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Christians love to claim that God is omni-everything. God is all-powerful. God is all-knowing. God is all-good. They say that even though the God as presented in their bible is obviously none of these things. But more importantly, given the way the universe is no God is that way … or at least here is an argument to that effect.

God is all-powerful. That is God is omnipotent. Omnipotence is defined as having the capacity to do anything that is logically possible to do. I’m not asking that God be able to make a square circle or a married bachelor or even a rock that is too heavy for he himself to lift. All of those things are logically impossible to do. But before we bestow the label of omnipotence God must be able to interact in the world to change what would have naturally occurred should he decide it is worthwhile to do.

God is all-knowing. That is God is omnipotent. Omniscience means that God knows everything that is logically possible to know. For the sake of this argument I am not going to even demand that God know the future, but he does need to know everything about the present.

God is all-good. That is God is omnibenevolent. Omnibenevolence means that God wants good for all members of his creation.

A God who is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent is a God that I will refer to as omnimax.

There is one more term that needs defining in this argument, and that is “unnecessary suffering”. Unnecessary suffering is any suffering beyond the minimum it would take to achieve a greater good. Suffering that leads to a greater good that could not have been achieved in a way that would have involved less suffering is considered necessary.

Here is the logic of the argument:

(1) If God is omniscient then he knows unnecessary suffering exists.
(2) If God is omnibenevolent then he wants to prevent it.
(3) If God is omnipotent then he has the power to prevent it.
(4) Unnecessary suffering exists.
(5) Therefore, God cannot be omnimax.

The logic is straight-forward deductive logic and is therefore a logically valid argument. But is it a logically sound argument? The soundness of the argument depends upon the truth of the premises. Premises 1, 2, and 3 follow directly from the definitions of omniscient, omnibenevolent, and omnipotent so they are certainly true. So the soundness of the argument rests solely on the truth or falsity of premise 4 … Unnecessary suffering exists.

What would it take for premise 4 to be false? Well, it would be false if every instance of suffering in the world leads to some greater good that could not have been achieved with less suffering. And that is the ONLY way it can be false. With that realization it should be obvious that premise 4 is true and therefore the argument itself is true. But, I have found that religious people often have no problems denying the obvious when it comes to rationalizing their beliefs. So let me make argument that premise 4 is true.

Theistic arguments often divide suffering into two types; one that results from human misdeeds (we’ll call that “moral suffering”), and one that results from the random actions of nature (we’ll call that “natural suffering”). Theists generally justify moral suffering with the free-will defense. That argument goes something like this:

Moral suffering is mankind’s fault not God’s. God gave mankind free will and with it comes the power to do evil things. God doesn’t want us to choose evil things, but if we do then God is forced to allow it so that free will will be maintained.

So in the context of my argument, the greater good that comes from moral suffering is the maintenance of free will. Does that REALLY make sense? Let’s look at the holocaust. 6,000,000 Jews were gassed and died. How many German officers and soldiers used their free will to implement it? I certainly don’t know, but I’m sure that it was much less than 6,000,000. Wasn’t the free will of every killed Jew cut short at death? So if God wanted to maximize free will wouldn’t it have been better to curtail the Nazi free will to save that of the victims?

Well, let’s suppose it wasn’t. Let’s suppose that an act on the part of God that eliminated the holocaust altogether could not have been achieved in any way that didn’t undermine free will in a way that was worse than by allowing the 6,000,000 Jewish deaths. Could not the salvation of free will have been achieved with less suffering?

A few Jews did escape the holocaust, and that doesn’t seem to have hurt free will greatly. Couldn’t God have done something such that a single Jew could have survived limiting the suffering to 5,999,999 and still have maintained free will? Couldn’t just one of those Jews have successfully escaped without damaging free will? If so then unnecessary suffering took place and God cannot be omnimax.

The theistic defense of natural suffering generally centers on the unexpected consequences of having a less random universe. For instance, if there were no earthquakes then there would be no plate tectonics. Without plate tectonics there would be no uplift of land areas and by now all the land would have eroded away into the ocean. But couldn’t God have prevented one of those earthquakes? Were they ALL necessary? How about just preventing the 1556 Shaanxi earthquake in China that killed an estimated 830,000 people. Seems to me that would have prevented a significant amount of suffering without undue harm to plate tectonics.

