Featured Atheists Attack Billy Graham

The new atheists are militant and have no common courtesy or manners. They are not exactly good-natured.

A few years ago Billy Graham gave a crusade here in Indianapolis. I was astonished to see pickets outside the old Hoosier Dome with all sorts of weird accusations.

Americans seem to be drifting away from the ideal of freedom of conscience, and certainly the new atheists would like to restrict freedom of conscience. They believe in scientism and evolution.

 

Let's be careful of too broad a brush. I have a friend who is a 'new atheist' who is a gentleman is his demeanour and behaviour. When we suspected our daughter-in-law had leukaemia he sent a donation to the Irish Cancer Society on her name. He had me write a guest post on his blog. He is kinder than many Christians with whom I disagree

 

From what I've seen it's usually the antitheists (typically believe that theism is the world's biggest cause of problems) that act this way moreso than the atheists.
Yeah, they are hypocrites when they do this, because often they are guilty of acting the same way they accuse many theists of: acting self-righteous, stifling freedom of speech, etc.

I have to agree that not all atheists are like that, though. Those that respect opinions other than their own do exist. The militant ones are just more vocal.

 

Good explanation of the difference between antitheists and atheists. My friend, believe it or not, says though he is an atheist he sees the great contributions that Christiniaty has made and tends to see us in a positive light. He also sees the great damage Islam has done and exposes their present horrors. He even bought a book called 'The Atheist Delusion' which described the contributions of the church through history.

He is embarrassed by the ugly antitheists much as we are embarrassed by some of our brethren who show the same kind of unkindness and vitriol. If I can find the story I'll need to ask him about how he feels about this post.

My friend and I differ on almost every issue, but we never have to resort to attacking each other or throwing out implications and innuendo against each other. It makes for pleasant conversation.


Either way, I am sure that Dr Graham sees this as something to be expected. It is what Jesus foretold.

 

C4K, how do you define the term "new atheist"? I am talking about people like Dawkins and Hitchens. You seem to be talking about an old-style atheist. The new atheists don't believe in freedom of conscience in my opinion, but I am awaiting to hear your defense of them on that issue.

 

That's a fair question. I don't know about the term I guess, I just know that Geoff labels himself as a 'new atheist. '

 

I've heard these two labeled as anti-theists. They oppose belief in deity as opposed to those who are against the idea of anything coming about as a result of a supernatural being or supernatural events.

If transposed in the context of pre-historicity the former would destroy any temple where any sort of deity is worshipped and subjugate those who believe in that or those deity or deities (think Maozedung, Red Guards, Lenin, communist re-education camps, etc) to create a new society of "enlightened" citizens whose belief is in themselves while the latter, the atheists, are perfectly willing to engage THE IDEA itself (and not the resulting action) while comfortable with existing side by side with those who do worship deity and subscribe to the supernatural.

Rather a mouthful, eh ?:smilewinkgrin::laugh:
:laugh:
In Christian context, the neo-atheists are Arminians or Calvinists who are not content with simply disproving the other's doctrine without becoming rather personal in their attack of the other's beliefs or defense of theirs through sarcasm, indirect personal insults (or even direct), caustic sarcasm, and like stuff, while the classic atheists would be the equivalent of the Arminian or Calvinist who avoid any remark that may cause insult to the other or be interpreted as such by the other, and instead remain focused on the sciptural and/or intellectual merits of his argumentation and debate.

Another way to put it is neo-atheists are faux humanists while classical atheists are true humanists.

(that's it, I'm out of breath.....:laugh

 

Isn't it a shame how often this holds true?More proof of how Christians need to focus on US and what we should be doing instead of what the atheists are doing.

Want to know how to combat an atheist? Love him.:thumbsup:

 

Agreed. Treating him like an enemy will only alienate him further.

Lots of atheists who talk to me online have all these assumptions regarding how I'm going to respond to and treat them. They expect me to reflect the logical fallacies and hostilities of other Christians they've interacted with.

Not all, certainly, but I think a lot of them are upset because of the way Christians have treated them, or how they perceive some Christians have treated them. Sometimes these perceptions are not real but imagined or planted by someone else.
Because I've been in a similar position myself, though mine was more about leaving a sub-denomination, I can understand.

 

I think you can include drug abusers, homosexuals, abortionists, atheists, agnostics and many others in that same category. They come out with guns a blazing because of what they have perceived the church's view of them to be from past interactions with some very unloving Christians, and folks in the media who are often presented as the face of Christianity while presenting nothing of the love of Christ.

When most of the depictions they get from the church are about the church being against XYZ specific sin, but never seeming to hear the church express concern about ALL of their sin, it comes across as hateful and judgmental.

Perhaps the church needs to stop making a big deal about specific sins and start making a bigger deal about the need to repent of ALL sin?

 

I tend to agree.:thumbsup:

 

While I agree the Church should proclaim to whole counsel of God regarding sin, and perhaps in many cases certain parts of the Church focus on certain sins while ignoring others, I do think that no matter how the Church preaches against sin many folks are going to be offended when their particular sin is spoken against. The unregenerate don't like to hear that they are sinners, and thus they will consider judgmental anyone who speaks out against their pet sin, particularly when society has said that such a sin is only normal or natural...or even a civil right.

