If Christianity dies, who benefits?
From time to time I suggest that this country will, sooner or later become a Muslim nation, having given up Christianity and so left a space waiting to be filled, which secularism simply cannot do. This suggestion is generally met with incredulity at best, and derision at worst. I don’t say this is an immediate prospect, but I do think it is a long-term one.
Well, those who think the idea absurd might do well to study the latest analysis of the 2011 census.
It suggests that a minority of British people will describe themselves as Christians within the next decade. (There are now just over 33 million British Christians, and only a third of these attend church apart from weddings, baptisms and funerals) ‘Describing themselves as’ is of course a good deal less significant than attending church, bringing their children up as Christians or anything of that sort. Meanwhile the general decline in Christianity has been masked by the recent arrival of 1.2 million Christians from Poland, Nigeria and other countries. My guess is that those who stay will be secularised by this country, rather than that they will re-Christianise it.
So what, then of the Muslim population? This has risen by 75 per cent , also boosted by migrants - 600,000 in this case. Won’t they be secularised? I’m not so sure. Muslims tend to stick to the pattern of the faith – the fasts and festivals, the traditions and dietary rules, in a way which Christians don’t. they also seem to me to have much stronger family connections. And, thanks to multiculturalism , they are often concentrated in certain areas, which tends to strengthen adhesion and loyalty. They are also a lot younger than Christians. The average age of a British Muslim is 25. A quarter of Christians are over 65. Younger people, of course, have more children than older people.
Meanwhile 32 per cent of under 25s say they have no religion at all.
Keith Porteous Wood, the executive director of the National Secular Society, was quoted as saying the long–term reduction of Christianity, particularly among young people, was now ‘unstoppable’.
‘In another 20 years there are going to be more active Muslims than there are churchgoers’, he said. ‘The time has now come that institutional Christianity is no longer justified.
‘The number has dropped below critical mass for which there is no longer any justification for the established Church, for example.’
I think he is right about the numbers. I really don’t understand why he should worry about the ‘established church’, an enfeebled and vestigial thing which has almost no real influence on national life and thought (and when it does, isn’t particularly Christian).
It has always amused me in a bitter sort of way that militant secularists seem pleased by the decline of Christianity. I doubt very much that they will like it if I turn out to be right, and the removal of Christianity as the national religion simply creates a space into which Islam can move. Can they really be sure that this will not happen here? We are, as I often say, due for a religious revival as material growth fails and fizzles. Why shouldn’t it benefit Islam, simple, confident, youthful and unembarrassed?
HI again, Dermot, old bean! One thing's certain (well, almost): We're never going to agree on evolution or your alternative for it (if you have one). I wish you could convince me with your arguments (I wish the same of "believers"), but the more arguments I hear, the more convinced I am that they're flawed.
Life fairly obviously, I'd say, does somehow begin spontaneously. After all, we're here, aren't we? And as I said, since there's 20% oxygen and 80% nitrogen (approximately, of course), that's why our organism needs precisely that mixture. You see, over the course of evolution the existing environment caused us (and all other forms of life) to adapt to it. Those who didn't perished.
Strangely enough there are little fish and great long worms, crabs and centipedes etc. that don't need oxygen or sunlight and feel really comfortable in boiling water and pressure that'd implode any submarine. And where do they live? Not in the Himalayas but several kilometres deep at the bottom of the ocean. Do you really think some creator made that environment just for their benefit?
Dermot, no hard feelings, but I think I'll leave it at that - till the next time. OK?
Posted by: bunker | 14 June 2013 at 02:20 PM
"all those things in the Goldilocks zone that you mention - you know, protein synthesis, blood clotting, precise solar system - are not the way they are because of us."
Ah! Mr Bunker (I know you want to know about God; you just don't know how to ask).
It's simply a matter of opinion old chap, You see them (or want us to believe you do) as incidental happenings that evolution simply took advantage of; but I see them as clear signs of a intelligent planning.
One thing you are quite wrong about though: You seem to believe that life could, and would, occur if the "random" environment had been a different chemical make up. As though life is inevitable no matter what the chemical ingredients happen to be.
