Perhaps it is in the act of submitting ones will to something outside ones self, even to something as impersonal as a traditional standard of behavior that set these guys off. After all, it seems to me that many atheists are in a sort of adolescent rebellion against authority in general, and they can sense that You Know Who is lurking down that road.
John Hearn | 06.30.06 - 1:32 pm | #

Amen, Mark.
Flambeaux | Homepage | 06.30.06 - 1:34 pm | #

"hard atheism is *essentially* negative"

Amen again. This has been my experience with the public face of atheism. Recall the ugly press releases and reaction from one atheist group to President Bush's beautiful words during the worship service following 9/11.


"I'm keeping RA in my prayers."
I've told atheists before that I will keep them in my prayers and received a similar ugly, negative reply both times: "I'll sacrifice my neighbor's dog for you".

Ok...

Not accusing RA of this behavior...
dpt | 06.30.06 - 2:00 pm | #

Umm....all I can say is wow! The hatred and bile flowing in hte comboxes is like a train wreck...I can't seem to look away.

I have a number of friends and coworkers who are athiests, and some of them do mock and belittle faith-based worldviews, but I have never, even in the most heated debate, encountered anything like I read on that website.

So, why is that I'm hooked and keep returning?
Keith Strohm | Homepage | 06.30.06 - 2:14 pm | #

I went there and read some of the comments, and within minutes, began to feel dizzy from being drenched in other peoples' sheer toxic hatred for one another, for God, for themselves, and for the world in general!

Yikes! Yikes on toast!

If you want a foretaste of what Hell would be like, go there, read that.
Marion (Mael Muire) | 06.30.06 - 2:25 pm | #

I know a number of people who call themselves "atheists" (although what they usually turn out to be is agnostic), but when the subject is religion, I have never met with anything other than courtesy, or at the very least, civility. The most vicious comments about what I believe have always come from fellow believers in something -- one Hindu was particularly obnoxious, especially since he had obviously raised the subject merely to ridicule monotheism.

I would surmise that the attacks on RA result from fellow non-believers seeing in his refusal to (continue) attack(ing) Christians an heretical lapse -- he no longer non-believes the same way they non-believe, ergo, he is "really" a closet believer, heretic or dissenter from "true" atheism. Within a milieu that rejects concepts of social justice or never understood them in the first place, the immediate reaction to non-understanding or non-acceptance of his point of view is identical to that which you'll see among believers: ridicule, name calling, libel, and (of course) outright unthinking rejection of anything he might have to say.

His chief crime, of course, in our positivist age, is to try and have principles based on a consistent interpretation of nature. Brought to their logical end, his investigations will result in his conversion to some form of theism -- but don't hold your breath waiting. It took Mortimer Adler (the "Great Books" philosopher) nearly his entire life to make the journey from nominal Jew to nominal Anglican to practicing Catholic. In "Aristotle for Everybody," you can actually read him arguing with himself in a footnote over the claims of the Catholic Church; you could see where he was headed, but he had to admit it to himself before he could get anywhere.
A. Nonymouse | 06.30.06 - 2:42 pm | #

A re-reading of the comments on RA's blog confirm me in my opinion. I've seen much worse spewing out of the mouths of people who (sometimes violently) assert their own Christianity, usually with the aim of disparaging that of anyone who does not meet their high standards or conform to their particular principles.
A. Nonymouse | 06.30.06 - 2:52 pm | #

"I've seen much worse spewing out of the mouths of people who (sometimes violently) assert their own Christianity"

In my experience, I'm not sure worse but definitely ugliness unbecoming of a Christian. Though again, we all have weaknesses and shortcomings to overcome, and unfortunately many are exposed in the public sphere.
dpt | 06.30.06 - 2:59 pm | #

He's also said he's going to try to swear off mockery and sarcasm.

