GOP Congressman Attempts To Prohibit Atheist Chaplains

If you need to see a counselor
There’s someplace you can go
But it shows up on your record that you went
But a chaplain, if you see one,
No one else will ever know–
An alternative that’s clearly heaven-sent!

If you choose to go to chapel
You can get the morning off
If you don’t, you are free to stay and work
So the floors are mopped and polished
By the folks who chose to scoff–
Just another well-deserved religious perk!

Though the godless here among us
Number roughly one in five
(More than Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu troops combined)
We’ll claim none are found in foxholes
Where religion comes alive–
If their chaplains all are christian, they won’t mind!

Foolish congressmen are singing
Hymns with many sour notes
And it’s frankly disrespectful to the troops
Don’t expect their tune to change, though,
Cos it guarantees them votes…
And it keeps the godless jumping through their hoops

Not content to simply vote down an amendment providing specifically for atheist chaplains in the military, GOP congressweasel John Fleming is attempting to actively prohibit such chaplains, on the off chance the military decided that providing support for the 20% of troops who identify as atheists or agnostics was a good idea. If anyone thought “support our troops” was enough to overcome prejudice against atheists, today’s news will disabuse you of that illusion.

A positive view, with thoughtful legal analysis.

A relatively neutral, unsophisticated view, from the Christian News Network.

Batshit crazy (especially the comments) from The Blaze.

“Why I Don’t Believe In Atheism”

Atheists are a miserable lot—
Just horrid, each one that I’ve found;
They’re grumpy and angry and touchy and mean—
Or, they have been, while I’ve been around.

In an odd sort of editorial at the Times-Picayune of New Orleans, Dr. Joe McKeever (preacher and cartoonist) gives a lesson in caricature. That is, he writes a piece honestly, that serves as a caricature, so broadly sketched, distorted and unsubtle. He addresses the “atheistic peddlers”, who “are sure that we mindless theists have never considered the superior evidence for the positions they hold.” (Interestingly enough, I have never known any atheists who have actually gone door-to-door peddling their atheism, but just this past weekend some Jehovah’s Witnesses seemed surprised that I had, in fact, read the bible and considered the evidence they figured I, as a mindless atheist, had never considered. I’m sure my atheist readers will confess to their peripatetic atheism-peddling in the comments.)

Most of the solid believers I know have considered atheism at one time or other. I did, while in college. This is not to say I joined the humanist society of Birmingham or majored in skepticism at Birmingham-Southern. But I read some of the stuff, talked to a few of the people, thought about the ramifications of it all, and made my choice to take my stand with believers.

I’ve never regretted it.

Here’s why.

That is, here are seven incredibly bad, old, trite, and useless excuses. Each has been answered many times over; hell, each has been answered here, in verse.

1) As a rule, atheists tend to be a pretty miserable lot, while the best Christians I know are also the most put-together, positive, and effective people in the room.

Today’s verse is in response to this one. Dr McK has distilled a common factor–atheism–from his interactions with a bunch of miserable atheists. Now, I’m an atheist, but I am not miserable, as a rule. I do wonder, though, if I might not be pretty miserable around Dr. McK.

2) Since faith is required for either position, choosing to believe this amazing universe came together by chance and will go out the same way requires far more faith than this Alabama farm boy can muster. As has been said in the book by this title, “I don’t have faith enough to be an atheist.”

It takes more endurance *not* to run a marathon, you know.

3) While it’s true a large portion of Christians have probably not investigated various apologetic aspects–evidence for the resurrection, the historicity of Jesus, the integrity of Scriptures– a great many have. I sat in the room with Dr. Carl F. H. Henry in the summer of 1978 as he said to some of us, “Christianity is the only world religion that has come through the scientific revolution and emerged intact.” Some of the others are fighting tooth and claw to keep modern technology from taking a look at their authoritative writings.

Regarding the first part… so, does the good doctor agree that children are believing for the wrong reasons? As for the second… wow. If by “intact”, you mean “splintered into tens of thousands of sects”, and by “only” you mean “one of many”, and you ignore the clash between science and christianity in schools across the nation, he might have a point.

4) I do like the old line of reasoning that goes: “If the atheist is true and after death, we all disappear into nothingness, then as a Christian I have lost nothing. But if Jesus Christ is true and after death life just begins to get interesting, then the atheist is in a lot of trouble.” What about that can they not see?

