God Has Left the Building...

Several months ago, CNN published the results of a couple of disturbing polls about Americans and their religious beliefs. The first found that more Americans are rejecting religion and thus, according to CNN, America is becoming "less Christian." The second, a Pew survey of only 742 mostly white evangelical Protestants, revealed that more than six in 10 of them believe that torture is often or sometimes justified.

More than six in 10? What this says about those claiming to be God's own is that perhaps they should use their Bibles for more than "thumping." Because not one in 10 -- not one in 10 thousand -- not one in 10 million -- Christians believes that torture can ever be justified. Ever.

Anyone who has paid attention to the growing number of evangelical zealots over the past couple of decades must be aware that there is a growing chasm between Religion and Christianity. Today, the term, "religious Christians" is nothing if not oxymoronic. It seems when folks become apocalyptic frothing-at-the-mouth religious, they ultimately stray from the light and life of Christianity, while descending deeper into the darkness and death of Religion.

Because, all religion is politics. CNN quoted Mark Silk of Trinity College, who said, "In the 1990s, it really sunk in on the American public generally that there was a long-lasting 'religious right' connected to a political party, and that turned a lot of people the other way." Silk cited the obvious link between the Republican Party and groups such as the Moral Majority and Focus on the Family.

Tony Perkins, the right-wing evangelical president of the Family Research Council, told CNN not to worry. He said people will return to their faith in droves; that soon, the decline will ease and religion will be an even greater part of people's lives. The good news, according to Perkins, is, "As the economy goes downward, I think people are going to be driven to religion." (emphasis added)

Yes, as more Americans lose their jobs, their homes, their very reasons for living, those like Perkins see them as Manchurian congregations -- flocks driven to religion like cattle -- bawling, shuffling, pushing, milling around with tags in their ears, looking for a leader. Even now, they can be seen in mammoth mega-churches, some with arms raised -- fists clutching at dead air -- others writhing in the aisles, moaning, begging for some "sign" from their rigidly religious God. Perhaps their panic stems from the instinctive knowledge that God, unable to get a word in edgewise, has left the building.

The conservative religious right is a frightening political force driven in its efforts to divide and conquer by greed, an insatiable lust for power, and an ideology of hate. Its members, unable to drag God down to their level, have no qualms about elevating themselves to what they perceive as His level. They succeed in controlling the flock because fear -- especially fear of God -- is a great motivator. They use God not only as a weapon against millions who stand between them and their goals of replacing democracy with theocracy and of controlling the worlds resources and its people -- but as a divine justification for the destruction they leave in their wake.

No one was more adept at giving God credit for his killing fields than former president George W. Bush, who openly bragged that God had hired him to remove evil from the face of the earth. "I trust God speaks through me," Bush said in 2004. "Without that, I couldn't do my job." And, even before that, in 2003, Bush tried to round up a "coalition of the willing" for his Iraq slaughter on God's behalf. According to Charleston Gazette editor James A. Haught, Bush told then French President Jacques Chirac that "Iraq must be invaded to thwart Gog and Magog, the Bible’s satanic agents of the Apocalypse." Haught wrote...



But some presidents, such as Lyndon Johnson, were not so magnanimous. God got the blame, not the credit, for the Vietman atrocity. Ronnie Dugger, in his book, "The Politician: The Life and Times of Lyndon Johnson," writes that Johnson told Austrian ambassador Ernst Lemberter in 1966 that the Holy Ghost regularly visited him..."He comes to me about 2 o'clock in the morning," Johnson said, "--when I have to give word to the boys, and I get the word from God whether to bomb or not."

Now, you don't have to be a Christian to reject the right-wing bull hockey that the God who appeared in a blinding flash of light and spoke to Paul on the road to Damascus has sunk to the evangelical depths where He emits not even a glimmer as He bends our presidents' ears on who to slaughter, urges televangelist Pat Robertson to ask a woman about her sex life, and is still deciding if He wants Michelle Bachman or Sarah Palin to be president.

Christians should be lauded for rejecting modern-day Religion. When the God they are taught to love is either credited -- or blamed -- for all hell on earth; when they search in vain for Jesus, and finally find Him, hanging out in a secretive townhouse on Washington's C Street with the greedy, war-mongering gang who refer to themselves as "The Family," it's time to take a second look at the direction in which this nation is hurtling.

