens.

 

We need citizens like that.

Lies, lying and disinformation suffuse mainstream politics as never before. A recent Washington Post-ABC News poll found that 29 percent of Americans believe that President Biden was not legitimately elected, a total composed of those who think there is solid evidence of fraud (22 percent) and those who think there isn’t (7 percent). I don’t know which is worse: believing there to be evidence of fraud when even the Trump campaign can’t find any or asserting the election was stolen even though you know there’s no proof.

 

Meanwhile, we are just beginning to grasp that artificial intelligence could develop an almost limitless power to deceive — threatening the ability of even the most alert citizen to discern what’s real.

 

We need Americans who demand — as atheists do — that truth claims be tethered to fact. We need Americans who understand — as atheists do — that the future of the world is in our hands. And in this particular political moment, we need Americans to stand up to Christian nationalists who are using their growing political and judicial power to take away our rights. Atheists can do that.

 

Fortunately, there are a lot of atheists in the United States — probably far more than you think.

ome people say they believe in God, but not the kind favored by monotheistic religions — a conscious supreme being with powers of intercession or creation. When they say “God” they mean cosmic oneness or astonishing coincidences. They mean that sense of smallness-within-largeness they’ve felt while standing on the shore of the ocean or holding a newborn baby or hearing the final measures of Chopin’s “Fantaisie-Impromptu.”

 

So, why do those people use the word “God” at all? The philosopher Daniel C. Dennett argues in “Breaking the Spell” that since we know we’re supposed to believe in God, when we don’t believe in a supernatural being we give the name instead to things we do believe in, such as transcendent moments of human connection.

 

Whatever the case, in 2022, Gallup found that 81 percent of Americans believe in God, the lowest percentage yet recorded. This year, when it gave respondents the option of saying they’re not sure, it found that only 74 percent believe in God, 14 percent weren’t sure, and 12 percent did not believe.

 

Not believing in God — that’s the very definition of atheism. But when people go around counting atheists, the number they come up with is far lower than that. The most recent number from Pew Research Center is 4 percent.

What’s with the gap? That’s anti-atheist stigma (and pro-belief bias) at work. Everybody’s keeping quiet, because everybody wants to be liked. Some researchers, recognizing this problem, developed a workaround.

 

In 2017, psychologists Will Gervais and Maxine Najle tried to estimate the prevalence of atheism in the United States using a technique called “unmatched count”: They asked two groups of 1,000 respondents each, how many statements were true among a list of statements. The lists were identical except that one of them included the statement “I believe in God.” By comparing the numbers, the researchers could then estimate the percentage of atheists without ever asking a direct question. They came up with around 26 percent.

 

If that’s true or even close, there are more atheists in the United States than Catholics.

Do you know what some of those atheists call themselves? Catholics. And Protestants, Jews, Muslims and Buddhists. General Social Survey data back this up: Among religious Americans, only 64 percent are certain about the existence of God. Hidden atheists can be found not just among the “nones,” as they’re called — the religiously unaffiliated — but also in America’s churches, mosques and synagogues.

 

“If you added up all the nominal Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, etc. — those who are religious in name only,” Harvard humanist chaplain Greg M. Epstein writes in “Good Without God,” “you really might get the largest denomination in the world.”

 

Atheists are everywhere. And we are unusually disposed to getting stuff done.

Iused to say, when people asked me what atheists do believe, that it was simple: Atheists believe that God is a human invention.

 

But now, I think it’s more than that.

 

If you are an atheist — if you do not believe in a Supreme Being — you can be moral or not, mindful or not, clever or not, hopeful or not. Clearly, you can keep going to church. But, by definition, you cannot believe that God is in charge. You must give up the notion of God’s will, God’s purpose, God’s mysterious ways.

 

In some ways, this makes life easier. You don’t have to work out why God might cause or ignore suffering, what parts of this broken world are God’s plan, or what work is his to do and what is yours.

 

But you also don’t get to leave things up to God. Atheists must accept that people are allowing — we are allowing — women to die in childbirth, children to go hungry, men to buy guns that can slaughter dozens of people in minutes. Atheists believe people organized the world as it is now, and only people can make it better.

 

No wonder we are “the most politically active group in American politics today,” according to political scientist Ryan Burge, interpreting data from the Cooperative Election Study.

 

That’s right: Atheists take more political action — donating to campaigns, protesting, attending meetings, working for politicians — than any other “religious” group. And we vote. In his study on this data, sociologist Evan Stewart noted that atheists were about 30 percent more likely to vote than religiously affiliated respondents.

We also vote far more than most religiously unaffiliated people. That’s what distinguishes atheists from the “nones” — and what I didn’t realize at first.

 

Atheists haven’t just checked out of organized religion. (Indeed, we may not have.) We haven’t just rejected belief in God. (Though, obviously, that’s the starting point.) Where atheism becomes a definite stance rather than a lack of direction, a positive belief and not just a negative one, is in our understanding that, without a higher power, we need human power to change the world.

 

I want to be clear: There are clergy members and congregations all across this country working to do good, not waiting for God to answer their prayers or assuming that God meant for the globe to get hotter. You don’t have to be an atheist to conduct yourself as if people are responsible for the world they live in — you just have to act like an atheist, by taking matters into your own hands.

Countless good people of faith do just that. But one thing they can’t do as well as atheists is push back against the outsize cultural and political power of religion itself.

 

That power is crushing some of our most vulnerable citizens. And I don’t mean my fellow atheists. Atheists, it’s true, are subject to discrimination and scapegoating; somehow we’re to blame for moral chaos, mass shootings and whatever the “trans cult” is. Yes, we are technically barred from serving as jurors in the state of Maryland or joining a Boy Scout troop anywhere, but we do not, as a group, suffer anything like the prejudice that, say, LGBTQ+ people face. It’s not even close.

 

Peel back the layers of discrimination against LGBTQ+ people, though, and you find religion. Peel back the layers of control over women’s bodies — from dress codes that punish girls for male desire all the way to the Supreme Court striking down Roe v. Wade — and you find religion. Often, there isn’t much peeling to do. According to the bill itself, Missouri’s total abortion ban was created “in recognition that Almighty God is the author of life.” Say what, now?

Peel back the layers of abstinence-only or marriage-centered or anti-homosexual sex education and you find religion. “Don’t say gay” laws, laws denying trans kids medical care, school-library book bans and even efforts to suppress the teaching of inconvenient historical facts — motivated by religion.

 

And when religion loses a fight and progress wins instead? Religion then claims it’s not subject to the resulting laws. “Religious belief” is — more and more, at the state and federal levels — a way to sidestep advances the country makes in civil rights, human rights and public health.

In 45 states and D.C., parents can get religious exemptions from laws that require schoolchildren to be vaccinated. Seven states allow pharmacists to refuse to fill contraceptive prescriptions because of their religious beliefs. Every business with a federal contract has to comply with federal nondiscrimination rules — unless it’s a religious organization. Every employer that provides health insurance has to comply with the Affordable Care Act’s contraceptive mandate — unless it’s, say, a craft supply store with Christian owners.

 

Case by case, law by law, our country’s commitment to the first right enumerated in our Bill of Rights — “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion” — is faltering. The Supreme Court has ruled that the citizens of Maine have to pay for parochial school, that a high school football coach should be free to lead a prayer on the 50-yard line, that a potential wedding website designer can reject potential same-sex clients. This past summer, Oklahoma approved the nation’s first publicly funded religious school. This fall, Texas began allowing schools to employ clergy members in place of guidance counselors.

 

You don’t have to be an atheist to worry about the structural integrity of Thomas Jefferson’s “wall of separation between Church & State.” You don’t have to be an atheist to think that religion should not shape public policy or that believers should have to follow the laws that everyone else does. You don’t have to be an atheist to see that Christian nationalists are using “religious liberty” to perpetuate much of the discrimination Americans suffer today.

 

But atheists can do one thing about the country’s drift into theocracy that our religious neighbors won’t: We can tell people we don’t believe in God. The more people who do that, the more we normalize atheism in America, the easier it will be — for both politicians and the general public — to usher religion back out of our laws.

