This atheist doesn't give a damn about Carrie Underwood's song

There's a rumor going around about atheists being angry about an overtly religious song by Carrie Underwood.  I wouldn't even have known about it if people didn't post this nonsense on social media.  Without checking sources to find out which atheists are trying to get the song banned, conservatives perpetuate a falsehood that raises the ire of the ignorant against people who aren't doing anything to harm them.

• The United States Constitution prevents legislation that would get any song banned.  Sure, atheists might boycott overtly religious music, but get it banned?  How?  The claim is ridiculous on its face, and even if some atheist or group of atheists tried, it would be legal folly.  Expensive legal folly.  
• They're assuming that atheists would care about Carrie Underwood's music.  I don't think I've heard a single Carrie Underwood song.  She doesn't sing in a genre where I'd have the opportunity to listen to her.  What is it, country?  Atheists who listen to country have to be used to religious themes by now; they've been part of country music for as long as I can remember.  
• There are so many music choices out there, no one need be bothered by a single song by a single artist, ever.  Unless the music industry decided collectively to only produce religious music, atheists have and will always have plenty of opportunity to listen to music without religious themes.  Radio stations limit what they play, so this song might get a lot of attention on certain stations, but no atheists need be subjected to religious music against their will. 

I don't even have to ask if people are stupid enough to believe that atheists would be angry--as if atheists all think with one mind and speak with one voice--at a religious song, because I know they are.  If they weren't, this nonsense wouldn't be all over Facebook, Twitter, conservative blogs, and fake news sites.  

Just stop it, idiots.  We don't give a shit.  I don't know the lyrics, I haven't looked it up, and it's doubtful I'll ever hear the song.  

Why are so many Christians obsessed with the "sins" of other people?

I've read the Bible many times--twenty-seven that I can remember, all before the age of twenty-four. I have read many verses hundreds of times, having read in church as a teen and later, after rejecting religion, to refer to then when apologists used them as arguments. What I can't remember reading in the parts where the Jesus character is traipsing around Galilee is any mention of forcing people to stop committing sins.

Of course, to me, "sin" is a meaningless concept; it requires a transgression against a deity, and I don't have evidence of deities; they're all man-made myths. I suppose it could be extended to include transgressions against other people, but that's not common usage.

In any case, so many Christians seem to want to apply their concept of sin to the law, in spite of the fact that there is nothing attributed to the Jesus character that suggest that they should force other people to their way of thinking. I remember something about "Judge not, lest ye be judged." I remember something about not pointing out the mote in your neighbor's eye while ignoring the log in your own. I remember things about giving all your money to the poor, about loving your neighbor and your enemy, turning the other cheek, and so on and so forth, but I just can't seem to recall a word about forcing other people to stop sinning.

Before someone brings up the notion that Jesus didn't disregard Old Testament law (forgetting for the moment that I have no reason to buy into the idea that Jesus actually existed), let's remember that he saved a woman accused of adultery from stoning, and forgave her for her sins.

Jesus would be a really cool character if it weren't for the doctrine of hell, the weird story about him cursing a fig tree, the doctrine of hell, and the talk about hating your family if they don't believe. The values his character advanced in the Bible were humility, love, forgiveness, and charity. These, of course, are all things just as easily attributed to empathy, and do not actually require moral teaching. The concepts of turning the other cheek and loving your enemy are a bit more difficult, and seemingly counterintuitive.

Of course, I didn't create this post to be a cheerleader for Jesus; my point is that if you're going to call yourself a Christian, why not follow the teachings attributed to him and leave other people well alone? Yes, you're commanded to witness to people, but you're also supposed to proverbially shake the dust from your feet and move on when people don't listen to you. You're supposed to hang out with the sinners and live by example among them, not legislate your morality on them. Persuasion and example: that's what I got out of what I read in the Bible.

What prompted this post was a story about how a priest was arrested for praying and passing out literature in front of an abortion clinic. I suspect there's more to this story; he was probably obstructing the entrance while doing these things, which you're not supposed to do anywhere. If you're going to protest abortion--or anything else--you can't do it on private property, especially if you're obstructing the entrances to a place of business or medical services.

