This is the thirtieth installment in the Sacrilegious Humor series. This is a series that I would like readers to help me with. If you know of a comedy bit that is irreverent towards religion, makes fun of religion, pokes fun at sincerely held religious beliefs, or challenges the firmly held religious beliefs of others, please email me the name of the bit or a link to it.
Today’s bit is Caller Punks Christian TV Host.
Warning, many of the comedy bits in this series will contain profanity. You have been warned.
According to the Above Rubies website, Nancy Campbell is an “internationally known author, speaker, and authority on Biblical Motherhood and Family.” Campbell preaches the old-time Fundamentalist gospel of patriarchy — a world in which women marry, obey their husbands, bear lots of children, and keep the home. Recently, in a post titled A Higher Vision, Campbell detailed her vision for her children and grandchildren. Here’s what Campbell had to say:
I want children who love God above all else.
I want children who are growing into the likeness of Christ.
I want children who love righteousness and abhor evil.
I want children who have a biblical mindset and stand for God’s truth.
I want children who will not compromise godly standards.
I want children who will not be tainted by the spirit of this world.
I want children who will not give in to the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, but who will pursue the will of God.
I want children who love God’s Word and love to pray.
I want children who will blaze across this world with the gospel and message of truth.
Amen.
As you can see, Campbell’s vision for her progeny focuses on the Evangelical God and the Bible. Like many Evangelicals, her vision is singular and blinkered, making Campbell blind to the wonders of the world outside the narrow confines of the Christian box. All that matters to Campbell is that her children and grandchildren turn out to be good little Christians who follow the approved way of life.
I too have children and grandchildren, and like Campbell I have a vision for them. However, my vision is far different from that of Campbell’s:
I want children who think for themselves.
I want children who enjoy life.
I want children who treat others with respect.
I want children who love their families.
I want children who value hard work and enjoy the fruits of their labors.
I want children who aren’t afraid to stand against bigotry and racism.
I want children who will live every moment to its fullest, realizing that life is short.
I want children who value fun, pleasure, and relaxation.
I want children who will travel far and wide, enjoying the wonders of earth.
And most of all, I want children who are happy.
Amen.
Campbell’s vision is one of exclusion, whereas my vision is one of inclusion. Campbell’s vision focuses on right beliefs and obedience, whereas my vision focuses on embracing and enjoying life. Campbell’s vision sees the goal as a room in God’s celestial kingdom, where my vision sees the goal as a life well lived. Campbell envisions life as that of Pilgrim in John Bunyan’s The Pilgrim’s Progress. Trudge on dear Pilgrim, remembering that Heaven awaits you IF you make it to the end. What a sad way to live life, squandering the too-short time we have on earth.
I have more of a Dixie Chicks way of looking at life. In 1998, the Chicks released the single Wide Open Places. I think the song aptly describes how those of us who are rooted in there here and now view life:
Who doesn’t know what I’m talking about
Who’s never left home, who’s never struck out
To find a dream and a life of their own
A place in the clouds, a foundation of stone
Many precede and many will follow
A young girl’s dream no longer hollow
It takes the shape of a place out west
But what it holds for her, she hasn’t yet guessed
[Chorus]
She needs wide open spaces
Room to make her big mistakes
She needs new faces
She knows the high stakes
She traveled this road as a child
Wide eyed and grinning, she never tired
But now she won’t be coming back with the rest
If these are life’s lessons, she’ll take this test
[Repeat Chorus]
She knows the high stakes
As her folks drive away, her dad yells, “Check the oil!”
Mom stares out the window and says, “I’m leaving my girl”
She said, “It didn’t seem like that long ago”
When she stood there and let her own folks know
[Repeat Chorus]
She knows the highest stakes
She knows the highest stakes
She knows the highest stakes
She knows the highest stakes
Wide open spaces, that’s what I hope my children and grandchildren find as the meander their ways through this life. Who knows what might lie ahead. Campbell wants to keep her children and grandchildren safe within the confines of the Evangelical box. (Please see The Danger of Being in a Box and Why it Makes Sense When You are in it and What I Found When I Left the Box) While there is great comfort and security that comes from knowing everyone is safely in the box, this is no way to live and enjoy life. That’s what Evangelicalism does. It confines people for life in Bible Prison, safe from the evil, sinful world. Humanism, however, opens wide the gate and says, You are FREE! Enjoy life. Embrace all that it has to offer, knowing that we don’t know what tomorrow might bring. Life is like the steam rising from a radiator on a cold winter’s day. It quickly dissipates into the air and then it is gone (James 4:14). Solomon was surely right when he said:
There is nothing better for a man, than that he should eat and drink, and that he should make his soul enjoy good in his labour
….