For years, conservative right-wingers have hidden out in the C Street "church," where they are free to conduct all manner of fraud and to carry on adulterous affairs. People who have sold their souls; who have no sense of morality, and who use God as a Trojan Horse to hide their political manipulations to replace both Democrats and Democracy are quite mad, you know. Right-wing evangelicals and neocon operatives are consumed with religious hate, not Christian love. Their modus operandi is, as Weekly Standard operative William Kristol said, "go for the kill."

And, those who are familiar with Kristol know he wasn't referring just to health care. Pat Robertson's Christian Coalition protege, the now disgraced Ralph Reed, dubbed in 1995 by Time magazine as "the right hand of God," was a master at evangelical politics, which he said was like Viet Cong-style guerrilla warfare. Reed said, "I want to be invisible. I do guerrilla warfare. I paint my face and travel at night. You don't know it's over until you're in a body bag. You don't know until election night."

Anyone doubting the viciousness with which Reed would "go for the kill" should have a talk with Vietnam War hero and amputee Max Cleland, who not only found himself crammed into a body bag on election night 2002, thanks to Ralph Reed, but was in there with Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden.

But Reed and others are tyros when it comes to those most likely to cause Christians to reject religion -- those whom CNN failed to mention who incite violence by preaching sermons laced with politics, religion, racism -- and hate. Those like Tempe, Arizona's Steven Anderson, who has no college degree nor formal Bible training, but is qualified to preach because he "has memorized almost half of the New Testament." Anderson started his own church -- Faithful Word Baptist -- in 2005 on Christmas Day. A firey right-wing preacher, he's against homosexuality, liberalism -- and President Barack Obama.

In August, Anderson gave a breathtakingly vile speech entitled, "Why I Hate Obama," in which he said about President Obama, among many other things...



Anderson, and those like him, epitomize the breach between Religion and Christianity. The religious believe that God belongs to them. Christians know that they belong to God. It's that simple. Thus, CNN polls notwithstanding, America cannot become "less Christian" as a result of members of the flock jerking the tags from their ears -- and rejecting modern-day religion.

"Christians should be lauded for rejecting modern-day Religion. When the God they are taught to love is either credited -- or blamed -- for all hell on earth; when they search in vain for Jesus, and finally find Him, hanging out in a secretive townhouse on Washington's C Street with the greedy, war-mongering gang who refer to themselves as "The Family," it's time to take a second look at the direction in which this nation is hurtling."

I hope you take the time to read the AlterNet piece on The Family. Talk about a den of iniquity!

Long hard read, but fascinating.

just a long-winded version of the "No True Scotsman" fallacy. As if violence, hatred and bigotry were anything new for the Christian church.

Far too many "good" people worship the church rather than who/what that church is supposed to represent. I'm beginning to think that God has left practically every building. Where's Paul when you need him to chase the hypocrites and money-changers out of the churches?

As far as being "long-winded," well...um...uh...hey -- you sound like my husband. You ain't Ol' Yeller in drag, are you?

That was Jesus, not Paul.

Not too familiar with your New Testament, are you?

and most importantly infuse politics with religion like Bush, Falwell, Reed, Delay, Kristol,Perkins,Dobson, Haggard, and as the extreme historical example of this toxic mix, Hitler, are the most pathological, manipulative,hypocritical, immoral, murderous leaders- in stark contrast to their subjective self-image as doing "god's" good work.


good post, thanks.

...is that I can be a mouse in the corner when these evil bastards stand before their Maker and try to buy Him off with their fist-fulls of filthy money. Whoo-boy! It's gonna get nasty!

Thanks, Brempro

that it will happen that way? How do you know that gawd won't bring the hammer down on all those "liberal" and "progressive" Christians for just interpreting his word any way that happened to suit them at the moment, and for not doing enough to fight the evil that he commanded? I have no doubt that the fundies are looking forward to that with the same glee...

I think the fundies and their ilk will have a lot of 'splaining to do if there is a Judgment Day.