Are you going to take the same pledge, Mark?
skeptical catholic | 06.30.06 - 3:05 pm | #

No. I know my limits.
Mark Shea | Homepage | 06.30.06 - 3:10 pm | #

Evil turns upon itself.

Thank you, Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, for that valuable life lesson.
Brian | 06.30.06 - 3:13 pm | #

Mark,
Awesome post! Thanks for bringing this to folks attention. I've been over at his blog since September 2005 trying to present the face of the reasonable believer to counter the caricature they mostly hold too. The recent change is just...breathtaking, miraculous, amazaing.

I'd also like to encourage everyone to pray for TRA. He's under withering attack from many fronts. Not just from his own commenters, but from others in the online atheist community.

As you already said. What he needs now is friends, support, and prayers.
SteveG | 06.30.06 - 3:56 pm | #

+J.M.J+

Are any of the ranting commentors in his combox over the age of fifteen?

Reading some of the comments, it's interesting how atheists feel like a persecuted minority and fear that if Christians turn the US into a theocracy they would kill all the atheists. Evangelicals feel much the same way about "secular humanists".

I've often noticed how just about every group in the US sees itself as oppressed in one way or another. Jews feel like second class citizens in a country with a Christian majority. Anti-Semites believe that "the Jews run everything" and so are oppressing them! African Americans live with our country's ignoble history of race relations and lingering prejudice to this day. White supremicists believe that affirmative action prefers blacks and so "oppresses" whites. Christians fear that secular humanists in the media and academia will eventually usher in an era of persecution, while atheists and secular humanists fear a possible future "theocracy". Feminists insist that women are still oppressed, while men's rights groups point to examples of unfairness against men.

Praytell, does anyone in this country actually consider themselves a first class citizen?

(BTW, I'm not saying that all of the above=listed aggrieved groups are correct, just that this is how they perceive things. Some have an accurate perception, others do not.)

In Jesu et Maria,
Rosemarie | 06.30.06 - 4:05 pm | #

Rosemarie,

I think your age question is dead on.

My experience with some of these folks reminds me of some friends of mine who spent WAY to much effort in high school proving that they were not, in fact, their parents.

And I am, in fact, a first class citizen. You have our leave to withdraw.
Ed the Roman | 06.30.06 - 5:15 pm | #

It is generally speaking not a good practice to be ranking "citizens" in the same way that we rank airline seating. Not as Christians, anyway. In the eyes of God we are all of the same class--the class of sinners. Ed the Roman is not a "first class" sinner; he's the same kind that I am--stone classless and totally dependent on grace for the hope that one needs just to keep on keepin' on.
It is almost a cliche to say that many atheists, in their obsessional, persistent and visceral opposition to God are actually closer to God than an awful lot of soi-dissant theists who almost never give God a second thought. That said, there is always hope of flipping such an atheist. And we should try to do so, both by praying for them, and by attempting to discuss our faith with them in a non-judgemental and non-confrontational manner. We should take every opportunity to witness for Christ to any person seen to be hungry for the truth. And most professed and "militant" atheists are hungry for the truth. They just haven't found yet found it. Quietly show them--seventy times seven times, if that's what it takes.
Rob | 07.01.06 - 7:28 am | #

+J.M.J+

>>>It is generally speaking not a good practice to be ranking "citizens" in the same way that we rank airline seating.

Don't get me wrong; I'm not personally ranking them that way. I'm just pointing out that many people feel that way about society's acceptance of them and the opportunities open to them. I certainly do not believe that Jews, African Americans or others who have been victims of prejudice in this country are "second-class" Americans; they are just as American as the rest of us, they've just been shafted by certain elements in our society.

I'm just fascinated how so many different groups can see themselves as "oppressed", including those seen as privileged by others.

In Jesu et Maria,
Rosemarie | 07.01.06 - 12:45 pm | #

Rosemarie--
Yes, I acknowledge that you were making a valid point about the ubiquity of "victimhood."
Rob | 07.01.06 - 2:21 pm | #

In my experience, many militant atheists have had traumatic experiences in the past where theists have wronged them in some way. Some of it is real, and some of it is percieved, but real or not, it drives a wedge between God and man.

