Red rags to bulls

[James Hannam]

I'm on CiF again:

www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2009/oct/22/religion-catholicism

[humphreyclarke]

Hilarious, well that seems to have pissed off Adam Rutherford.

I think James is perhaps a bit bullish after the Pope's recent announcement.

www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/oct/20/roman-catholic-church-receives-anglicans

[captainzman]

For those who have been reading CiF longer than I have- have the commentators always been this hostile?

[humphreyclarke]

Yeah, actually this is tame compared to the usual thumping anti-religious rhetoric you tend to get on there.

[merkavah12]

WOAH!

This is the sort of mayhem and carnage that I would expect from a soccer match.

[humphreyclarke]

I was wondering how long it would take for Giordano Bruno to show up. Sure enough:

And you call yourself a historian?? Have you ever heard of Galileo? A man who was put under house arrest for the rest of his life for the heresy of describing the world as it is? Do you know of Giordono Bruno, burnt alive with a spike forced through his tongue, for the sin of being a mathematician, philosopher and astronomer. The enlightenment arose not from the church, but despite of it.

Have you ever heard of the Greeks, who knew 3000 years ago that the world revolved around the sun, who predicted atoms, who accurately measured the circumference of the earth, who theorised that the stars were suns? Have you really never heard of Thales, Aristotle, Aristarchus, Archimedes, Eratosthenes, Hipparchus, Epicurus, Euclid? Tragically followed by the dark ages of the Abrahamic religions, obscuring truth and knowledge for thousands of years, persecuting, perpetrating superstitious dogma, for over 2000 years, fighting tooth and nail against science and progress. Hardly an example of holding science dear, is it?

Glorious

[merkavah12]

Oh please, please, PLEASE post the response to that drivel.

[eckadimmock]

Someone called TOFhimself seems to be laying about him with a will. I wonder if that's the same "Himself" that posts here.

[himself]

It's possible.

[eckadimmock]

Well good job, er, yourself.

[eckadimmock]

Here's Hitchen's comments on the same debate (and others).

He seems to be mellowing a little.

However, I have discovered that the so-called Christian right is much less monolithic, and very much more polite and hospitable, than I would once have thought, or than most liberals believe.

he even seems quite fond of Wilson

Wilson isn't one of those evasive Christians who mumble apologetically about how some of the Bible stories are really just "metaphors." He is willing to maintain very staunchly that Jesus of Nazareth was the Christ and that his sacrifice redeems our state of sin, which in turn is the outcome of our rebellion against God. He doesn't waffle when asked why God allows so much evil and suffering—of course he "allows" it since it is the inescapable state of rebellious sinners. I much prefer this sincerity to the vague and Python-esque witterings of the interfaith and ecumenical groups who barely respect their own traditions and who look upon faith as just another word for community organizing.