CathNews - a Service of Church Resources

Have Your Say 

Recent Comments

1. It is surely the time for the Church to join with conscientious atheists and agnostics, along with cultural Catholics, to present to Australian society the good done by the Christian religion and in particular, the Catholic Religion.
   
   The drum beating and flag waving of the New Atheists, illustrated by the appearance of Christopher Hitchens at the Opera House, is going to continue and just as in the 1960's, when the New Order was drafting the younger generation and forming them into an army of relativism, the Church will again be sidelined if, as it did nothing in the 1960's, it does nothing to counter the false messages and images of Richard dawkins et al.

   Posted By: Fr Mick Mac Andrew, Bombala NSW

2. What have atheists ever done for the world except set up earthly kingdoms which resulted in genocides and mass murder? Hitler, Mao, Pol Pot and Lenin were atheists and have the dubious distinction of having killed more people than anyone else. A conservative estimate of those killed by Mao is about 100 million people.
   
   Where are the homes for the homeless, the orphanages, the schools, the refuges, hospitals, the hospices and myriad other works of 'the Atheist Society? I can't see them. The Christians established all of the above in abundant numbers.
   
   Many atheists are just confused - others are more ideological and push their agendas. They deny that each person has a spirit and do great harm to humanity by peddling this view. Viktor Frankl said in each person there is a search for meaning, and the meaning is not to be found in a summation of material things.
   
   The ultimate question for the atheists is - where did the universe come from - who let off the Big Bang? If they say it 'evolved itself' then they are saying something can come from nothing. And that is unscientific. They have to prove first that something can come from nothing. and that they cannot do. They usually avoid the question.

   Posted By: Skye

3. I think you're on to something here, Father Mick.
   
   There are conscientious people of good will across the belief/non-belief spectrum who do not like the puerility and venom of the big-A Atheist campaign against religion. People may not be theists, but they can still appreciate the Churches' contribution to the world, especially in the areas of health, education and welfare for the poor and vulnerable.

   Posted By: Poppenhauer

4. Father Mick, I salute you for your good sense.
   Not all atheists present polarising, totally anti-religious positions, in the media, as does a person like Richard Dawkins.
   In fact, even a reviewer of one of his books, in the totally scientific 'New Scientist', wrote in exasperation of his thumping an ideological drum:
   
   "You get the sense that Dawkins can't control it. It's as if he suffers from anti-religious Tourette's."
   
   However, in dialogue with a very reasonable atheist scientist, Lawrence Krebs, Dawkins talked about the power of religion to to comfort & give purpose in life (with research to prove it!), He said:
   
   "I imagine you would agree with me that we have no objection to people drawing comfort from wherever they choose & no objection to strong moral compasses."
   
   Dawkins' real foe is religious fundamentalism that trumpets beliefs that science has long proven wrong. Like, that the world is 6,000 years old.
   If only he'd stick to that,instead of totally rubbishing everything in the metaphysical world associated with faith.
   
   Krauss tells Dawkins that good science can actually enrich faith by not trying to 'rid the world of God' but by cutting out the most irrational & harmful aspects of religious fundamentalism. Not surprisingly, Krauss, an atheist, gets asked to speak to Catholic groups & has been invited to the Vatican for discussions on science. He thinks that faith, at its very best, is an important part of the human experience which brings benefits to people.
   He summarizes:
   "What we need to try to eradicate is not religious belief, or faith, it is ignorance."
   Dawkins replies: "We pretty much agree here."
   And so would St Augustine.
   
   Which is why I think you are absolutely right, Fr Mick, that there is a huge fertile ground for mutual cooperation & understandings between the 2 opposite poles of Total Anti-Religion and Religious Fundamentalism.
   
   Summed up by another New Scientist reviewer who wrote:
   "There are good, scientific reasons why religion won't disappear, however much anyone might want it to.'
   
   And science won't disappear either, leaving lots of room to make friends with people who hold a faith...in the big space between those polarised positions.
   
   
   
   

   Posted By: Marie H

5. I say let them go for it and explain to us all what it is they do believe in, which seems to be not much at all. But it is their religion.
   The only thing that disturbs me is that the Richard Dawkins and Catherine Devenys of the world are not merely atheists, but fundamentalist bigots, extremists in their religion. Surely this difference needs to be publicly defined.

   Posted By: Michelle Ehlers

6. A regular coven.
   
   Great. Not.
   
   A story about bitter & twisted men who REALLY show how bitter they are when they talk about religion.

   Posted By: Peter

7. I think it's great that Australian non-believers can meet and network amongst others of like mind. To campaign for separation of church and state (to the benefit of all) to discuss how we might combat the extremes of religion and how we might better work with those of faith.
   
   Perhaps, Fr Mick, it's time that we all got together to realize that Catholics/Christians, Muslims etc don't have a monopoly on good will or social justice.
   
   What have people of Faith to fear?
   
