no God? yeah right!

Why do atheist groups dedicate so much effort telling people (believers and not) that we (believers) are wrong? Everyday Christian (http://www.everydaychristian.com/) just posted an article about a new advert campaign by American Humanist Association (http://www.considerhumanism.org/) to discredit the Bible.

Atheist Group Launching National Ad Campaign Challenging Bible
http://www.everydaychristian.com/news/weblink/8887/

These groups of non-believers spend lots more effort telling people that there's no God than we (Christians) spend teaching about God. Maybe it's the sickening desperation of proving themselves that their belief system must be true, yet doubting their own belief system.

religious differences vs non-believers

The problem's not so much whatever group of religious differences between Judaism, Christianity, Islam and any other religion. It isn't whose god or interpretation of God is the "true" God.

Belief in the Godhead or its lack of is bigger issue. Nowadays we can't say "God bless America" without some idiot complaining about the word "God."

To make matters worse, non-believers do have their own gods -- money, greed (any or all of the seven deadly sins to be included in this list), Darwin (evolution) and themselves. This is such hypocrisy that punishes believers in order to make this little population of the nation happy.

Other cultures (even those within the US) make constant references to God (Jehovah, Allah, Buddha, Krishna, Ra, etc) in their day-to-day speech. This is something rarely found nowadays in US English heavily tainted with political correctness. At least, it's good to know that this isn't true in other cultures.

The Muslim greeting "Salem malenku" is both a greeting and a blessing. The expression means "May the peace of God be with you."

The Arabic expression "Insh'allah" means "God willing" and it expresses the hope that God would allow something to happen. This expression was adopted in Spain as "Ojala."

At the same time, the Spanish goodbye expression "Adios" means "Go with God," which comes from the Latin expression "A Deus." The same remains true for similar expressions like "Adiu" in French. Unfortunately many of the people using this and similar expressions aren't aware of the religious meaning of these words and phrases.

In Hebrew, a person may say "Shalom" as greeting which means "May God be with you." Although Hebrew doesn't have as many references to God in its speech, worldwide most people consider Hebrew as the language of the People of God.

In English (American especially), the expressions "For God's sake" and "(May) God bless you" have rather been changed to accommodate atheists and others. These expressions have changed to "For Pete's sake" (even "For fuck's sake") and a generic "Bless you" or the German expression "Gesundheit," which means "healthiness." Expressions like "In the year of our Lord" are no longer common, but at least it survives in classic English literature and poetry.

At the least, the common expression "(May) Lord help us" or "(May) God help us" is still used as a reminder that this is a nation of believers (82.31% of Christians, 1.77% of Jews, 1.58 % of Muslims; 2006, http://www.thearda.com/internationalData/countries/country_234_1.asp) by many including Presidents.

friends from other books

As a continuation of http://project05952381.blogspot.com/2010/07/friends-from-afar.html I wanted to emphasize that distance doesn't always mean geographical position of two object or persons.

After living abroad about one third of my life and living in NYC for the other two thirds, not all my friends are Christian of whatever denomination.

For example, my friends I-An and I-Chun (sisters) are Buddhist.

Coto is atheist or so he calls himself. After all, his wife is Christian (Catholic perhaps).

Julian is non-practicing Jew and married to a non-practicing Christian.

Several of my friends are Muslim. As a matter of fact, my friend Sheila converted to Islam after spending most of her life as a Christian.

Of course, many are Christian although they don't practice their faith. If they do, it might be limited to several times a year.

After a while, religion is not too important when making friends for life. Nonetheless I must admit that some (if not all) the friends whom I've made in church might be my friends (http://project05952381.blogspot.com/2010/05/my-church-friends-unexpected-fellowship.html) for the rest our lives.

my skeptical (atheist) friends

Speaking of atheists (http://project05952381.blogspot.com/2010/05/being-geek-and-christian.html), two of my childhood friends -- atheists, hardcore skeptical, scientists in their own right with doctorates and such -- do have some valid points to their reasoning from a scientific point of view, which make me think and look for a religious/scientific answer their claims. It's the never ending quarrel (two against one) between friends, which we often avoid. Nonetheless I want to win the battle and prove them that there's a Godhead and make them worship God in whatever way (religion) they see fit.

Needless to say, most of my friends believe in God following different religious beliefs -- not only Christian.

In all this might be why I like reading Friedrich Nietzsche ("Gott ist tot"). His material always make me more interested in Christianity as well as forcing me to analyze my religious beliefs against my understanding of science.

Cuba, 31 years later

After going through some old articles, I read an article how Cuba is becoming a Christian nation once again (http://www.pcusa.org/pcnews/2010/10280.htm). The Cuban constitution changed the description of the nation from atheist (hostile, government rejection to religion) to secular (neutral, government tolerance to the practice of religion) on 04/02/1990.

With this change, several Christian groups of various denominations have started or continued now without persecution to teach others about God as if this was a savage, Godless and/or pagan land. These missionaries are rebuilding the religious infrastructure of the country that was practically on hold for about three decades -- about two generations of Cubans brought up or at least coaxed via propaganda in the idea that man's supreme above all and/or there's no God -- since the Communist takeover in 1959. Although humans unlearn ideas and habits slowly and learn new ones even more slowly, Christian congregations seem to have been growing rapidly for the past two decades. It would take some more time for most of the population to find God once more.

This proves that humans need to believe in God -- not only to explain the unknown, but rather to cope with life itself. Perhaps the most important right anyone can have is practicing the religious and/or spiritual beliefs that he/she prefers.