Understanding Atheism
I’ve decided to expand on my previous post entitled, “Atheism vs Agnosticism” where I explored the different ways of thinking about atheism. The reason for this is because since writing that post, I’ve further explored what atheism means to others and have done a lot of reading on the subject. Some of the books I’ve read are: God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything by Christopher Hitchens, The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins, The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason, Letter to a Christian Nation, and An Atheist Manifesto by Sam Harris – all of which I highly recommend. In addition to these books, I’ve come across a wealth of information on various websites and especially YouTube.
As my original post talked about, there are a number of ways to define the terms ‘atheist’ and ‘agnostic’. My exploration of these terms were on a more passive level, that is to say I didn’t apply an active component to the definitions; the words were simply defined as what they mean separate from how they’re used. I’d say that most atheists, like myself, use a strict definition where ‘a-theist’ means, “not theist” (just as ‘atypical’ means “not typical”), and opposed to “a disbelief in a god” (since this would indicate a type of belief itself). I tend to like this definition for its simplicity. However, I’ve noticed that most theists (meaning ‘religious believers’) tend to view the term as having much more intent behind the term, such as “against religion”, “god hater”, or “anarchist” (the last two making absolutely no relevant sense). There are many atheists out there who either don’t subscribe to the label (though fit my definition) or don’t actively oppose religion at all, while others are in active opposition to specific theistic beliefs or all of theism. It’s important to remember that atheism is not an ideology, nor is it a religion unto itself as some people like to think.
Changing Views on Drinking
One of the defining aspects of Latter-day Saints, is their abstinence from alcohol, tobacco, coffee, and all kinds of illegal drugs. In this regard, I continue to be the poster-boy for Mormonism. I haven’t had a single alcoholic drink, cigarette, cup of coffee, or illegal drug in my entire life. Only recently, after having distanced myself from the Church, have I started to truly consider my reasons for maintaining this abstinence. For this blog post, I’ll be focusing on alcohol portion of the Word of Wisdom.
Alcoholic drinks were never in the house while I grew up. My world was alcohol-free, and I remember being told on numerous occasions that it was evil and dangerous to drink. My parents would even make the odd derogatory comment whenever we’d see someone drinking on TV. This type of teaching method didn’t work in the way I believe my parents intended, in that I made the correlation that bad people drink, opposed to the drinking itself being what was bad. I had always been warned that I should not be friends with anyone who drinks, and that if I found myself in a situation where alcohol was present, I should leave. Again, strengthening the idea that it’s the people who were bad for drinking, rather than the drink. Only bad people drank alcohol, or so it seemed.
Review: The God Delusion
The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
The God Delusion, by Richard Dawkins, is aptly named. It illustrates how the concept of a personal god (specifically the Abrahamic god of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) is one of complete fiction, and yet has so many convinced of His existence, despite the mounting evidence that the world is not as described in ancient scripture.
Dawkins’s approach to his arguments against theistic belief in the supernatural is an obvious extension from his career in evolutionary biology. Dawkins is very careful to take the time to define each term that he uses, sorting out the different meanings, so that his specific use of the term is clearly understood. This goes a long way to avoid confusion, especially when talking about the polytheistic, monotheistic, pantheistic, and panentheistic uses of the word ‘god’. Dawkins is also very good at presenting a much more complete picture of commonly misrepresented & quote mined historical figures such as Einstein, the American founding fathers, Hitler, etc., and shows how their uses of the word ‘god’ rarely meets today’s Christian definition.
Dawkins’s ‘The God Delusion’ is a scientific approach, in methodology if not evidentiality, to the arguments against the beliefs in gods, and is much more reserved and soft-spoken than Christopher Hitchen’s rather abrasive book, ‘God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything’. These two books have a stark contrast in their delivery, but share the same sound reasoning and logic. I highly recommend both of them.
Adolf Hitler & The Plan of Salvation
Today is the 66th anniversary of Adolf Hitler’s death, and it got me thinking about how LDS theology views Hitler in its plan of salvation.
We are all well aware of the horrific monstrosities that were perpetrated by Hitler when he became the fascist leader of Nazi Germany during WWII, as well as his role in the events of the holocaust. To me, such a person as Hitler is beyond redemption or forgiveness. There is no evidence that, if given a chance, he would have changed his ways during his lifetime had he not completed suicide. But what of his next life?
The Plan of Salvation
Review: Letter to a Christian Nation
Letter to a Christian Nation by Sam Harris
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
A wonderfully concise and straightforward address to theists in general and traditional Christians in specific. The arguments brought forward in this short letter should be more than enough to convince anyone capable of rational thought of the dangerous and misguided superstitions that permeate our society. If humans expect to thrive and become more than the sum of our parts, we must shed these self-induced or inherited delusions. This work has been the first of Sam Harris’s that I have read, and it will definitely not be the last.
Response From the Church, part 4 (final)
Well, it finally arrived (only 10 weeks from when I sent in my resignation letter)! I’m officially an apostate!
The official letter from the LDS Church confirming my resignation as a member
It’s interesting to note that my wife wasn’t included in this letter. I wonder if hers is being sent separately or if they forgot about her? I’ll have to look into that.
Church Finance (via Truth Hurts)
The following is an extremely well researched four-part posting by Truth Hurts (who’s an active member of the Church, yet highly critical – a paradox that I can’t quite yet grasp) on the topic of Church finance. As I’ve noticed for quite a while now, the Church is much more a business corporation (with tax-excempt status) than it is a religious organization set on saving souls.
It’s a long read, with a few tangent thoughts sprinkled throughout, but it makes for a very interesting and informative (and well-documented) read. Here are the links to all four parts (I found parts 1 & 3 to be the most interesting):
via Truth Hurts
Rape Apology and Joseph Smith (via Molly Muses . . .)
It always amazes me how Mormons can turn a blind eye to their founder’s sexual “transgressions” (aka. rape) while then taking the stance that all sexual sin is second only to murder (as per Boyd K. Packer’s April 2011 talk, “Guided by the Holy Spirit“) Although I plan to address this topic in greater detail in the future, I thought I’d pass along this blog post by Molly Muses, who has worded things better that I could have done.
BYU Honor Code Debate: Tactics
Last week, I had posted the article entitled, Gay Students vs. BYU Honor Code (archived here), to my Facebook account. This, along with my opening comments on the article, caused quite a debate (you can read more about this on my previous blog post). What really struck me were the tactics being used by those in favor of BYU’s honor code (and by extension, LDS morals). What I mean by “tactics” is the way in which they presented and ‘justified’ their argument, not the argument itself. Some of these tactics are somewhat universal, in that most people use them regularly, including myself (though I’m trying to improve in this area). However, I’ve noticed certain ones being extremely common among Mormons specifically.
