Even if we were to ignore the obvious crimes against humanity that
atheistic communists have committed, atheism would be condemned simply
by examining the devastation of the French Revolution.
Several points:
1. This is a silly, if not also a thoroughly common, argument.
If the negative actions of any and all theists reflect badly upon all
theists, all forms of religion and all religionists then it follows that
the negative actions of any and all atheists reflect badly upon all
atheists, all forms of irreligion and all irreligionists. This logical
fallacy is called “Guilt by Association.”
2. Communism is definitely a religion as the
Catholic Church has claimed for more than a century. It’s an atheistic
religion. It’s a religion created by atheists, celebrated by atheists
and defended by atheists. It comes with its own prophets and prophecies,
sacred items, soteriology, hierotopy, pseudo-spirituality,
pseudo-morality, pilgrimages, temples, theophany, soteriology, cultic
practices, sacred texts and exegetical commentary.
3. Even if we were to ignore the obvious crimes
against humanity that atheists involved in the global communist movement
in the past century have committed, we can condemn all atheists and
atheism simply by examining the one million dead at the hands of
“rational,” “enlightened” atheist French Revolutionaries. Historians
call the Vendean Martyrs in March 1793 the modern-era’s first genocide.
The atheist French Revolutionary Army ordered the conscription of
300,000 citizens of Vendée. Having already had all of their churches
suppressed and their bishops slaughtered, this infuriated the populace
which rose up in “The Catholic Army.” In response, the Revolutionary
Army massacred 6,000 Vendée prisoners, many of them women, children and
the elderly, after the battle of Savenay. In addition, 3,000 Vendée
women were drowned at Pont-au-Baux. In addition, 5,000 Vendée priests,
elderly, women and children were tied in groups in barges and drowned in
the Loire River at Nantes. By July, AD 1796, nearly 500,000 Vendean
Catholics were killed. All of these theists were killed at the hands of
atheists. Considering this was the first cry of “public” atheism—as
opposed to individuals who simply didn’t believe in God throughout
Christian history—atheists have yet to explain why “compassionate” and
“rational” atheists’ hands are so murderously bloody.
4. If the above statement were true, it might make
the atheist case unassailable. However, anyone who has read a newspaper
at any time between the 17th and 21st centuries knows this to be untrue.
This is one of the atheists’ fondest lies. I’m not sure that the person
about to be executed by a Marxist or Maoist atheist is assuaged in the
knowledge that his evil, merciless executioner isn’t killing him because he’s an atheist but rather because he believes in an atheist philosophy and only coincidently
doesn’t believe in God. Multiply this by all 152 million dead at the
hands of atheists in the 20th and 21st century—a carnage which has yet
to abate—makes the above claim perfectly worthless. In addition, we have
more than sufficient proof that atheists killed in the name of atheism
as in the case of the Soviet Union’s Society of the Militant Godless,
Mao Zedong’s Red Guard, the Enlightenment’s Reign of Terror, Abimael
Guzmán’s Shining Path, atheist Napoleon’s wars and Plutarco Elias Calles
democide of Mexican Catholics during the Cristero Wars.
5. Atheists who make nonsensical, ahistorical and misological claims
such as this one, prove they’ve never truly examined their own
community’s behavior under the microscope as they enjoy doing with us.
Consider instead those who have died in the name of atheistic
philosophies such as marxism, socialism, communism, maoism, Nazism,
fascism, totalitarianism, libertarianism, monopolistic capitalism,
robber barronism, industrialization, secularism, jingoism, anarchism,
social darwinism, eugenics, malthusianism, messianic scientism,
nihilism, anti-humanist terrorism, individualism, narcissism,
physicalism, materialism, consumerism, modernism, postmodernism,
nietzscheism, Marquis de Sade’s sadism, (i.e., sadistic murders) moral relativism, hedonism, radical feminism, (i.e., abortions, infanticide, suicide, false claims of rape) radical environmentalism, (i.e., ecological terrorism) Anton LaVey’s satanism, (i.e., ritual murders) and the “Law of Attraction.” (i.e.,
the deaths, including suicides, caused by Peter Popoff, Sylvia Browne
and other gurus”) All of these atheistic philosophies have resulted in
the deaths of countless hundreds of millions of human beings. In
comparison, the deaths caused by religion seem almost quaint and
insignificant.