This is patent nonsense, for there are plenty of different environments around in the universe, and even here on earth, but none of them have sprouted or can support life can they. We don't have any evidence of life spontaneously occurring, or surviving in (for example) a concentrated salt solution do we?, and salt has been around as long as the earth almost. There is only one system that supports life, and there is overwhelming scientific evidence for that (you claim to follow science, so start showing it).
Come to think about it, an oxygen environment is also lethal to organic life, and would quickly have destroyed any amino acid polymers long long before they could have organised themselves into the first replicating molecule. So, life occurred here despite the oxygen; not because of it. A true enigma for science: that we need for our survival, the very substance that is highly destructive to our organic make-up.
Tis you who puts the cart before the horse with your assumptions. Get it straight Mr Bunker, our incubation systems are not in the least random.
By the way the blood-clotting cascade operation is such an exquisite system for a number of reasons not least being the prevention of clotting where it's *not* wanted, and would be lethal like in our life giving veins and capillaries. Its a bit like having permanent bleach in your household water system that's there all the time in the water itself, but only comes out when you need it, like when you flush the loo; but stays away when you fill the kettle. Get your head arond that?
You should spend some time reading about it before you dismiss it as a crude leak stopper. Then you may begin to appreciate the nature of One who could design such a system.
Have a nice day.
Posted by: Dermot Doyle | 12 June 2013 at 03:06 PM
HI again, Dermot - I too thought the thread was dead. But then I read your comment. How can I resist replying?
Because once again you've got things the wrong way round. You've put the cart before the horse, so to speak.
You see, all those things in the Goldilocks zone that you mention - you know, protein synthesis, blood clotting, precise solar system - are not the way they are because of us.
On the contrary, we are the way we are because they are the way they are. Your argument is rather like saying that it is an amazing coincidence how our legs are exactly the right length to reach down to the ground!
Put another way, we humans would be in big trouble if we needed to breathe a mixture of 80% oxygen and 20 nitrogen. But oddly enough we don't. Because we have adapted to the atmosphere which we're lumped with. And if we hadn't developed blood-clotting through evolution, we'd all have bled to death long ago.
So no, it's not in the least surprising that all the things you mention are as they are. Indeed it is irrational to imagine their being any different, given the way we are.
So isn't it rather silly to use this as an argument?
Posted by: bunker | 11 June 2013 at 10:29 PM
"If science only tells us so much, does it tell us enough to infer that there is some one behind the scenes, whom we call ‘God’?"
Curtis.
I've just clocked this as I thought this thread was long dead, but, if you're still there:
Well call Him what you will: God, Creator, Supreme Being, Extra Terrestrial Intelligence, so long as it is respectful (well that's the rule I follow anyway), but if you are asking if science tells us enough to infer that there is something behind it all, just spend an afternoon reading about protein synthesis (you can even do it the lazy way by watching it on Youtube), or the amazing precision behind our Solar System, or the chemical cascades behind blood clotting, hearing, and sight (to name but three), they are truly mind-blowing.
I suppose you are well aware of how all life supporting systems are subject to the "Goldilocks" effect. How everything has to be just right. Our current atmosphere for example (it is incredible that all this carbon emissions fuss is about just a fraction of a per cent increase in CO2 which in total makes up less than 0.05 per cent of our atmosphere in the first place?
That's what I mean about how things have to be just right, and this is a massive clue for the thinking man don't you think Curtis? As far as I'm concerned, anything based on sheer chance cannot be subject to such critical parameters. So, in answer to your question: As these facts have been provided by scientific study; then this is science itself confirming a Creator.
You can, of course, continue to swallow the notion that all this is pointless and purposeless chance, but be prepared for a rough ride from the coming scientific information revolution, which is beginning to gain irresistible momentum. Such sweet irony I feel.
"Even if there is a God, does science tell us enough for us to infer what He might be up to?"