This is a picture of a baby born with Harlequin Fetus Syndrome. Harlequin Fetus Syndrome is a birth defect that has been reported to occur once in every 300,000 live births. It results from a mutation of the ABCA12 gene which codes for a protein that is responsible for the transport of lipids across the cell membranes of skin cells. Babies with this mutation undergo abnormal skin development. The skin becomes very thick and non-pliable. It constricts and as it does so it cracks forming those giant scale-like plates that can be seen in the picture. Also as the skin contracts the eyelids are everted and the mouth takes that characteristic appearance.

The disease was first described in 1750 and until very recently all children died from it within a few days. Death generally occurred from dehydration (the baby was unable to nurse with his malfomed mouth), constriction of the skin around the chest cavity causing suffocation, or by bacterial infection through the cracks in the skin. Recently the acne drug, Isotretinoin, has been shown to be helpful and has allowed some of the children born with the disease to survive into early adolescence and a few are reaching adulthood now.

Needless to say any family touched by this birth defect is going to undergo suffering. What possible greater good could come of this?

One conceivable answer is that a family faced with this horror could be drawn closer together. But as a general rule this is not true. Parents that suffer a death of a child have higher divorce rates than those who don’t. The stress tears families apart … it does not bring them together.

Another possible answer is that the child undergoing such suffering could inspire others to heights of nobility that they would not have achieved otherwise. Indeed, in looking up information on the subject I came across the story of Ryan Gonzalez one of the survivors of Harlequin Fetus Syndrome. The problems he has overcome and the things he has accomplished certainly are inspiring. But that by no means overshadows the thousands of others who died horrible painful deaths within a couple of weeks of their birth. Couldn’t God have prevented those needless deaths until the time came when someone like Ryan would survive and be an inspiration for us?

Harlequin Fetus Syndrome is inherited in an autosomal recessive pattern. That means the fetus must have two copies of the defective gene (one from each parent) for the trait to be expressed. Thus, to prevent the disease God would have needed to help an unaffected sperm cell fertilize the cell instead of the one that actually did. Compared to curing cancer, that seems like child’s play.

I have used the holocaust, earthquakes, and birth defects as examples, and they certainly have caused a great deal of human suffering, and some people believe that suffering MUST have had some higher purpose even if we cannot fathom it. Otherwise the tragedy would be unbearable.

To avoid that appeal to the unknown let’s take a different approach.

Those lines in the sidewalk are ants. They are all dead. I don’t know what killed them, but I suspect the hot Florida sidewalk had at least something to do with it. What about all the ants that have died unnoticed on hot sidewalks. What greater good comes from that suffering? Their suffering doesn’t inspire other ants … ants act by instinct. Their suffering doesn’t inspire us … we didn’t notice. They suffered for no apparent greater good.

If any of that suffering above is unnecessary — and I don’t see how anyone can rationally maintain that all of it leads to greater goods that could not have been achieved with less suffering — then unnecessary suffering exists and an omnimax God is impossible.

But let’s not stop there. What does a less than omnimax God mean? It means that God is either not knowledgeable enough to know that unnecessary suffering exists, doesn’t care enough to prevent it, or is not powerful enough to prevent it.

If God is not knowledgeable enough to know that unnecessary suffering exists, what else does he not know? From a human perspective — the only source of knowledge we have to predict what an non-omniscient God knowledge would be like — it would be easier to tell if a baby is about to be born with Harlequin Fetus Syndrome (do amniocentesis and check on the ABCA12 genes) than it is to read someone’s mind. That alone should put in doubt God’s ability to answer prayers. Indeed, scientific studies that attempt to assess the efficacy of intercessory prayer are coming to a strong but tentative conclusion that it doesn’t help.

If God doesn’t care enough to prevent unnecessary suffering, then why does this asshole deserve worship? He certainly isn’t the basis for moral behavior.

If God isn’t powerful enough to prevent unnecessary suffering — especially suffering that could be prevented from nudging a particular sperm out of the way — then what makes you think he was powerful enough to have created the entire universe and planned out life to be the way it is? It just doesn’t make sense.