6. But even if we were to never mention any of the dark secret murders
of the atheist community ever again, an important question remains
begging to be begged: Why is it that no one has ever been helped anyone
in the name of atheism? There has never been anyone who has ever given a
crust of bread or a drop of water or a stitch of clothing to anyone in
the name of atheism. (Richard Dawkins admits in his The God Delusion
that it’s “easier to herd cats than to get atheists to cooperate each
other.” This goes a long way in explaining why atheists refuse to
cooperate with each other and form charitable concerns. Christians
easily cooperate with each other otherwise hospitals and schools would
never get built.)
If this is incorrect, where are the army of atheists humanitarian
traipsing about Africa and Asia giving hope to the poor and
disadvantaged? Certainly none of the famous atheist polemicists have
ever done so. Christopher Hitchens was asked on multiply occasions if he
or other atheists who similarly had a poor opinion of St. Mother Teresa
have actually gone to India and rolled up their sleeves to bathe
lepers. I’ve asked many atheists including P.Z. Myers, Patricia
Churchland and Christopher Hitchens and none have responded in the
positive. Madalyn O’Hair never mentioned having done so. Mao and Stalin
were busy killing tens of millions of their compatriots by engineering
famines in their respective countries so it’s hard to imagine they also
helped poor people. When I volunteered at Mother Teresa’s street clinics
in Calcutta, I never met an atheist doing the same work but I routinely
met Catholics doing so.
Regardless of their obviously false claim that atheists have
dutifully avoided murdering anyone, it’s a rather worthless commentary
if a community has done nothing positive for humanity. Most humans have
never killed anyone but this hardly makes those most people saints or
Nobel Peace Prize material. (Mother Teresa was both.) It would be a sad
epigraph on an atheist’s tombstone if it read, “He never helped a single
individual, but at least he never killed anyone except as a result of
his indifference and apathy.” Most prison convicts and related
sociopaths have similarly not killed anyone but the fact that
they’re in prison proves they’ve disregarded the rights and needs of
others. Only atheists put humanitarians in prison as in the case of the
Soviet Union and Post-Revolutionary China, North Korea, Cuba, Cambodia
and Viêt Nam.
7. Further, the fact that many atheists are glib or
gratified at the horror of mass murders committed by their fellow
atheists goes a long way in proving they are mere contrarians. One can’t
glibly disregard the suffering of others while ignoring the fact that
others (i.e., Catholics) are working towards alleviating
suffering in the world and throughout it all, lying about their good
works—that’s requires a special kind of evil which is hopefully
extremely rare in this world.
These philosophies and the horrors they generated aside,
fundamentalist atheists should rather worry about the kind of people
they hope to attract to their community when they mock religion. Truly
compassionate, generous, gentle, kind and forgiving people won’t be
attracted to a group that mocks others. I’ve been a Catholic for a long
time and I have never heard the word “atheism” or “atheist” ever
mentioned in church. Having been an atheist prior to reverting to
Catholicism, I can assure you that that community is obsessed
by the Church finding themselves incapable, or unwilling, of discussing
anything other than the most recent reason for hating us. They never
talk about the wonders and glories of atheism or the joy that it
engenders in their hearts. They never raise virtuous atheists as models
for themselves and their children. They never organize themselves to
help the unfortunate. It’s because they can’t and simply don’t want to.
Frankly, after a couple of years, I simply couldn’t take it anymore. I
left atheism behind because it was snarky, sniping and moribund
reveling in its bitterness and denial. It’s amazing anyone
psychologically and spiritually survives the wholesale rejection of
hope, logic and reality as they cherry pick data to uphold their
opinions. Or, maybe, it’s because God has a special place in His heart
for atheists. As G.K. Chesterton points out, God even sustains atheists
in their disbelief.
Another link related to Atheism (In case the Atheists attack your religion).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_atheism
https://evangelicalsnow.wordpress.com/2012/06/21/no-one-kills-in-the-name-of-atheism/
http://www.thomism.org/atheism/atheist_murderers.html
https://billmuehlenberg.com/2014/02/08/atheism-government-and-killing/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/League_of_Militant_Atheists
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Catholic_victims_of_Soviet_persecutions
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_Christians_in_the_Eastern_Bloc
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_Christians_in_the_Soviet_Union
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecutions_of_the_Catholic_Church_and_Pius_XII
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_Jehovah%27s_Witnesses#Soviet_Union
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_Muslims#USSR
https://www.conservapedia.com/Atheism_and_violence
Source