Church message backfires, helps atheist group.
Offline Actually it is a double edge sword. It appears that a church a while back put up the message "Don't believe in God? Don't believe everything you hear". Well, we know what they meant and they know what they meant, but if you are plugging for Jesus, maybe you should think before you sell? Maybe?
Anywho, a Cleveland atheist group caught wind of this and was going to put it on billboards next week. But the sign company caught wind of where they got the idea and backed out. But that was not before the atheist website got bombarded with so much attention it crashed several times.
Maybe if the church hadn't made such a stink about it the atheist site wouldn't have gotten so much attention?
Here is the story
http://www.clevescene.com/scene-and-heard/archives/2011/11/23/atheists-holiday-message-thwarted
The article is called "Atheist's holiday message thwarted". Just in case this link doesn't work. The summery above the link is my punditry and is not part of the article.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
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Ah, so when an atheist group wants to put up the exact same billboard, it is too inflammatory.
Our revels now are ended. These our actors, | As I foretold you, were all spirits, and | Are melted into air, into thin air; | And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, | The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, | The solemn temples, the great globe itself, - Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, | And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, | Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff | As dreams are made on, and our little life | Is rounded with a sleep. - Shakespeare
-- Trends in the “War on Christmas”
Once again, more than 84 percent of survey respondents do not feel there is a War on Christmas in America. A full 88 percent of more than 4578 surveyed feel that the annual headlines surrounding the debates over Christmas are overblown media events driven by political agendas.
On the topic of retailers who refuse to say or use the term “Merry Christmas” or to substitute the word “holiday” for “Christmas”, 69 percent of respondents just don’t care.
Of those who hear the term “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas”, 98 percent are not offended or bothered.
99 percent of respondents prefer that a Christmas tree be called a Christmas instead of a “holiday tree”, though only 5%.
On the issues of Christmas on public properties or in public institutions such as schools and court houses there is a clear divide. 56 percent of Americans polled do not think Christmas should be exclusively displayed during holiday periods like Christmas where other holidays, such as Ramadan and Channukah, are also celebrated. 67 percent feel Christmas should be allowed in schools inclusive of music of a religious nature such as Silent Night and O Little Town of Bethlehem. But 77 percent also feel that similarly religious music should be allowed of other faiths celebrating holidays as well.
Speaking of Christmas in the schools, a new question this year casts doubts on the ability of educators to accurately or adequately teach the history of Christmas. 62 percent of respondents say public schools are incapable of teaching the subject.
http://mymerrychristmas.com/library/christmas-present-4/christmas-in-america-2011-a-merrier-christmas-by-spending-less-275/
Incapable of teaching on the subject?
Religion Kills !!!
Numbers 31:17-18 - Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man.
http://jesus-needs-money.blogspot.com/
It was a gaff on the Church's part. We've all made gaffs at some point. I was at a pro choice rally in DC several years ago. Some fundies were on the sidewalk praying. A bunch of us went up to them while they were praying and chanted "Pro life what a lie you don't care if women die". But I gaffed and said "Pro choice what a lie, you don't care if women die. OOOOOPS! It only means we are human.
But, in all seriousness. There is a war, not on holidays, not on getting together with family and giving gifts. I am fine with that. But there is a war and one I don't think we should shy away from. The war is about Christians in America thinking they own a day as if no one else exists. But what is worse, is that some want it to be focused on a claimed event that is scientifically absurd. There was no virgin birth. This festering myth needs to die, not the holiday itself. Just the people who think everyone else should believe in virgin births like them and celebrate Christmas centered around Jesus's magical fictional birth.
No one is going to deny you the right to pretend that virgins can get knocked up by god via "poof". But this is not a theocracy. We do not have to believe that myth to want to spend time with our loved ones or give to others.
The war is not on civil rights. The war is on absurd claims. The war is on self centered people who think they are the only religion that exists or that there is only one way to celebrate a holiday.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
This is great news! An illustration why I have no need to have a fake War on Christmas this year. I don't need to teach John Gibson and Fox a lesson, America is already doing it. Believe there is a War on Christmas? Well that puts you in a very small minority... of idiots.
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We have been slowly "winning" the "war" on christmass even though we didn't declair war and I'm not sure exactly what we are winning. Every year I hear more and more true believers admit "we know christ wasn't realy born on 12/25" more and more each day are willing to admit that the date and decorations and gift giving are from pagen traditions, yet they are still believers. At least they seem to be thinking more and we both know that more thinking creates more atheists.
Take Guyana S.A. for example; and I understand Trinidad & Tobago is the same. Most people [like 90% or so] don't reguard christmass as religious at all. They take to the season the same way North Americans do. Decorations and gift giving, trees and holly, peace on earth and good will toward men. Sort of the english language version of Japans 'Season of the Ninth!' [Beathovan's 9th]. The reason is easy enough to understand the population in both countrys is around 60% Hindhu and 25% Muslim. Bollywood movies and TV shows are the most popular froms of entertainment even though most of these people are 6 & 7 generations removed from India.
I spent years trying to explain that christmass was a christian holiday and they weren't christians, only to hear "Christmass is for everybody it's not religion"; I finnaly gave up and now I do my Santa Claus shtick 3 times each year in Guyana; At my house, at an orphanage and an impromptue charity kitchen. Try dressing like a North Pole refugee in 85 degree heat, I dare you!!!! I'm off next week for my Dec. 10 performance.
The future I see is that Christmass will remain but any religious aspect will fade out into insignificance.
"Very funny Scotty; now beam down our clothes."
VEGETARIAN: Ancient Hindu word for "lousy hunter"
If man was formed from dirt, why is there still dirt?