Jesus says that all scripture/law/prophecy boils down to the act of loving God with everything you are and loving yourself as you love your neighbor. When asked whom he meant by "neighbor", Jesus chose a Samaritan, which apparently would have shocked the orthodox Jews in his audience. Samaritans were considered outsiders and "unclean," from what I understand.

Jesus also made a distinction between his true followers (who care for the poor, the hungry, the stranger, et al.) and his false followers who turn their backs on caring for "the least of these."

As they often are, the fundies and conservatives are clearly on the wrong side of what it is they say they believe. You'll never be able to convince them of that, of course.

(And I am not knowledgeable of Christian scripture, btw)

I also think it is valid to complain about the fundies and ultra-religious who ignore the ethical teachings in their own scripture.

If scripture provides a set of characteristics that describes "false followers" then one can (and should) use that as support in questioning legitimacy without being accused of using a no true scotsman fallacy.

That chapter was one of the pillars of my faith when I identified myself as a Christian (along with the Samaritan passage I quoted and the passage in John where Jesus tells the Pharisee that God is ultimately a mystery we experience but can't really know..."the wind goes where it will etc.").

whatever "religion". The names change, but the characters and plot pretty much remain the same. :shrug:

http://www.bible-history.com/pharisees/PHARISEESThe_Paradox_of_the_Pharisees.htm

snip>

One of the greatest ironies of scripture is the rejection of Christ by the stewards of God's word. Their extensive knowledge of the word of God did not bring them to faith in The Living Word of God, but rather they're hatred of God was exposed.

It is written in the Prophets: `They will all be taught by God.' Everyone who listens to the Father and learns from him comes to me. John 6:45

In all their studies of Scripture, they did not listen to the Father, or learn from him. Something vital was missing inside of them.

Perhaps they were missing honesty. Had they been honest with God's word, and with themselves they would have felt a constant need for mercy and forgiveness rather than pride and self sufficiency as they spent their time learning. They would have been prepped for a Savior like many of the common people who had much less Bible knowledge, but applied honesty and humility to what they knew.

To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable:

"Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector....

I agree that religious hypocrisy is a reality and we all have to deal with this kind of people no matter which religion. It does seem like a rerun, over and over and over again...

But on another subject, given the link provided... The conclusion from the linked site gives me the creeps especially when it comes from a site that has a section linking to "astronomical evidences for the God of the Bible." :-)

With that in mind it is hard to read the conclusion from the author of the "Paradox of the Pharisees" page without some annoyance:

"The Pharisees as a Jewish sect provided a great service in teaching and preserving the word of God, how tragic that they were not able to receive it's most important benefit for themselves the humility required to embrace their Messiah and Savior."

Reading some of the content at that website I have reasons to believe that we, the decedents of Pharisaic Judaism, are still those who don't have the humility required to embrace this Messiah and Savior. We are still seen as the party poopers. The irony is that, by having this point of view, the author doesn't seem to accept us for what we are and for our world view. But then the conclusion is that we are described as being the arrogant aholes for not accepting an "absolute truth."

thread. Found some great ones here: http://www.bible-history.com/pharisees/PHARISEESJesus_and_the_Pharisees.htm
but couldn't deal with some of the commentary on that page either.

It's difficult to find a progressive Christian site that bothers to delve as deeply into "judging" others for their hypocrisy. That whole notion of pointing out the speck another's eye while having a log in one's own I suppose. Most progressive sites are too busy discussing what we're called to do as followers of Christ than what we're to think of others or "believe in".

My apologies if my use of that site offended - certainly was not my intention. I should have paid closer attention. :hug: A page pointing to hypocrisy, concluding with the author's own hypocrisy.

It does bare out the notion of a huge chasm developing in the Church though, doesn't it? I attended a lecture with the former Bishop from NY who was relating the story of an interfaith meeting he attended. The Muslim cab driver, learning of his title and destination asked "are you from the Christian sect that follows Christ?". People outside the faith see there's a huge difference, but seems no one is willing to stand up to call out the "brood of vipers" as Jesus did...gets back to the non-judging thing again. I suppose it becomes cyclical after awhile.

Oh, and I didn't catch the "astronomical evidences for the God of the Bible." I just found the doctrinal statement and sure enuff, I linked to a freaking fundie site! ARRRRGH! :banghead:

I figured it was a mistake and one I have made in the past as well. I was only commenting on the content of the page.