All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again. Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth?
Wherefore I perceive that there is nothing better, than that a man should rejoice in his own works; for that is his portion: for who shall bring him to see what shall be after him?
….
Then I commended mirth, because a man hath no better thing under the sun, than to eat, and to drink, and to be merry: for that shall abide with him of his labour the days of his life, which God giveth him under the sun.
….
For to him that is joined to all the living there is hope: for a living dog is better than a dead lion. For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten. Also their love, and their hatred, and their envy, is now perished; neither have they any more a portion for ever in any thing that is done under the sun. Go thy way, eat thy bread with joy, and drink thy wine with a merry heart; for God now accepteth thy works. Let thy garments be always white; and let thy head lack no ointment. Live joyfully with the wife whom thou lovest all the days of the life of thy vanity, which he hath given thee under the sun, all the days of thy vanity: for that is thy portion in this life, and in thy labour which thou takest under the sun. Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest.
Let me conclude this post with the advice I give on the ABOUTpage of this blog:
You have one life. There is no heaven or hell. There is no afterlife. You have one life, it’s yours, and what you do with it is what matters most. Love and forgive those who matter to you and ignore those who add nothing to your life. Life is too short to spend time trying to make nice with those who will never make nice with you. Determine who are the people in your life that matter and give your time and devotion to them. Live each and every day to its fullest. You never know when death might come calling. Don’t waste time trying to be a jack of all trades, master of none. Find one or two things you like to do and do them well. Too many people spend way too much time doing things they will never be good at.
Here’s the conclusion of the matter. It’s your life and you best get to living it. Some day, sooner than you think, it will be over. Don’t let your dying days be ones of regret over what might have been.
What follows is a video produced by Tim Wildmon and the American Family Association. This video purports to “explain” to Fundamentalist zealots the true nature and ideology of secular progressivism. What the video really does is show that Wildmon and his costars either know very little about secularism and progressivism or they are deliberately lying in hopes of providing yet another red meat meal for culture warriors. My money is on the latter. This video is 3 minutes long. Enjoy!
The photograph above is the header picture for my Facebook page. Illiterate Christians and atheists alike wrongly assume from the photo that I am a Christian. The same thing happens on my blog. People often wrongly think that I am a Christian. These people — who evidently can’t be bothered to investigate who I am and what my blog is all about — read one post and make a snap judgment.
Here’s two examples of what I am talking about. I received both of these today.
The last example is from a man who watched one of the Songs of Sacrilege videos. Evidently, he thought I was a Christian who was objecting to the sacrilege of the song. Oh well…
Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
As a good evangelical, I never believed in purgatory; that is until this year when I decided that I was already living there. I don’t mean in a religious sense, but rather in the sense that I am in neither one place nor the other.
For reasons I will come to, I have all but lost my faith. But, since I have a lovely wife and good friends who are Christians, I will never really be able to walk away.
I have read a few blogs written by former Christians. Nearly all of them are written by American ex-Christians. I am from the UK, and I believe that there are a number of cultural differences between churches in the UK and America. There are many flavours of Christianity, so I can’t really generalise, but what I do know is that my experience differs from that of many of people who have lost their faith. In America, it is more culturally acceptable to be an evangelical Christian — especially in the Bible belt where being a good citizen requires regular church attendance and voting Republican. My experiences in the UK, however, have been different. We don’t have a religious right, and evangelical Christians are quite rare. I didn’t knowingly meet an evangelical (Reformed) Christian until I was nineteen! In the UK, evangelicals stand out from the crowd and are a bit weird. When I first accepted the doctrine of eternal punishment in hell I was nineteen. I remember thinking, at the time, I have become a religious extremist. No one at my high school, not even the school chaplain, believed in hell!