Yes, we should be loving in our sharing the truth, but the truth must be told regarding sin (whatever it is). If one doesn't think he has sinned, one will not feel the need to repent and embrace the Gospel. On the other hand, those with whom we share the Gospel must know that we have sinned as well so that in sharing the Law and Gospel we are not looking down upon them as somehow being better than them.

 

I have found that the unregenerate have no problem accepting that they are sinners. They just don't like the idea that many in the church seem to promote of them going to hell because of one particular sin in their lives. For sure one sin can get you to hell. But repenting of one and not the gazillion others ain't gonna mean much in the scope of eternity.

They are, in part, rightly getting upset because we're not doing what God called us to do which is preaching the Gospel. The Gospel directs people to repent of ALL their sin.

It by some miraculous good fortune we convinced an atheist that there is a God, unless he repented of ALL of his sins and not just the idolatry of atheism, he'd still go to hell.

Preach the Gospel.

But that applies to ALL sin. Of late , wen many in the church speak to sin, it's always a specific sin with little or no regard for the REST of the sin.

An unsaved person who is finally convinced that homosexual marriage is not Biblical would still be on the way to hell, and all we would have done was successfully convince someone that they were wrong about an issue.

We MUST preach the Gospel and the Gospel speaks to ALL sin.

Specific sin is to be dealt with amongst those WITHIN the church.

Again, that's why we should focus on repenting of ALL of the sin and not just one

Unfortunately, that's exactly how a lot of folks perceive it when all they hear from us is that we're against certain issues.

Why are we so well known for what we're against instead of Who we are for?

 

But it's that one particular sin that people are now claiming is NOT really a sin and are trying to foist on the rest of us, even proposing legislation to make it a hate crime to speak out against it in Church.

If that's the case, it should be corrected. However, the Church shouldn't shrink back from talking about sin in particular (all sins) just to speak of general vague repentence, particularly if folks are deluding themselves to think their particular vice is not really sinful (whatEVER it happens to be).

I think so much time is expended on one particular sin (homosexuality) because not only is there a big push to regard the expression of that as normal and a civil right, but now you got folks in churches revising Scripture to accommodate them, assuring us that it's really NOT a sin and that those who regard it as such are just 'bigots'. The effects of this revisionism is hindering folks even in the church from recognizing that homosexual activity is sinful, so, yeah, we need to correct such wrong headed interpretations for the sakes of the souls of those who are caught up in it. For if they don't agree that it really is a sin, they aren't going to repent of it--and this goes for any particular sin that has been rationalized away by individuals or society--and they will be damned thereby.

 

So what though? Are we to be disobedient because the world is claiming something is not a sin? It's as though we're offended that unsaved people act unsaved when we used to be the same way.

How are they foisting any more sin upon us? Sin is here and has been since the fall of man. Perhaps sin seems to be proliferating because we, the church--- the ones who are supposed to be preaching the word that sets men free, are too busy complaining about one sin instead of calling men to repentance of ALL their sin?

What does it matter if they think their VICE is not really sinful? Show them the totality of ALL their sin and they will see why there is a need for a GOD Who saves.

Then be the church and kick the false teachers out if they don't submit to correction.

History shows that you're not gonna convince many folks that we love them and are concerned about their eternal souls when we constantly bark at them about one sin with seemingly no regard for the rest of them.

All a person has to do is recognize that they fall short and are a committer of SINS. There are a lot of times when people have sinned and they don't even know it. Not knowing ain't gonna keep a person out of hell. Preaching the GOSPEL points to a repentance of ALL sin.

THAT is the message we have been commissioned of God to deliver. But we're upset that unsaved people would dare try to say that something isn't a sin when we've often done the same thing.

 

Thanks, PinoyBaptist, for the good definition! I always hear Dawkins and Hitchens called New Atheists, and I think that you described them correctly as willing to engage in personal insults. The ones attacking the Graham website in my mind are also petty criminals.

Perhaps you have heard tapes of Madelyn Murray O'Hair. She was very poorly educated and you could be the most highly educated person with the most loving personality and she would not be polite or kind to you but even she was not like Dawkins and Hitchens.

With me the issue that these New Atheists raise is do they believe in the very freedom of conscience that has allowed them to flourish when they do not show common human decency to the average Christian. Obama with his frontal attacks on Catholicism in particular also raises doubts in my mind about his commitment to liberty. The case where Obama expelled the Germans who sought sanctuary to homeschool their children in the name of religious liberty, a right denied in regimented Germany, also raises questions in my mind about Obama's commitment to freedom of conscience.

To reiterate, the attack upon the property of Billy Graham is criminal.

 

It's not the world, it's people inside some churches now who are watering down the truth to accommodate the spirit of the age.

My comment was in regards to possible persecution that may come if laws are passed which prohibit Churches from speaking out against homosexual activity. And you do realized that ALL their sin includes specific particular sins, right? One cannot be said to repent of ALL their sin, if they are tenaciously clinging to one particular pet sin.

ALL sin includes the totallity of particular sins--you realize that, right?