Posted on 12/21/2012 2:24:54 PM PST by NYer
I was asked by the Young Adult group in my parish to address some ads on our local buses and subway trains here in Washington. The members of the Young adult group found the ads offensive and troubling, especially since they were aimed at kids. The ads are posted by the American “Humanist” Association (AHA) and are indeed aimed at kids and teenagers. The focus of the message is “Kids without God: You’re not the only one.” I have altered the ad at the upper right of this post to avoid listing its website but as you can see God is represented by a seeming angry and/or accusing finger and a bemused teenager who says “I’m getting a bit old for imaginary friends.”
OK, so lets start with the necessary disclaimer. This is America and an folks are free to post billboards and promote ideas, even unpleasant or obnoxious ones. That said, I wonder if Christians would get away with the kind of demeaning and dismissive tone evident in these bill boards by the AHA.
Consider, first of all the timing of these ads, Christmas. Just about every year, the AHA runs its ads right during the Holy Season of Christmas and Chanukah. I would argue that this amounts to an intentional form of rudeness that the secular media would never accept in return from Christians.
Think, for example if, on “Earth day” (usually happens in April) Christians were to announce that, as far as we were concerned this had become an annoying celebration of the secularists, druids and others. And therefore we sought to ridicule their holiday by burning leaves, throwing trash around in public, or on our property, or turning all our lights on in protest. Perhaps too we might engage in personal ridicule on earth day, scoffing at them, calling them “tree huggers” and erecting posters encouraging people to kick a tree instead. It is unlikely we would be ignored by the media if we acted thus, on their special day, and ridiculed “Earth Day” and those who celebrate it. Rather we would be excoriated by the press and others for this.
And yet, many secularists and atheists rudely ridicule, mock and seek to put an end to our observance of Christmas. I am willing to engage secularists and atheists on matters of my faith, and I have done so on this blog. But acting, as many of them do, at the times of our sacred feasts is just plain rude, it is shameful behavior.
Next, note the ridiculing nature of the poster at the above right. The slogan equates faith in God with being childish and immature, as if faith in God were no different than “believing” in Santa Claus or some other imaginary friend, as little children do, who don’t know any better.
This dismissal of the belief in God as childish is insulting to the billions of people on this planet who DO believe in God. Belief in God is not childish, and God is not an “imaginary friend” for those of us who believe. I did have imaginary friends as a child, and I know the difference between what they where, and who God actually is. I am not stupid, and others who believe are not stupid, or childish, or immature.
I and others who believe, do so by the gift of faith and also because of the manifold evidence of God’s works and presence in our lives. I live in a world, that to my observation has obviously been designed and thus presents strong evidence of having a designer, that obviously has existence and thus has a source of that existence. Further, when I pray I am heard. I talk to the Lord every day, and I hear from him every day. I know and experience his presence in the depths of my soul, in deep contemplative experience, and in my daily life. And the Lord Jesus Christ is changing my life. His word and plan for my make sense to me, and have summoned me to a magnificent and joyful life. His gospel is a prophetic interpretation of reality that has have ordered my life and given meaning and explanations that comport with my lived experience. I have tested God’s promises and teachings in the laboratory of my own life and found them to be true.
Now an atheist or secularist is free to question me on any of this, and I understand that they doubt my experience or would what to explain it away. But the disrespectful nature of this AHA ad is rude and insulting. It presumes that I and others who believe are merely to be regarded as simpletons, clinging to childish notions and fairy tales. I am doing nothing of the sort. I am no fool, I am not a child, and God is not “an imaginary friend” to me. My life of faith is rooted in real experience and the manifold evidence of having tested God’s word, having found it true and wise, and seeing my life changed by God. I also have the lived experience of thousands of other acquaintances who believe, who know and encounter the Lord in their lives and experience his powerful presence.
There is also the lived experiences of billions of others, currently on this planet and those who have gone before who testify to the existence, presence and power of God in their lives.
Ridiculing all of us as simpletons, and implying that the ancient Catholic, Christian and Jewish faith amounts to no more than have “an imaginary friend is not only insulting and rude, it is uninformed. The intellectual, spiritual, liturgical, Scriptural and artistic legacy of the Judeo-Christian faith is both rich, and rooted in careful thought and balance. I would also add to this the many other great religious traditions on this planet. And while I do not agree with many of their fundamental tenants, the great contribution of these faith traditions to civilization and culture cannot be denied and should be respected.
Dismissing this great and rich tradition of faith and more than implying it is childish comes across as boorish, bigoted and unschooled.
Further the “pointed finger” supposedly representing God is also cartoonish, unbalanced and disrespectful to the great religious tradition. It is true that God does confront injustice, wrong-doing and sin in the Holy Scriptures I revere. But it is also true that those same scriptures teach and reveal that God creates everything in Love and provides for his children and creation. He is merciful and forgiving. He respects human freedom and summons us to follow him freely, not under compulsion. In his love he entered our world and joined his sufferings to ours, and repaired the ancient breach, reaching out a saving hand (not just a pointed finger) to all who take hold of it. The God I know and have personally met, loves immensely, and when he does seek to correct me, I experience it as an act of love just as the Scriptures assert (e.g. Hebrews 12). God has a passion to set things right in and for those whom he loves. Here too, the cartoonish simplification of God by the AHA is inaccurate and unschooled.