 

Okay, but should you say you’re an atheist even if you believe in “God” as the power of nature or something like that?

Yes. It does no one any favors — not the country, not your neighbors — to say you believe in God metaphorically when there are plenty of people out there who literally believe that God is looking down from heaven deciding which of us to cast into hell.

 

In fact, when certain believers wield enough political power to turn their God’s presumed preferences into law, I would say it’s dangerous to claim you believe in “God” when what you actually believe in is awe or wonder. (Your “God is love” only lends validity and power to their “God hates gays.”)

 

So ask yourself: Do I think a supernatural being is in charge of the universe?

 

If you answer “no,” you’re an atheist. That’s it — you’re done.

 

But if you go further: You’ll be doing something good for your country.

 

When I started raising my kids as atheists, I wasn’t particularly honest with the rest of the world. I wasn’t everybody’s mom, right? Plus, I had to get along with other people. Young parents need community, and I was afraid to risk alienating new parent friends by being honest about being — looks both ways, lowers voice — an atheist.

 

But, in addition to making me be honest inside our home, my children pushed me to start being honest on the outside. In part, I wanted to set an example for them, and in part, I wanted to help change the world they would face.

It shouldn’t be hard to say you don’t believe in God. It shouldn’t be shocking or shameful. I know that I’m moral and respectful and friendly. And the more I say to people that I’m an atheist — me, the mom who taught the kindergarten class about baking with yeast and brought the killer cupcakes to the bake sale — the more people will stop assuming that being an atheist means being … a serial killer.

 

And then? The more I say I’m an atheist, the more other people will feel comfortable calling themselves atheists. And the stigma will gradually dissolve.

 

Can you imagine? If we all knew how many of us there are?

 

It would give everyone permission to be honest with their kids and their friends, to grapple with big questions without having to hold on to beliefs they never embraced.

 

And it would take away permission, too. Permission to pass laws (or grant exemptions to laws) based on the presumed desires of a fictional creation. Permission to be cruel to fellow human beings based on Bible verses. Permission to eschew political action in favor of “thoughts and prayers.”

 

I understand that, to many people, this might sound difficult or risky. It took me years to declare myself an atheist, and I was raised Reform Jewish, I live in the Northeast, I’m White, I work at home, and my family and friends are a liberal bunch. The stakes were low for me. For some, I fully concede, the stakes are too high.

 

If you think you’d lose your job or put your children at risk of harassment for declaring your atheism, you get a pass. If you would be risking physical harm, don’t speak out. If you’re an atheist running for school board somewhere that book bans are on the agenda, then feel free to keep it quiet, and God bless.

 

But for everyone else who doesn’t believe in God and hasn’t said so? Consider that your honesty will allow others to be honest, and that your reticence encourages others to keep quiet. Consider that the longer everyone keeps quiet, the longer religion has political and cultural license to hurt people. Consider that the United States — to survive as a secular democracy — needs you now more than ever.

 

And the next time you find yourself tempted to pretend that you believe in God? Tell the truth instead.

 

 

Edited October 3, 2023 by CoffeeTiger

[I_M4_AU 7,848]

1 hour ago, CoffeeTiger said:

And the next time you find yourself tempted to pretend that you believe in God? Tell the truth instead.

Time to man up Coffee.

[I_M4_AU 7,848]

To discuss the article; The parents are responsible to guide their children through the pitfalls of life.  She seems to think she has all the answers and will force her beliefs on those poor children.  What if she is wrong?  I bet it never occurred to her.

Instead of allowing the children to discover the truth she is inserting *her* truth.  It is similar to a Munchausen Trans mother convincing her child he/she is trans, after all it is her truth.

Guiding a child through life is much more difficult that telling them what to think.

The Bible is a great tool to teach lessons of life.  It’s too bad she has now discounted that tool and will encourage her children to read anything but the Bible.  They will become like her and distrust anything Jewish or Christian just because it is Jewish or Christain and not be able to discern between what is good about religion and what is not good.  There really isn’t a neutral religion known as atheism, people will gravitate to what ever makes them feel coincides with their beliefs, whether voluntarily or not.  It is evident in what she has written.