Ah, Pascal’s Wager. I used to keep running tallies of a) people who used Pascal’s Wager as a serious argument, and b) people who sincerely argued that no Christian ever used Pascal’s Wager as a serious argument anymore. Here’s one response. Here’s another.

5) If we know people by their fruits, then philosophies should identify themselves the same way. So, does anyone know any charitable ministry ever started by the atheists? Show me one and I can show you a hundred hospitals and colleges, children’s homes and crisis centers begun by Christ-followers.

I wrote this before what’s-his-name noted that there were no atheist groups helping Oklahoma (and, obviously, before he got roundly spanked for making the same mistake Dr. McK makes. I wrote some after Katrina as well (and yes, donated both money and blood–but there is no way in Cuttletown to have my money marked as an atheist contribution), and contrasted the church response at the time.

6) There are the miracles, such as the existence of Holy Scriptures (the uniformity of them, the prophecies, the clarity, and a thousand other aspects), the existence of the Man of Galilee (His birth, life, death, and resurrection; His teachings and promises, etc), the existence of the Church (so flawed, without its divine nature, surely it would have vanished long ago), and the existence of honest inquiry among believers (a sure sign, if you ask me, that God’s people are into Truth and nothing else).

Yes, the evidence leads directly to Jesus. Except when it is simply too bizarre and unbelievable to be false.

7) My testimony–and yours–on the power of Jesus Christ who changed our lives. And, as C. S. Lewis pointed out, if a skeptic scoffs that my life is so far inferior to what a true Christian should look like, I do not argue with that, but reply that my life is still so far beyond what it would have been without Christ.

Ok, I actually have quite a bit on this, but I’ve chosen a bit of musing on special pleading–Dr. McK has exceedingly high standards for atheists to meet, but when it comes to sufficient evidence for his own beliefs, his own testimony trumps all. Just because.

There is more to his essay, but nothing you haven’t heard a thousand times. I don’t think they are taking comments at the NOLA site, so I’m afraid you can’t let the good doctor know what you think of his reasoning. But hey, you can vent here.

“Reality Beyond The Material”

“All of human experience, over millennia, suggests a richness and complexity of reality beyond the material.”

I’ve heard there’s a heaven, its streets paved with gold,
Where diamonds and platinum gleams
It’s as real as my hand is, or so I’ve been told,
Though it might just be Swedenborg’s dreams.

I’ve heard I have angels who watch what I do
And act, if I do something rash
The lady who told me, she swore it was true
Then she charged me a whole lot of cash

I’ve heard I can heal any ailment at all
But first, I just have to believe
No matter what problem, how big or how small,
But science just cannot perceive!

I’ve heard there are miracles, wonders, and more,
Overflowing reality’s cup
And I’m thinking it’s something I ought to ignore…
Cos it looks like just making shit up

So yeah… my aggregator threw this at me today. From the Jamaica Gleaner, it’s “Science and Religion: a clash of two faiths”. The title alone tells you pretty much everything you need to know about the author’s position. The only additional info you might need is to note that this article is a response to a previous article… or, as the present author puts it:

Every now and again, some of the puff-chested doctors-cum-priests of science and a wide variety of coat-tail-hanging quacks emerge to advise us that religion, and particularly Christianity, is terminally ill. This is especially strange since modern science is irrefutably a product of Christian faith, more particularly of Protestant Christian faith.

So here comes another one, Dr Patrick White, who holds a doctorate in engineering and has led research groups at Bell Labs, puffingly announcing ‘Christianity losing race against science’ (Gleaner, July 1, 2013).

Initially, I was a bit confused as to whether science or puffery was the enemy. Turns out it’s science.

Science is replete with its own pet prejudices, bigotry and religious zealotry. At its epistemological core, science, as preached by many practitioners and bandwagon believers, operates on two weak assumptions: The reductionist view that reality is purely material, the interplay of matter and energy; and that the only way of truly knowing is by ‘scientific method’.

All of human experience, over millennia, suggests a richness and complexity of reality beyond the material. Science has been quite glibly willing to dismiss the mountain of evidence of non-material reality in defence of its own pet prejudice and in a deliberate and concerted effort to get rid of ‘god’ and the supernatural, which might be more properly described as the ‘othernatural’ rather than the ‘supernatural’.

Go ahead and read it… look for the critique of religion that matches the critique of science. Science is critiqued, and by virtue of a version of special pleading, religion is there to pick up the pieces.