So what is the most likely conclusion? … For me the answer is again obvious. God is not omnipotent, omniscient, nor omnibenevolent. But it isn’t his fault. He doesn’t exist.

I am an atheist. I call myself a vocal atheist. That is I speak my mind about atheism quite forcefully … especially in blogs like this one. For that reason I get labelled a militant atheist by people who think that atheists should just keep quite. It seems that my term has not caught on amongst other vocal atheists like Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, or PZ Myers. The term they use most is new atheist. I’m not so sure exactly how new our type of atheism is, but I do prefer it to militant atheism.

Militant atheism is a pejorative term. Let’s do a google news search using the search term “militant Christian”. I get 1 hit to this story. There is one line in the story that equates “militant Christians” to terrorists.

Now let’s do a google news search using the search term “militant Jew”. Again I get a single hit to this story. It refers to the rise of an underground Jewish organization that carries out bombings.

How about “militant Hindu”? This time I get 11 hits and all refer to groups of Hindus that are willing to kill people of other religions.

“Militant Muslims”? Somewhat surprisingly I got only 7 hits, and again all of them refer to Muslims who are willing to kill people.

Now lets do a search on “militant atheist” Again I got 7 hits. One story equates militant atheists to religious fundamentalists, two stories are about Christopher Hitchens, one is about Richard Dawkins, one is about Bill Maher, another mentions Ralph Ingersoll (an atheist in the late 1800’s), and the other is a review of a novel by Philip Roth who the reviewer calls a militant atheist.

So what was the point of that? For Christians, Jews, Hindus, and Muslims the term “militant” seems to be restricted to people who advocate (or are perceived to advocate) terrorism. Neither Hitchens, Dawkins, Maher, Roth, or Ingersoll ever advocated anything like that. Neither do I.

So why is it that we get labelled “militant”? The answer is that we vocally criticize religion. We say that at its heart religion is a really stupid thing to believe. I wont speak for others, but for me I would be very happy if it were to disappear altogether. Religious people read things like that and they call us “militant” when they REALLY mean intolerant. But I will argue that they are wrong even there. We are not intolerant, or at least not intolerant in a manner that matters.

What constitutes intolerance? Dictionaries often include lack of respect for the beliefs of others. Under this definition I suppose I am intolerant of religion. I don’t respect a belief system that says that God made the world for man, gave him a bunch of “laws” that are so heinous that no one, not even fundamentalists, would consider obeying nowadays, then waited until 2000 years ago so he could impregnate a virgin and have his son (who is really himself) born into the world wait 30 years of his 33 year long life before doing anything of note, then spend his last 3 years preaching in a backwater country, so he could con the Romans and Jews into crucifying him unmercifully somehow paying a nonspecific debt that everybody from then on in perpetuity could be forgiven their sins (but for some reason couldn’t have unless Jesus/God died) and achieve eternal bliss in a non-material paradise communing with God (even though they didn’t seem to enjoy communing with him that much while he was here on Earth). I think the belief is ridiculous, frankly. And that is why I often ridicule it.

But who cares? What I am NOT advocating is that religious people should be forbidden the right to practice their religion. I am NOT advocating that religious people be denied jobs because of it. I am NOT advocating that religious people should be forbidden much of anything except the right to force their religion (or to force RESPECT for their religion) on others.

Yes, I would be ecstatic if religion died. But I don’t want anyone to kill it. I want it to die much the way Paganism died or at least decreased to a level of insignificance. People didn’t need it anymore and came to see it as ridiculous. That is the only way I want it to die.

Do I object to the phrase, “under God” in the pledge of allegiance? It isn’t the most important thing, but … Yes, I do. Doesn’t that mean that I am trying to get my atheism into government? No, it doesn’t. I want the phrase removed from th pledge. I DON’T WANT the phrase “under no God” to replace it.

Do I think prayer should be taken out of school? No, I don’t. In fact I don’t see how that could possibly done. If a student wants to pray on his own time … fine! Pray. In fact, NOBODY has ever said that a student couldn’t do that. What I don’t want is a special time set aside for prayer. Why do we need this when students CAN pray on their own?

Do I object to the 10 Commandments in courthouses. Yes, I do. The 10 Commandments aren’t all that impressive. The commandments either are already a part of secular law, are irrelevant to modern society, have important exceptions, concern private matters that should not be a concern of government, or are a violation of the First Amendment’s freedoms of speech and religion. Take a look:

1st Commandment: You shall have no other Gods before me.