 

[Leftfield 2,601]

1 hour ago, I_M4_AU said:

To discuss the article; The parents are responsible to guide their children through the pitfalls of life.  She seems to think she has all the answers and will force her beliefs on those poor children.  What if she is wrong?  I bet it never occurred to her.

Instead of allowing the children to discover the truth she is inserting *her* truth.  It is similar to a Munchausen Trans mother convincing her child he/she is trans, after all it is her truth.

Guiding a child through life is much more difficult that telling them what to think.

The Bible is a great tool to teach lessons of life.  It’s too bad she has now discounted that tool and will encourage her children to read anything but the Bible.  They will become like her and distrust anything Jewish or Christian just because it is Jewish or Christain and not be able to discern between what is good about religion and what is not good.  There really isn’t a neutral religion known as atheism, people will gravitate to what ever makes them feel coincides with their beliefs, whether voluntarily or not.  It is evident in what she has written.

 

The really funny thing is, your entire critique is based upon your belief that you're right. As you accuse her, has it never occurred that you might wrong?

You accuse her of inserting *her* truth and telling them what to think, when she clearly stated that the lesson she was teaching her children was to look at facts and evidence, and make their own judgements. Don't just take things on faith as *truth*. I tell my kids the same - don't ever fail to question the things I try to teach you, as I might be wrong. 

Where in that article did she discount the Bible as being worth reading? She was reading a book about Greek mythology to her children, so why do you think she wouldn't read the Bible to them? As you say, there are many worthy lessons in there. Just because she doesn't believe in God doesn't automatically mean she rejects all teachings of all religions. As many of us do, we can accept the messages without believing the stories.

 

[I_M4_AU 7,848]

17 minutes ago, Leftfield said:

has it never occurred that you might wrong?

 

18 minutes ago, Leftfield said:

Don't just take things on faith as *truth*. I tell my kids the same - don't ever fail to question the things I try to teach you, as I might be wrong

It looks like you are telling your *truth* as I don’t know how old your children are, but hers are young and have not developed into trying to find the truth by exploring other evidence.  They will only explore the avenues she will provide for them.  Children of the age her children are are looking for a simple answer, they are not capable of discerning the nuances of truth.  By telling them to even question you is undermining yourself as a parent at that age.

25 minutes ago, Leftfield said:

You accuse her of inserting *her* truth and telling them what to think, when she clearly stated that the lesson she was teaching her children was to look at facts and evidence, and make their own judgements.

What she tells her children and what they understand are two different things.  You will never know what they hear and understand until later in life.  It’s a crap shoot and as parents we can only hope it turns out right.  We all parent by picking things we liked about our parents and what we didn’t. The problem is we sometimes don’t understand what we didn’t like about our parents way of guiding us is not known until we have kids and make our own mistakes.

 

32 minutes ago, Leftfield said:

Where in that article did she discount the Bible as being worth reading? She was reading a book about Greek mythology to her children, so why do you think she wouldn't read the Bible to them? As you say, there are many worthy lessons in there. Just because she doesn't believe in God doesn't automatically mean she rejects all teachings of all religions. As many of us do, we can accept the messages without believing the stories.

She clearly stated that God was a myth just like the gods of Greek Mythology.  She goes on to say we now know the gods of mythology were proven not to have the power once thought.  There are plenty of books out there that present the lessons of the Bible without giving credit where credit is due.  I doubt her household will mention God many times other than telling her kids He is a myth.

In the past the phrase *quesion everything* was popular, the other part of that is just because you question something doesn’t mean it needs to be changed.

[Leftfield 2,601]

25 minutes ago, I_M4_AU said:

 

It looks like you are telling your *truth* as I don’t know how old your children are, but hers are young and have not developed into trying to find the truth by exploring other evidence.  They will only explore the avenues she will provide for them.  Children of the age her children are are looking for a simple answer, they are not capable of discerning the nuances of truth.  By telling them to even question you is undermining yourself as a parent at that age.

So my telling my children to ask questions to be sure evidence continues to support what I teach them is my *truth*? Guilty as charged, I guess? 

