Is it possible to believe in both God and Evolution?

[Syphros]

I'd rather like to think that the prototype WAS perfect, and because we are derivative of that we can never return there by our own means. Man has struggled with returning to Eden ever since and continues to do so. Is not man as of now pursuing perfection?

Exactly! You only persue perfection when you are imperfect yourself. We're just like Adam and Eve who betrayed God and now we have violence and injustice in the world. And when he sent Jesus down to show us how to live our lives and we didn't believe him and thought him a conman before killing him. God is more annoyed with us than ever...

 

[fantome profane]

How would YOU react if a theist tells you they want to eradicate atheism? Just agree with him and discard your atheism?

Is that a joke? If??!!! You feel comfortable with the use of the word “if” here do you?

We are told this every day. There are huge million dollar institutions dedicated to the eradication of atheism. World leaders make speeches in support of the eradication of atheism and receive huge contributions in return. And how do I react to this? Politely (or at least I try to). They have every right to call for the eradication of atheism with all of the eloquence they can muster and I will do nothing but protect their right to do so.

Unless the attack is on you, do you simply find it acceptable?

But that is exactly the point, an attack on atheism is not an attack on me, it is an attack on an idea. And any idea that cannot stand against open direct passionate attack does not deserve special protection. Ideas such as atheism should be, must be, and will be attacked. That is a good thing.

Don't support the intolerants from either side.

I support a free an open debate in the marketplace of ideas. I want to hear from the extremists, as well as the moderates. More than this I demand to hear from all sides. It is a dangerous place out there for ideas, and those that don’t have what it takes to survive should not; will not.

 

[ChristineES]

One error people seem to make is that if someone believes in evolution or some part of evolution that automatically makes them an atheist. Another is that if someone is religious, people automatically think that they completely reject evolution and all different aspects of it. These aren't always true.

 

[logician]

I am not saying that one who believes in evolution can't be religious, I'm just saying I don't personally believe evolution is compatible with a god concept.

 

[Scuba Pete]

Is that a joke? If??!!! You feel comfortable with the use of the word “if” here do you?

We are told this every day.

So you feel that turn about is fair play? They did it to me, so I can do it to them?

Feel free then to preach intolerance. You will not find me listening to you.

 

[logician]

It is true that atheists are strongly discriminated against in most aspects of AMerican society.

Just look at our coins, the pledge of allegiance, etc.

 

[sandandfoam]

It is true that atheists are strongly discriminated against in most aspects of AMerican society.

Just look at our coins, the pledge of allegiance, etc.

I haven't visited the US but this seems incredible to the outside world. I was listening to the radio yesterday and the presenter and guest on a talk show were talking in wonder of the prevalance of YEC in the US.
I wonder is it a cultural thing rather than a religious thing. In this country the vast majority of the population is Roman Catholic yet YEC is generally accepted as absurd.

 

[Scuba Pete]

It is true that atheists are strongly discriminated against in most aspects of AMerican society.

I am sure you are asked to sit at the back of the bus, have had burning crosses in your yards and have been jailed for eating in a "Theist Only" restaurant.

Yeah, the motto on currency (which is a complete crock and everyone knows it) is lamentable and yes, there is way too much emphasis in the pledge of allegiance on God but really:

Have you lost a job?
Have you been beaten up?
Have you been denied access to any public facility?

Without such things, it's illogical for someone to CLAIM "strongly discriminated" and not cringe for those who HAVE been strongly discriminated against. The problem with your martyr complex is a complete lack of martyrs. In logic, we call this an appeal to reality.

 

[Willamena]

I am not saying that one who believes in evolution can't be religious, I'm just saying I don't personally believe evolution is compatible with a god concept.

Do you think, as an atheist, that the problem may be an incorrect "God" concept?

 

[camanintx]

Have you lost a job?
Have you been beaten up?
Have you been denied access to any public facility?

Maybe not, but we did have our MySpace group deleted.

 

[logician]

Do you think, as an atheist, that the problem may be an incorrect "God" concept?

No, I don't.

 

[logician]

I am sure you are asked to sit at the back of the bus, have had burning crosses in your yards and have been jailed for eating in a "Theist Only" restaurant.

Yeah, the motto on currency (which is a complete crock and everyone knows it) is lamentable and yes, there is way too much emphasis in the pledge of allegiance on God but really:

Have you lost a job?
Have you been beaten up?
Have you been denied access to any public facility?

Without such things, it's illogical for someone to CLAIM "strongly discriminated" and not cringe for those who HAVE been strongly discriminated against. The problem with your martyr complex is a complete lack of martyrs. In logic, we call this an appeal to reality.

You do know that prominent atheists (Madelyn Ohair) have been murdered for their beliefs in the U.S. A politician dare not claim he is an atheist, death threats are soon to follow.

 

[Mister_T]

You do know that prominent atheists (Madelyn Ohair) have been murdered for their beliefs in the U.S. A politician dare not claim he is an atheist, death threats are soon to follow.

Logician, let's not put your own spin on how Madelyn O'Hair was mudered.

Madelyn O'Hair was robbed, kidnapped and mudered by her own organization's (American Atheist's) office manager who, "shockingly", was an atheist.
Madalyn Murray O'Hair - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Really now Logician......:bonk:

 

[Scuba Pete]

You do know that prominent atheists (Madelyn Ohair) have been murdered for their beliefs in the U.S. A politician dare not claim he is an atheist, death threats are soon to follow.

Dude, you're killing me... You know, your illogic notwithstanding, your flights of fancy have reached NEW heights. It appears that she was murdered by a fellow worker and atheist for money. Now don't YOU look foolish.

BTW, Madeline MURRAY O'Hair was a Great Aunt of mine. Go figure, huh?

Murder Ultimately, a murder investigation focused on Waters, who had worked as a typesetter for American Atheists and was the organization's office manager at the time the three vanished. Not only did Waters have previous convictions for violent crimes, there were several suspicious burglaries during his tenure, and he pleaded guilty earlier in 1995 to stealing $54,000 from American Atheists.
Shortly after his theft of the $54,000 was discovered, O'Hair wrote a scathing article in the 'Members Only' section of the American Atheists newsletter exposing Waters, the theft, and Waters' previous crimes, including a 1977 incident in which Waters allegedly beat and urinated upon his own mother. Waters' girlfriend later testified that he was enraged by O'Hair's article, and that he fantasized about torturing her in gruesome ways.
Police concluded that Waters and his accomplices had kidnapped all three O'Hairs, forced them to withdraw the missing funds, went on several huge shopping sprees with the O'Hairs' money and credit cards, and then murdered all three people. Danny Fry, an accomplice, was murdered a few days after the O'Hairs; his body was found with its head and hands severed on a riverbed, but his remains were unidentified for three and a half years. Waters eventually pled guilty to reduced charges.
In January 2001, Waters informed the police that the O'Hairs were buried on a Texas ranch, and he subsequently led them to the bodies. When the police excavated there, they discovered that the O'Hairs' bodies had been cut into dozens of pieces with a saw. The remains exhibited such extensive mutilation and successive decomposition that identification had to be made through dental records, by DNA testing and, in Madalyn O'Hair's case, by her prosthetic hip.
The gold coins extorted from the O'Hairs were put in a storage locker rented by Waters' girlfriend. Waters had taken out $80,000 and partied with his girlfriend for a few days, but upon his return he discovered that the remaining $420,000 had been stolen. An group of thieves operating in that area had a master key to the type of lock which Waters used to secure the locker. In the course of their activities, they came across the locker, used the master key to open it, and found a suitcase full of gold coins. They eventually spent all but one, which the police recovered.
Waters was found guilty of kidnapping, robbery, and murder in the Murray case, and was sentenced to 20 years in prison. In addition, he was also ordered to pay back a total of $543,665 to the United Secularists of America and the estates of Madalyn Murray O'Hair, Jon Garth Murray, and Robin Murray-O'Hair. It is unlikely that any of these debts were paid, as Waters had no ability to earn money while in prison. Waters died in prison of lung cancer on January 27, 2003.

Full article from Wikipedia

 

[Smoke]

Maybe not, but we did have our MySpace group deleted.

Atheists are barred from the Boy Scouts.

Until 1997, an atheist was ineligible to hold public office in the state of South Carolina; the state Supreme Court overturned the law due to a suit brought when the state denied an atheist's application to become a notary public. However, the state constitution says to this day:

SECTION 2. Person denying existence of Supreme Being not to hold office.
No person who denies the existence of the Supreme Being shall hold any office under this Constitution.
​

At least seven other state constitutions similarly bar atheists from public office. These provisions were effectively nullified by the US Supreme Court in Torcaso v. Watkins in 1961, but as you can see from the 1997 case in South Carolina, states are sometimes slow to get the message.

A 2007 Gallup poll discovered that Americans are less likely to vote for a qualified atheist than for any other category in the poll, including Mormons and homosexuals.

