A local evangelical minister slipped a message in the door today, announcing that there would be a kiddies’ show in the green by the house next week, while I’m out at work. Games, fun and bible stories for all the family. This kind of stuff makes my blood boil.
I’m not easily upset by many things, so I’m trying to understand why this stuff is such an affront to me.
1) It feels dishonest that people would dress up good ol’ bible-bashing with games and parties. Really what they want to do is to convert kids to their thinking when they are young and impressionable, so the whole fun and games thing is merely a device – a cloak – to enable them to reach out to children. To me, that’s just grubby.
2) There is a respect problem here. Surely parents should decide what is acceptable for their children, and what beliefs their children should have? This is a naked attempt to gain influence when none is invited.
3) There seems to be a pushiness about evangelicalism that requires them to go out and convert others to their ways. This only puts people’s back up, not because “Satan” is trying to lead us in another direction, but because we are entitled to our own personal views being considered and appreciated. Maybe “we” are right and “they” are wrong, but it’s not something that seems to be considered by them. They give the impression of talking, but not listening.
4) Evangelicanism feeds on human frailties and vulnerabilities. The tactic seems to be to catch people at a low ebb in their life, or to catch people who are too trusting for their own good. To me, this just feels wrong. Similar tactics have been used in other parts of the world by other ideologies, with sometimes devastating results. It’s so much about emotion, and less so about logic and reason.
Finally, (and possibly most importantly)…
5) Anyone with a modicum of scientific understanding of the world would realise that Evangelicalism is based on utterly false premises. Something is very wrong with a world-view that repudiates evolution and believes in a 6,000 year old Earth, the creation of the world in literally 6 days, the absolute inerrancy of the bible, the division of humanity into sinners and saved, and this utopian idea that all will be well if we follow the Bible. It’s a view that belongs in the Dark Ages, and yet it’s a view that is gaining currency in the supposedly enlightened developed world. It deserves to be lumped into the same bucket as astrology, crystals, faith-healing and soothsaying should be.
I guess those are the main reasons I feel annoyed about this. Maybe I’m being too harsh. Maybe I’m off base in some of my criticisms, but I do genuinely feel, given the complexities of this world and the challenges that we face, that all we need are people throwing religion into our face and telling us that all will be ok if we submit to the Law of Jesus Christ.
Please, blog to your heart’s content on the Internet, minister as you wish to your congregations, do good things for charity, pray to your god in whatever way you wish. But keep our kids out of it.
Passive Impressions 
I am new to the blogging world. I read this blog and got to thinking about what you said. I am a Christian. A follower of the “Law of Christ” as you called it. I want to be the first to apologize, not for the message of Jesus Christ, but possibly for the way it was portrayed to you. The law of Christ is not pursuasion, but love. Loving people for merely who they are and meeting a need in their lives without compromising beliefs. I have to agree with you in the sense that the evangelical churches have really lost the sight of the real message of Christ. The have made the message of Christ so much about religion and laws that they have forgotten the most important thing…grace and mercy.
As far as the evolution comment…I don’t know how far on the extreme side you are, but if you mean that man evolved from ape…let me ask this question. If it is so, why are there still apes? I believe in science and love it. It points to a divine creator. If you don’t believe me, study it more. But nevertheless, I once again apologize for the way the gospel of Christ has been portrayed to you, if it has not been portrayed in love.
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That would wind me up, too, and for all those reasons.
I remember feeling sooooo angry at University that many of my friends – away from home for the first time, and from pretty sheltered upbringings, so they were easy pickings as they were lonely and afraid – were targetted (and I use that word literrally) by the Alpha Course, an evangelical Christian group.
They were sucked in by the ‘We all love you’ bullshit… which actually amounted to ‘We will only love you if a) you don’t have sex b) you don’t do drugs c) you’re heterosexual c) you believe the Bible is the literal truth… etc’.
Grrrrr.
Oh my god. I just read the comment from Jasonmmcullars about evolution.
YET AGAIN a Christian has misunderstood the central premise of evolution. Man did not evolve from the apes that are alive today. Man and the other primates share a common ancestor, a prehistoric ape, a species which is no longer alive.
“If you don’t believe me, study it more.”
Right back at you, my friend.