I became an evangelical at university, having been a liberal Anglican throughout my teens. That was ten years ago. It was meeting Christians my own age who were practicing what they preached that made me take notice. Many people lose their faith and look back and criticize, very rightly, the churches they were part of. But I can honestly say that my experiences with Christians have only been positive. I love the churches I have been part of. They are full of loving, kind, generous, and self-sacrificing people. Of course, they have faults, but doesn’t everyone? I think that the best apologetic for Christianity is the church. ‘If you want your friends to know Jesus, get them to come to a church BBQ and they will see from the way Christians live and act towards each other that they have something special!’ I haven’t become disillusioned with the church — I still love the church. So what went wrong?
When I started attending an evangelical church — the church was Anglican but agreed wholeheartedly with the Westminster confession — at university I was amazed by how seriously they took the Bible. I liked the fact that they taught each passage in context, teaching congregants what the Biblical text meant for first century readers before explaining how it was applicable for us today. I liked that they used reason to understand what the Bible meant. All their beliefs were backed up by God’s word. They didn’t take a rigid, literal view, allowing texts such as Genesis or apocalyptic texts to speak, in context, for themselves. This church did not approve of visions and promptings from God. I had attended other churches in my teens where they believed God was supposed to speak to us while we closed our eyes. This church taught me that God speaks clearly to us through the Bible.
It was this supposedly solid biblical foundation that led to my undoing. My respect for the Bible led me to read it very closely and carefully. As I continued to read, I began questioning reformed interpretations of Paul’s writings. For those interested, look up James Dunn or N.T. Wright and the New Perspective on Paul. My questions didn’t make me doubt God or the Bible — only certain reformed interpretations.
This year I began to look closely at textual contradictions and passages that didn’t make sense. How did Judas die? How do you explain that Matthew seemed to think that Jesus would come back soon after AD 70? How do you explain that key doctrines developed over time?
I also began to hate — and I mean really hate — the idea of hell. I can accept that I am not perfect and that a perfect God would be right to punish evil. But, to punish someone for ever and ever and ever in a special resurrected body that has been given to them for that very purpose is sick! If the Bible clearly taught this from beginning to end I might accept it even if I didn’t like it. But, from my studies of the Bible, I can say for certain that hell is not taught in the Pentateuch. The idea of hell evolved over time and is only found in the books written after the Jewish exile. God doesn’t speak clearly in the Bible. It is a wonderful mix of different and contradictory voices — voices of men, not God.
Upon hearing of my doubts, Evangelicals tell me I just need to believe. Have faith. It doesn’t matter about the details. But this is not what they taught me! I was taught to do detailed exegesis, working out what the text means. That is the evangelical way, is it not? I have done the exegesis and I now agree with scholars like Bart Ehrman, Geza Vermes and Christine Hayes when say the text is not historically reliable. Evangelical hypocrisy is revealed when people closely study the bible and conclude the bible has contradictions. Such people are told: you are being too intellectual! You are sitting in judgement over God’s word. Isn’t that what Evangelical pastors do every Sunday? Every time you decide what you think the text is saying you are sitting in judgement of it!
So where does this leave me? I both love and hate Christianity and the Bible. I love Christians and I love the Bible as a rich literary text that gives us an insight into the development of the thoughts that have shaped western civilisation. But, at the same time I hate Christianity and the Bible. I hate the fact that because I disagree with the notion that the Bible is true that people will tell me that I am rebelling against God. I hate that people believe that hell is real and dedicate their lives to warning people about this. I hate that because of what the New Testament says my close friends and family will from now on regard me as being under the power of Satan. I hate that my wife will be devastated that I am ‘damned’ and disappointed that I won’t be able to be the spiritual head of our home. It is for these reasons I haven’t completely come out. The weird thing is that in the UK the vast majority of people think Christianity is mumbo jumbo. I just happen to be very close to people who make up the small minority that think the Bible is true. My change of heart will deeply affect my relationships with those I am closest to.
And I hate that despite all the evidence I will always have a nagging doubt that I might be wrong. And that on the last day I will have some explaining to do. For these reasons I think the rest of my life will be pretty miserable. Thanks Jesus.
Guest post by Neil. You can read Neil’s writing at Rejecting Jesus.
I didn’t reject my faith so that I could wallow in sin (though I do like a good wallow now and then). I didn’t turn away from Christianity as an act of rebellion against God, nor did I give it up so I could set myself up as Lord of my own life (though why that would be a bad thing, I’m not sure).