Taking science on its own ground, no hypothesis of origins can be established by scientific method because it simply cannot be tested, a key requirement of validating hypotheses. Origin, whether of matter or of life, is a unique, one-off, non-replicable event of the distant past without human witnesses. Scientific method proceeds by examining replicable phenomena for attaining reliable and valid results. In matters of origins, we all ultimately stand on a platform of faith.

The only rational, purely natural ‘scientific’ position is that we, conscious and self-reflective human beings, find ourselves here. We do not know where we came from. We do not know why we are here. We do not know where we are going.

Science can answer none of these critical existential questions. And science can assign no value to human life. The object cannot value itself. Value is derived from being valuable to another.

Sure, religion can’t answer scientific questions, but that’s not its fault:

Religion, and Christianity in particular, has often been its own worst enemy in the contrived conflict with science. The Bible is not a science text and was not intended to be. The pronouncements of the mediaeval Roman Catholic Church upon cosmology which led to its ‘routing’ by Copernicus and Galileo, over which Patrick White now gloats, had no warrant in data sources available to the Church.

The article concludes

As powerful and productive as they have been, science and scientific method are not without boundaries of competence to define and to examine reality. Trespassing outside those boundaries is definitely not scientific, and bluff and bluster by the doctors, priests and quacks of science cannot change that simple fact.

which the casual observer will note does not advance the cause of religion one inch. The argument is, roughly, “if it is not the 4th of July, it must necessarily be Christmas.” Sorry, but knocking down science (worse, knocking down science based on your inadequate understanding of it) does not strengthen religion.

Tearing down my neighbor’s house does not strengthen my own. Pretending to tear down my neighbor’s house is just as futile, with the added benefit of making me look like a fool.

God Did It

I don’t know how the flowers bloom
Or how the spring rains fall
I don’t know how the seasons change
I don’t know much at all

There’s lots of stuff I do not know
And though it may seem odd
Let’s please not call it ignorance—
I’d rather call it God. [Read more…]

Should Atheists Pray?

“Should atheists pray?” the paper asked
And commenters all had to share…
Seems nobody knows what an atheist is,
And nobody understands prayer

At the New York Times, the “Room for Debate” opinion page asks “Should Atheists Pray?”.

With atheist church services this month in Louisiana and New York, nonbelievers are borrowing some of the rituals of believers: gathering, singing, sermons.

Would it be fruitful for atheists to pray? For believers and others, what is the point of prayer?

They ask 5 people, only one of whom is an actual atheist (Hemant Mehta). The others include a professor of psychology and former pastor, a professor of preaching, a visiting professor of the new testament and co-pastor, and (naturally) Deepak Chopra. Of course, the real fun is in the comments to each essay.

We find, among essayists as well as commenters, that there are myriad understandings of just what atheism is–from simply not believing in a god, to specific denial of a god even if evidence for one was shown, to those who specifically hate the Christian god, to frankly incoherent quasi-descriptions. Oh, and it takes more faith to be an atheist than to believe, but you already knew that.

There are also a wide spectrum of beliefs about prayer. Now, atheists are sometimes accused of being the only ones who really take the bible seriously (thus, our claims about what believers believe are simply straw men), but honestly, there is no perspective of religious belief that I can conceive of that doesn’t have its manic proponents–from Chopra’s new-age touchy-feely amorphous blobby bullshit to prosperity gospel “god wants you to be rich, so ask him for money” to “prayer is not asking for anything, it’s thanking for everything”, to “prayer is the same as meditation” to anything under the sun.

So, should atheists pray? Near as I can tell, That’s about a thousand different questions, with about ten thousand reasonable answers, and about a hundred thousand unreasonable ones. Me? I have had more than a handful of occasions when I would have prayed, back when I was religious. Some of you know. I have had occasion… but I have not prayed in over 25 years. Never had the slightest inkling. My parents have prayed, my sister has prayed, and I don’t think any less of them for it. Not in the slightest. There is every reason for them to believe in prayer. Every reason but the right one–that it works. I know the studies on intercessory prayer. I know the evidence. I’ve pissed off my whole family by correcting my sister, in her hospital bed, when she credited prayer for her recovery. My own opinion–should atheists pray? No; nor should anyone.

Do I think any less of anyone for praying? Absolutely not. Depending on your own views, and your own definitions of prayer, there are maybe a million reasons to pray. None of the good ones involve there being a god, though. All the good reasons to pray involve us being human, and frail, and scared, or hopeful, or happy, or angry, or… oh, yeah, there are probably a million or so bad reasons to pray, too. So like I said, on the whole, my own opinion is anti-prayer.

