Worrying Out Loud

There seems to be a taboo in this country where you're not allowed to talk about others religious beliefs. You can debate everything such as politics, medicine, and everything in between. But as soon as you bring up religion, it's taboo. You have to be careful as you don't want to 'offend' the person. My aim is not to deliberately offend anyone. More so, I am worrying out loud. I am concerned that the progress of civilization is being stalled by outdated dogma from the bronze age. A majority of people are not only taking moral guidance from a book that is a couple of thousand years old, but also using it as an ample explanation of how natural orders work.

You ask why am I attacking God? I ask, why are you looking the other way? A majority of religious people, moderates as well, tend to stick their fingers in their ears and go La, La, La, as if the evidence were there as some sort of inconvenience to their belief. I realize I may offend some people but as I am coming to find out there is no easy way to tell a person that what they have based their life on may very well be wrong. You may also say I have no right to tell a person that they are wrong. From their point of view I can see this. People hold their beliefs very closely to the heart as it gives them a security blanket. When you tell someone they are wrong, you are immediately touching on their self sense of security. But I say oh boo hoo. Who cares if your wrong! You have to be open minded about the possibility of being wrong. Who cares if your offended. Sure, I am offended by things as well. Like Dawkins, I am offended when children are denied a proper education. I am offended when children are indoctrinated and told they might spend all eternity in hell. I am offended when medical science is compromised and has the potential to cure many diseases. But how else are we supposed to progress as a society if we first don't nuke the foundations?

You may also tell me that religion isn't all evil and it does so many good things for humanity. I would agree. In this blog I will not focus on the evil of religion, as there are plenty of other resources that point it out clearly, and I do realize religion does do a lot of good things and in many ways promotes peace. So what is my problem with it? The surrender of the mind. The alienation from nature into a dogmatic worldview.

So here it is, this is what we're up against: We have people like Ken Ham founder of the Creation Museum, who claims the Grand Canyon was the result of Noah's Flood and people roamed among the dinosaurs. Michael Behe of the Discovery Institute, who leads the Intelligent Design movement making an embarrassment of science by wanting equal time in the classroom against evolution. It's just bad science. Luckily the Supreme Court saw right through it in the Kitzmiller vs. Dover case. Then there is Patrick Henry College near Washington D.C., whose main goal is to train fundamentalist evangelical Christians to become political leaders. We have homeschool children being told to deny science as it cant explain anything. Once we can move past these outdated views and road blocks, we can focus on really important topics in science and moral civilization. There are many diseases to be cured and many many questions in science we can put our efforts into.

You will also say, but you haven't been to my church, they don't teach that. Yeah it may not where you are, but it may be happening in the church across the street from yours. Or it may be happening in the home next to yours. And this is why... I am worrying out loud.

"Nothing is more dangerous than a dogmatic worldview - nothing more constraining, more blinding to innovation, more destructive of openness to novelty." - Stephen Jay Gould