Christians like to tell me that these are the reasons I became apostate, but of course they’re not. Rather, I’d become aware that there’s no such thing as ‘sin’. Sin is a peculiarly religious invention with no traction in the real world; there’s only human behavior. I had reached a point where I understood there was no God, certainly not the Christian version and it follows you can’t rebel against something that doesn’t exist, nor, indeed, can you set yourself up as it.
Instead, I’d taken a long hard look at the claims of Christianity and in particular what the Bible had to say about Jesus. I asked myself:
whether human beings can return from the dead (no), can be born of virgins (no), can walk on water (no).
whether Jesus’ claims – that he would be back within his disciples’ lifetime to establish the Kingdom of God on Earth; that he would appear to them in the sky with the heavenly host; that he would bring about God’s judgement, again during his own generation – actually happened. (Evidently they didn’t.)
whether his promises were true – that whatever believers ask of God will happen; that his followers would do even greater miracles than Jesus himself; that they would be as one. (Another resounding ‘no’.)
whether I as a Christian, and whether any other believers anywhere, actually did as Jesus commanded. Did we sell all we had to give to the poor? Love our enemies? Turn the other cheek? Go the extra mile? Give to all who asked? Heal the sick? Forgive repeatedly?
Some might have done so, but by and large, no, we didn’t. We couldn’t even manage not to judge in case we were judged in return. No-one I knew or heard preach or even read about did any of the things Jesus commanded.
I could only conclude that this was because a) Jesus’ expectations were far too demanding and b) Christians don’t believe in him anyway. They may think they do – they like what he appears to say about marriage when they’re up for a little gay-bashing – but really they’re only interested in Paul’s ‘Christ’. Christ, the mythologized version of Jesus, gives them a buzz and – extra bonus – doesn’t expect too much of them. They can even carry on with the gay-bashing if they want. But Jesus? Him they don’t want to know – he’s too demanding, too extreme, too dead.
Every time, then, Jesus came up lacking: his promises were hollow, his prophecies unfulfilled, his morality impossible and his miracles and resurrection more than unlikely. Reason, experience and evidence told me that Jesus as we have him in the gospels is nothing more than the creation of a credulous age; his alter-ego, ‘the Christ’, even more so. Once I realized this – once I had this revelation, my very own deconversion experience – I was free. Free to live my life, to think for myself and be who I am. I recommend it to you; let the self-evident truth that faith is nothing more than self-delusion set you free too.
This is the twenty-ninth installment in the Sacrilegious Humor series. This is a series that I would like readers to help me with. If you know of a comedy bit that is irreverent towards religion, makes fun of religion, pokes fun at sincerely held religious beliefs, or challenges the firmly held religious beliefs of others, please email me the name of the bit or a link to it.
Today’s bit is Don’t Pray for Me, Make Me a Sandwich by Hannibal Buress.
Warning, many of the comedy bits in this series will contain profanity. You have been warned.
Evangelicals are up in arms over a recent statement made by Adele about Beyoncé. Here’s what Adele had to say:
“Beyonce is the most inspiring person I’ve ever had the pleasure of worshipping. Her talent, beauty, grace and work ethic are all in a league of their own. I appreciate you so much! Thank god for Beyoncé X.”
According to CHARISMA writer Jessilyn Justice, Adele’s Instagram post proves that “idol worship is very much a reality.” Justice bolsters her claim with several comments from indignant Evangelicals on Adele’s Instagram page:
“Lowercased g, upper cased B? Only God is to be worshipped, artists are to be admired.”
” _______wrote that Adele’s caption has a lowered case g in God.. When referencing God, it’s always capital G..her worshipping Beyonce this way is disrespectful to God and all those who believe in Him and Jesus Christ,” wrote on fan.
“She’s now saying that Beyoncé is a god . Can worship people and things and not hold them to the level of God . Do you know what worship means ?”
“!!THESE DEVIL WORSHIPPERS ARE STARTING TO THINK THEY’RE GODS,ITS TIME TO STOP THEM BEFORE ITS TOO LATE…WAKE (expletive) UP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THIS IS ALL UR FAULT FOR IDIOLZING THEM THE WAY YALL DO…WAKE (expletive) UP!!!!!!!!!!THESE ARE PEOPLE THAT THINK THEY ARE GODS ….WAKE (expletive) UP!!!!!WHAT MORE PROOF DO U NEED.”