Now then, I can't help you there, I have my own beliefs for sure (but we have enough self-appointed Bible bashers don't you agree) all I can say is: once you accept God's existence; He will lead you to where you should be at. If you insist though, Jesus' Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) captures the essence of your question (as to the purpose for life), and is more than enough for anybody, if they never read another word of scripture. We don't need vast Libraries of thick books when it comes to religion.
Mind how you go fellow traveller.
Posted by: Dermot Doyle | 05 June 2013 at 11:53 AM
Dermot Doyle |
Thank you for yours posts of 24th. May at 1:43am & 25th. May at 1:32am.
1. You write; ‘Well, you've answered the question yourself with your previous sentence to the one above’.
You must mean ‘Maybe our minds can only grasp so much and maybe there are some questions which lie beyond our answering and always will’ in my post of 23rd. May at 1:04pm.
How have I answered myself? The points which I was raising were:
1. If science only tells us so much, does it tell us enough to infer that there is some one behind the scenes, whom we call ‘God’? ,
2. Even if there is a God, does science tell us enough for us to infer what he (or she?) might be up to?
2. You write: ‘How do you/we know those Galactic collisions do not bring about some generating force necessary for the universe to maintain order?’
Well, we don’t. But is there one good reason to think that galactic collisions are serving some purpose?
Posted by: Curtis | 30 May 2013 at 10:15 AM
@ Dermot Doyle.
Just a little add on . I failed to do in my previous post on this thread . You say a wise and trained eye . Is prepared to pay millions for it . I hope that was an irony. For a trained and wise man would only buy such for a gamble. that at some time down the line another wise and trained eye, would pay more.
Art is mostly the penchant of those with more money than they really know what to do with it. A wise and trained eye, would invest in curing world hunger. Another one of Gods failings, in providing them as he did Moses crowd Manna from the heavens.
Posted by: mikebarnes | 29 May 2013 at 07:43 PM
Dermot Doyle
Well, as long as you keep it quiet, I now live in Almondbury, once on the route of the old turnpike route to York and now a pleasant 'village' to the south-east of Huddersfield. My son lives in 'Slawit', on the route to Marsden and all points west, so, blessed with a bus pass, I have been known to venture over the top for an hour or so to Diggle, but Friday was my first time in Dobcross.
Posted by: Alan Thomas | 26 May 2013 at 01:18 PM
"In all a day that strongly counters the argument that all is lost... and all for free!"
Posted by: Alan Thomas
Well, I am delighted to hear that, perhaps it's had a resurgence in recent years, but what about the whole weekend outwith the band contest, the new cloths and the whit walks. Are they on revival too then? I mean people buy new cloths every week these days.
I used to see the steam trains go over the viaduct there at Uppermill. Our school had rail track running both sides of it, and we used to see loads of Britannia class steam trains running past right beside the playground, with names like The Oliver Cromwell, and Boadicea. I remember the excitement in the playground when the Britannia herself came past, and The Flying Dutchman always created quite a stir too. Wonderful names and halcyon days indeed.
I am intrigued as to where exactly you are, though I appreciate you shouldn't go into too much detail.
Kindest regards.
Posted by: Dermot Doyle | 26 May 2013 at 11:58 AM
mikebarnes - yes, indeed. And why anyone should have designed such a complicated structure as my right knee, I can't imagine. Surely it could have been made simpler and less prone to becoming "gammy". - Not very intelligent, I think. A bodged-up job, in fact.
Posted by: bunker | 24 May 2013 at 05:09 PM
@ Mr. Bunker
The miracle is that you have a knee at all. Never look a gift horse in the mouth, as the old saw has it.
Posted by: Richard York | 26 May 2013 at 04:25 AM
@ Dermot Doyle
I suspect you're clutching at straws here. Jackson Pollock and tiny insects. The universe is beyond those as a proof it it were required, the mythical God of Abraham, as author of the universe. Made a Jackson Pollock of it . A mess, a chaotic nuclear furnace.
As for the tiny insect on my finger .That is a tangible finger and the insect avoids the swipe I use to dislodge it. So smart in a way although not able to explain who the finger was attached to.