Many other people have had traumatic natural evils happen to them for which they blame God. Rather than study what happened and the thoeries on why, they preffer to throw a hissy fit.
bookstopper | Homepage | 07.02.06 - 1:44 am | #

bookstopper--
Regardless of how they fell into error, they, like the man left for dead at the roadside by robbers, need the help of any Good Samaritan who encounters them in their dire straits.
Rob | 07.02.06 - 8:44 am | #

Atheists have a vested interest in presenting and regarding themselves as an oppressed minority with little or no power. In western culture, as a distortion of Christian concern for the poor and downtrodden, victim status confers tremendous power. The Protestant "minority" in Occupied Ireland has maintained its postion for centuries by indoctrinating itself and the British public with the idea that if the lid is taken off "the papists," society will dissolve in chaos, and all their ancient liberties and freedoms destroyed. The atheists, abortionists, socialists, etc., in the rest of the world have learned the lesson well.
A. Nonymouse | 07.03.06 - 8:00 am | #

A. Nonymouse--
Perhaps. But it is also the case that identifiable minorities actually *have been oppressed*, either by a homongenous majority, or by a coalition of other minority groups throughout history and in nearly every place where disparate cultures have collided. We are told by anthropologists that it all began with the confrontation of neanderthal man, homo erectus, and homo sapiens tens of thousands of years ago, shortly after the emergence of the latter from Africa, into the Near East and Eurasia. The self-appellations of primitive tribes usually translates as "the human beings," while what they call their nearly indistinguisable neighbors is somewhat less flattering. I take it all as more evidence of Original Sin.
Rob | 07.03.06 - 9:27 am | #

Of course. The point is not to disparage legitimate cases in which there is a genuinely oppressed minority, but to point out that, just as with everything good in our fallen state, it can be twisted for evil purposes.

Unfortunately, many people presume because some people illegitimately claim "victim status" and use it as a power play, that nobody is oppressed, and it's just whining -- or, on the other side of the political/philosophical spectrum, that if some people abuse their rights of property, life, or liberty, this justifies the abolition of private property, life, or liberty.

On the contrary -- a basic principle of western society, rooted in natural law (and, incidentally, a tacit acknowledgment of the Fall) is that "abuse does not invalidate use." As I've said before, no one may be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process -- and the existence of a general level of misery or injustice does not justify amercing innocent persons, regardless of the justification. Caiphas believed that it was better that one (innocent) man suffer rather than the whole people should perish -- but he was wrong.
A. Nonymouse | 07.03.06 - 4:07 pm | #

"Caiphas believed that it was better that one (innocent) man suffer rather than the whole people should perish--but he was wrong."


A. Nonymouse--
That's why I'm against capital punishment and war using contemporary weaponry that kills more civilians than combatants.
Rob | 07.03.06 - 4:39 pm | #

Gee, Rob, contemporary weaponry does a lot better on not killing civilians than the weaponry of sixty years ago.

If you prefer to eschew everything except what can be delivered by ground units that can observe their targets, you can vote for that. You will not like the result very much. One of the reasons that we developed the enhanced radiation warhead (AKA neutron bomb) is that it presented no significant risk to the urban populations: by the time ER weapons would be going off in a city, its inhabitants would be gone or killed by the Soviet artillery and armor moving into town. Remember what that town at the end of Saving Private Ryan looked like? Towns hit with ER were already going to look worse than that BEFORE the ER was fired.
Ed the Roman | 07.03.06 - 6:59 pm | #

An internet atheist swearing off mockery and sarcasm. This I have to see. If you take away the vitriol, most of them have nothing left to say.
Jeffrey S. Smith | 07.04.06 - 7:07 pm | #