My question to Christians is: how is it your place to judge abortion clinics, and how is it your place to keep women from getting abortions? You believe it's murder, sure, but that's you judging other people, and carrying out your judgment. If you really believe in eternal rewards and punishments, then you'll let your god take care of things and worry about yourself, as the Jesus character in the Bible told you. "Judge not, lest ye be judged." Don't point out the mote in your neighbor's eye. There's a log in your own. Maybe.

For my part, I want abortion to stay safe and legal. I don't think I should have control over a woman's decisions about her own body, and I think she should be protected from the will of others over decisions regarding her health and private life. I don't think anyone really loves and embraces abortion, but all of the alternatives a woman has with unplanned pregnancy are difficult, and the situations leading to that decision have complications and issues, as well. There's inequality in sexual relationships, for one thing. Males do not have to make a decision that involves either an invasive medical procedure, physical changes to the body followed by a grieving process, or a life taking care of a child, often before becoming financially stable or educated enough to have marketable skills.

Let's face it: abortion is invasive. What woman would do it for fun? Women who do choose it as an option are already scared, have conflicting emotions, and are often alone in making that decision; you're compounding the situation with protests and guilt trips. What is worse is that if abortion were outlawed, we'd be back to women--young, scared, often not well-off--going to drastic measures to give themselves abortions. They'd either be done by back-alley doctors, or they'd be self-induced with coat hangers, chemicals, or other dangerous methods. Some Christians out there cheer on that risk, but they're forgetting about how they're supposed to be without sin if they're going to cast stones. I haven't met a Christian yet who says that he or she is sinless. Abortion should be safe and legal, from my perspective, because I don't want women to suffer and men aren't equally responsible for the consequences of pregnancy. From the Christian perspective, I would think abortion should be safe and legal so that women would have the chance to be forgiven and "saved" sometime before death. I don't want to presume to think for Christians, so I'm asking: am I off base here? After all, "Jane Roe" became a Christian, right?

The second option, adoption, comes with its own issues. Statistically speaking, pregnancy has more risks than abortion. More women die of complications from pregnancy than from complications from abortions. A woman's body is permanently affected by pregnancy carried all the way to term. Then, there's the possibility of grief from giving the baby up. I was adopted. I met my biological mother. She grieved for about two years. Now, in her case, she wouldn't have aborted me, but it still should have been her choice (and it was, in Ohio, in 1971, when she would have aborted me if she had chosen that option), and if she had, I would never have known.

The third option, having the mother raise the child, is expecting a lot out of women who are most likely not at a point in their lives when they can handle it financially or emotionally. It's not easy to be a single mother--just ask any single mother with little means to raise children. Unwanted children are more likely to be abused. The children often grow up without fathers. Now, I'm not saying that fathers are always a good influence, but if a couple is in a stable relationship, it's so much easier to raise one or more children. There's usually more money, the husband and wife can take turns with the children or adopt separate responsibilities to make each other's lives easier; it's definitely a better situation than single parenthood without support. It is possible to raise a child successfully in a single-parent household. I think my half-sister turned out fine, and I know several other people from single-parent homes who are okay, too. Support from other family members and from friends made all the difference, though. It should be totally up to the woman to judge whether she has the means, stability, and emotional support network to raise a child on her own.

Single mothers are often put down by Christians. I remember Dan Quayle doing it; Pat Robertson and other televangelists do it; ordinary, average Christians do it. I have heard Christians speak in hushed, shocked, affronted tones about the young woman who was pregnant, who was going to have the baby. I have heard them asking: who is going to support that child?

You. Christians, if that woman is in your church, it should be you. If you're going to be pro-life, be pro-life. Step up and take care of the ones who are born, rather than focusing on the unborn and the "sinning" mothers. Babysit the child while the woman goes to work, help her with advice that comes from experience raising children, and forgive her for her "sin" of promiscuity. After all, it is not for you to judge. Right?