But any question that takes a spectrum and requires a black or white answer is a bad question. And that is what the NYTimes has done.

Maybe they should have asked more atheists.

Maybe they should have asked me.

Those Dead-Eyed, Soulless Atheist Types

The eyes are the windows to the soul
Or at least, that’s how they are credited;
And demons show up in a camera’s view
When the image is printed unedited—

The atheist hordes have no spirits inside,
You can tell from their cold, lifeless eyes;
Of course, they will claim it’s a trick of the light—
They are liars, so no great surprise.

Yes, I know that a flash will reflect in your eyes
It’s just physics, that’s all, I’m aware—
But I choose to believe that it’s more than just that…
They’re just atheists—I really don’t care.

Ok, this was weird. The good news first: The Secular Coalition for America just announced that they have met with the White House Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships:

Edwina Rogers led a group of several representatives from the nontheistic community including several of the Coalition’s member organizations, which included Aisha Goss, Deputy Director of the Secular Coalition for America; Wendy Kaminer, Secular Coalition Advisory Board member; Amanda Knief, Managing Director of American Atheists; Maggie Ardiente, Director of Communications and Development at the American Humanist Association; Greg Epstein, Humanist Chaplain at Harvard University; Jason Torpy, President of the Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers; and Michael DeDora, Director of the Center for Inquiry’s Office of Public Policy and CFI representative to the United Nations.
Edwina Rogers said it was important that a variety of Coalition members were at the meeting in order to show that the movement is unified. The religiously unaffiliated or “nones” now account for more than 19 percent of the American population. Among people aged 18-29 that number is even higher, with a full 35 percent identifying as unaffiliated, and 42 percent of that segment identifying as atheist or agnostic. The religiously unaffiliated are a growing and politically important demographic-the nones now represent the largest “religious” bloc of registered Democratic voters, comprising 24 percent, according to statistics from the Public Religion Research Institute and the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life.
“It’s impossible for the White House to work individually with every organization, but as a unified group the Administration can more efficiently work with us as a community,” Edwina Rogers said. “The role of the Secular Coalition is to be the unifying voice that speaks on behalf of the nontheistic and secular community–we feel this meeting was a prime example of our mission in action.”

But, see, I didn’t find out about this from the press release. I found out about it from The Blaze, where they think it strange that atheists would be interested in meeting with a government Faith office. Where, strangely enough, the commenters focused on… the photograph. If you take a look at the first (SCA) link, you’ll see a normal photograph, like those you have seen in stories on any number of topics. If you click on just the photo itself, though, and open it, you’ll see the unretouched version, before the very minor edits to get rid of flash artifacts in most of the eyes. Anyone using the photo for any story would do what they did, and simply get rid of those nasty white dots.

Anyone but The Blaze, it seems. Their story uses the unretouched (and unflattering) pic, and commenters were quick to point out that

they certainly have strange eyes. The camera doesn’t lie.

and

No indeed something does NOT look right in their eyes. Soulless…sort of like our Dear Leader and his “You can never spend too much of the citizens’ money” wife… If God does not inhabit; evil WILL enter. Indeed….

and

Look at their eyes. Reminiscent of Poltergeist!

and

I know people will just say it is because of the lighting, but take a look at each one of their eyes in the picture…..something doesn’t seem right. They all look evil.

This last commenter was responded to, and doubled down:

@Lucretius…I understand what you are trying to do and the point you are attempting to make. Yes I realize that there could be several factors that cause their eyes to look like that…such as the light from the flash reflecting off of the lenses in their eyes, although they do have this relatively new invention on cameras that stop that…maybe they just didn’t have it turned on. Or maybe it was dust particles reflecting back…..I get that….however, it does not take away from the fact that these people still look dead inside and evil…..and I”m not the only one that has pointed that out, just read through some of the other posts.

What I find so entertaining is that atheists claim to be these “freethinkers” and that they use “science” to explain everything. However, in science you have rules that you must abide by which in all honesty limit your ability to think freely.

And the funny thing? As ludicrous as these comments are, when compared to the other comments at The Blaze, these are the people who are at least commenting on something with some relationship to the real world. There really actually is a photo, and it really does have white spots in some people’s eyes. Sure, there is a simple explanation for it, but it is part of an observable reality. I can’t say the same for many of the other comments there.

Sarah, Rick, And Bill Report For Duty In The War Against Christmas

Dateline: Late June, 2013

Once again, the War On Christmas sees the atheists attack,
But there’s something different this year—this year Christ is fighting back!
Let the godless and their minions rant and rave and do their worst,
Cos our strategies are changing—yes, we’re even striking first!

There’s a book that’s set for launching, and it’s just what you’d expect,
Sarah Palin taking aim at the politically correct.
So it’s festive and it’s jolly; it’s tradition, meant to please,
With first amendment platitudes in pidgin legalese

And in Texas, there’s a notion, and Rick Perry says it’s his,
Making “Merry Christmas” legal which it… um… already is
But this pandering to Christians, even minuscule amounts
Makes the martyrs feel much better, and of course that’s all that counts.

Now I hear that Bill O’Reilly wonders where religion went,
When it’s tough to be a Christian (in the 80-plus percent)
Bill-O wants a Christian country, so it’s worth our fighting for
Which explains the man’s obsession with a six-month Christmas War

Here, it’s summer—barely summer—and the sun is beating down
And there’s no sign yet of Christmas in our sleepy little town
In the churches, stores, and neighborhoods, if Christmastime you seek,
Then you’re just a little early… Christmas season starts next week.

The war on Christmas gets earlier every year! I swear, though, it’s not my fault. This time, it’s a Christmas troika–Sarah Palin, Rick Perry, and Bill O’Reilly are harnessed up and pulling their sleigh through… the heat and humidity of summer.

Conscientious Objection The Godless Way

Your conscience is that little voice
Contributing to every choice
For those who let their conscience be their guide
The conscientious types report
If you’re the conscientious sort
You know that voice is coming from inside

For those who know their morals’ source
No Christian God, nor Jedi Force
Is necessary target for our search
But those who lack a moral spine
Whose morals need some source divine
Find conscience in the teachings of the church

For those whose morals are their own
Their stance is theirs, and theirs alone;
For others, moral views are heaven-sent.
I must admit, I was surprised
The moment that I realized
The latter group includes our government!

I guess the laws intend to seek
A very special kind of meek:
Without a god, one cannot show contrition!
Without religion, one can’t choose
From pacifist religious views!
So praise the Lord, and pass the ammunition!

See, now, this is where writing in verse is problematic. I finish the above comment, only to find that the problem has been solved. Margaret Doughty’s application for citizenship has been approved, after some very strange requests that her refusal to bear arms in defense of the nation (a 64 year old woman, she would not have been asked to) must be supported by a church’s endorsement. Apparently, conscience (on which conscientious objection depends) is officially seen not as something arising from within, but as something imposed by and supported by a particular religious tradition.

When I started this verse, Doughty represented a clear first amendment violation–that an atheist could object to taking up arms was unheard of. Quakers? Sure. Mennonites? Yup. Brethren? Have your pastor sign on the dotted line. Atheist? Wait just a moment.

I had a nice long rant ready… but Doughty’s application has been approved, so I’ll just go to bed now. You can read all about it here.

Cuttlecap tip to Joan!

William Lane Craig’s Wrong Number

The door to God is open, and the path is straight and true;
A child’s faith is more than faith enough.
But should you choose to leave God’s side (as many people do)
There are obstacles that make your leaving tough.

When the God that you believe in, ever since you were a kid,
Is consistent in His absence when you call
When you can’t believe He’s always there, the way that once you did,
Why, that’s not enough for disbelief at all!

Religion has its guardians, whose job is to protect it
Though a child or a fool may be devout
There is serious theology, which won’t let you reject it,
Which you have to know, before they’ll let you out!

Now the godless have a hotline for the doubtful or confused
Those with questions about life without a God
But the faithful think it’s dangerous, and hope it won’t be used,
Though the arguments they make are rather odd:

Why, the godless are ignoring all the new theistic thought—
Metaphysical philosophy and such—
They’re not offering religion all the deference they ought;
So the hotline can’t be helping people much

If they’re calling in a quandary, for a sympathetic ear,
When their relatives or neighbors give them grief
The advice they might be getting is inadequate, they fear,
If it lacks the modern logic of belief

Or some local church encroaches on the actions of the schools
And they’re looking for the proper place to turn—
Why distract them with minutia over first amendment rules?
There’s theology aplenty we must learn!

When a person leaves religion, who can better ease the friction
Than an expert from the flock you want to quit?
Cos, you know, the perfect person who can help you with addiction
Is the dealer who’s been selling you the shit.
[Read more…]