07.09.07
Should religion be banned?
This afternoon, my heart sank within me I as read the readers comments on a BBC webpage. The comments concerned the question of whether morality is declining in our nation, and why that is so. Most people who posted were athiests (although the poll attached to the comments should that 83% of people believe that religion has something to do with moral standards in our nation). Immediately, I was left with that sinking feeling that we Christians are keeping quiet whilst the atheists are making the bluster. Should we not stand up for Christ in our society?
Perhaps we are reticent because we struggle against the arguments of the atheists. They say that religion is the cause of wars and immorality. But as we examine the claim, we find that it is simply not true that Biblical Christianity causes wars and immorality.
1. What is the basis for the atheists insistence that we must be moral beings - is there some objective morality which stands outside the created realm demanding our submission and attention; or do we make our own morality (the only other alternative). If you take the second position, as atheists do, then who is to say whether the morality of national socialist Germany is superior or inferior to that of the democratic West. Where do we get our sense of right and wrong? Is there such a thing as objective morality? Atheists struggle to answer the question.
2. What is the answer to bad theology? Undoubtedly, bad religion has caused wars (e.g. Crusades, Jihad etc). But is the answer to dispense with all theology? No, the corrective to bad theology is not no theology, but good theology - the theology of Christ and the Bible. Atheists just cannot see the alternative.
3. What is the historical precedent for the suggestion that Christianity is immoral? Was it not Christians who emancipated the slaves? Is it not in this Christian country that the atheists have the right to freedom of speech (try it in Saudi Arabia or Iran). Is the Bible an immoral textbook - does it turn good people into killers, and saints into thieves, or the other way about?
4. Why the intolerance? One reader suggested that all religion be banned. It’s not the first time atheism tried to ban religion - it tried it in Soviet Russia and in Communist Albania. But the Spirit was victorious over the human. Be careful, my brothers, for the persecution is coming.
5. Why is atheism so fashionably arrogant?
This nation has always been immoral - the problem is not religion, it is us. The immorality of the Victorian age was hidden under the decorum of society, but it was no less immoral than today. The reason for our immorality as a nation is the darkness of the church - our ‘theologians’ struggle to believe the Bible and condone all kinds of immoral practices. We Christains are ashamed of Christ and fail to live Christ-like lives in the face of the religion of secularism. The decline of morality in our nation (or the more blatant manifestation of immorality) can be closely linked with the decline in church membership, Christian commitment and Christian evangelism.
But do not despair, for He who sits in heaven shall laugh at them. But do pray for our secular nation.