In my perception, based on your posts around here (and the few exchange we've had) I view you as a mensch so I didn't think you would agree with those views.

I even tried to address your point separately from my commentary on the website which is indeed a freaky fundie site. :-)

overly sensitive lately. I think I also tend to "project" my feelings onto others.

Good to talk with you again. :hi:

Jesus lied when he said it. The law of the Old Testament (which Jesus explicitly said was still be to followed) is nothing like that, and certainly does not express the sentiments of a loving god. Yes, the fundies cherry-pick which of god's rules and orders they choose to follow, but so does every other Christian, without exception. The bottom line remains that none of them has any real basis for claiming that their interpretation of scripture is any more correct than anyone else's.

trying to cut through dogmatism and legalism to revive the heart essence of his faith.

Beyond that, everything is dependent on interpretation. The very process of thinking is interpretation. When I was a journalist I always thought the whole "objective journalist" thing was such crap. You can strive to be fair and balanced (not in the Fox sense of the phrase), but everyone picks and chooses, emphasizes and de-emphasizes, is aware of and oblivious to details that in turn shape their "version of the truth", as one wise journalism teacher I had put it.

In theology, I don't know that we should be striving for "correctness"...whose version is more correct than others. Theology should serve to make us more humane and self aware. I know by and large it doesn't do that in practice, but there are theologians and believers who take that approach.

A few years ago I read a good review of Albert Speer's memoir by a theologian (Stanley Hauerwas, I think). It was all about how the stories we tell ourselves to make sense of our lives can easily lead to self-deception if we don't integrate the awareness of how powerful self-deception is into these stories. In other words, inherent in the stories we tell ourselves (whether religious, political, or whatever) should be the ongoing awareness that these are merely stories based on our prejudices, desires, fears, limitations, etc., and should not always be assumed to be true.

In even more other words, it's like the bumpersticker I have on my car: "Don't believe everything you think."

not Christianity. He wasn't out to start a new religion, other people just made one up after he was gone, from stories about what he supposedly said and did.

And yes, it really is all about interpretation, and that's the whole point. Neither fundamentaist nor more liberal Cristians can truly justify that their interpretation of scripture or their version of Christianity is any more true or correct than any other. Most people ultimately shape their version of Christianity to fit the kind of life they've decided to lead anyway, not the other way around.

And re: interpretations, if there is a Christian God, I believe that considering that the Deity created such a vast diversity in all life forms the Deity would be cool with the multitudinous ways people interpret their experiences of the Divine.

Manchurian congregations . . . like cattle, bawling . . . milling around with tags in their ears. Got to love that one.

" . . . they ultimately stray from the light and life of Christianity, while descending deeper into the darkness and death of Religion." I recommend a change of wording even though the metaphor is scintillating. " stray from the light and life of Christ's teachings " would have more authority than "Christianity" which has no moral authority and in many cases is already deep into the darkness and death of Religion.

A superb piece, Sheila. And thank you for the Szasz quote.

Bawling cattle is what I see when I watch the teabaggers bumping into each other with misspelled signs at gatherings about which they have no clue. They just go where the Beckerhead tells them to go...

I agree about the wording; however, the entire piece was Religion vs. Christianity, so that's the reason for the phrase.

Thanks again, and I love Szasz too.

"'stray from the light and life of Christ's teachings' ... 'Christianity' ...is already deep into the darkness and death of Religion.'"

.

"a growing chasm between Religion and Christianity"

What does this mean?

Because, all religion is politics.

I don't believe this. I know people who are very religious and don't really pay attention to politics.

"they ultimately stray from the light and life of Christianity"

What does this mean? Light and life?

"The religious believe that God belongs to them. Christians know that they belong to God. It's that simple."

Are you not saying the same thing they are saying. Are you not both claiming to know what real Christianity is? Are you not both claiming to know who is a true Christian and who is not a true Christian?

Pretty cut and dried,imo.

thank you.

Other claims seem to be devoid of any meaning.

What do you like about this OP?

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I am unable to find the ones you are talking about. Please explain.

Let's start with phrases which have no meaning, except perhaps for the author of the thread.