Questions That Atheists Should Answer?

I use Google Alerts to get news about subjects that interest me. One of these alerts is a search for "atheist", because, in case you don't know already, I am one. I do see a lot of news articles, but the search also includes blogs. I have toyed with the idea of excluding blogs from the searches, since many of them are just people like Ray Comfort, painting caricatures of atheists with their outrageous stereotypes, putting words in our mouths that many of us--the atheists I know, anyway--would never say.

In any case, I ran across a video from a young man who had five questions he believed atheists should answer. He wanted a YouTube video response or a response in his comments, but I don't think my responses would fit in one comment, I don't want to post several, and I'm definitely not doing a video at this hour--but I thought I'd answer his questions. I will be posting this link in his comments, so I hope he'll run across this page.

Question 1: "Atheists believe that the universe began millions and millions of years ago. Now, how would you know this for a fact, or is it just a guess?"

Greg's Take: Let's parse this question first, because I have some issues with it.

First, there's the "Atheists believe" part. I have been hanging with Atheists long enough to know that we're as diverse a group of individuals as any other group can be; the only thing we have in common is our rejection of theism. There's no worldview that you can assign to all atheists. Some Atheists know very little about cosomology and don't care. Many Atheists don't know a thing about evolution, either, and don't care. They leave these things to astrophysicists and biologists, respectively.

Secondly, there's the word, "believe". Many of us reject the word, "believe", for its implication of acceptance without evidence. I know I do. I have no place for faith in my life, and "believe" is something I'm trying really hard to remove from my vocabulary, because it doesn't do justice to the amount of research I put into the things I know.

Thirdly, there's the idea of the universe beginning. Scientists don't know if the universe had a beginning. They don't. Seriously. All they know for certain is that the universe expanded. How do they know? You know that famous telescope named Hubble? That telescope was named after the scientist who, through the discovery of a phenomenon known as red shift, found out that everything in the universe appeared to be moving away from everything else, and on a certain trajectory. Everything seemed to be moving away from a center.

Fourth of all, it's not "millions and millions", but "billions and billions". The universe started to expand about 13.7 billion years ago.

Finally, no, it's not a guess. Red shift is real. The universe is expanding and has been. Scientists--notice that I didn't say "Atheists", because not every Atheist is well-versed in physics/cosmology--know that the universe is at least 13.7 billion years old because a) the speed of light is a constant, b) we can measure the distance from Earth to the stars we can see with Hubble, c) light had to travel the distance necessary for us to see it, and d) no plausible alternative explanation backed by evidence can explain how light could reach us without traveling this distance. In order for light to be here from where the universe began to expand, it would have had to travel faster than light. I repeat: light would have to travel faster than light.

Question 2: Why are atheists like Richard Dawkins actually afraid of admitting to the fact that they could possibly be wrong and that there is a god?

Greg's Take: Let me begin by answering that there are no Atheists like Dawkins. He's an international Atheist celebrity. He's a household name. There are a few with his level of fame: Hitchens, Harris, Madelyn Murray O'Hair, some comedians (e.g., George Carlin), but not many with his knowledge of biology, his soft-spoken manner, and his intellect.

I would argue that Dawkins would say--actually, he has said--that he is 99.9% sure that there is no designer, like a good scientist would say about anything. He also says he's 99.9% sure there are no fairies. Scientists do not rule out possibilities, but science deals only with what can be observed and quantified, so things people accept on faith are outside the realm of scientific thought.

For my part, I say that the burden of proof is on those making the claim that their god exists. Bring on your evidence, because I haven't seen any. It always comes down to faith.

Question 3: Why do atheists think that it is illogical for Christians and religious people to believe in god, because they can't see him, feel him, hear him, et cetera, believe that we don't have proof of god, when apparently, atheists believe and have faith in the big bang theory and evolution? Atheists love to preach it and teach it in schools, so wouldn't that make atheism a religion?

