DeKAY: Latest import — New Atheism

By PEGGY DeKAY

“I don't think even the blackest atheist has an idea of what real separation [from God] will be. Outer darkness. What we live in you might call ... "inner darkness."

— John Updike’s “Rabbit, Run”

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What's new about the New Atheism? The New Atheism, and its believers, aren't satisfied to deny the existence of God, or even condemn the belief in God, but they are out to destroy our “respect for our belief in God,” in short, they want to make atheism “cool.” They paint believers with a broad, harsh brush.

Do you remember the old movie called “Network?” It was a story about a newscaster, Howard Beal, played expertly by Peter Finch, who after being told he would lose his job in two weeks, began to lose it on the air.

During his last broadcast he asks his viewers to get mad, to go to their windows and shout, “I'm as mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore.”

I was reminded of that movie, and the sentiment expressed by the Howard Beal character, after seeing an interview on BBC (British Broadcasting Corp.), with Richard Dawkins, a British scientist and the Charles Simonyi Professor of the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University. Dawkins is an atheist; but he is not content to be an atheist, he wants converts and lots of them. His killing field is comprised of agnostics and non-committed non-believers. He, and his fellow British atheist, Christopher Hitchens represent the New Atheists religion. Ground zero for New Atheism is Oxford.

Hunting season on Christians for Dawkins and his colleagues has officially begun. We, as Christians, are, in Dawkins estimation, ignorant-myth-believing-Bible-thumping-looney-creationist-Christians.

He and his fellow believers, disdain all religion, (except atheism) but most notably, and most vocally, the Christian religion. During a recent BBC interview Dawkins said, “It is very important to make a distinction between what I could call sensible religious people ... and the sort of nut cases who believe the entire world, the entire universe was made in six days, less than 10,000 years ago.” He goes on to say, “ ... loony creationists are more annoying to people like bishops than they are to people like me, but they are annoying to both of us.”

How does the learned Dawkins feel about educating children in religion, both in England and the United States? “There is a lamentable ignorance among children of the Bible, that doesn't mean that it should be taught as true.”

He has described Christians as people “anxious for Armageddon.”

Let me set the record straight. I am, by Dawkins definition, a loony creationist. Sadly for Dawkins, but lucky for me, my lunacy was passed on to me and supported by my parents, also loony Creationists. I am not anxious for Armageddon, and in fact want to live to a ripe old age, in good health and prosperity. Most, if not all, of my Christian friends feel the same way.

In the last few years, a number of books touting the intellectual superiority of atheism and by extension, atheists, have been written by the likes of Daniel Dennett, (”Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon”), and Dawkins' book, “The God Delusion,” alongside Sam Harris' book, “The End of Faith.” Together, these four men, Dawkins, Hitchens, Harris and Dennett represent ground zero of the New Atheism.

Hitchens, when interviewed by Matt Cherry in Free Inquiry, said: "I'm an atheist. I'm not neutral about religion, I'm hostile to it. I think it is a positively bad idea, not just a false one. And I mean not just organized religion, but religious belief itself." Hitchens' latest book is entitled “God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything.”

While the New Atheists take us on in the Barnes and Nobles, and Amazon.coms of this world, the second hunting ground for Christians seems to be the most famous safari land of all, Hollywood, Calif.

I remember when men and women of faith were seen in movies and on television as people of honor, and integrity. Hollywood made blockbuster movies about heroes of the Bible like “Ben Hur” and “The Ten Commandments.” People of faith were portrayed as strong and hardworking, full of wisdom and kindness. Now, as far as Hollywood is concerned men of the cloth are mongrels, thieves and money changers and their congregations full of half -witted, mean-spirited malcontents.

While the New Atheists talk about the Big Bang, natural selection and evolution, I hear a small voice in the background clamoring to be heard. There is a new breed of scientists beginning to understand the supreme design of our world, and they call their theory Intelligent Design.

Atheists would have us all believe that we were formed first by chance, then by change, adaptation and selection. It seems to me that in this world nothing is by chance. Cities are designed; they don't spring up from nothingness. When I became pregnant, the development of my child was ordered, designed, if you will.

The New Atheists disdain faith, but it seems to me that it takes a heap more faith to believe that the tree in my back yard, with its leaves who transform carbon dioxide into oxygen that I can breath, and whose wood can be used to build my house, cook my food, and keep me warm, was all a 'roll of the dice'. To me it sounds like a plan, a very good plan at that; an intelligent design.

The Bible says that the “beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord.” It reminds me of the conversation between God and the scientist. The scientist bets God that he can create a human being just like God did in Genesis. God agrees to the challenge, but reminds the scientist that he must create his human with his own skill. The scientist, with a smug look on his face, bends down, collecting a small hand full of dirt to begin making his human. God interrupts him, smiling, and says, “Not so fast, make your own dirt.”

“To be an atheist requires an indefinitely greater measure of faith than to receive all the great truths which atheism would deny.”

— Joseph Addison, the Spectator, Mar. 8, 1711

Thoughts from the Hungry Side of Daybreak are written by Peggy DeKay, a business and freelance writer. She can be reached at pldekay@insightbb.com.

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