[…] I was going to write about Elizabeth Gaskell’s wonderful novel Cranford, but then I read this post over on Woodpigeon’s site and the extraordinarily ignorant first comment on it, and I had to […]
Jason, I don’t disagree that your beliefs are mainly about love. In fact I blogged about this very thing recently. However, just because you love something fervently doesn’t make it true. People of all practically all faiths love their deity, the problem being that they cannot all be right. So love, no matter how earnest it is expressed, and how deep your conviction is, is not enough to convince me whether it is true or not.
And as to your second point: I studied science for 9 years, followed by a life-long interest in the subject. I consider myself quite well read on the subject. Trucie is spot on: you do not understand the mechanisms of evolution by your statement above: where did you hear that? Science does not point to a divine creator, otherwise we wouldn’t be having this conversation. If anything it has, over the past 200 years, put a stake through the heart of biblical literalism.
Okay. Please point me to a good source to study more on evolution. I’m not saying that I know everything about science. Obviously I don’t. That’s one reason I started blogging. To learn more. I just look at science in a different perspective.
I want to ask a couple of questions regarding evolution.
1. The prehistoric ape is an ancestor of man? Why does that prehistoric ape no longer exist? I know that it could be that the forces of nature have changed since that time, but there has be something deeper.
2. If prehistoric apes can evolve into man, why can’t man himself not evolve into something greater?
Please do not misunderstand my questions as sarcastic, I mean them only academically.
My main source of information is writings from a man named Lee Strobel. He is a scientist who was an atheist for many years. His works include, “A Case for Christ” and “A Case for the Creator”. Believe it or not, the books are more about science than God. That’s what entrigued (is that how you spell it?) me to begin with. Let me ask a question…do you guys believe in absolute truth?
Jason,
Books on evolution? Well, I would recommend “Almost like a whale” by Steve Jones; Richard Dawkins’ “The blind watchmaker” or Steven Jay Gould’s “Hens teeth and horse’s toes”. Maybe even a general introduction to science might suffice, and in that case I would recommend Bill Bryson’s “A brief history of nearly everything”.
As to your questions: why does that prehistoric ape no longer exist? The likelihood is that it became extinct because it wasn’t sufficiently adapted to changes in the world, or competition from other animals in its surroundings. There isn’t really anything deeper than that. Some of its progeny were better adapted and were better able to survive the changes.
We are evolving, but the pace of evolution is extremely slow. Our children may contain small genetic differences to us, which over a long period of time might build up into something more substantial. Suffice to say that if humanity were to survive the next million years (a big if), there might be a big difference between the humans we see today and humans then. What those differences would be is anyone’s guess.
Lee Strobel is not a scientist. He does not have a science degree. So it’s difficult to see how he has anything to offer at all in the evolution debate.
Do I believe in absolute truth? I do think that there are certain physical laws that exist throughout nature which could be described as absolute in the sense that they have never been convincingly disproved. Gravity is one example, atomic theory is another. Then there is electromagnetism, electrodynamics, quantum theory, nuclear physics: all of them the foundation of our modern world and explain, for instance, why a car works when you turn the key or why planes don’t just fall out of the sky.
Science comes up with a very good understanding of nature because it tests theories and dumps them if they don’t fit the data. This, over time, leads to very robust and useful theories indeed. Evangelicalism does not test its theories: it dumps the data if it doesn’t quite fit the theory. That, in a nutshell, is ludicrous.
My apologies once again for incorrect information. Lee Stroble was an atheist journalist who set out to disprove Christianity. He used science as his platform.
Thanks for the book suggestions. I’ll take a look for the last reference.
I also believe in absolute truth. I believe that truth is the one thing that holds science together. Let me ask another question. This one question was the pinnacle in my search for truth. It is one question that provoked C.S. Lewis to search for the truth also. Here it is…
Where did morality come from? What determines the actions that are “right” and “wrong”? Let me know your thoughts.
Jason, you might like to read some of Plato’s works, there are some great English translations of his dialogues on morality. Interesting, isn’t it, that human beings were investigating what makes actions ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ a good 600 years before Christ was born.
For what its worth, I believe that actions (and intentions – but that’s a whole other debate) are only ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ because a given society says so. And society says that because the ‘right’ actions tend towards fostering peace and stability whereas the ‘wrong’ actions tend towards anarchy and war.