Greg's Take: We come back in this question to the mistaken noting of Atheists believing things. Think of it more like this: Atheists, for the most part, from what I've seen and experienced, trust scientists. At least, those among us who know science (or are scientists ourselves! Not me--I'm an IT professional) trust scientists, because scientists deal in what is observable, quantifiable, and verifiable. I will admit that many Atheists get overzealous in their defense of evolution and the big bang (which I prefer to refer to as the expansion of the universe as we know it) and go a little far, taking liberties with what science is actually available, but as a former biology major and someone who really enjoys science, as someone who reads journals and science news, I can tell you that evolution is a fact, that it is inevitable, and it takes more knowledge than I can impart to you in this blog entry to understand how it works.

To simplify evolution as much as I possibly can, it's all in the genes. To expand just a little, I can say with certainty that during reproduction, a little bit more information is added to DNA. This addition is an observable, verifiable fact. With additional DNA, there is a possibility that different genes will be active in the next generation of a species, which explains population genetics, but I won't go into that at the moment. What I can say is that when you add mutation (which is the only mechanism creationists seem to think exists for evolution; it's not) and gene-crossing to the mix, you have all sorts of possibities that open up.

I can expand and expand and expand, but unless you've taken a few courses in biology at the college level, you're not going to get it. Evolution is a fact; it's the theories regarding evolution that are not 100% proven--but they are 99.9% there. Evolution has so much predictive power in science. For example, you know the flu vaccines that are administered every year? Scientists know how to make these vaccines because they can predict the evolutionary path of viruses--and it is a statistical fact that people who get flu shots are less likely to get the flu, and more likely to recover faster from it if they do get it.

I already touched on the Big Bang theory, so I won't go over it again. I would just advise you to think of it as an expansion of the universe, because nobody knows what happened before 13.7 billion years ago. Nobody. There are some educated guesses, but there is no certainty.

Oh, and no, atheism is not a religion. If Atheism is a religion, bald is a hairstyle. The reason evolution and the Big Bang are taught in schools is because science must be taught in science classrooms. It is unfair to students who want a career in the sciences to waste time in science class on things that are not science. Creationism is a matter of faith, and does not belong in a biology or physics classrom. What you learn in science classes has everything to do with the body of knowledge that scientists have built, and has nothing to do with popular opinion or debates between people of faith and people of no faith.

Question 4: If the big bang theory were true, then how did everything in the universe come to be designed the way it did? Like for example, how could the Earth be in the perfect position for the sun to give it light, and if it moved by an inch or so, we wouldn't have light like we have now, and the Earth is the only planet with supplies for human life? [I tried to correct for grammar here, but you get the gist, right? I gave up because I hate playing the grammar police.]

Greg's Take: First of all, the Earth moves much more than inch toward or away from the sun, depending on where it is in its orbit. Secondly, how do you know that Earth is the only planet that can support human life? It's a big universe out there, and there could be thousands, millions, or billions of inhabitable planets in it. We just don't know. The odds are good that there is some more life out there in some form, given the number of stars, and given the number of solar systems with planets astronomers are now discovering.

Life has always been a struggle on Earth. While life begets life, life also eats other life. Life has to contend with climate changes and natural disasters, geographic separations and limitations on food sources. Species after species forms and dies. Warm-blooded species last an average of twenty-five million years; cold-blooded species last around three hundred million. I should say that the genus lasts that long, because there is a blurry line where the species becomes so different that it can no longer breed with creatures like its ancestors. Given what geneticists know now about the amount of information that is added with reproduction to DNA, enough change will occur over a twenty-five million year period to make the descendents become very different from their ancestors.

To say that this life is "fine-tuned" for life (which is how it is usually worded) is to have it backwards: life struggled and thrived due to adaptations that allowed it to live under the conditions that existed already. This planet was uninhabitable 3.5 billion or 4 billion years ago; whatever the first life was had to have the correct adaptations to allow it to survive under the conditions that existed then. I am fairly certain that more than one combination of self-replicating proteins appeared, but only the combination(s) producing the characteristics giving it survival advantages thrived.

