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THIS IS HOME About GWBAA Previous columns Definitions Reviews CONTACT Link to this site World Copyright © Martin Foreman scroll further down for books on atheism from Amazon.co.uk Supporting advertisers helps to provide an income for this website |
Watch this space.... This website is being renovated and will be relaunched in July 2008 as a global resource on reasoning, atheism and morality. In the meantime, please browse the articles posted here 2005 - 2007. The last column in the series appears below. (During renovation some links may be missing - apologies for any inconvenience.) Thank you and farewell - but not goodbye © Martin Foreman Word Count: 799 words June 24, 2007 I had ambitious plans for this column when I started writing it two years ago. It would be nationally syndicated, starting off in one or two local weeklies and gradually picking up more and more subscribers until it became as much of a national institution as Frank Rich’s New York Times column or Rush Limbaugh’s daily broadcasts. But the best-laid plans of mice and men... Although many of these columns have been reprinted in atheist newsletters, magazines and websites, not one newspaper in the USA has subscribed to GWBAA. I could ascribe my failure to poor writing. The thoughts aren’t expressed clearly and the reader is confused or bored. There’s little meat and what there is is poorly displayed. But self-doubt is not the American Way. Besides, compared to some of the drivel that gets published national and local press, my pieces were beacons of literature, intelligent, thought-provoking and a pleasure to read. The problem was that I lacked a critical gene – that of self-promotion. Behind the computer screen I brim with self-confidence and if you ask me to stand up in public I can give a decent speech. But I’m a failure at cold calls and knocking on doors. I dislike pushing myself, even to delegate the task to an agent. Besides, I spend more time abroad than stateside, severely limiting my opportunities personal contact. After a year, when t became clear that GWBAA was not going to find a mass audience, I nevertheless persisted. The pleasure of writing the columns was greater than the disappointment of finding a mass audience. That pleasure was rooted in the fact that they made may think. In presenting an argument, I had to defend the points I was making and consider other points of view. The more I wrote, the more I thought and learned about religion and my conviction that atheist was the only honest worldview became even stronger. Almost every aspect of faith that I looked into demonstrated its follies which I then tried to convey to my readers. The emphasis on male priests, for example, led to the obvious conclusion that leaders of worship should always provide proof of their masculinity before being allowed to conduct the service. The nonsensical idea of eternity, whether spent in heaven or hell. Human consciousness cannot survive death. We may wish life to be longer, but no-one who gives the matter any thought would want to live forever worshipping a monomaniacal deity. The carnage in Iraq and the Middle East, Afghanistan and Pakistan and the terrorism and violence that affect us all. Different groups of male-circumcised, mysogynistic, pork-avoiding, semitic-language speakers all convinced that they have the right to violently impose their narrow ugly vision of their mythical ugly god on the world about them. Moderate believers may be in the majority, but fundamentalism is the true face of religion. The hypocrisy of religious “morality”. Its obscene priorities – your first duty is not to your loved ones or the community you live in, but to worship me, your egotistical God. Its poorly worded commandments and hundreds of capricious rules that take the joy out of life and loving. True moralists know that there is only one commandment – let no harm come to others – and it is a commandment greater, more noble and more honest than any God could ever imagine. The dishonesty of creationism and intelligent design, which base their “science” on selecting the facts and arguments that support their viewpoint while ignoring or disparaging the real science that disproves it. The abuse of children indoctrinated into religion – and in some religions physically mutilated as babies, children or adolescents – before they have the opportunity to develop reason for themselves. The fact that Jesus probably never existed. Why does Paul fail to refer to any aspect of Christ’s life, despite the fact the Son-God supposedly lived only a couple of decades earlier? Other topics that, only indirectly related to religion. The abortion debate, the origins of homosexuality, Ann Coulter, liberal and conservative values. For all these issues that I wrote about, I have to thank you, my readers and subscribers, both those who were silent and those who wrote to congratulate or criticize me. Without you, I would have had no incentive. Without you I would not have learned. But it is time to move on. I have other commitments – most importantly managing a tour company in Thailand that takes up most of my time and still too much of my money. Besides, there are many others, better than I, working to free the world from religion, both online and in print and 113 of all my columns can be read on www.godwouldbeanatheist.com. So this is farewell. Not goodbye, because that is simply a contraction of “God be with ye”. Farewell, and thanks again. Previous columns |
If God existed, he would... If God existed, he would be an atheist. DREAM ON.... "According to ASSIST News Service, a young Muslim man arrived at the mission center and demanded an audience with the pastor. “I directed him to see one of my co-workers,” says Pastor Yusif, a national missionary active in West Africa. “But he insisted it was personal and wanted to see me.” The man introduced himself as Ahmed, 33, from a strong Muslim background. He said he memorized the entire Koran by 11 and later became a Koranic instructor. Ahmed told Pastor Yusif about a profound emptiness at the core of his being. He was looking for God but doubted he existed. Internal anxieties robbed him of peace. After his wife left him, he struggled to find meaning in life. In his desperation, he asked God to speak to him and show him if he is real. One night a vivid dream terrified him. “A huge man appeared to him in the dream and said he had to cut off his head and put on a new one,” Pastor Yusif reports. “The man was holding a long sword... the handle of the sword had a cross.” When Ahmed awakened, he suddenly realized the man meant for him to take off his Muslim head and replace it with a Christian head. Pastor Yusif shared the way of salvation, and Ahmed prayed to receive Jesus as his Savior and Lord." story spotted on religious news service Crosswalk |