To summarize, the bill board, ad campaign of the American Humanist Association comes off as rude, boorish and bigoted. It steeps its message in a ridiculing notion and implication that billions of believers throughout this world and many more stretch back into time are nothing more than children who believe in an “imaginary friend.” The utter lack of respect for the rich cultural tapestry, careful intellectual tradition, and lived experience of billions of believers in this ad shows the AHA is little more than uniformed an unschooled in the traditions and faith they try to criticize. The timing, tactics and content of this bill board by the AHA show them to be far from the humanitarian principles they claim to promote.
There is nothing humanist or humanitarian in their ad at all. It is plain and simple, “Rude,” just plain rude.
Why don’t you go tattle?
I can not defend your strawman creation.
The existence or non- existence of God is IMPOSSIBLE to prove. If I state that it is IMPOSSIBLE to prove God's existence or non-existence then I am NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT asking **you** to do the IMPOSSIBLE!
Is a “DUH” needed here? Gee! I thought atheists prided themselves on their logical thinking skills.
Are you using my post merely as an opportunity to throw out a canned talking point from one of the atheist websites?
Maybe the world was created 4,000 years ago or 4 trillion years ago. The point is that the first atom, the first neutron, the electron came from somewhere or something.
One give that creator any name one desires, yet I find it irrational to deny its existence.
Therefore: It is best that government be a limited as possible and as locally controlled as possible because everything government touches has consequences that are NOT politically, culturally, or religiously neutral.
It has been my observation that atheists, are wonderful defenders of government sponsored and paid-for evolution and godless temples of K-12 indoctrination ( oops! “schools”).
My conclusion: Atheists and evolutions are bullies. They just love that government establishes their faith and forces the rest of us to pay for it.
Prove mermaids do not exist, or go back to trolling threads about public schools and pretend you never sent your kid to one.
Because I was wasting my time trying to educate someone who is incapable of learning. I gave you too much credit. I thought that if I explained it in simple terms, you would comprehend. I didn’t realize your limitations.
Well, now you do, sweetheart.
It is IMPOSSIBLE to prove the existence or non-existence of God. THEREFORE I am NOT NOT NOT asking you to do so.
( or mermaids, either!)
Regardless of the religious worldview ( godless or God-centered) one’s worldview is **faith** based. Neither is religiously neutral in content or consequences. It is for this reason that government should be as limited as possible and as locally controlled as possible.
My conclusion: Atheists and evolutionist LOVE government force precisely because they get the taxpayers to support their anointed godless religious worldview. The biggest offender, and most expensive, are our government owned and run godless temples of indoctrintion ( misnamed: schools).
By the way, attempting to discredit the argument by discrediting the poster is a liberal Alynsky debating technique. Only a liberal would seriously think smart Freepers would fall for this. Using this Alynsky technique merely makes the users of this tactic look foolish and immature.
Would you care to point out what in that ad targets Christianity or excludes Islam?
So putting the poster about your Dad in a subway would be ok? :>)
That's not exactly accurate. There is plenty of evidence. I think it is overwhelming evidence. Evidence of history, of scripture/prophecy, evidence of reason, and evidence of changed lives.
It's weighty evidence; the type you'd see regarding any discussion of events that have transpired. Since you can't recreate ANY event in history, you are left with a different standard of evidence than with, for example, a proof in geometry.
Take an historic debate: Prove that George Washington Was a Christian. It really depends on what you mean by "prove", doesn't it?
Exactly right.
One of the loons behind this billboard campaign was on Hannity's show last night. He, and others of his ilk, are perfectly transparent. They claim not to believe God exists, while spending all their time running around trying to disprove Him.
The Bible says we all have knowledge of God. It isn't that atheists don't believe----they're just angry, shaking their fists.
What does it matter to you if I want my child to believe that there is a God and that Jesus is His Son, who was sent for my salvation?
Terrorized?
That is just over the top rhetoric which doesn’t match reality.
What difference does it make to an atheist if one believes in God?
You said that religion does harm. So does non religion.
There is no example of good done by powerful non believers, whereas there is ample evidence of enormous good done in the name of Jesus by people in power as well as ordinary men and women.
Personally, these billboards and such don’t offend me, nor do they concern me. I just am curious why religion has caused such hatred.
Again, it can’t just be because of some “harm” done by Christianity, as there has been much more harm done to humanity by atheists.
Oh my. You know nothing about Christianity. Nothing. First, All sexual sins, including rape, are covered under “Do not commit adultery.”
Your analogy simply doesn’t work on any level. In fact it is downright racist, as in “All middle Eastern men are rapists” simply because they are from a certain region.
Second, belief in Christ as a savior from our sins has nothing to do with getting freebies. It is an acknowlegdement that we cannot be good enough to earn our way into heaven by doing good works. Many people want to believe they can be good enough to ignore the need to accept Christ.
As for not having to pay for anything, Christ isn’t about money. Christianity is about forgiveness, not revenge. The values of forgiveness, purity, modesty, stewardship are the very core of conservatism.
Black liberation theology is about revenge. It is not Christianity.
Thank you. The blessing of our Savior to you and your own.
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