Invitation to Steven Weinberg and Christopher Hitchens Part 2

Part 2 of discussion over Weinberg's idea that it takes religion to make a good person do bad things, and Hitchens' idea that religion poisons everything.

Category:

People & Blogs

Tags:

• atheism
• Christian spirituality
• Christopher Hitchens
• Marsha Hansen
• John Polinghorne
• Steven Weinberg
• faith
• belief in God

[MarshaERH]

Tribal views of "God" are invariably self-serving, often justifying the very actions your rightly protest. They frequently hide under the guise of religion; but, mercy, love, justice, respect for the neighbor, honor for a loving Creative God, joy in life, encouragement for learning, and human freedom are the heart Jesus' message . Pascal was a devout follower & defender of Christ. I hold your hand in protesting wrong. Amos& Jeremiah decry the same thingsas you, as offenses to man and God.

[MarshaERH]

BTW...Isaac Newton was deeply religious and left copius theological papers. If you're going to call yourself Newton's student, take Alexander the Great's advice to a disgraced soldier named Alexander, either change your ways or change your name. Your questions in no way reflect Newton's thinking.

[NewtonsStudent]

do you think Africans believed in jesus before Europeans stole their asses from Africa? are all of those who never heard the word jesus in hell?

[MarshaERH]

Why don't you just forward your insulting question to the Coptic churches in Africa and ask them? Maybe you'll learn something .I resent your flippant attitude toward slavery and your thinly veiled implications about Africans/African Americans. Do I have your permission to say that we're not entirely derivative thinkers? As for hell, thank Dante for most of the prevailing images. If you're concerned about people in real hell, do something about the suffering in the world. Grow up.

[emeralds222]

I'm sorry, I realize there is goodness that you wish, yet Christopher Hitchens is stating that religion poisons even the good that is done by the church.

To teach children to believe in myth as fact, this is today child abuse. Can you understand this?

To teach children that drinking blood and eating flesh (as you are supposed to realize at told in the NT), is indeed barbaric and bronze age thinking.

To deem a book as "holy" which promotes stoning and smashing babies heads against rocks

[MarshaERH]

Emerald, Amos and Jeremiah join you in decrying awful practices. Jesus came, interacting with common folk, criminals, the disinfranchised, to tell of our worth and stop our harming one another. Whom did he condemn or stand by to see stoned? What child did he dismiss? Jesus came to call humanity away from social injustice and wrong ideas of reality . He brings light to a dark world. People try to justify atrocities, but they all appear as what they are in the light of Jesus' own words.

[CauseIHadToAsk]

I think you are not getting it. I don't think either hitchens or weinberg were getting at that religion is the sole cause of the woes in the world. They aremerely saying that religion is capable of making good people do bad things. And I would agree. Religion is the ultimate testament of our ability in stupid thinking.

[togaida]

Ma'am, I mean no disrespect but there isno real reason to believe in anything good in religion or this god character, this god person is himself a megalomaniac if not petulant omniscient socipathic infanticidal, genocidal maniac. I find that religion is based on two important proofs: 1. "believe what I say or I'll hurt you, 2. Blood. all mainstream religon is steeped in it like pascal said, "men never do evil so complete or cheerfully than by religious conviction".

[rationalbrainftw]

Oh my goodness, please stop. If you think for one second that Weinberg & Hitchens wouldn't give you a serious verbal spanking then you need to re-evaluate your level of intelligence. I've watched several of your videos & your IQ is at best average. You preach learning & have done none. Your thinking is flawed, your reasoning is flawed. Get your nose out of the bible & read a science book, it will serve you better. Eventually, with some VERY hard study, you might forego fantasy & enter reality.

[nosajj12345]

The 3 Abrahamic religions have brought nothing but intellectual and social stagnation to humankind. Not to mention untold suffering and death. She over estimates the human ability to responsibly handle something as powerful as religion. HUMANS CAN'T HANDLE RELIGION. History has proven this time and again. Jeez lady, have you not been paying attention!!! BTW Stalin was a seminarian and Hitler a Catholic.

[fctchk]

Perhaps one of the most tragic ironies of history - the African American embrace of Christianity; a type of mass Stockholm syndrome:

"You may purchase slaves from the foreigners among you. You may purchase their children treating them as property, passing them on to your children as inheritance. " Leviticus 25:44-46

[Metanoeia]

Thanks for the video!

[1skepticalbrother]

Question Marsha. I can understand how and maybe why human beings behave the way that we do, but if your God is omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent and "omni"-loving why would "he" allow the slaughter of the innocent? Where was this "love" that Jesus preached about employed in the setting up of this great nation of ours? Are we the beneficiaries of early American Christian "gangsters" who wiped out anyone that got in the way of their objective to establish a Christian nation founded on "LOVE"?

[HateHasNotWorked]

Not to be mean but you did nothing to even start to change my mind into saying yes there was a talking snake,or heaven and hell, or noah...Sorry