An Atheistic Examination of the Culture of Belief: How Religious Devotion Trivializes American Law and Politics

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October 2002

Yesterday's Rave touched upon a widely-shared attitude regarding politics and religion: that a candidate's religion is a private, personal matter immune from inquiry. Journalists may probe every political, social or corporate membership the candidate has ever held, but his church affiliation is out of bounds, completely irrelevant to judging his fitness for office. It was a "canard" to suggest that JFK might be beholden to the Pope, and to this day any attempt to tie a Catholic office-seeker to the Vatican is condemned as anti-Catholic bigotry. To be sure, a candidate might put aside his religious convictions in favor of... (430 Words)

Those of you who collect icky religious legal position papers should be thrilled by the release this month of A Shared Vision: Religious Liberty in the 21st Century by a coalition of Baptist, Jewish and interfaith organizations (available here in pdf format). The Raving Atheist is endlessly amused by documents of this genre, created by teams of vicious, brass-knuckled lawyers who are paid to make their clients' loathsome political agendas more palatable by dressing them up in gentle, pastoral tones. Thus, Vision lulls us for several pages with a vague, obsequious tribute to "America's embrace of religious liberty . .... (884 Words)

Jerusalem, Israel, October 29, 2002 Special to The Raving Atheist The discovery of a tomb purporting to contain the remains of a brother of Jesus Christ has cast doubt upon the doctrine of the "perpetual virginity" of Mary. The find poses a challenge to millennia of Catholic teaching, which holds that Mary bore Jesus through an immaculate conception and remained chaste throughout her marriage to Joseph. Top Vatican officials warn that the universe may be imperiled if it turns out, as the evidence suggests, that Mary was dirty filthy whore who had sex with her husband. "The Blessed Mother is... (208 Words)

The Squad this week introduces the concept of "spiritual correctness" in its response to Melanie, who opposes her son's choice to dress up as a devil for Halloween. Although the boy has assured her that "it's not real," Melanie is still "uncomfortable" with the idea of him trick-or-treating in red suit. The Squad sides with Mother on this one. They disagree with those who argue that "a devil suit is no more likely to seduce [a] child into the ways of Satanism than Superman duds are likely to convince him to leap off tall buildings," although the stats supporting the... (436 Words)

Spell-checking my last post, I noticed that the first replacement suggested for the word "Wiccans" is "wackiness." Perhaps it should be added as a synonym in the thesaurus, as well.... (30 Words)

As I noted in an earlier Rave, last year a New Jersey federal court ruled that the Town of Tenafly was not required to permit Orthodox Jews to erect an Eruv -- a stick and string contraption that God needs to see before he lets people take wheelchairs and strollers out of the house -- on public utility poles. Yesterday, an appeals court reversed certain parts of that ruling, a move which Eruv supporters are heralding as a triumph for religious freedom. Legally speaking, however, the decision is pretty limited, granting no new favors to the delusionally devout. The core... (461 Words)

Columbia, South Carolina, October 24, 2002 Special to The Raving Atheist The first sniper victim shot in Virginia credits God's intervention with saving her life, according to her sister, Debbie Gainey. The victim, whose name has not been released, revealed that she turned aside a moment before she was wounded by a bullet in a Fredericksburg parking lot, thus averting a shot directly in the middle of her back. "Normally, I stand completely motionless in parking lots for hours," she explained. "However, that particular day I was miraculously in motion, having decided, inexplicably, to avoid getting run over by all... (347 Words)

New York Post Catholic apologist Maggie Gallagher is in a snit over the characterization of Oklahoma City bomber Tim McVeigh as a "Christian terrorist" (not in the Post's online version but probably available here tomorrow). She claims that he was, in fact, an "avowed agnostic," a Star Trek Junkie who read Penthouse, Hustler and Ayn Rand (you know the type). Yes, McVeigh asked for a Catholic priest just before his execution, but that "surprised everyone who knew him." Gallagher sees the "Christian terrorist" label as an irresponsible slur by a liberal media that has a "psychic need to equate Christian... (436 Words)