   And please people Hitler was a committed Christian. Neither Atheism nor Theism will motivate a person to acts of good or ill. For that you require an ideology, whether it be religious or non. Ideology can be manipulated by those who sit at the top to selfish ends and it often is.
   
   Why not come along to the conference instead of casting stones from the sidelines?
   

   Posted By: Sean the Blogonaut

8. Sean, I don't want to be picky, given you've argued for dialogue amongst those of faith & those who don't.
   That's a fair argument.
   But Hitler was not a committed Christian. Go read the condemnatiions of his beliefs & policies, by Bishop Galen, an amaziningly brave German catholic bishop.
   Hitler & fellows, placed the death penalty on anyone who read those statements from the pulpit or published them for distribution. But that didn't stop people passing them around secretly.
   

   Posted By: Marie H

9. Sean, well said but, please...Hitler was not a committed Christian. My studies of the Nazi terror show that he turned on Christianity, seeing it as a (Jewish) religion of weaklings.
   We have nothing to fear from the Dawkins of this world. But, perhaps, we should be grateful that they challenge us. I guess when it comes to the kind of God some Catholics believe in I, too, might be an atheist because I do not believe in such a god.

   Posted By: Francis

10. The Christian churches could combine their financial resources and expertise, to produce a television series and DVDs, to systematically counteract the arguments that Dawkins made in his TV series and his books. If Dawkins can fund television time and if athiests, according to the above article, can arrange a “convention billed as the world's largest” in Melbourne in 2010, perhaps the Christian churches can fund a TV series and even a convention, because all the atheists’ points can be dispelled.
    
    In recent years there have been around seven separate TV programs from different sources trying to demolish Christianity, one of which invalidly claimed that the tomb of Christ had been found. All the anti-Christian claims can be discounted, but I have not seen any programs that provide the counteracting evidence. This is not necessary for those who have no doubt about the existence of God, but there are probably many people who are being adversely affected by Dawkins and Hitchens, which I think is a major reason why people abandon their religion, and they need to know the other side in support of Christianity.
    
    The book “Greater Than You Think: A Theologian Answers the Atheists About God" was specifically written by Fr Thomas D. Williams to explain the fallacies put by Dawkins and Hitchens and others. Some informative and easy to read points are on Melbourne Archdiocese site www.cam.org.au on 17 June 2008 under Perspectives (access second screen left column) and several years of topics are in date order.

    Posted By: Julie Keating

11. Skye - it's just not historically accurate to say Hitler was an atheist. He was brought up a Catholic and the Nazis had official ties to the Catholic throughout their reign. Also if you read Mein Kampf you will see Hitler making constant references to God. Whether Hitler was an atheist is hard to know - what you can say is that he never held himself out to be one.

    Posted By: chris davidson

12. You can lead an atheist to evidence, but you can't make him think. They are absolutely sure there no absolutes, and absolutely sure all values are relative.
    In the atheistic evolutionary Wonderland, an effect can not only be far greater than the cause, but actually opposite to the cause; order comes from chaos; life from non-life; information from no information; intelligence from no intelligence; reason from non-reason; and mind from mindless matter.
    Blind mindless matter in motion turns mud to mind; earth to Einstein; frog to prince, and goo into you via the zoo.
    Then we magically have an indifferent and unfeeling universe plus an indifferent, unfeeling mindless evolutionary mechanism somehow produce loving, caring and altruistic human beings.
    Here's the bottom line. God is not only a reality, but a philosophical and scientific necessity.
    
    

    Posted By: John Heininger

• » Advertise in CathNews

Email to Friend Please fill out the following details (fields marked with a * are mandatory):
Send To Email Address*:
Send To Name *:
Sent By Email Address*:
Sent By Name *:
Text to include in email:
Captcha validation:	please enter the code above:

^ Page Top

Comment on this article

More from this section

1. Brennan committee finds need for human rights legislation

   The Rudd government appointed National Human Rights Consultation committee's final report that was released yesterday recommended the country adopts a Human Rights Act.

2. More Australians backing abortion rights

   Some 57 percent of Australians support a woman's right to an abortion any time they want one, a third backs the procedure in "special circumstances", while only 4 percent is totally opposed, an Australian Election Study showed.

3. Secrecy protects perpetrators of child killers: welfare advocates

   Australian Catholic University academic Patricia Hansen and child welfare advocate Frank Ainsworth have come out strongly against protecting the anonymity of children killed by their parents, saying it protects the perpetrators.

4. The functional universe implies a Creator: Pell

   Sydney Archbishop Cardinal George Pell quoted Aristotle, Stephen Hawking, Albert Einstein and the astronomer Fred Hoyle, who famously said he believed "the universe is a put-up job", in a talk titled "Without God We Are Nothing".

5. ACU dean named Vic businesswoman of 2009

   Pauline Nugent, Dean of Health Sciences at the Australian Catholic University, has been named 2009 Telstra Victorian Business Woman of the Year for her leadership and the rapid expansion of health courses and research activity at the university.