Ah yes, each new day brings Evangelicals numerous opportunities to express their indignation and outrage. What I find so amazing about these comments is that they assume that there is only one God — theirs — and that Adele’s use of the word lower g god was a direct attack on the name of the Christian God. Adele is not religious. I found no evidence on the internet for Adele ever making a public statement about God, Christianity, or religion in general. One website pointed to a 2015 Rolling Stone interview in which Adele purportedly said that she is not religious. However, I could not find the interview on Rolling Stone’s website. That said, in the course of looking for this interview I read several other Rolling Stone articles that quoted Adele. These articles clearly show that Adele’s two favorite words are God and fuck, with fuck being the runaway winner in the favorite word race.
Evidently, Evangelicals are okay with what they call the “F word,” but using the word “God” incorrectly is considered a mortal sin. And evidently, even spelling “god” incorrectly is considered a serious infraction of God’s vocabulary Code®. Spend any amount of time around Evangelicals and you will find out that the quickest way to get their backs up is to use the word God in way they consider disrespectful (yet these same Evangelicals ridicule Muslims for doing the same). Some Evangelicals even go so far as to police public speech, correcting and admonishing people who dare to use the name of the Christian God (and Jesus) inappropriately. Here’s a short list of usages Evangelicals disapprove of:
Saying God like GAWD
Saying Lord Almighty like LORD ALMIGHTY!
Saying Jesus like JESUS!
Saying Jesus Christ like JESUS CHRIST!
Saying Jesus H. Christ
Saying Jesus Fucking Christ
Saying Jesus, Joseph, and Mary
Saying Goddamn
Saying God dammit
Utter these words in front of certain Evangelicals and you will likely get a self-righteous look of rebuke. Continue taking the “Lord’s name in vain” and some Evangelicals might even publicly call you out. I have known Evangelicals to even complain to their employers about their fellow employees’ offensive speech. Picture a toddler stomping his feet and saying, Mommy, make them stop! Of course, when their fellow employees find out about them going to the boss, guess what happens? That’s right. More taking the Lord’s name in vain. I learned this years ago when I worked for ARO Corporation in Bryan, Ohio. Newly married and filled with “Godly” zeal, I went to the plant manager and complained about the handful of pornographic (Playboy) pictures that were on display here and there on the factory floor. The plant manager “heard” my complaint and did nothing. The next afternoon, guess what I found taped to the front of my machine? That’s right, a picture of a naked woman. This went on for several days, long enough for me to understand that I should mind my own business. So it is with Evangelicals who get their panties in a knot when people profane the name of their God.
Evangelicals expect preferential treatment in the workplace, and often become outraged and offended when people refuse to play by their rules. I wonder if they ever bother to see things from the perspective on non-Evangelicals? My daughter works for a company where her job requires her to work in proximity with a handful of people. Her supervisor is an Evangelical. In her department they are permitted to play the radio. Guess what station is on every day? The local Evangelical Christian station. For eight hours each day, my daughter is forced to listen to atrocious Christian music, talk shows, and sermons. She could complain, resulting in the radio being removed from her department. Instead, she says nothing. My daughter has learned to tune out what she certainly considers “profane speech.” Evangelicals upset at Adele should do the same.
Evangelicals need to understand that for the nonreligious, words like God and Jesus are just that — words. If Evangelicals don’t like hearing (or reading) people use words that they deem offensive, then they should avoid people who use such words. Or they can grow up and quit throwing juvenile temper tantrums every time someone uses a word on God’s vocabulary Code®. Evangelicals need to stop expecting non-believers to play by their rules. I am an atheist, and when I say God dammit, I am not asking for the Evangelical God to damn the subject of my tirade. Last night, the Cincinnati Reds bullpen blew yet another game. When the relief pitcher gave up the lead, I said, in a voice that I am sure my neighbors could hear, REALLY? GOD DAMMIT! ARE WE E-V-E-R GOING TO WIN A GAME? Sometimes, I get texts from several of my sons expressing similar sentiments. None of us is calling on the Christian God when we use such language.
I am sure this post will do little to sway Evangelicals from their view of language. Like my wife in the morning needing several cups of black coffee, many Evangelicals need a cup of outrage to get them through the day. (Please see Christian Swear Words.)
Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Despite the many challenges Polly and I have faced over the past 40 years, we, amazingly, still love each other. We began life together as two naïve young people mutually infatuated with one another. As most couples who have been married a long time will tell you, deep, abiding love takes time to grow. Young love is often focused on the physical, but as couples age, their love for one another becomes more complex. Certainly, the physical is still important, but love is so much more than biological needs and urges. As people age, they change. We get up in the morning, look in the mirror, knowing that the youthful beauty and virility of 40 years ago is waning. It’s not that I don’t think Polly is beautiful — I do — but she is much more than just a pretty face. She is my friend and confidant. She’s the hand on the till when my life is spinning out of control. I am there for her and she is there for me. Oh, we still fuss and fight, often over the same things we fought about 30 years ago. Each of us is still as irritating to the other. But love forged in the fires of human experience sees beyond the irritations and personality quirks. Some days we don’t like each other very much. That’s life. Loves sees beyond the moment, reminding us that we have been privileged to experience a life that many will never know.
There are times when I feel guilty over being happily married. I correspond with people whose marriages are on the rocks thanks to their loss of faith. I wish I could wave a magic wand over their marriages and make them whole again, but I know I can’t. Stress and loss often reveal cracks in marital relationships. Sadly, many marriages don’t survive when one party says I no longer believe. Similar to the loss of a child, losing Jesus can and does cause great heartache and often leads to marital conflict. Some couples find a way to make things work, others can’t find a way to build a bridge from loving Jesus together to one partner not believing God exists. For whatever reason, Polly and I were able to walk away from Christianity together. While our reasons for deconverting are different, both of us number ourselves among the godless. Sometimes, people will suggest that Polly is some sort of lemming blindly following her husband. I think there are members of her family who sincerely believe that once I am dead Polly will return to Christianity. The fact that they think this reveals that they have likely never understood Polly. She’s quiet and reserved, and people often mistake her demeanor for passivity. Nothing could be farther from the truth. She is, in every way, just as committed as I am to living according to the humanist ideals. And it is this commitment that continues to strengthen our marriage.
I usually listen to Spotify when I write. Today, I am in a country mood. What follows is a song by Jon Pardi that aptly expresses the love I have Polly. I hope she enjoys it, and I hope you do too.
I wanna sweep you off your feet tonight
I wanna love you and hold you tight
Spin you around on some old dance floor
Act like we never met before for fun, ‘cause
You’re the one I want, you’re the one I need
Baby, if I was a king, ah, you would be my queen
You’re the rock in my roll
You’re good for my soul, it’s true
I’m head over boots for you
The way you sparkle like a diamond ring
Maybe one day we can make it a thing
Test time and grow old together
Rock in our chairs and talk about the weather, yeah
So, bring it on in for that angel kiss
Put that feel good on my lips, ‘cause
You’re the one I want, you’re the one I need
Baby, if I was a king, ah, you would be my queen
You’re the rock in my roll
You’re good for my soul, it’s true
I’m head over boots for you
Yeah, I’m here to pick you up
And I hope I don’t let you down, no, ‘cause
You’re the one I want, you’re the one I need
Baby, if I was a king, ah, you would be my queen
You’re the rock in my roll
You’re good for my soul, it’s true
I’m head over boots for you
You’re the one I want, you’re the one I need
Baby, if I was a king, ah, you would be my queen
You’re the rock in my roll
You’re good for my soul, it’s true
I’m head over boots for you
I wanna sweep you off your feet tonight
I wanna love you and hold you tight
Spin you around on some old dance floor
Christian bloviator Matt Barber — a former boxer who evidently took one too many hits to the head — took to his blog today to regale readers with his ignorance concerning atheism. Barber, a creationist, wrote the post to detail his Bible-based beliefs about the creation of the universe. He vomits up arguments that have been repeatedly refuted, and like a peacock strutting his stuff, Barber arrogantly states that his argumentative brilliance deals atheism (and science) a mortal blow. Of course, only in Barber’s Fundamentalist universe do such arguments find adoring and cheering crowds. In the real world, suggesting that the Big Bang proves the existence of God — God being, of course, Barber’s Evangelical deity — is rightly ridiculed and dismissed.