"they ultimately stray from the light and life of Christianity"

I imagine if you asked several different people what this phrase meant, you would get several different answers. You could tell me what this phrase means to you, but I still would not know what this phrase means to the OP.

"while descending deeper into the darkness and death of Religion"

Same complaint as above.

"all religion is politics"

Is the OP trying to redefine the word "religion," the word "politics," or is the OP trying something else with this wordplay?

There are some people who are religious but not really political, how does "all religion is politics" work for them?

OK, now for the hypocritical section...

The OP contains a section concerning people, such as Bush and Lyndon Johnson, who credit or blame God for war. The OP seems to believe this credit and blame is inaccurate. The OP also mentions C Street, Pat Robertson, and some others, all who interpret God wrong according to the OP. The OP then states...

"The religious believe that God belongs to them. Christians know that they belong to God. It's that simple."

The OP is accusing people of owning God, which the OP considers to be a bad thing.

Meanwhile, the OP is owning God by claiming to know God's will and by using religion to discredit political foes, such as Bush.

My use of the phrase, "claiming to know God's will," is not referring to someone who believes, "God wants me to volunteer at this soup kitchen," the phrase is referring to the OP's critique of other people's "God wants..."

Both liberal Christians and conservative Christians seem to claim, "My version of the Christian God is accurate, and your version of the Christian God is not accurate."

But first thing I would like to get out of the way is that as long as prominent spokesmen for new atheism, like Same Harris, also give a ringing endorsement for the use of torture, it's pretty hard to narrow the focus on just the Christian fundamentalists. As long as Hitchens and Harris are out there beating the drum for Neoconservative foreign adventures, some people are going to wonder if the new, more aggressive atheist movements are also taking on many aspects of religious cults....some atheists seem to have adopted the hero-worship part for example.

That said, it's not surprising that the more political, the more corrupt, and the more intrusive religious institutions become, the more people are driven away and disgusted by the way the churches operate. I mentioned this in a previous post, that my wife is one of many liberal Catholics who have been turned off by the Catholic Church's strategy of interfering in the political process, not to mention intruding into the sexual habits of the flock. This sort of thing has already happened in Western European countries, where the majority of people consider churches to be hypocritical, dangerous institutions, largely because of their historic role of corruption and political interference. So, it's no surprise that a lot of Americans have a different impression of churches since their grab for power during the last 30 years!

AS for the religious right leaders, both the politicians and the preachers on the religious right probably don't really believe much of their own crap that they preach. It's all for consumption of the masses, and that's why there is this never ending parade of religious right leaders getting caught in sex scandals, drug scandals, and of course the money schemes they've used to enrich themselves off of gullible supporters. The best explanation for this paradox of why they don't practice what they preach, I think is in a book written by psychology professor Robert Altemeyer, called "The Authoritarians" http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~altemey/ The book is now available online free in pdf form. Altemeyer's basic theory from polling data is that the leaders of fascist and proto-fascist movements is that the leaders of these movements have very sharply distinct personality profile differences from their authoritarian followers.

The followers are typical of the people observed at the Teabagger rallies and Sarah Palin booksignings - they have little or no intellectual curiosity, and are fearful and hostile towards people and ideas that are different from their own group think. So, it goes without saying that the followers are far more likely to come from fundamentalist religious homes where they've grown up with more limited choices and a hostility towards "unchristian" ideas. And Altemeyer's polling results reflected this, since people who grew up in more liberal homes, where they had to think for themselves and were given opportunities at younger ages to make decisions, were very unlikely to grow up to be authoritarian followers. One caveat here is that authoritarianism grows and contracts depending on the times. The days and weeks after 9/11 were filled with fear and hysteria, and were a time when many people who would not have otherwise surrendered good judgement for security, did so anyway. And of course, many of those people (like myself) really felt burned when we discovered how our leaders took advantage of that desire for security. In calmer, more prosperous times, many conservatives may start re-evaluating some of their beliefs and become less authoritarian. Unfortunately, considering what we are heading into, I think the odds are that authoritarianism will grow in strength, and could even lead to fascism if it's not stopped!