She said the anecdote about reading Greek mythology to her children was her entrance into this topic with them. We have no idea how long ago that was, so to extrapolate that age to the rest of the conversations she's had with her children is an error.

I don't believe telling my children to use their brains is undermining me. I think it's telling them that I'm fallible, and will do my best to do right by them, but sometimes I'm going to fail and they need to be prepared to think for themselves. No, I didn't have conversations like that with them when they were 5, but they started not long after that. 

32 minutes ago, I_M4_AU said:

She clearly stated that God was a myth just like the gods of Greek Mythology.  She goes on to say we now know the gods of mythology were proven not to have the power once thought.  There are plenty of books out there that present the lessons of the Bible without giving credit where credit is due.  I doubt her household will mention God many times other than telling her kids He is a myth.

Now you're just projecting your own vision of who she is. You have no idea how she has presented/will present this to her children. She's nothing but respectful to those with faith in the article. Why do you assume otherwise in how you view her? Perhaps because of the very stereotypes of athiests that she points out in the article?

34 minutes ago, I_M4_AU said:

In the past the phrase *quesion everything* was popular, the other part of that is just because you question something doesn’t mean it needs to be changed.

Correct, and at no point did I say questioning something demands it.

[homersapien 11,379]

Religion is always passed along by indoctrinating children.  That's exactly why countries/cultures are defined by particular religions - including ours.

If Christians were honest with themselves, they would easily recognize the "path to salvation" has more to do with where you were born than it does with any sort of universal truth.

 

 

 

Edited October 4, 2023 by homersapien

[I_M4_AU 7,848]

6 minutes ago, Leftfield said:

Correct, and at no point did I say questioning something demands it.

This statement never mentioned you.  Your assumption is noted.

[Leftfield 2,601]

1 minute ago, I_M4_AU said:

This statement never mentioned you.  Your assumption is noted.

O....k?

[PUB78 1,358]

3 hours ago, Leftfield said:

The really funny thing is, your entire critique is based upon your belief that you're right. As you accuse her, has it never occurred that you might wrong?

You accuse her of inserting *her* truth and telling them what to think, when she clearly stated that the lesson she was teaching her children was to look at facts and evidence, and make their own judgements. Don't just take things on faith as *truth*. I tell my kids the same - don't ever fail to question the things I try to teach you, as I might be wrong. 

Where in that article did she discount the Bible as being worth reading? She was reading a book about Greek mythology to her children, so why do you think she wouldn't read the Bible to them? As you say, there are many worthy lessons in there. Just because she doesn't believe in God doesn't automatically mean she rejects all teachings of all religions. As many of us do, we can accept the messages without believing the stories.

 

 

[Leftfield 2,601]

2 hours ago, PUB78 said:

 

Of the two of us, who would you say is more open to new evidence?

[PUB78 1,358]

2 hours ago, Leftfield said:

Of the two of us, who would you say is more open to new evidence?

New evidence of what? The existence of  God?

[Leftfield 2,601]

4 minutes ago, PUB78 said:

New evidence of what? The existence of  God?

Well, anything really, but yes, especially the existence of God.

Wondering why that picture wasn't shared during the pandemic.

[homersapien 11,379]

13 hours ago, Leftfield said:

Of the two of us, who would you s ay is more open to new evidence?

Ironic, huh?

[CoffeeTiger 5,109]

11 hours ago, Leftfield said:

Well, anything really, but yes, especially the existence of God.

Wondering why that picture wasn't shared during the pandemic.

I think the article alluded to this a bit. 
 

when you have a religion that tells you everything…and you believe that religion to be 100% indisputably true, then you don’t need to know, learn, or explore anything else. 
 

If your religion tells you who you are, how you came to be, how you need to live, why you need to live that way, what will happen to you when you die, and that everything you don’t know you don’t need to worry about because your God will handle it…..then there isn’t any reason for you to learn or accept any new knowledge or information. You already know everything you need to know from your religion. 
 

everything else just ends up possibly being ‘false knowledge’

 

 

Edited October 4, 2023 by CoffeeTiger

[I_M4_AU 7,848]

2 hours ago, CoffeeTiger said:

I think the article alluded to this a bit. 
 

when you have a religion that tells you everything…and you believe that religion to be 100% indisputably true, then you don’t need to know, learn, or explore anything else. 
 