Here in the realms of fact Nature tends in moments to kill or maim thousands . No swipe nature extends to us is avoidable. But according to you and yours in faith .This is a god doing this .So just to add to his remiss at the chaos . Little swipes at the human insects on his finger . Sounds a swell guy.
Like Bunker says .I hope his knee is better designed than that of Bunker . And his Sphincter better designed than mine. But like his universe, I doubt it.
Posted by: mikebarnes | 25 May 2013 at 08:12 PM
Dermot Doyle
Dobcross, of course - you can tell I'm an incomer to this amazing area. A wonderful experience that started at 10am, a service at 1100 for the combined Saddleworth Churches, Sports afternoon on the Woolpack Playing Fields and The Band Contest from 4pm to late evening (the last band up closing with 'The Day Thou Gavest').
Bands from Norway, Germany, Lewes, Abingdon together with some 40 local marching bands - and many bands had musicians in their early teens.
In all a day that strongly counters the argument that all is lost... and all for free!
Posted by: Alan Thomas | 25 May 2013 at 01:53 PM
I would alter the question and ask, if democracy dies, who benefits? I believe that democracy by its very nature, is doomed to self destruct, because, its all things are equal policy renders its underbelly open to attack. Democracy has no protection against the enemy within, in fact it is regarded as host by those who seek to destroy democracy. Democracy driven by Liberalism, will die, killed off by those it arrogantly believed it could convert I.e. the enemy within.
On the other hand. lf Christianity dies, who benefits? I believe the world order will soon revert back to survival of the fittest and most ruthless. One thing is certain, the democracies of the world who believe everything is equal, don't stand a cat in hells chance of surviving.
Posted by: paul clark | 25 May 2013 at 01:39 PM
"One must be drawn to the conclusion the universe is a chaotic shambles."
Posted by: mikebarnes.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder I suppose. Some look at Jackson Pollock's No. 5, 1948 "masterpiece" and see nothing but a chaotic shambles of paint splashes; yet others with the "trained and wise" eye; are prepared to pay over a 100 million quid for what they consider to be exquisite artistic precision and beauty.
You should study a phenomenon named: The Goldilocks Enigma, where you will find reason for what you perceive to be a cosmic chaotic shambles.
How do you/we know those Galactic collisions do not bring about some generating force necessary for the universe to maintain order? Remember the tiny insect crawling up your finger; what does he know about his universe?
Posted by: Dermot Doyle | 25 May 2013 at 01:32 AM
Contributor bunker, whom I thank for kindly replying, wrote:
"Peter Preston - if you have any evidence that the atheists in the UK go around giving vent to their "irascible tempers" and physically assaulting other people, would you please present it. Until you do, I think we may assume that that is not the case."
Well, how would I know, sir, if I happened to see someone 'giving vent', as you say, to his irascible temper, whether he was an atheist? It might not after all be the best time to ask anyway.
I don't know who you mean by "we" in "I think we may assume that that is not the case." but what you assume is your own business - and theirs too, whoever they may be - and not mine, sir.
Posted by: Peter Preston | 24 May 2013 at 08:28 PM
mikebarnes - yes, indeed. And why anyone should have designed such a complicated structure as my right knee, I can't imagine. Surely it could have been made simpler and less prone to becoming "gammy". - Not very intelligent, I think. A bodged-up job, in fact.
Posted by: bunker | 24 May 2013 at 05:09 PM
@ Deremot Doyle.
In yesterdays Mail a story featuring the collision between two galaxies was shown, including pictures. Now as far as I'm aware thats roughly 300 colliding galaxies so far found.
If therefore the universe is / was by intelligent design. Then a fault exists that allows these events to happen .Or god was remiss, lazy . of didn't give a damn.
Looking at the scared sufaces of just our own satelite. One must be drawn to the conculsion the universe is a chaotic shambles.
Posted by: mikebarnes | 24 May 2013 at 03:07 PM
"Have you ever been to the Dob Cross Whit Friday do? It's a big event on the brass band marching calendar"
Alan Thomas.
