Christians can’t help themselves. They really can’t. In a world where science is progressing day in and day out, they are stuck with the other bronze age religions, languishing in a pit that their invisible friend will never left them out of. It is easy to see why, then, that Christians are happy to tolerate all other forms of religion (no matter how at odds with their own one-true-god they may be) but save the real damnation for Atheists.

Writing in the Times yesterday, the Rev Dr Peter Mullen (“Chaplain to the Stock Exchange” ffs) opened up with an attack on atheism that is so old and worn it is shocking anyone still tries it. It is shocking to people who are capable of learning, so it is actually less shocking that the theists demonstrate the complete inability to develop their thoughts…

Reading the article, I honestly think Dr Mullen lives in some bizarro world where he is scared the evil Atheists will climb into his bedroom and torture him for being a man of God (*). He begins his scare piece with drivel:

Far worse than the threat from international terrorism is the aggressive process of secularisation that has gripped our country, and most of Europe, and which is becoming ever more frenzied.

Erm, no. Appeal to fear noted and from there it just becomes nonsense and lies. Remember, lies make baby Jesus cry… This is actually the most sense you get from the madman so I can only assume the Times gave him space to rouse the rabble into responding. Well done The Times.

For example, I guess not many people are aware that it is against the law for state schools to teach the Christian faith as true. Teachers are allowed only to teach about religions. This is atheism by decree, for the only perspective from which one can teach about all religions is the secular perspective.

Wow. It really does make your eyes water as you try to follow this logic. But, Dr Mullen has made his point. I am offended that State Schools can not teach the truth of Odin, Thor, the Bifrost Bridge and Ragnarok. How dare they not teach the traditional religion of this nation…

“Atheism by decree” – what nonsense. I am amazed that clerics and theologians feel their belief is so fragile that unless children are completely, and continually, brainwashed they will stray to the Evil Atheism. Just goes to show that deep down they are all aware their crap is just crap and given time to think even children will realise this.

From this bad start, Dr Mullen goes on to talk about homosexuality and abortion with equal measures of idiocy and nonsense. There is nothing new, just the shameful regurgitation of old nonsense, vitriol, hatred and scare-mongering. The latter is something which appears to be a theme in Dr Mullen’s whole article. Basically he is trying to frighten people into the church. What a kind and nice deity these Christians worship.

Last point, as well as being the Stock Exchange’s chaplain, Dr Mullen is also the Rector of the Parish Church of St Michaels, Cornhill. If you thought his writing seems to be odd for a UK Anglican and felt more American Baptist, a clue may be in the Church’s webpage: (emphasis mine)

We are traditional Church of England – real Anglicans. We use the Authorised (King James) version of the Bible (1611) and the Book of Common Prayer (1662).

Hmm. Makes you wonder…

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(*) Interesting: given that Jesus sacrificed himself for others, isn’t it strange how many Christians are happy to sacrifice others for themselves…

Libby Purvis pointed out in the Times religion blog that baptising kids to get into a specific school isn’t the irrelevant ritual that many parents imagine it to be.

OK, obviously it is an irrelevant ritual. But it’s a big deal to the Catholic Church. The Vatican page that Libby Purvis linked to is a mite chilling. It makes a lot of contradictory claims. The unbaptised have to go straight to hell without collecting their free pass. Except, if they are really small, Jesus will probably feel sorry for them….

Otherwise, the unbaptised can basically only go straight to heaven if they die doing some noble Christian work. This is called the “Baptism of Blood.” It sounds so much like a Goth band that I want to learn to play the guitar right now, just so that I can put the name on a street poster, in dripping red letters on black…..

I am getting a strong whiff of the abbattoir in “god’s purpose” for humanity, the thing that religious folk keep banging on about. Fresh meat seems to be the answer. You can’t have baptism removed. It’s like a cattle-brand n your soul.

Some soul eater needs to know if you count in heaven as the spiritual equivalent of “halal” or “kosher”. What with the Baptism of Blood image, as well. And believers being the Churches “flock.” Didn’t Jesus claim to be a Fisher of men? These are pretty blatant admissions of an agricultural purpose for humanity, methinks.

The National Secular Society produces a de-baptism certificate that you can download. It appears that you can get declared not a Catholic but you can’t undo the historical fact of having been baptised. The Church of England (Episcopalian?) is also unwilling to strike names from its register of baptisms, on the evidence of a letter from Chris Taylor.

I emailed the diocese where I was dunked many years ago asking if I could be struck from the record as I have always thought it to be a load of old rubbish and said that if my parents had given me the choice of going through some sort of black magic voodoo ceremony performed by a probable child abuser in a dress I would, even at the age of 6 months, have said thanks but no thanks. I received a reply telling me that there was nothing that I could do about it.

