I always enjoyed Robert Heinlien's quotes about religion: "Men rarely (if ever) manage to dream up a god superior to themselves. Most gods have the manners and morals of a spoiled child." "History does not record anywhere a religion that has any rational basis. Religion is a crutch for people not strong enough to stand up to the unknown without help." "The most preposterous notion that H. sapiens has ever dreamed up is that the Lord God of Creation, Shaper and Ruler of all the Universes, wants the saccharine adoration of His creatures, can be swayed by their prayers, and becomes petulant if He does not receive this flattery. Yet this absurd fantasy, without a shred of evidence to bolster it, pays all the expenses of the oldest, largest, and least productive industry in all history." "It is a truism that almost any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so, and will follow it by suppressing opposition, subverting all education to seize early the minds of the young, and by killing, locking up, or driving underground all heretics." "A long and wicked life followed by five minutes of perfect grace gets you into Heaven. An equally long life of decent living and good works followed by one outburst of taking the name of the Lord in vain - then have a heart attack at that moment and be damned for eternity. Is that the system?" "Of all the strange "crimes" that human beings have legislated of nothing, "blasphemy" is the most amazing - with "obscenity" and "indecent exposure" fighting it out for the second and third place." And probably the most applicable to this thread: "Theology is never any help; it is searching in a dark cellar at midnight for a black cat that isn't there. Theologians can persuade themselves of anything."
No one is denying the right, but it is UnAmerican none the less, and goes against the principle of the foundation of this country to speak on behalf of and in support of basic criticism or restriction in any way of personal belief system of others. It is essentially a worthless judgment of a basic human right to hold one's own belief systems, and no surprise who takes up that banner of criticism of others beliefs...the fundamentalist theists, and the fundamentalist atheists both...
Free speech cannot be Un-American. Personal belief publicly expressed is free speech and likewise freely open to critical speech against . That is what free speech is. Freedon to speak does not restrict the holding of the belief. The suggestion that it is against principles to speak freely is what would be Un American. Whether the subject is considered worthless or not.
Disagree. A person has free speech to talk about how great slavery is and how we need to bring it back, how we need to practice fascism, etc. Does that make their topic, i.e the need for America to return to slavery and/or establish fascism, or representative of American principles and values? So is their speech promoting slavery and fascism really American, or unAmerican?
z9- here is a question: The Synoptic Gospels make a statement re. how one should treat your enemies: Matthew 5:44 Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you. Luke 6:35 But love ye your enemies, and do good. Yet, those who profess belief in Christ want to go out and kill a bunch of Muslims. Any idea why? Seneca
They don't want to. They want the gov't armed forces to do it , which is just what Romans 13 says the gov't is commisioned by God to do. Any other questions, son?
These are the arguements of an adolesent minded schoolboy. If God exists, and if it is true that God has given human being free will, then simple logic leads one to accpet that such barbaric actions are that of man, not of God. The simple minded arguement that religion and God are one of the same are at the root of such questions as posed by the author of the quoted post above. Men kill other men for a variety of reasons, none of which have anything to do with whether or not God even exists, let alone participates in such actions.
Not sure what is more humorous, the sheer audacity of you declaring... "I have a profound statement to make", or how lacking in profundity your statements is! Question: What form of 'ATTACKS' on religion are you referring to you. And just how do YOU attack religion on a day-to-day basis, be it christianity, islam, judaism, hinduism, Satanism, druidism, etc ..., "the entire concept that religious beliefs are somehow sacred, should be respected, and should not be attacked " Here's a little quiz to test just how profound you are: List as many things you can substitute "religious beliefs" in your statement above. For each, ask yourself. "Should I ATTACK this?" Sorry, had to call it-like I see it. You're obviously a snot-nosed punk. Perhaps you'll grow out of this need to offend people randomly ... perhaps not.