Well, I'll go to't fut ov arr sturs! Yes of course (hope the moderator doesn't mind us rambling on). After leaving Manchester as a kid, we lived briefly in Greenfield, Diggle, then settled in Delph for a few years (the moving van came round just after dark, as I remember). I finished up in the waterman's cottage, up there in Castleshaw, a stunningly beautiful place I still visit occasionally.
Dobcross (not Dob Cross) was within a mile or so of all these places, and the highlight of the year (every bit as important as Christmas) was the annual Delph band contest (on Swan meadow just behind the Swan Inn, sadly now a victim of developers) at Whitsuntide. If I remember rightly every village had it's own contest, and the same bands would compete at all of them.
These wonderful, and highly colourful occasions will remain indelible in my mind, with everybody (except us sadly) wearing new cloths after the whit walk. The Sun always shone, and the Dobcross band were always the star attraction, having a higher standard than all the rest. Why? perhaps you could tell me, you seem to have an interest in it.
The Whitsuntide festivals still survive today, but, alas, like everything else; are a pale shadow of their former glory. I ran away from home at the tender age of fifteen going on sixteen, and ended up in the Army two years later, so that was the end of that, incredibly, this area has become very posh these days with houses reaching a million pounds or more would you believe. That waterman's cottage is now well over half a million which is amazing considering my father, who had a job with the water board, paid (absolutely true) two shillings a week rent for it. How the wheels turn eh?
Posted by: Dermot Doyle | 24 May 2013 at 12:09 PM
Peter Preston - if you have any evidence that the atheists in the UK go around giving vent to their "irascible tempers" and physically assaulting other people, would you please present it. Until you do, I think we may assume that that is not the case.
Where is the difficulty in creating laws protecting free speech? And forbidding (if you prefer) the abuse of free speech as, for example, in slander, libel, perjury, racism etc. etc.? I'm not a lawyer. Formulating such laws is what "Juristen" are there for.
You ask what that has to do with the subject being discussed. Well, I must admit I've almost forgotten what that subject is. Ah, yes, I remember now, Mr Hitchens suggested that Christianity might one day die out in the UK. And I surmised about what might follow. - However did we get a way from that subject?
(Wasn't there that question as to whether atheists might not abide by the rules without a "restraint"? I vaguely remember something along those lines.)
Posted by: bunker | 24 May 2013 at 11:42 AM
Peter Hitchens: “… militant secularists seem pleased by the decline of Christianity. I doubt very much that they will like it if … the removal of Christianity as the national religion simply creates a space into which Islam can move.”
Those who oppose Christianity can be put into two groups. The first group is thoughtful persons who object to spiritual aspects of Christianity. For example, they feel it is, like Richard Dawkins says, child abuse to tell young children that when they tell a lie or won’t go to bed, what is happening in their heads is that a supernatural being called the devil has entered their heads and is actually whispering ideas in their minds to merge with their own thoughts. To some, this is clearly child abuse – but only to the small proportion of children who ponder on such things, and for the other 99% it is harmless enough.
This is the first group who oppose Christianity, who are swelled in numbers by the good persons who are divorced, and who are condemned by the Catholic church, and whom Peter Hitchens wishes to make more difficult to be free of the bad person.
Then there is a second group of persons who also oppose Christianity for entirely different reasons, and who will be referred to as ‘BBC types’ – these oppose Christianity because it gives value in society to moral values associated with the better persons within society. Consider a hospital matron who has no religious belief at all, but a strong moral code, and who wishes to sack the lazy and cruel nurses. She can be defined as a better, superior person, and the cruel nurse can be defined as an inferior person. And this is without bringing religion into it. The Left oppose any system that gives status and power to such a matron by virtue of her superior personal qualities. This is because their inner natures from their genes make these persons of the Left instinctively opposed to the superior persons within society. Note the matron in my example was not religious, simply a person of superior genes. The BBC Left oppose Christianity because it endorses her type and leads to promotion on the basis of personal virtue, even if the person of virtue is not religious at all, as in my example.