Be they theist, atheist or anti-theist, on this nearly all scientists agree: In the beginning there was nothing. There was no time, space or matter. There wasn’t even emptiness, only nothingness. Well, nothing natural anyway.
Then: bang! Everything. Nonexistence became existence. Nothing became, in less than an instant, our inconceivably vast and finely tuned universe governed by what mankind would later call – after we, too, popped into existence from nowhere, fully armed with conscious awareness and the ability to think, communicate and observe – “natural law” or “physics.”
Time, space, earth, life and, finally, human life were not.
And then they were.
Writing in the Wall Street Journal, Christian author Eric Metaxas notes, “The fine-tuning necessary for life to exist on a planet is nothing compared with the fine-tuning required for the universe to exist at all. For example, astrophysicists now know that the values of the four fundamental forces – gravity, the electromagnetic force, and the ‘strong’ and ‘weak’ nuclear forces – were determined less than one-millionth of a second after the big bang. Alter any one value and the universe could not exist. For instance, if the ratio between the nuclear strong force and the electromagnetic force had been off by the tiniest fraction of the tiniest fraction – by even one part in 100,000,000,000,000,000 – then no stars could have ever formed at all. Feel free to gulp. … It would be like tossing a coin and having it come up heads 10 quintillion times in a row. Really?”
Secular materialists claim it can’t be – that such explanation is a “God of the gaps” explanation and, therefore, must be banished from the realm of scientific inquiry. They demand that anything beyond the known natural is off-limits. Atheists attribute all of existence to, well, nothing. It just kind of happened. Genesis 1:1 of the materialist bible might read: “In the beginning nothing created the heavens and the earth.” Even in the material world that’s just plain silly. Nothing plus nothing equals something? Zero times zero equals everything?
And so, they have “reasoned” themselves into a corner. These same materialists acknowledge that, prior to the moment of singularity – the Big Bang – there was no “natural.” They admit that there was an unnatural time and place before natural time and space – that something, sometime, somewhere preceded the material universe. That which preceded the natural was, necessarily, “beyond the natural” and, therefore, was, is and forever shall be “supernatural.”
Reader, meet God.
In short: the Big Bang blows atheism sky high.
Scientists readily admit that they do not yet have answers for what preceded the Big Bang. Like Ken Ham, Barber ultimately appeals not to science, but to the Bible. God said ______, end of discussion. Barber thinks that by invoking God as the cause of the Big Bang that he has provided an argument that cannot be refuted. Of course, even a child can refute this argument. If everything in the universe has a cause, then where did God come from? The God who caused the Big Bang and created the universe acted within time and space, so he/she/it must also have a beginning. Neither scientists or religionists have answers for what happened before the Big Bang. The difference is that scientists are still trying to find answers. Creationists, on the other hand, appeal to the Bible, trusting that unknown ancient sheepherders or tribal lords had a better understanding of the universe than modern scientists.
I am curious however of one thing. Is Matt Barber saying he actually believes that God used the Big Bang to bring the universe into existence? If the answers is yes, then what happened to believing the Bible, particularly Genesis 1-3? You know, the verses, if taken as written, that say God created the universe in six literal 24 hour days, 6,021 years ago. Surely creationists have no need of making an argument for fine-tuning. Isn’t it enough to say God did it?
Barber also had these things to say about atheism/atheists in general:
“They say there are no atheists in the foxhole. Even fewer when death is certain. None once the final curtain falls. God’s Word declares, “The fool hath said in his heart ‘there is no God’” (Psalm 14).”
“In my experience it is something common among atheists: an inexplicable, incongruent and visceral hatred for the very God they imagine does not exist. Indeed, Romans 1:20 notes, “For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.” Yet excuses they make.”
“As I see it, atheism provides a case study in willful suspension of disbelief – all to escape, as the God-denier imagines it, accountability for massaging the libertine impulse.”
I know, nothing atheists haven’t heard countless times before.
If you have some spare time during your daily constitution, you can read Barber’s post here. Warning, doing so could cause diarrhea.
The photograph above is the header picture for my Facebook page. Illiterate Christians and atheists alike wrongly assume from the photo that I am a Christian. The same thing happens on my blog. People often wrongly think that I am a Christian. These people — who evidently can’t be bothered to investigate who I am and what my blog is all about — read one post and make a snap judgment.