Anyway, the leaders of authoritarian movements, whom Altemeyer calls "social dominators" have a totally different profile than the pigeons in the flock. They don't necessarily even believe the religious rules that are taught in their churches, and even if they do, they don't believe they apply personally. The social dominators are highly narcisstic (not surprisingly) and believe they are of a special class of people. Many of their views on honesty, personal integrity, rule adherence, are sharply different than the followers of the movement. One finding particularly surprised Altemeyer -- he noticed that the social dominators are actually far more racist than the authoritarian follower.

Occasionally, a subject would score high on both the authoritarian and social dominator scales, and Altemeyer considers this group to be particularly dangerous, since the average social dominator is more likely to be a pragmatic despot, whereas the double high is going to be the dogged leader of a fanatical cult or a wreckless political strategy -- and although George Bush was not a subject for Altemeyer's polling data, he speculates that Dubya would be a likely candidate for a double high, and we're fortunate that his term as president is over.

Okay, this might take awhile, but if you go on atheist forums or atheist meetup groups like Atheist Nexus, you'll get a different definition from everyone who offers to explain the term. And the same thing with the critics of new atheism -- they aren't exactly consistent either.

What is generally accepted, is that a change occurred in the way atheism was presented when a group of four prominent atheist spokesmen -- often referred to as the Four Horsemen: Rickard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett and Christopher Hitchens, started writing books and giving interviews and lectures a few years back. Their books became the 'atheist bestsellers' -- a completely new phenomena, since previous books by atheist philosophers and writers of counter-apologetics never appeared on bestseller lists or in most book stores.

There are two key factors generally recognized in the success of their books and why they are the go-to guys when the media wants to talk to an atheist:

1. The aggressive, often over-the-top rhetoric in these books. With the exception of Dennett, most of the new atheist bestsellers got immediate MSM attention for statements that shocked the public: Dawkins equating teaching religion with child abuse, Harris and Hitchens supporting U.S. invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan (Hitchens still supports the Iraq Invasion, Harris climbed down from that one), but Harris gave a defense of the use of torture in some desperate circumstances (aren't they all!) in the End Of Faith - maybe he was watching too many episodes of 24!

2. Every action creates a reaction. The overreach by fundamentalist Christians in America....briefly, the evangelical takeover of the Republican Party, combined with the installation of religious fanatic president who did more than pay the usual lip service to the Religious Right. The rise of fundamentalism has driven more more secular-minded people out of church, or to liberal non-judgmental churches like the Unitarian/Universalists - who have seen substantial growth in most areas of the U.S. and Canada since the evangelicals decided that they should establish "Christian" principles in government. Besides the falloff in church attendance over the last ten years, the recovery of some declining liberal churches is a trend that should be examined also

The difference between new atheism and the previous atheist positions is usually considered to be that new atheists are bolder and more confrontational. But the reasons why they are more out front and in-your-face should be given a look. I would say it stems from how they view theists and whether they believe theism is a valid belief position for other people.

New atheists, like Dawkins in particular, have written extensively about whether some people need religion, or need to believe in God. Traditionally, most atheists were willing to accept that theists can have valid reasons for maintaining belief in God or other supernatural phenomena such as souls. Many atheist scientists have an opinion that it doesn't matter if people hold these beliefs as long as they don't interfere with how they conduct themselves in the natural world where we all have to live and work. This is probably an unworkable situation, since someone who believes they have a soul will allow that belief to influence decisions they make on issues like stem cell research or euthanasia. So it's impossible to completely compartmentalize religious beliefs from affecting views on science or social issues.

For example, there are some atheists who object to late term abortion, since higher brain functioning areas are developing and establishing connections with other regions of the brain, but the very few self-proclaimed "pro life atheists" cannot make reasonable or logical arguments for taking a "life begins at conception" stand. Unless someone believes that a soul has been dropped into a fertilized egg, they have no valid reason for considering it to be a person. Long story short, this is one topic I debated recently that divides opinion over whether or not people believe in souls, and how adamant they are regarding that belief.