Margaret Downey has compiled hundreds of cases of discrimination against atheists. For example:

• Gray, Tennessee: Carletta Sims joined a financial firm in June 2001. Shortly afterward, two Baptist coworkers took offense upon learning that Sims was an atheist. Management granted the coworkers’ request to be assigned workspaces further from Sims. When Sims complained about a picture of Jesus left on her computer, management discharged her. Sims filed suit, seeking $250,000; U.S. District Judge Thomas Hull ruled that “religious discrimination (or preferential treatment of Christians) can be inferred.” In January 2004, the major bank that had since acquired the firm settled with Sims for an undisclosed amount.
• Calgary, Alberta: An eleven-year-old boy (name withheld) experienced daily physical attacks and threats against his life by schoolmates—notably the sons of three local pastors—after protesting intercom readings of the Lord’s Prayer in a public school. He was repeatedly body-checked into hallway walls and attacked in the rest rooms. One pastor’s son stalked him with a butcher knife in an empty portable classroom. Despite the seriousness of this incident, no action was taken. The boy’s parents transferred him to another school for his own safety.
• Minneapolis, Minnesota: First-grader Michael Bristor, an atheist, was denied an honor roll certificate when he refused to participate in an unconstitutional “prayer time” at a public school. For three years, administrators ignored the family’s complaints until a lawsuit was filed.
• Ada, Oklahoma: A Baptist student told a local newspaper she wouldn’t take professor William Zellner’s classes because he was an atheist, triggering a flurry of abuse. Zellner received harassing notes and telephone calls, some threatening. His car was vandalized, for a time on a daily basis. A local church sold “I am praying for Dr. Zellner” buttons. His children experienced shunning and beatings from religious children.

There are innumerable cases where the courts have given preference to a religious parent over an atheist parent in custody cases. In one case in Mississippi, the court ordered a father to take his child to church once a week, ruling that it was in the best interest of the child to receive religious instruction.

Discrimination against atheists is common in the armed forces. Just one example is Jeremy Hall, whose atheist group -- formed with the permission of his chaplain -- was broken up by a major with a bachelor's degree in "personal evangelism," who then threated to have Hall charged under the UCMJ.

Discrimination against atheists -- and indeed, against anyone who is not a Christian (or at least a Jew) is rampant in the United States.

 

[Smoke]

Logician, let's not put your own spin on how Madelyn O'Hair was mudered.

Madelyn O'Hair was robbed, kidnapped and mudered by her own organization's (American Atheist's) office manager who, "shockingly", was an atheist.
Madalyn Murray O'Hair - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Really now Logician......:bonk:

That's true. However, the authorities were notably unconcerned about the disappearance of O'Hair and her son and granddaughter. They refused even to accept a missing persons report from anyone but O'Hair's son, a Christian preacher who had publicly vilified his mother and refused to file a report. It was widely reported, and is still widely believed, that O'Hair and her family stole funds from American Atheists and went into hiding. The Murray-O'Hairs survived in captivity for at least a month before they were murdered. It's entirely possible that their deaths might have been prevented if the good Christians at the Austin PD had given a damn.

 

[Willamena]

Calgary, Alberta: An eleven-year-old boy (name withheld) experienced daily physical attacks and threats against his life by schoolmates—notably the sons of three local pastors—after protesting intercom readings of the Lord’s Prayer in a public school. He was repeatedly body-checked into hallway walls and attacked in the rest rooms. One pastor’s son stalked him with a butcher knife in an empty portable classroom. Despite the seriousness of this incident, no action was taken. The boy’s parents transferred him to another school for his own safety.

I googled this incident, but could find no other information about it, other than what you've copied (and has been copied by many other webpages). I am curious when this incident took place, as I'm quite sure the Lord's Prayer has not seen said in public schools in Alberta since I was a kid, in the 1960's. I believe it's no longer legal to broadcast it in that setting.

 

[Smoke]

I googled this incident, but could find no other information about it, other than what you've copied (and has been copied by many other webpages). I am curious when this incident took place, as I'm quite sure the Lord's Prayer has not seen said in public schools in Alberta since I was a kid, in the 1960's. I believe it's no longer legal to broadcast it in that setting.

I was unable to find any information about that specific case other than what Margaret Downey provided. However, I found cases of compulsory prayer in public schools in Ontario, British Columbia and Manitoba in 1988, cases of the Lord's Prayer being recited in Alberta classrooms in 1999, and in Saskatchewan in 2000. In the 2000 case, the story said that under Saskatchewan law schools had the option of no prayer or Christian prayer, but couldn't introduce prayers from other religions.

 

[Willamena]

...cases of the Lord's Prayer being recited in Alberta classrooms in 1999

Not quite; this story is about providing "a forum for Christian children to pray each morning" outside the class.

I still suspect the Calgary incident may have been very old.

 

[Scuba Pete]

Let me state unequivocally, that discrimination FOR or AGAINST a person because of their personal beliefs is wrong and completely unconstitutional. It's my biggest beef with the BSA.

However, I don't see this as being any where near the systematic discrimination experienced by Jews, by blacks and even by communists. My mother, a proclaimed atheist, has spent her entire life battling for equal rights and talking with her, she can't ever remember being discriminated against for that. For being a single mom: yes. For associating with Blacks: yes, and me too. For protesting the war: yes and we were tapped by the FBI in the late sixties. But she can't remember once being denied for being an atheist.