Faith leaders abandoning their own faith
Offline I read the linked article this morning in "Psychology Today" while sitting in a coffee house. It literally made my day. The article discusses the growing number of clergy that are rejecting their own faith after finding it no longer tenable.
Interviewees are two pastors that are on the verge of leaving their churches due to a lack of belief (their names protected at this point). Dan Barker and Richard Dawkins are also interviewed as well as Carlton Pearson who simply walked away from his 5,000 member Tulsa, OK mega-church and growing success as an evangelist. This was particulary interesting to me since I used to actually attend this church in my former delusional state. Pearson said he sat watching children die in Africa on TV one day while holding his daughter in his arms. When he thought about how his own faith told him that those children would have to go to hell, he broke down and realized he could never follow a god like that. Now Pearson left money and success (empty and dishonest as it was) to form a tiny Unitarian church made up mostly of atheists, skeptics and agnostics. While he still hasn't completely embraced atheism, he seems quite close.
Anyway, the article is well worth reading and maybe even a cause for optimism. I definitely have an even greater appreciation for groups like the RRS after having read it.
AN ATHEIST IN THE PULPIT
http://psychologytoday.com/articles/index.php?term=20071228-000003&page=1
"In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act."
George Orwell
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Now jread, I know that you have read the rules to this particular forum. Why are you posting here? Mods...you know what to do.
Your god's silence speaks loud and clear
My guess is we will see this happen more and more frequently. Especially with the new information about atheists being out there, I've noticed more and more people that used to be religious (old friends) are now ditching it because it just doesn't make sense to them anymore.
Interesting article, but not all that unexpected. I hear a lot from theists that many atheists will convert to one religion or another. I don't have a problem with that at all. However few people remember Billy Graham's partner back during his start up. I think his name was Chuck Temepleman. I read an article once that described how he went from a fervent believer to an atheist. It isn't very often theists discuss the loss of faith in their own. There are a lot of really good testimonials about atheist conversions at www.infidels.org. It's amazing how much a lot of these mirror my own loss of belief. btw sorry for mis-spelling atheist lol, I just found out I was one instead of an agnostic.
"Always seek out the truth, but avoid at all costs those that claim to have found it" ANONYMOUS
Unfortunately often the conversion is contrariwise...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5seiLDAM2Q a neuroscientist and psychiatrist...
If God exist....must clarify me many doubts... <<(darwin)><
"Religion is an insult to human dignity. Without it you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.
An MD who forgets how organ harvesting works and thinks Goddidit?
Yeah...OK...we've never heard of theists claiming atheism before...
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
I agree. A lot of times when people weigh magic against logic, logic just makes more sense.
Frosty's coming back someday. Will you be ready?
It would appear the dilemma these faith leaders have dug themselves into will have lasting effects on their lives. They have built their careers and fortunes on something that they now know to be complete and utter crap. Given the choice of whether to leave their faith/career to pursue an uncertain future (usually with virtually no skills in any other field), or to continue to lie straight to their flock's faces in order to keep their revenue stream flowing, many of these faith leaders will chose the latter. I don't blame them. It's not easy to change careers at any age, especially when you would essentially have to start from scratch. In addition to this heavy burden, the families of these faith leaders have to not only deal with the repercussions of the career change, such as lower income, but they must also suffer emotional and social alienation within their community.
Once you have veered down the slippery slope that is the evangelical career path, you hit a point where you are no longer sliding, you are free falling.
Your god's silence speaks loud and clear
Religion is almost entirely a product of culture than logical thinking (or even non-logical thinking). There is no serious genetic difference between Europeans and Americans but your average Brit is more likely to admit to be homosexual than religious in any survey(its 5% gay 2% admitting to going to any religious service outside funerals etc).
This is why the atheist/secular movement in the US is so dangerous, once it becomes acceptable it will become normal. The religious nuts know full well the default 'normal' state of any human being is not a church goer
Articals like this give me hope for the future.
I cannot stress this enough. It is not one voice. It is not the good cop atheist or bad cop atheist. It is not one website or one author. It is all of us collectively raising our voices.
It was spacifically because of a brave atheist nurse in Chicago, right after 9/11 who put her thoughts and criticisms of being left out of the mourning process that all Americans felt at that time. It was because of that AP opinion printed in newspapers all over the country, that I decided to be active.
At that time, back in O1 things like that were rare and few and far between. And the atheist websites back then were few and certainly had amost no active memberships.
Jake's atheist network was the first website I joined an back then there wasnt even 200 members, and most were NOT active daily. That site grew day after day after day, and gave birth to Infidel Guy's website and poplarity of his radio show, which in turn gave birth to Rational Responders and this website.
Now I cant go a week without seeing "atheist" in some sort of major media, be it a magizine, radio show, or TV. That wasnt the case in 01.
Even before Jake people like Ellen Johnson, and Madolyn O'hair since the 1960s and even the 1800s people like Robert Ingersoll spoke out against superstition and promoted reason.
At risk of sounding like a Halmark card, you do make a differance, every single one of you. There are people who make a name for themselves, but it is also the support of those names and websites and books, that put them where they are.
Kudos to all who get involved, from Flemming, to Sapient, to Hitchens to Dawkins and Downey, all the way down to every single atheist who posts at these websites, who send in their opinions to the local papers and contact their ellected officials.
Articals like this would be rare back in 01, but this is just another reason to not only to keep going, but to step it up. IT IS WORKING!
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
As much as I apreciate the patience of deconstructionists, I like to take the fast track, because in the end, as much as they claim, "God did it" they still have to defend hocus pocus claims, which they cant. And what you just said is why I cut to the chase and attack the magic.
For the same reason a Christian rejects the utterance of Thor making lightening, or the utterance of Jesus being the spawn of alliens(Scientology), for the same reason they reject ouiji boards and rabbit's feet, I reject the utterance that a being with no sperm or penis got a girl pregnant and that a zombie god survived rigor mortis after 3 days.
It is that simple. Although I do admit that people's brains can become so scrambled that they desperatly cling to apologetics that it does take a deconstructionist to unravel their scrambled indoctrination.
I simply cut to the chase and call a duck a duck and fiction fiction. If you dont believe that Harry Potter litterally flew around on a broom, then you should also be capable of discarding the "POOF" "ABRACADABRA" claims of any holy book of any religion.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog