The Church of Atheism

talesofbeingtj:

1) It is not true that “people who work for churches don’t pay taxes”.

<more details on this>

I knew there was some component I had wrong in my supposition. I wonder though: do the clergy pay for the food they eat at church? I’m genuinely asking because I simply don’t know, but I need to know for my essay.

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2) I agree with you about TV evangelists being general fuckwads, but let’s not cast everyone with religious beliefs in with the worst extreme examples, shall we?

I never intended to lob all religious people in with the TV evangelists or other extremists. I was merely listing them as an example of people even on the “highly advocative and vocal side” who actually care more about money.

I’m well aware that those people are, in fact, a minority — but do keep in mind that they still reach audiences of many millions of viewers.

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<lots of excellent examples of churches doing great, wonderful things>

These are great things to read; if you have other examples feel free to email some to me, I’m hoping to pick a few truly wonderful ones to include in my essay as examples of good, positive things the churches of the world do.

I do want to say one thing, though: all those things can be (and are) coordinated by any group of people coming together to just do good things, religious or not. There is nothing that keeps a bunch of atheists or agnostics from getting together and help others like that, and in fact I’ve seen that happen plenty of times (and participated/helped on occasion).

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Painting all religious people with the same brush is a lazy argument and a stereotype. I’m guessing you’re against stereotypes, so let’s not make an exception that stereotypes are bad “except for those awful religious people”.

Again, I never intended to group all religious people together. Also, I never used the words “awful religious people” and I didn’t think you were attempting to make that look like a quote, but it does have the potential to be interpreted that way.

I’m very much in agreement that stereotyping — in any direction — is a bad thing, so I’ll make sure to be more clear in future writings when I’m using a subset as an example that they are distinctly a subset, and not representative of the whole.

What I’m writing about and fighting against is the negative influences and impact religion has on our society, culture and freedoms—nothing more than that. Not the people, but religion itself (and all religions at that). That’s what my essay is about and I’ll make extra-extra certain that it’s unquestionably clear what (small) subsets my critiques are of and that they are not of religion as a whole nor all religious people themselves.

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3) I would be in total favor of the Mormon church’s tax exempt status being challenged after the lobbying work they did against Prop 8 in California. (For that matter I would be in favor of removing tax exempt status from churches which refuse to ordain women and/or gay/lesbian people.) Once your “church” has started pouring that much money to influence elections, you’re essentially a lobbying firm, not a church.

I think that opens up a can of worms as to where to draw the line. Separation of church and state should not be a large, fuzzy gray area—it should be very simple, strict and across the board.

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4) I think the USA ought to do what Europe has done for ages, which is to separate the religious and civil aspects of marriage.

Even in Europe it’s not quite as nice as you make it out to be. In some countries, gays can get married and have the same rights as heterosexual married people (unlike the gay marriage in the few US states that allow it). But in many countries still, those (civil) rights are not truly equal.

The Same-sex Marriages wikipedia page has the breakdown on it all, and it’s not quite as across-the-board as “Europe” at all. Only five countries fully acknowledge & support it, though many (but still not all) do have a “Civil union” that covers most (and sometimes all) of the same perks as what used to be “Married”.

Still: it would be fantastic if the USA as a whole would go the direction of most of these European countries. It definitely would be a massive win for equality.

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(I don’t think anyone can make a coherent anti-gay marriage argument without a religious component, which means that it ought to be allowed in a country which is supposed to separate matters of church and state.)

And there you have the crux of the issue at hand and the reason why I’m increasingly vocal about all this: “supposed to” is not the same as “is”.

I want it to be “is” and I’ll fight for that to happen in every way I can.

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I completely understand the anger that people feel when they see the extreme religious right zealots out there. Just remember that they’re extremists, not elected representatives. (I suppose the Pope is sort of elected, but there are a lot of Catholics who think the Pope/church’s stance on condoms, etc is narrowminded and stupid, and the Pope certainly doesn’t represent the bulk of Christians, nevermind Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, etc.)

My essay is all over this but I really need to refine it more before I can quote excerpts. I’ll try and get it done soon though.

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For what it’s worth.

It’s worth a lot. It really is, and I thank you for putting all of that down for me to take into consideration. Definitely keep pointing out any flaws I make in my rhetoric and claims, because I’m just as fallible as any man can be.

Source: kurafire