For example, pretty much every society on the planet says that it is wrong to kill another human being, and wrong to steal their property. And that included societies based on the Christian Bible which says “Thou shalt not kill” etc. But the reason for that is not ‘because God says so’ – afterall, WHY should he say so? The reason must be that, if that law did not exist – if we all killed whomever we wanted, just because we could, then our children and weaker members of society – the old, the sick, and probably women, too – would be preyed upon by the physically stronger. No one would strive to better them selves, to gather food or make shelter, knowing that someone stronger could just come along and take it, without consequences. We are an intelligent species and as such we value more than just brute strength, and we know we must protect those who are not the most strong, but who still have a great deal to offer our society. So we all say “Thou shalt not kill” and we punish those who break this rule, because it defends us and all we hold dear.
This conversation could go on endlessly – it has been going on for several thousand years already 🙂 – but I would really recommend that you read as widely as you can if you are interested in ethics. From Socrates, Plato and Aristotle, Cicero, Seneca, Marcus Aurelius, St Augustine, St Thomas Aquinas, right through to Hobbes, Hume, Leibniz, Kant and the more modern ethical philosophers. By all means, read what evangelical Christians have to say about morality, but don’t ONLY read what they have to say because they have started with their conclusion, and that can’t be a sensible way to investigate anything. Enjoy!
Jason, are you seriously trying to suggest that the human race is too stupid not to realise that there are consequences to actions such as murder, assault, thievery and deception etc? Half the world does not accept the biblical God and yet their societies are not much different to supposedly Christian ones.
Morality does wax and wane independently of a divine creator. Slavery was “right” 300 years ago. Damage to the rain forests was “right” up to 50 years ago. Giving women the vote was “wrong” a 100 years ago. Capital punishment is “right” in some countries to this day. If you are seriously suggesting that we can’t know right from wrong until we accept Jesus into our heart I can point you to a blog that suggests that the reality on the ground is very different indeed.
So, tell me: why shouldn’t I just accept Islam? Islamic believers are no less enthusiastic and fervent in their beliefs as you guys. What makes them wrong and you guys right?
Hi Colm
Interesting post and some hilarious comments. I met a live one when I posted about the BBC Blueprint programme.
I was in Donegal town last year with a few children. There was a puppet show aimed at kids in the Diamond. Our lot went to watch for while, but lost interest since it was rubbish. Oh and it was by some evangelical lot trying to get their funny old message across. Thankfully, we’re all content with just the one birth.
Hi Sharon, I’ve just read your comments and I was very impressed by the way you answered Kim. Really, the whole thing baffles me too that people can be so willfully anti-education. I think I’ll be thumbing through Carl Sagan’s masterpiece “Demon-Haunted World” again soon..
Colm,
Before I answer your question, I want to say that I am really enjoying our conversations. You too Truce. I will again admit that I am obviously not as learned in science as you guys. I hope that I didn’t appear to be. I also hope that I am not sounding pushy or arrogant in my statements. That is not my intentions at all… to “push” you to believe something like all those other evangelicals do.
To answer your question on which religion you should or shouldn’t believe in, that is completely up to you. My personal opinion on Islam…I don’t want to follow a religion that clearly states that someone should be killed if they don’t believe the same way you do. You seem to me to be a guy that feels the same way.
After reading your comments on what the evangelicals were doing in your town, I couldn’t help but think, “What has made him feel this way? Could it be they offended him in some way? If so, what did they say exactly?” What was it that made you so irrate to blog about it? Were they acting judgemental toward you? If so, you have every right to be irrate…don’t blame you at all. That’s the way we are when we have been offended.
the church I attend has a program called Celebrate Recovery. It is a 12-step program that helps addicts (alcohol, drugs, sex, etc.) get their lives “back together”. It helps them “get cleaned up” and hopefully stay that way. Reference the comment you made earlier about consequences to actions. they made “wrong” actions that gave them grave consequences. Anyway…that’s the past, we help them with their future.
The pastor made a statement one Sunday. “The biggest harm to Christianity today, is Christianity itself.” He referred to the religion of Christianity. You see I believe that’s where a lot of evangelicals and/ or Christians today have missed the boat. They look at Christianity as a religion. They have tried to “Bible bash” and “save” people from their sins in a matter of what? An hour or so? Depending on the person, they probably mean well. They may be communicating it the wrong way, but I don’t know. I’m not there.