Evidence that his is correct is that the word superior has become a derogatory term in this country. If any bloggers are offended by my comments, it is this term that will cause their inner outrage.
If this view is correct, then the BBC-type will not really care what replaces Christianity, as long as the replacement does not endorse the better amongst us and assist the better persons to have influence and authority. If this is the case, they will not really care whether we have Islam or communism - either one will do nicely. This explains why the BBC hates Christianity, but reveres both Islam and communism.
Posted by: Bob, son of Bob | 24 May 2013 at 11:22 AM
"But in that case, do you know enough to say that ‘this universe and all that dwells in it, is the work/plan of a far superior intelligence’?"
Well, you've answered the question yourself with your previous sentence to the one above. Our minds cannot take in the universe's majesty, because it's (as we must acknowledge) beyond the parameters of human comprehension. Testament in itself that whoever, or whatever, created it; has to be even greater again. Can we see creation and yet deny a Creator? It's entirely up to you if you want to accept the self assembly postulation, I can't prove otherwise, but it's not how I see things.
Isaiah puts it better:
"Woe unto him that striveth with his Maker! Let the potsherd strive with the potsherds of the earth. Shall the clay say to him that fashioneth it, What makest thou? or thy work, He hath no hands?" (KJB 45:9).
"Who are you to judge who is a super scientist and who is not?"
No doubt Prof Hawking is a brilliant scientist in human terms, and I do respect that, but in Creator terms; definitely potsherd. Some of his ideas however, are just plain barmy. Hairy vacuum sucker creatures on windy planets, remember? Any fool can conjure up stuff like that, but the scientific journals took it all so seriously, making complete fools of themselves, such was their sycophancy.
If a cosmologist (Hawking) can be described as a super-scientist, how much more super is the one who fashioned what he simply observes. Dawkins can be described as a great biologist I suppose, but he is also just an observer/discoverer. The only truly the great biologist is the one who fashioned biology. At the end of the day they are just the Captain Cook's of their scientific disciplines, discovering what's already there.
My religion?
It's not important, but for what it's worth, I go to the Christian church (though not often enough) and always will do, mainly to be in the company of fellow worshippers whose hearts are in the right place whatever their creed. Personally speaking? I believe I alone am responsible for my actions in this life, and I alone will pay the price for any evil deeds (not too confident either) when I face my Maker. The same Maker who made Jesus, and Jesus says as much himself, in Matthew 25:32-46. Clear warning that it's the same for everyone, and no get-out-of-gaol cards. You can't be one of his sheep; if you don't you *behave* like one.
Well, you did ask. Take care fellow traveller.
Posted by: Dermot Doyle | 24 May 2013 at 01:43 AM
Contributor Tony Dodd, whom I thank for kindly replying, wrote:
"Peter Preston - you may very well be right when you refer to everyone in the world being "bent". I wonder who did the "bending"?"
Well, I'm no theologian but I think the Christian church's doctrine of original sin - as I understand it, at least - does not declare - as the film character Mr Bridger does - that absolutely everyone in the world is 'bent' but rather that the world offers all of us many temptations to become so warped and may actually 'bend' us, if we are not on our guard against them and if we do not seek the help of divine grace to reject them.
However Mr Bridger's down-to-earth practicality seemed to me to come very close to what I imagine the church is saying about the human capacity for wrongdoing.
I am, of course, open to correction by wiser heads than mine.
Posted by: Peter Preston | 23 May 2013 at 08:00 PM
Contributor bunker, whom I thank for kindly replying, wrote:
"Most atheists (as far as I know) don't go around stealing, raping and murdering. What is it, I wonder, that "restrains" them. The law of the land and their conscience, perhaps?"
Well, how many have you asked, sir? And, even if they did 'go around' doing those things, might they not be inclined to dissimulate their wickedness? Even atheists, I dare say, can tell lies. Perhaps, as you say, the law of the land and their consciences may restrain them. Who can say? And - more to the point - what difference does it make to the matter being discussed?
"First of all there could be laws ensuring free speech" you suggest.
Would you care to frame the terms of such a law, sir? Whose free speech would they ensure anyway? What if one person's speech became so 'free' that he started to offend everyone around him and he could speak louder than those who were trying to silence him. Would they be infringing your hypothetical 'law' indeed in even trying to silence him, perhaps out of concern for the feelings of their loved ones?
Laws against censorship never work because a censor is anyone who says "thou shalt not!" and such a law would find itself forbidding people to forbid people.
(Thou shalt not say "thou shalt not")
I think that, if you sit down and try to frame a law 'ensuring free speech', you will quickly see how impossible it is. What actual things expressed in simple English would your 'law' forbid?
No, sir. The shot is simply not on the board.
"..Are you suggesting" you ask "that a large number of Christians at present in the UK only abide by the law because they see the potential wrath of God and the prospect of hellfire as the only reason why they don't give vent to their "irascible temper" and start "physically attacking" other persons. - I have a higher opinion of Christians in general than that."
I'm very pleased to hear it, sir; so have I. I would be surprised to learn that the Christians you mention could deserve such a description but I try not to intrude on the private consciences of others and so, your guess is as good as mine, as they say. But - once more - what on earth has that to do with the subject being discussed?
Posted by: Peter Preston | 23 May 2013 at 07:45 PM
paul Clark - thank you for your views. But you - like everyone else so far with the exception of, er ... sorry, I've forgotten who it was (my apologies) - has failed to answer my question. I accept it if someone says "I don't know which I'd choose". But if Christianity does die in the UK, the question remains: What follows? So, if you don't like either of my proposals, perhaps you could suggest something yourself.
Posted by: bunker | 23 May 2013 at 07:17 PM
Dermot Doyle
Hostile? Perhaps somewhat doubting, but what else would you expect from a Thomas?
Have you ever been to the Dob Cross Whit Friday do? It's a big event on the brass band marching calendar, 50 or more bands from Yorkshire, Derbyshire and the other place to the west - the name escapes me...
I've been persuaded to venture across the border with a couple of friends tomorrow. And it looks like thermal whatsits and the old hip flask weather!
Posted by: Alan Thomas | 23 May 2013 at 05:48 PM
Hi Curtis
Thanks for your post, and some interesting questions there- I'll answer as best I can (in no particular order)..
"Is agnosticism naturally hostile to Christianity too?
You probably will not believe me, but I am happy to say to Christians ‘You believe this but I am not sure' and let it go at that. I am not going to throw anyone to the lions - honest!"
Actually I do believe you. I don't categorize agnosticism in the same, er, category as atheism (at least of the militant kind). I find agnostics (for the most part) at least open minded one way or the other (although the downside is that constantly sitting on the fence shows an unwillingness to commit to any beliefs at all- but that can be for another discussion). It's the militant atheist that insists (s)he believes in freedom for all and then lays down a whole list of what they will not tolerate and all the while pretending to be tolerant, that grates on me. And that leads me to:
" ‘we have to pretend that all faiths are "equal"’. How in the world can saying that all religions are equal be discrimination?"
I agree- saying that all religions are to be treated equally isn't discrimination. However, it's what's put into practice is what I was referring to- officially we are all equal, and yet we all know that in practice some religions are more equal than others. It's the contradictory actions that don't support the phoney "equality" that amounts to discrimination (if we all were truly treated on an equal footing I would not have mentioned this)!
And finally..
"‘there would be so many rules and regulations against it (Christianity) that it would soon be outlawed’
What might these rules and regulations be?"
A good question. You only have to look at D Bunker's post for an example. However, I'm sure under the guise of "not causing offence" there would be a whole range of restrictions, from not wearing a cross to offering to pray for hospital patients to not daring to mention it in schools.
Must admit, I quite like what Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard said in her speech on immigration (can be found on the internet). If only our craven politicians had the will or the courage to say something even half as sensible it would ease lots of tensions- alas, they don't...
Regards
Posted by: Mark | 23 May 2013 at 04:53 PM