Well, if your destiny is being earmarked for some spiritual being’s special dinner on 6th November 2058, once you are on the menu, you’ve had it…

It is wonderful, isn’t it. I go offline for a few days and the wonderfully strange concoction of people who make up our fair planet feel safe to come and comment here. Amazing.

Just over a week ago, I wrote a post looking at the insanity alternate world view that makes up a Bravenet board called “Rapture in the Air.” This seems to have resulted in a massive amount (for this blog anyway) of responses – oddly aimed at the related Shelly Corbitt post – including ones from the supposed founder of Rapture in the Air. They are almost as funny as the board. However, the pinnacle (for me anyway) of unintentional humour came in the form of a comment from Rita Cosby. I liked this so much, I felt the need to fisk it in full in a new post. Here goes…

WOW….

Thank you. We aim to impress.

you guys really are prejudice toward Christians.

Well, actually no. We aren’t even prejudiced against Christians. Generally speaking we are happy to challenge any line of nonsense, whatever its source. There is, of course, a larger amount of posts here looking at the illogical nonsense Christians throw about like chaff. The reason for this is not that we hate Christians more than any other fantasy religion, but we live in a Christian nation. The madness of Christianity actually has a direct impact on our day to day lives. It is basically, shoved down our throats on a regular basis so of course, it is going to get the most attention here. We have tried to include all religions though, and if you were actually bothered to spend more than a second looking you would see this. However, I suspect you have simply come here with this idea because some one in your religious group told you it was true, and you are conditioned not to question…

What if you find out in the near future that what your read at this site [assumed to mean RITA] is true, do you realize that by then it will be to late to repent and all of you will have to go through the tribulation.

An interesting variation on Pascals Wager. Interesting yet equally flawed. I do not for one second doubt that there is the possibility that the erm, future described on Rapture in the Air might come true. However, this possibility has to be weighed up against the possibility that the world will end in Ragnarok. What if you find out in the “near future” that the Giants have attacked Asgard and it is too late for you to take your place by Odin’s side in the final battle?

The future you anticipate is but one of an infinite number of possibilities. The chances of it happening are basically 1 divided by infinity. I am more likely to repeatedly win the lottery every week from now until the day I die.

Now, I am sure that the good fundies can simply refute any other end of times myth on the basis that the Bible tells them their one is true. However, this is poor reasoning. Even without having to worry about the Bible’s accuracy, the fact remains that “rapture” obsessed Christians are a minority of your own religion – most Christians do not believe in this nonsense, so it can’t really be viewed as doctrinally sound.

Of course, you will still have one more opportunity to give your life to Christ, if of course you live through the chaos and destruction that will take place during the 7 years of tribulation.

Phew. I was worried things would get bad. If you die in the tribulation what happens? If you die before the rapture what happens? What has happened to the countless millions of people who were born and died before the “Born again” cult took off?

I just thought I would give you a heads up folks, you can either take or leave my advice,

I’ll leave it, but thanks anyway.

but ignoring Jesus and His free gift of salvation you are in for eternal life separated from God in a place call hell………..

Where is this “place call hell?” Can you point to it on a map?

this will not be a very nice place to be, especially for all eternity.

Yeah, this brings me to another point of interest. You claim to worship a loving, caring deity who has, basically, pushed the forgiveness idea quite strongly. There is a two thousand year tradition of your deity granting all humanity with free will and the right to choose their own actions. The New Testament is a tribute to forgiving those who wrong you, being kind to all humanity (etc). From a purely moral point of view, the NT is fairly good.

Then you present this evil, nasty spiteful deity who is not content with a bit of smiting those who have the temerity to offend his divine majesty but will condemn them to an ETERNITY of torment. Wow. That is amazing.

Shall we look at this in the manner of an analogy? I think so.

Imagine, a conversation between a man and his wife. The husband tells his wife he loves her and she means the world to him. One day, the wife goes shopping and forgets to buy the husband’s newspaper.

In the REAL WORLD, the husband – even if he is a bit upset – would be expected to say “Ok, I still love you.” If he punched her for this, he would (rightly) be open for some jail time. If he beat her repeatedly he would be (again rightly) be spending a lot of time in jail. If he killed her, well in some places he would be on death row.

Now, in the land of your deity, a similar infraction will result in not just a black eye or broken ribs but ETERNITY in hell.

Where is the love there? The loving, all good God is actually a monstrous dictator who commits acts so vile they would shock the world if a human did it. He is the ultimate terrorist.

Do you really not see the logical flaw in saying to people “You have free will to do whatever you choose, but if you do not do exactly what I tell you, you will be punished worse then you can ever imagine“? I think we can all agree that dictatorships are a BADTHING™. If God was called Saddam Hussein, America would have bombed heaven to the dark ages.

Think about it.

It may surprise you (but it shouldn’t) but I have thought about it. Have you really thought about it?