A couple of weeks ago Jesus was telling folks that gas was free. This week some of that gas might have been used by Kentucky porn shop owner Michael Braithwaite, who burned up $10,000 worth of smut at Jesus' specific request. Braithwaite says that he had the revelation that he was involved in a sinful business after he was injured in a car accident, and plans to open up a Christian bookstore. So instead of selling magazines depicting naked women in bubble baths, he's going to sell books depicting rape, incest, cannibalism, genocide . . .... (97 Words)

The Squad this week fields a question from Marcie, who wants to know 1) why, if God is all-powerful, he doesn't destroy Satan, and 2) why did Satan turn to evil when he was once an angel? The Squad responds to only the first part of the question, and their answer, as usual, is a model of double-talk. First, they assure us that "[a]ll of Satan's power is from God" and that "God could destroy Satan but [chose] not to do so." However, it turns out, Satan is not really evil, but rather "more of an accuser angel than some... (273 Words)

No posting today due to death in the family. Yes, of course the death has made me rethink everything and now I believe in God. I will return tomorrow with God Squad Review XIV.... (34 Words)

You can judge a book by its cover. Philosophy for Dummies is the most idiotic, and evil, mass circulation paperback The Raving Atheist has encountered. Masquerading as an introductory text on philosophy, the book is really little more than a Catholic religious tract. Not surprising, given that its author, Tom Morris, holds a Ph.D in Religious Studies from Yale and taught at Notre Dame for fifteen years. Morris also edited the dreadful God and the Philosophers, a collection of essays by devout philosophy professors who were asked to reconcile their faith with the truth-demands of philosophy (most instead just reminisce... (666 Words)

Wichita, Kansas, October 17, 2002 Special to The Raving Atheist Carbon dating of the Shroud of Turin now shows that Jesus was propped up in a Kansas cornfield in 1900 rather than crucified in Jerusalem in 32 A.D., say scientists affiliated with the authentication project. Furthermore, a microscopic examination of impressions near the top of the Shroud reveals that they were made by straw rather than hair -- confirming the widely-held theory that Christ was, in reality, the Scarecrow from the Wizard of Oz. Pope John Paul II angrily denounced the findings as "impoceros." The Pontiff also cautioned that any... (234 Words)

London, England, October 16, 2002 Special to The Raving Atheist In an effort to evade the Islamic Sharia law ban on the receipt or payment of interest, British Muslims have devised a financial scheme so complex that it cannot even be unraveled by the infinite intelligence of Allah, reports the Guardian. The plan was devised to meet the needs of Muslim home buyers, who have experienced difficulty finding banks willing to extend long-term, interest-free mortgages. Robert C. Merton, winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics, described the interest-avoiding scheme as "utterly mind-boggling," and stated that his limited intelligence could only... (397 Words)

The holy grail of every slippery slope moral argument is a dead baby –- demonstrate that your adversary's policies will somehow lead to the killing of innocent children and you've won the debate. Even the most hardened moral relativist will buckle once you ask whether child sacrifice is just a matter of taste. But . . . what if the very practice your opponent advocates is child-killing? Where do you go from there? Back up the slope, arguing that child-killing leads to shoplifting? The question is a bit more than theoretical. A few weeks back, 15 year old Jessica Crank... (775 Words)

Last week the Squad offered cold comfort to a grieving widow, telling her, among other things, that she didn't deserve her husband in the first place. This week Joy (a Catholic) seeks consolation from the Squad, having lost to a miscarriage a baby she had been trying to conceive for three years. Now, it goes without saying that Joy fully deserved this tragedy, but all she wants to know from the Squad is whether her baby will go to heaven. Surely, they will grant her that much? Unfortunately, the best they can do is somewhere between "no" and "maybe." Joy... (510 Words)

Congress on Tuesday passed another bill reaffirming its support for the "Under God" language in the Pledge of Allegiance. Among the few (it passed 401 to 5) who voted against the measure was Barney Frank, the openly gay Congressman from Massachusetts. Frank's opposition illustrates precisely why the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals was legally wrong in ruling to strike the god reference. It also shows why the bill was necessary and, unfortunately, why it does not go far enough. Because there is a god, America is a heterosexual nation. That is the law of the land. Under the Supreme Court's... (324 Words)

Sarasota, Florida, October 10, 2002 Special to The Raving Atheist Television Tarot psychic Miss Cleo yesterday denounced God for his misuse of Tarot cards. God, who is on a multi-state sniper-killing rampage, left the Death Card at the site of his most recent murder -- even though that card symbolizes change and transition rather than death. "He is giving professional Tarot readers a bad name," said Miss Cleo, an actress whose real name is Youree Cleomili Harris. "The Death Card helps those who have been Unlucky in Love, or who have Family Troubles or some other vaguely-defined difficulty," she said.... (282 Words)

In last Friday's Rave, I noted that NBC sportscaster Bob Costas condemns the notion that God would trivialize himself by meddling with the outcome of sporting events. The policy is apparently different at CBS, where David Letterman interviewed fly fishing nun Carol Anne Corley (the subject of yesterday's Rave) without challenging her theory that God blesses her worms and rearranges the weather for her outings. NBC, however, may be coming around to CBS' view of things. Costas' boss, NBC Sports President Ken Schanzer, has endorsed a book, "Philosophy for Dummies," which would make even the most ardent Jock for Jesus... (414 Words)

Fort Smith, Arkansas, October 8, 2002 Special to The Raving Atheist (via a link from Kathy Kinsley) What's black and white and red all over? Not just a newspaper. There's also Sister Carol Anne Corley -- her habit splattered with fish blood as she tears a barbed steel hook through the roof of the mouth of a spasming, suffocating speckled sea trout and pulls it out through the top of its head. For the 58-year-old nun, fly fishing is a spiritual experience which teaches her to appreciate God's gifts. "Until I saw my first catfish nearly pump its heart out... (221 Words)

The Squad this week adds insult (and a great deal of confusion) to the injury of a young widow who lost her husband last month in an auto accident. Nancy is "furious that God would let this happen" and feels "like the world is just rolling on and I am being left behind." With the sort of compassion you would expect from The Raving Atheist, the Squad opens by telling Nancy that "[t]he word is rolling on, and you are being left behind." But then, quite unlike me, they advise her to seek "a more balanced view of God." Why?... (457 Words)

Salon runs an annoyingly typical piece on "jock theology," ridiculing those athletes who pray on the field and praise God for their victories. It accuses the players of having "a kindergartner's mentality about religion" and of "treating God as a good-luck charm." Sportscaster Bob Costas criticizes the jocks' "simplistic and self-serving view of what God is and does," noting that "[i]t makes no sense that a God who, for all human understanding, can appear indifferent to major pain and suffering on a large scale or the illness of a child, would intercede to help get a first down." And Robert... (494 Words)

In my series on God and the Objectivists, I focused on whether a person who believes in God could be an Objectivist. I concluded that an Objectivist could believe in a very abstract sort of god, but could not derive any moral principles from the fact of its existence. To formulate an ethics from the existence of God, an Objectivist would have to abandon reason and reality and adopt some from of primitive, god-command theology. However, I also noted that on any particular moral issue, an Objectivist's view might well coincide with the position advocated by any number of faiths.... (574 Words)

The Vatican, October 2, 2002 Special to The Raving Atheist The Vatican yesterday officially recognized two miracles performed by Mother Teresa after her death, all but guaranteeing that Pope John Paul II will declare her a saint. The revered nun, who died in 1997, is credited with making a quarter and a small plastic ball disappear. Under Catholic law, one posthumous miracle is needed for beatification, while a second trick is required for canonization, or sainthood. A pontifical council formed in 1998 to investigate the miracles concluded that there was no scientific explanation for the disappearance of the coin and... (250 Words)

This is the final installment in a series of essays exploring whether a belief in God is consistent with Objectivist principles. I previously explored whether God-belief is consistent with an epistemology of reason (here and here) and a metaphysics of objective reality (here). What I ultimately suggested (without explicitly endorsing) was that an Objectivist could reasonably conclude that something vaguely analogous to human intelligence caused the universe, without risking too hard a spanking from Ayn Rand. However, the embrace of a logically self-contradictory definition of God, or a literal belief in any of the scripturally-based, anthropomorphic sky-deities, gets you thrown... (962 Words)

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