Instead, I wish other Christians would take the time to get to know someone for who they are, not judge, and unconditionally love people. Like in generally speaking, a father or mother to a child. To show that person they guenuinly care about their physical, as well as, their spiritual well-being. A “No strings attached” sort of action.
Christianity is about a relationship…yes, with Jesus Christ. In general, like a Father to a son or daughter. One that yes, requires faith and trust, but once trusted in, becomes reality. I can’t explain it with scientific termanology. It’s like the wind. You can’t see it, smell it, or touch it, but you can feel it and you know it’s there. I’m sure you’ve heard that more than you desire. I’ll leave it be then.
Do you believe that God exists? Or doesn’t exist?
Another way of recruiting proselytes is practised by the local Mormons. Presently they’re offering free evening classes in English. Nowhere mentioning who they are. Just an address “big white church like building” and the time and day.
However I abstain in partaking in this debate. Trying to convince brain washed fundamentalists about the real world is just a waste of time.
I tend to pick my fights nowadays.
You’re not wrong at all – you’re in fact right on the money.
This is happening here in US all over the place. I once had evangelic neighbors who were repeatedly taking my kid to these “games” and “kiddie shows”, over our protests and repeatedly without our approval. To stop this, I had to put them on notice that if this happens just one more time I’ll go to police and report it as a kidnapping.
They now have this “New way to do the church” scheme going to attract more people, especially young adults, and they’re pumping millions into it.
Watch out when you see that sign somewhere there in IRL! They are sneaky and inventive bastards, that’s for sure.
Jason, let’s say I’m open to new evidence as it arises. The evidence for a divine creator would want to be darn good though.. 🙂
I would think you are being very unfair on Islam. Any Muslims I have ever met are courteous, friendly and welcoming to people who don’t necessarily believe in the things they do.
I don’t doubt that you have found a great source of love from your beliefs. To the point that you want to tell everyone about it. To the point that you genuinely want to help others. That’s genuinely great, except that such feelings are shared with many Muslims, Hare Krishna’s, Mormons and Scientologists to name just a few. In each case the feelings are similar, but the fairy tale is different in each case.
If Scientologists came along to your neighbourhood and made attempts to befriend your kids, how might you feel? Uncomfortable? That’s how I feel in the case of all proselytising faith groups, including evangelicalism. People who wish to convert others to their creed should leave children out of it.
Dragonqueen – dear oh dear. This kind of stuff just gives me the shivers.
Hi Joe – I didn’t see your posting. That’s pretty bad. This kind of behaviour would wind anybody up..
I agree with Colm, Joe. That’s crazy they would do that without your consent.
Colm,
I see your point and understand where you’re coming from. It is by faith, to know the divine creator, not by evidence (Ephesians 2:8-10 if you want to read). I may not have any hard nose evidence (scientifically speaking)on hand that would point to Him, but that also means that I don’t have hard nose evidence to prove that HE doesn’t exist either. What do you think about the intellegent design theory? Currently, because of our conversation, I have began to take a look at science more liberally than through the bible alone. What’s your take?
“I may not have any hard nose evidence (scientifically speaking)on hand that would point to Him, but that also means that I don’t have hard nose evidence to prove that HE doesn’t exist either” – OK, but those two statements are not equivalent to each other. Scientologists talk about people living on Venus and all sorts of mad stuff: it would be difficult to prove that they don’t exist either, but what’s your guess? What’s your guess that Valhalla doesn’t exist, or that the elephant god Ganesha doesn’t exist? It’s impossible to prove a negative, but you can take an educated guess all the same.
Joe may take issue with me on intelligent design (and with good reason), but here’s my take anyway. Intelligent design is bunkum. It’s not proper science. The approach, as far as I understand, is that because scientists can’t currently understand certain things, that the reason is therefore God (or, as the ID folk would say – an intelligent designer: they are circumspect about using the word “God” in their tracts). Technically, this is known as an Argument from Ignorance – because something is beyond our knowledge, then it MUST have some predefined origin (usually supernatural). Such an argument is wrong-headed: it may well have a natural or yet undefined cause: it’s just that more research is needed before any conclusions can be made. Intelligent Design was dealt a hammer blow a few years ago in a landmark case where the proponents were effectively accused of lying in order to further their case. ID is a religious and a political issue rather than a scientific one. ID would never have been brought up at all as an idea if it were not so much opposition to the standard theories of evolution from creationists.
