Regarding: You Killed My Daughter. Hey, it Happens.

In response to Ian's comment :

Unbelievable. Now religion is crack. I would venture to say that throughout history, religion has done more for the preservation and advancement of man and humanity than any atheistic worldview has, and there have been “atheists” for as long as there have been religions. In fact, in any society that has tried to supplant religion with rationalist atheist social constructs has met with dismal failure.

You like to talk about the separation of church and state, then turn around and lament that the government doesn’t rip children away from religious parents and raise them in some faux utopian societal education camp. Well you are precisely the REASON for the separation of church and state - to prevent some power hungry, pseudo intellectual, self-aggrandizing fascist from establishing his own state religion, whether that be atheism or any other religion. The purpose was to protect the freedom of religion, not to protect the government from having religious members. In fact, the Constitution pre-supposed a public morality motivated by religiosity, though not of any particular stripe.

Further more, what is the lie? The idea of a Creative Intelligence is no less tenable than the notion of the Big Bang or whatever the human explanation de’rigeur for the origin of the universe is. Many if not most hard scientists confess to leaning more and more toward the idea of Creative Intelligence, even if they do not have more dogmatic religious beliefs

Regarding: Goosing the Antithesis - Faith and Reason

I saw this article on the Goosing the Antithesis blog. I could not find a place to add a comment, so here is a hasty and brief response:

It seems interesting that the same defense you use against the argument that thought and ideas are immaterial is also a defense for the existence of God. If what I think is material, and if reality is made up of the material, then, if I think that God exists, He does.

Faith and reason are not contradictory, but are inseperable. You might not have a "religious" faith, but you do in fact have faith - faith in the god of science and in man's ability to discern truth through reason. Or maybe you have faith in the basic decency of humanity (somehow divorcing your perception of decency from the influence of Judeo/Christian Western Civilization) though if you look at some developing and third world countries there is little evidence of it.

We all take many things that defy understanding on faith. For example, the origin of the universe. Religionists have their view, and you have your view, neither of which can be proven or entirely disproved.

Regarding morality - if you arrive at some high level of virtue through the application of your intellect and reason over some period of time, and likewise someone with religious faith arrives at the same level of virtue through pondering the tenets of their faith, how is one better than the other?

I just can't understand the vitriol that most atheists have toward religious people. The animosity seems totally unwarranted. What is it to you if someone finds comfort and meaning in some force outside themselves? Do you not do the same with loved ones or partners? And why seeth with frustration if someone does try to persuade you to their faith? If nothing else, politely decline and thank them for caring enough about you to share their greatest treasure with you. Any why generalize and insult the intelligence of everyone that disagrees with you? Many of the greatest scientific, mathematical, and philosophical discoveries were made by religous people.

In my opinion, hatred is the greatest evidence of ignorance and there is enough of that in the world.