Why Be So Visible, So Outspoken?

Atheists are often accused of being too outspoken, too militant, to strident. Our mere presence in society offends many people, all of them religious in one way or the other. Our existence is a reminder that the religious worldview is not the only one, that there is some possibility that they might be wrong about their beliefs in the supernatural, which beliefs forms a major component of how they deal with the day to day exigencies of life. We’re simply telling them that their beliefs, their vision of reality, could be wrong. Since there is an underlying current of insecurity in those beliefs, we make them nervous.

Insecurity?

Atheists And Their Quotes

Going to church doesn’t make you a Christian any more than going to a garage makes you a car.—Dr. Laurence J. Peter

Everybody loves a good quote. Atheists are no different. We quote mine as well as anybody, although on the whole, I think we pay a little more attention to the accuracy, relevance and completeness of the quotes we use, unlike those liars for Jesus who will pick any quote out of context that even remotely seems to support them, and flog it like a dead horse. They even like to make up quotes. Atheists, in my experience, tend to use quotes more judiciously, and far more accurately.

Those Elusive Ten Commandments

I really should read the Bible. I’m not one of those atheists who claims that my reading of the Bible actually caused my deconversion. I haven’t read it from cover to cover, primarily because it’s written so archaically, that I can’t get through it, and because there’s really no point to reading it. Logic says that you don’t put the cart before the horse, and logic also says you don’t read the Bible to find evidence of the existence of god. God must be proven first before I’d read it for that reason (and what other reason to read it?). To say god exists because the Bible says it’s true is circular.