Wow, for a minute there I thought I’d stumbled onto an h2g2 conversation, Colm (albeit a much more polite one). 😉
Agree with you totally about leaving the kids out of it.
And I also agree with dragonqueen that it is pointless to ‘debate’ with religious fundamentalists. They have no intention of listening to reason.
Hi Az, yes – so long as there is politeness on all sides I’m happy to engage. I have little interest in “converting” (or is it de-converting?) evangelicals to my views and I expect the same respect from them in return. Once that is the case we can “shoot the breeze”, as it were.
As a Christian, Catholic by upbringing but leaning more towards Calvin’s view of Christianity, I’m always offended by the so called “churches” that are forcing their beliefs onto others.
Colm, as you have experienced, I don’t even try to do that. As I think I told you in one of our pub conversations, I do have a certainty about the existence of God but without any scientific proof of it. It’s my personal belief. That doesn’t give me the right to go out and “Bible bash” people though. On the contrary, it gives me an obligation to unconditionally love my fellow humans. No where does it say that I have to go out and indoctrinate people into my way of thinking. All I can do is “lead by example”.
That to me is what being a Christian is.
Jason, you might consider viewing the Bible more as a collection of lovely stories and not a scientific reference.
Genesis as far I’m concerned is a lovely story and describes the stages of creation in simple to understand, by people 2000+ years ago, images. (Now I’m going to attract some flack 🙂 ).
I can see this subject coming up again one evening down the pub around our glasses of orange juice…
Hi Pirlam, I don’t want this to seem like an anti-Christian message, because it’s isn’t. What I don’t like are people gaining influence with children where the basic tenets of what they believe fly directly in the face of the established scientific research on the available facts: geology, biology, anthropology, astronomy, psychology, etc, etc. To me, this is very unsound and unwelcome proselytisation, and it does not distinguish them, in my mind, from any cult.
I was asked that very question a few days ago – did I think that evangelicalism was a cult, and I answered “yes”. Maybe there are evangelicals around who do not take the bible so literally, but I have yet to meet them. Evangelicalism, to my knowledge, is a branch of Christianity that believes that the the bible tales are absolutely factual. If that is what they want to believe, let them: but that doesn’t give them the license to reach out to my kids and confuse them.
I will preface this comment by saying that I am not a member of any organized church, but given the huge influence religion has on the majority of people in the world, I feel it is important to know something about it, sort of in the nature of “Know thy enemy.” Or as Pogo was wont to say, “I have met the enemy and he is us.”
This has been an interesting series to read, but I just have to respond to the comment above wherein Jason rejects Islam because it states that a person should be killed if they don’t believe the way you do. First of all, I have not studied the Koran extensively, but I believe that Muhammed stated that all people of the Book (by which he meant christians, jews and muslims) were Godly and should be respected.
To say the the Bible does not advocate killing people who do not believe as you do is to ignore the numerous places where the Hebrew hordes murdered every man and manchild in the city they had just conquered, and then raped and enslaved the women and girl children. Also, the quickest thought that came to my mind is the statement “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23) If you aren’t a believer in Jesus, you are automatically a sinner (in the eyes of the evangelists, anyway) and therefore Paul believes you should die. I’m sure if I wanted to waste more time perusing the Bible, I could come up with other similar examples of the “Convert or Die” position.
It’s obvious. The younger you can get to kids and influence their foundational core beliefs, the more chance you have they will continue to believe whatever they’ve learnt. It’s often so ingrained they never question it later.
This is why I support the children’s freethought camps and secular students’ alliance. No, not because they indoctrinate children with atheistic beliefs, but because they teach kids how to think critically.
I was well into my teens when I started to learn about critical thinking. Even today I would consider myself an apprentice. It’s difficult to do, possibly because the whole world is out to persuade us in one way or another, and maybe because we are biologically suited towards the acceptance of authoritarian messages.