This problem where a relatively innocuous belief can create irrational stands on important social issues is one of the reasons why the New Atheists take on an evangelical fervor about deconverting theists of all stripes, whether they are fundamentalists or moderates. They take an unfriendly approach to liberal Christians just the same as they would to the fundamentalist Christian. Sam Harris has even declared that he has more respect for fundamentalists than the liberals, because they have more straightforward and coherrent beliefs. The problem with the position that everyone will be better and happier as an atheist, is that most theists consider a belief in personal immortality to be crucial, and a belief in God to be important to provide a sense of purpose for living. Those two points are the first objections I hear when I tell people I'm an atheist. They can't understand how I can find a sense of purpose, and why I don't feel despair that I am past the halfway point of life. These are fundamental ways we make sense of the world and deal with life, and I don't think someone else can wade into the world of personal subjective experience, and tell them how they should find purpose and meaning. I've talked to at least one atheist blogger who became a reluctant atheist, and is having problems dealing with these issues. He looks back at his religious past with fondness and wishes he could still believe it.

The hostile attitude new atheists have towards religious liberals might be because the evangelical atheists share more in common with a religious fundamentalist than they do with the more mystical, undefined beliefs of the liberals. The fundamentalists and the new atheists both take a literalist approach to religion and beliefs, so they can argue over the meaning of a biblical verse, without the frustration of having a liberal Christian reinterpret or reformulate their approach by saying it should be viewed allegorically rather than literally. In a way I think Harris hates the liberal Christians because it is more difficult to convert someone to atheism if they have do not have a straightforward, literal interpretation of God and the supernatural. The liberal might say something like:"I feel God's presence" or something like that, and that's a hard thing to try to argue against! I think Dawkins complained about this sort of argument as being like trying to nail jello to a wall. The difference between my POV and the New Atheist, is that I don't want to bother trying to "nail jello to a wall" in the first place. And that's the key difference between New Atheism and atheists who are starting to take on the Humanist label to distinguish themselves from the followers of the Four Horsemen.

incomplete. My definition was, "a handful of authors." Your addition seems to be a hawkish world view plus being outspoken on the subject of theology.

Seems to me de Sade would be a "new atheist," except he was writing a couple of hundred years ago, though de Sade seems to be more aggressive than the "new atheists" you describe.

an aggressive, hawkish approach with the Muslim World. There are no leaders or defining principles of "New Atheism," it's just recognized as a movement, or perhaps no more than a trend in thinking that developed around the influence of the Four Horsemen.

Sam Harris is probably the one who is most responsible for hitching this movement to U.S. foreign policy, since he was an early supporter of invading Afghanistan and Iraq. His reasoning is that Islam is the most dangerous religion in the world, so it should be knocked down first, and then attention can be devoted to bringing down Christianity and other religions. He showed a surprising fondness for Buddhism in his first book, so maybe he would want to keep that one going...but fellow new atheist - Chris Hitchens included long condemnations of Buddhist practice and the Dalai Lama, just to let everyone know he wants to take them down too. But if a lot of new atheist spokesmen decided that Islam must be challenged first, that meant forming an alliance with Neocons and Theocons, which is the opposite approach most atheists would have taken on inter-religious rivalries. Hitchens himself is not a conservative, and in his younger days was a Trotskyite Marxist. But siding with U.S. foreign policy on many issues made him the Neocons favorite atheist and gave him an opportunity for speaking engagements in front of conservative political action groups like the Heritage Foundation.

Most who would identify themselves as new atheists probably don't include a stance on political or global issues, but see it as representing a more vocal and aggressive approach to promoting atheism. Richard Dawkins even started an atheist copy of the gay rights "Out Campaign." On RDF they have a page devoted to the atheist Out Campaign here: http://outcampaign.org/. The other tenet of new atheism that doesn't get as much attention is the perspective that everyone should be an atheist, and atheists should be deconverting theists for their own good. It's not hard to find the similarities between this and the various religious evangelicals pushing their own "truth" that the whole world has to accept.

If you're curious how this plays out in a real life discussion, check out a discussion on the "A Christian And An Atheist" site that liberal Pastor Scott has with American Atheists' President Ed Buckner, who tries to deconvert Pastor Scott with a reverse engineered version of Pascal's Wager -- click on episode 70: "Grilled Pastor for Two," at this page: http://www.achristianandanatheist.com/ to hear an example of atheist fundamentalist evangelism in action.