Question 5: When Christians like my brothers and sisters in christ and I spread the word of god in a loving and perfect way, why do you have so much hate towards us when we share with you about the gospel of our lord and savior jesus christ, when he came to this world to save sinners, he died on the cross for our sins, and was risen from the dead?

Greg's Take: I can't speak for all Atheists. No Atheist can. What I can say is that I do not hate you. I don't know what reactions you're receiving that you translate as hate, but I can guess, because when I first rejected religion, I was angry, frustrated, and alone. I knew a precious few people who were Atheists, and when I came out to my Christian friends, they just wouldn't leave me to it. They felt that I was "lost" and that my "soul" needed "saved", but they--and you--have no idea how condescending that sounds to someone who has just undertaken an intellectual journey away from religion. I read the Bible at least twenty-seven times through during my life, referring to various versus hundreds, perhaps thousands of times during the course of my journey. I studied ancient religions, I studied philosophers and apologists--rejecting faith wasn't something I came to lightly. For people I once considered friends to treat me as though I was being foolish, going through a phase, or as if I had lost my way somehow was disheartening and annoying. That's probably one of the perspectives you're meeting.

I'm well beyond that point now. I'm not angry as much anymore, though I do get passionate about defending kids from being ostracized from their religious classmates, or when a town turns against a family for wanting to keep religion out of government, or when Atheists are painted as hateful, bitter, morally corrupt people. In any case, toward individual Christians, I am pretty much done being angry, but it can get a bit annoying, hearing the same thing over and over. Having debated with Christians since 1991, I can tell you that I haven't come across anything new in about ten years. Sure, there are new spins on old arguments, but it always comes down to the same thing: you have faith, you have ancient texts, and you have artwork. You have no real evidence to prove that your Bible is true, you have no evidence that your god exists, and Jesus is just mythical as any other figure in your anthology of myths. You truly believe that Jesus performed all of those miracles, that he was born of a virgin, that he rose from the dead; I can't buy into any of it. There's scant evidence that he was even a historical person, let alone this magical man-god that your Bible makes him out to be.

Do you really believe Jonah could have survived in the belly of an ocean-dwelling creature? He wouldn't have drowned, asphyxiated, or been digested over the three days he supposedly spent in there?

Don't even get me started on Noah's flood. If you believe that story, please build me a boat with those dimensions that will float--without steel supports, entirely of gopher wood (whatever that is). The longest wooden boat ever built without steel supports was less than three hundred feet long. The reason why was a phenomenon known as "keeling". Essentially, the wood would crack and the boat would sink. Never mind explaining how all of the salt water and fresh water life survived, how algae could have survived without sunlight for forty days and nights, or any other of the long list of things in that story that just aren't possible.

I don't hate you; I just get a bit annoyed by the constant attacks on physics and biology by people who have, at best, a limited understanding of the subjects. Do you know the complexity of the math involved in physics and biology? Have you taken an advanced chemistry class? These subjects aren't ones just anyone can take; science involves heavy mathematics and logical thinking. It's not surprising that most people aren't scientists, but it is surprising how many people reject science out of hand when they haven't taken even the freshman level courses at the college level, if they even took the very basic high school level ones.

I don't hate you, but your Bible bothers me. I don't like being called filthy, foolish, a liar, and an antichrist. I don't like the execution orders your Bible gives regarding Atheists in at least four verses. I don't like how your Bible treats women as the property of men. I don't like its support of slavery. It bothers me that the only way your god character could think of to absolve human beings of sin was to make a humiliating blood sacrifice of his only begotten son (if I would even go as far as to accept this myth, which I don't). It also bothers me that this concept of original sin was born of a myth about a man and woman who didn't have the knowledge of good and evil, but were expected to know that it was evil to disobey your god when they were punished for eating fruit (!) that somehow gave them this knowledge.

Conclusion: I hope I've answered your questions to your satisfaction. Feel free to ask follow-up questions.