{"id":462,"date":"2011-09-13T22:44:00","date_gmt":"2011-09-13T22:44:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theatheistrabbi\/2011\/09\/no-god-expect-rampant-pedophilia.html"},"modified":"2011-09-13T22:44:00","modified_gmt":"2011-09-13T22:44:00","slug":"no-god-expect-rampant-pedophilia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theatheistrabbi\/2011\/09\/no-god-expect-rampant-pedophilia.html","title":{"rendered":"No God? Expect Rampant Pedophilia!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

During one recent Republican debate, audience members (whom I assume are not chosen off the streets) whooped and hollered in praise of Rick Perry\u2019s many executions.\u00a0 Last night, during the CNN Republican debate<\/a>, there were shouts of \u201clet him die\u201d when Ron Paul was asked about a hypothetical uninsured comatose man.<\/p>\n

I would wager a substantial amount of money that these folks were all \u2013 or mostly \u2013 God fearing people.<\/p>\n

I present these recent examples of morally uplifting behavior as a contrast to an article by Rabbi Moshe Averick<\/a> instructing us that pedophilia is next on the slippery slope of atheism.\u00a0 Now I don\u2019t know about you, but when I think of pedophilia, it\u2019s not atheists who immediately pop into mind, but I\u2019ll let that lie for now.\u00a0 He goes on to obsess over Princeton University\u2019s Peter Singer for promoting amorality.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know who Singer is, but if (and it\u2019s a big if) he\u2019s being cited accurately, he doesn\u2019t speak for humanists.<\/p>\n

Averick makes the usual point that only an acceptance that humans were made in God\u2019s image can lead us to true morality.\u00a0 Otherwise morality is \u201csimply a word\u201d:<\/p>\n

In my own lifetime I have witnessed radical societal swings in moral behavior and attitudes regarding marriage and sexuality, homosexuality, the killing of unborn children, euthanasia, and the use of illicit drugs.<\/p>\n

He specifically cites one of the firm commandments that emerges from belief in God:<\/p>\n

Thou shalt not have sex with children, and if you do you will be looked upon as a disgusting and contemptible criminal and will be treated as such.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I don\u2019t quite see how he came up with that one, seeing that it contradicts the practice of many religions to marry girls off at a quite tender age.\u00a0 Most western religious folks aren\u2019t thrilled about little girls marrying older men, but please don\u2019t tell me they got that from God.<\/p>\n

Demonstrating his foolishness, Averick closes with this assertion:<\/p>\n

A wise man once observed that while belief in God after the Holocaust may be difficult, belief in man after the Holocaust is impossible. The choices before us are clear: we will either seek a transcendent moral law to which we will all submit, or we will seek our own personal and societal indulgence. If we turn to God in our quest to create a moral and just world, we have a fighting chance; if not, we are doomed to spiral into the man-made hell of the human jungle.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Here we go again.<\/p>\n

For those of you just joining us, Nazi Germany was NOT an atheist society.\u00a0 The Vatican made a pact with the Nazis.\u00a0 Hitler cited God and religion all the time:<\/p>\n

Today Christians \u2026 stand at the head of [this country]\u2026 I pledge that I never will tie myself to parties who want to destroy Christianity .. We want to fill our culture again with the Christian spirit \u2026 We want to burn out all the recent immoral developments in literature, in the theater, and in the press \u2013 in short, we want to burn out the poison of immorality which has entered into our whole life and culture as a result of liberal excess during the past \u2026 (few) years.<\/p>\n

\u2013 Adolf Hitler, quoted in: The Speeches of Adolf Hitler, 1922-1939, Vol. 1 (London, Oxford University Press, 1942), pg. 871-872<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

How\u2019s that for a godly \u201ctranscendent moral law\u201d?<\/p>\n

I have a proposal for Averick and all the other atheist-obsessed religious types.\u00a0 Go gather up all of your fellow religious fanatics.\u00a0 Just to make it easier, confine yourselves to monotheists.\u00a0 Have a long talk about \u201ctranscendent moral law\u201d and then please come to a consensus as to what you figure out (or God tells you).\u00a0 Of course, we expect you to come to complete agreement.\u00a0 Not just about the gays, but on all of the other issues as well, down to who gets to go to heaven and on what basis.<\/p>\n

While you\u2019re busy with that, leave us humanists to to do the same (we\u2019ll solve that heaven question pretty quickly).\u00a0 I promise you that when we\u2019re all done, only one group will be left unbloodied.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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