This is a direct violation of the 1st Amendment and if you consider God as being an Abrahamic God then is only relevant for Hindus and some remaining pagans.

 

2nd Commandment: You shall not make for yourself an idol.

Another direct violation of the First Amendment and suffers from the same irrelevancy as the 1st Commandment.

 

3rd Commandment: You shall not make wrongful use of the name of your God.

Who determines wrongful use? Furthermore, if it is an attempt to curtail how a person can describe God, then it is a violation of the First Amendment’s freedom of speech.

 

4th Commandment: Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy.

The biblical intent of this commandment was to prohibit work on the Sabbath (Friday for Islam, Saturday for Judaism, Sunday for Christianity). In today’s society this not feasible.

 

5th Commandment: Honor your father and mother.

As a general rule this is good. But not everybody is fortunate enough to have parents as good as mine. Some people have abusive parents and these parents do not need to be honored.

 

6th Commandment: You shall not murder.

Already incorporated into secular law.

 

7th Commandment: You shall not commit adultery.

Government shouldn’t concern itself with the sexual activity of consenting adults.

 

8th Commandment: You shall not steal.

Already a part of secular law.

 

9th Commandment: You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

Covered with libel and perjury laws.

 

10th Commandment: You shall not covet your neighbors house or wife.

I’ve never been sure exactly what this means, but I gather it means you shouldn’t envy what your neighbor has. If so it is a thought crime and government has no right dictating what another can or cannot think.

(note … not all Christian denominations agree on the numbering of the 10 commandments. I used the Anglican version since it is the one I grew up with).

So … yeah, I’m not thrilled with these commandments. Legalistically they are rather primitive. The only reason anyone would want them is because they think their God said it, and therefore it is an unacceptable intrusion of religion into government.

The point here is that I’m (and to my knowledge, no other “new atheist”) not making any proposal to limit the RIGHT that any person has to believe what they want. But I’m also saying that no one has a RIGHT to demand their belief be RESPECTED.

Should I RESPECT someone’s belief that there never has been a lunar landing … it was all an elaborate hoax? Should I RESPECT someone’s belief that there never was a holocaust? Should I RESPECT someones belief that Elvis is still alive? Why should I respect someone’s belief that God magicked up the world pretty much as it is now in 6 days 6,000 years ago?

You cannot demand respect for a ridiculous belief. Beliefs should be required to EARN respect. … even mine.

If we like it or not, religion is and always has been an important factor of almost every aspect of life. Religious influence is an over-aching theme throughout the realms of household to country wide ethics, from how one person treats their neighbour to the largest scales of how one country treats another and the politics of states, providences and countries.

It seems to many however, that religion has lost it’s importance throughout everyday life. Not as many people attended Church for example now as they did in the middle ages. The public belief in God (mainly the God of Abraham) in the Eastern World has decreased dramatically according to some surveys and investigations. However, that is not the case- religion has lost it’s visible importance. The respect for ministers of the Faith(s) has indeed decreased from the mid-1900’s, however religion is still important in people’s lives.

People of this world look for continuity in their lives. With the ever changing world around us, people need something that stays the same, it is natural for us as humans to search for something comforting that is sill and continuous rather than chaotic and erratic. For example, the world is changing in terms of economic shifts in all countries of the world, the earth is physically changing with global warming and dramatic environmental changes that follow. All of which will be discussed in later blogs. One of the only things which seem to follow the ever updating world is (some areas of) the modern Church, whilst keeping the traditional belief in God, a never changing aspect in this ever-changing world. Therefore, you find either a burst of people looking towards to Church for certain reasons (that will be discussed on later blogs) or a burst of people looking towards God (usually a traditional God), which could create a oxymoronic neo-Christian movement (which will again be discussed later.)

Anyway, this blog is just designed to serve as an introduction to what will be added later, with regard to the Christian life-style in the Eastern world, and it’s influences in modern leadership and communities. In addition, the relationship between Church and State, Politics and many other latest issues with Christianity and life issues in the secular community will later be discussed.

Religion within an ever-changing World.

Daniel Dennis