If your religion tells you who you are, how you came to be, how you need to live, why you need to live that way, what will happen to you when you die, and that everything you don’t know you don’t need to worry about because your God will handle it…..then there isn’t any reason for you to learn or accept any new knowledge or information. You already know everything you need to know from your religion. 
 

everything else just ends up possibly being ‘false knowledge’

 

 

This is interesting; you and a few others on this forum have admitted to have been brought up in a religious setting and yet you have broken from the fold.  Your arguement isn’t as solid as you make it out to be.  I would guess the majority of people question what they have been taught from time to time.  The best teacher is life itself.  A moral compass is required and how you obtain that is at the heart of the conversation. 

Is it better to be taught that in a structured religion or learn as you go and hope you’ve taught everything they need to know?  No matter which you choose the child will start to question a parent as to how they were taught.

The same people that believe religious structure being taught to the young will warp a child’s mind are the very ones that want to warp a child’s mind in saying that you were assigned a gender at birth by doctor and he/she could be wrong.  That decision is up to a child of as young as 2.

It seems atheism is the religion of the left.  Count me out.

[PUB78 1,358]

16 hours ago, Leftfield said:

Of the two of us, who would you say is more open to new evidence?

False knowledge because ignorance is no excuse. God has revealed himself to man through his glorious creation and his word.

[Leftfield 2,601]

14 minutes ago, PUB78 said:

False knowledge because ignorance is no excuse. God has revealed himself to man through his glorious creation and his word.

Not sure if you intended to answer my question with that, but you did. Thanks.

[CoffeeTiger 5,109]

1 hour ago, I_M4_AU said:

This is interesting; you and a few others on this forum have admitted to have been brought up in a religious setting and yet you have broken from the fold.  Your arguement isn’t as solid as you make it out to be.  I would guess the majority of people question what they have been taught from time to time.  The best teacher is life itself.  A moral compass is required and how you obtain that is at the heart of the conversation. 

 

1 hour ago, I_M4_AU said:

Is it better to be taught that in a structured religion or learn as you go and hope you’ve taught everything they need to know?  No matter which you choose the child will start to question a parent as to how they were taught.

 

It would entirely depend on what that structured religion is. Yes, there are some Churches and religious beliefs out there that it are immensely harmful to raise children in. Other Churches and belief systems aren't bad and can be good at teaching morals and structure. 

There is a wide variety.

Religion is not the only way to impart morals and life lessons on children growing up. It's a fallacy to believe that an atheist person can have no morals or know right from wrong without a religion to give them guidance. 

1 hour ago, I_M4_AU said:

The same people that believe religious structure being taught to the young will warp a child’s mind are the very ones that want to warp a child’s mind in saying that you were assigned a gender at birth by doctor and he/she could be wrong.  That decision is up to a child of as young as 2.

It seems atheism is the religion of the left.  Count me out.

 

The vast majority of atheist parents are not encouraging their young children to become transgendered or encouraging them to get surgery. That is a ridiculous argument, and is really no different than accusing all religious parents of being abusive because there are some cases of parents using religion to control their children and abuse them mentally, physically, and sexually. 

Just like Religion and Christianity, atheism exists in all political spectrums. 

I think it's probable that Donald Trump is an atheist, or possibly an agnostic in that he doesn't seem to believe or worship any given God or religion. 

 

 

Edited October 4, 2023 by CoffeeTiger

[icanthearyou 4,463]

Most believe in religion, not god.  Most believe in the religious concept of Jesus, not His teaching. 

Most cannot/will not grasp the idea that religion and god are two different concepts.  Religions and their hierarchies have worldly appetites.

Hypocrisy, tribalism, self righteousness separate the religious from god and, help deter others from seeing god.

I know Jesus is real.  His spirit is revealed through the bible.  However, He is found in love, charity, grace, mercy.  He is not found in the concepts (dogma, orthodoxy, tradition) of religion.

Understanding and knowing Jesus is more of an exercise in love, not religious scholarship.

I doubt it is any better to be an insincere "christian" than, to be an atheist. 

Very interesting essay.

 

 

 

[I_M4_AU 7,848]

17 minutes ago, CoffeeTiger said:

Religion is not the only way to impart morals and life lessons on children growing up. It's a fallacy to believe that an atheist person can have no morals or know right from wrong without a religion to give them guidance.

I never said this.  

18 minutes ago, CoffeeTiger said:

The vast majority of atheist parents are not encouraging their young children to become transgendered or encouraging them to get surgery

I didn’t say this either.  The ones that are are the ones that are warping their child’s mind and not letting them think for themselves.  It can happen if you are religious or not.

 

22 minutes ago, CoffeeTiger said:

I think it's probable that Donald Trump is an atheist, or possibly an agnostic in that he doesn't seem to believe or worship any given God or religion. 

I would have no idea as he doesn’t wear it on his sleeve and that’s fine with me.

[SaltyTiger 7,812]

On 10/3/2023 at 2:20 PM, Leftfield said:

She said the anecdote about reading Greek mythology to her children was her entrance into this topic with them.

Reading Greek mythology to a 5 and 3 year old? Telling about the opinion article contributor.
 

Most normal folks read things like “Otis the Tractor and Puppy”. Every child book is mythical. Purpose is to form reading skills and habits. Typical Coffee slap at Christian’s.

[AUFAN78 3,909]

On 10/4/2023 at 8:30 AM, CoffeeTiger said:

I think the article alluded to this a bit. 
 

when you have a religion that tells you everything…and you believe that religion to be 100% indisputably true, then you don’t need to know, learn, or explore anything else. 
 

If your religion tells you who you are, how you came to be, how you need to live, why you need to live that way, what will happen to you when you die, and that everything you don’t know you don’t need to worry about because your God will handle it…..then there isn’t any reason for you to learn or accept any new knowledge or information. You already know everything you need to know from your religion. 
 

everything else just ends up possibly being ‘false knowledge’

 

 

I was raised in a Baptist Church environment, but never taught not to learn and grow. Quite the opposite actually. But quite curious your religious upbringing that taught you these lessons. If you choose not to share I understand. 

[AUApostle 7,651]

It’s hard for many cultural Christians, much less atheists, to understand why we need more God.  Those are all great points, but they deny one thing…the power of God that is present in my life that manifests daily through healing, provision, prophesy, words of knowledge, fruitful relationships, and an overall absence of fear.  An obedience to prayer, worship, and scripture has brought depth to my relationship with God that I never knew as a young person struggling with these questions.  He has brought me a long ways in 5 years…from a fearful, prideful, disengaged sleepy Christian to someone who walks daily in his victory.  My relationship with my wife and my kids has been transformed and once I decided to let go of the idol of my career and the idol of comfort and truly submitted to Him it’s all flourished.
 

I remember reading a book by Loren Cunningham with my wife about 10 years ago and thinking, “Lord, I want to be used by you, but I don’t want to endure all those crazy faith stories where God shows up with money that we need at the last minute or I have to go out into the streets and pray for healing for strangers.  I’ll do whatever you need, but don’t make me do that.”  And here I am 10 years later doing EXACTLY that and it’s a much more fulfilling life than whatever I thought I wanted (rich Starchitect winning awards?).

 Happy to share my testimony of healing and miraculous provision for anyone that’s curious.

[Leftfield 2,601]

16 hours ago, SaltyTiger said:

Reading Greek mythology to a 5 and 3 year old? Telling about the opinion article contributor.
 

Most normal folks read things like “Otis the Tractor and Puppy”. Every child book is mythical. Purpose is to form reading skills and habits. Typical Coffee slap at Christian’s.

How is it "telling"? There are plenty of books on mythology for children that don't go into the gory details. I had a few books myself when I was a kid. Was fascinated by the illustrations and depictions, and enjoyed many of the stories. Why do you assume she's reading them The Iliad?

And maybe she doesn't have "normal" kids. There are plenty of children who are advanced readers and understand more than their peers at an early age. Maybe you don't like that it's "telling" that they're an intelligent family?

I'm not Coffee, by the way.