107 thoughts on “Atheism and Christian Culture”

1. Richardthughes,

   Enjoy your driveby, get those feet looked at.

   I was right. You were wrong. Yes, I enjoy the truth, especially here at TSZ, where the truth is in such short supply.

2. The Supreme Court has recognized atheism as equivalent to a “religion” for purposes of the First Amendment on numerous occasions.

3. Mark Frank: Atheism is not a religion.

4. I said: “Atheism is afforded the same protection for legal purposes. It’s not hard, Mung.”

   Which is true, Mung.

   You said: ‘Laws respecting atheism or impeding the free exercise of atheism are obviously excluded from this first amendment protection.”

   Which is wrong, Mung.

   I hope that helps.

5. And a dog is equivalent to a cat with respect to number of legs. Serious question: Are you new to thinking?

6. I know it’s difficult to understand, but sometimes people have opinions that differ.

   That’s why, in general, when we want to progress something we make an effort and pull all opinions together into a single document, cull the least supported and progress the rest. If that fails, try again.

   Whereas of course, with ID, everyone can have an opinion (the designer created the universe, the designer might be an alien etc) and there is no way to cull the least supported because none of them have any support beyond the opinion of the person offering that idea.

   So I can see why you are confused Mung and think that by pointing out the differences of opinion you are achieving something. In fact all you are doing is illustrating the fact that you don’t do this at UD – there are many more contradictory opinions given at UD then here, so I’m wondering why you’ve chosen to do this act here rather then there?

   Oh, wait, I do know…

7. Mung: I was right. You were wrong.

   Round of applause!

   You might (think) you’ve won a battle but remind me, how’s the war going? It’s all gone YEC over at UD.

   Yes, I enjoy the truth, especially here at TSZ, where the truth is in such short supply.

   Therefore there is more truth at UD and therefore you are a YEC!

   Nice of you to finally admit it Mung!

8. Those of us in the non-US world (a tiny enclave that might pass unnoticed on a cursory glance at the globe) are delighted to have a clear steer on the ‘is atheism a religion’ question from the United States Supreme Court, I’m sure. And if a US court were to conclude that – say – ID is religious in nature, Mung would be keen to accept that too?

9. Allan Miller:

   Those of us in the non-US world (a tiny enclave that might pass unnoticed on a cursory glance at the globe) are delighted to have a clear steer on the ‘is atheism a religion’ question from the United States Supreme Court, I’m sure.

   http://www.uscourts.gov/FederalCourts/UnderstandingtheFederalCourts/DistrictCourts.aspx

10. Uh … yeah, that’s great. Want a guide to the court system in Estonia?

11. Argumentum Ad America and Appeal To The Law are subgenres of informal fallacies and used so commonly on the internet that they should be recognised in their own right.

12. I’m not sure what Mung’s point is, but I found this to be rather illuminating approach to the subject:

    http://atheism.about.com/library/FAQs/ath/blathm_rel_religion.htm

    Mark Frank is correct that atheism is not a religion. Oddly, the very word “a-theism”, really ought to be one’s first clue. That Mung cannot tell the difference between an actual social structure and a legal precedent for purposes of equal treatment strikes me as wholly disingenuous are just plain idiocy.

    So which is it Mung? Are you being dishonest or are you just ignorant of the contextual differences?

13. Hi everyone. It’s not very often I come over here, but I just happened to, on a whim. For the benefit of all concerned, I should point out that several people over at Uncommon Descent post under the handle of “News.” The post on Measles and Religion was mine, not Denyse’s. I use my own name for my more substantive posts. This was a short one, intended as a brief riposte to Professor Jerry Coyne’s attempt to link religion to the anti-vaccination movement. (On the skeptics’ side, I could have mentioned apatheist Bill Maher, but I forebore from doing so. That would have been a cheap shot: a sample of one. A sample of a mere 0.002% of churchgoers is not much better.)

    I am well aware that Christmas was originally a pagan festival, just as I’m aware that there are atheists who play the organ in various churches. But let’s face it: if you were a betting man, and you heard that a certain person played Christmas carols every year in front of his own staff, and died reading the poetry of T. S. Eliot, you would surely bet against the likelihood of that person’s being an atheist, would you not?

    As for “60 religions sharing similar stories of birth, death and resurrection,” all I can say is: name one. (Yes, I’ve read about Horus, Krishna and Mithra. Have you?)

    One last thing. Calling a lady an idiot is not nice, as I’m sure Mark Frank would agree. The offending commenter should apologize.

14. Hello vjtorley,

    While anti-vaccination beliefs and advocacy are not limited to the religious there is ample data that strongly suggests that religious factions and their anti-vaccination advocacy have resulted in many of the recent outbreaks of vaccine preventable disease in children. Children die as a result of these decisions, e.g., Philadelphia 5 dead in 1991. All one need do is to examine the data to see that this is true. We also have the many instances of people opting out of vaccines based on religious beliefs. Wether these people are actually religious, or not, is another question. They could easily be lying. However, if this is what we think about their claims then we would have to make the assumption that any objection based on religious grounds may be a lie.

15. But let’s face it: if you were a betting man, and you heard that a certain person played Christmas carols every year in front of his own staff, and died reading the poetry of T. S. Eliot, you would surely bet against the likelihood of that person’s being an atheist, would you not?

    I would bet against any given person being an atheist, but if the person was from the UK I would not regard the playing of carols as a strong indicator of a religious bent. And, no, reading TS Eliot does not make a person likely to be Christian. Have you read his poetry before he converted?

16. It’s no worse to call a woman an idiot than a man.

17. “One last thing. Calling a lady an idiot is not nice, as I’m sure Mark Frank would agree. The offending commenter should apologize.”

    I agree. Do you read your own blog? Are you familiar with Joe G?

    Luke 6:41

18. He loves truth! He is right and you are wrong!

19. But let’s face it: if you were a betting man, and you heard that a certain person played Christmas carols every year in front of his own staff, and died reading the poetry of T. S. Eliot, you would surely bet against the likelihood of that person’s being an atheist, would you not?

    In my family, such an assumption would be considered laughable. I spent ten years in a choir and didn’t meet any conventional believers. I suppose many of them had vague mystical ideas, but none talked about the bible as literally true.

20. While anti-vaccination beliefs and advocacy are not limited to the religious there is ample data that strongly suggests that religious factions and their anti-vaccination advocacy have resulted in many of the recent outbreaks of vaccine preventable disease in children.

    The anti-vaccine movement in California is more tied to new age woo than to fundamentalist churches. This differs from place to place, but not all stupid people are churchgoers.

21. Hi Vincent

    You’re very welcome here.

    As for “60 religions sharing similar stories of birth, death and resurrection,” all I can say is: name one.

    Mithraism?

    Lizzie has established the rules of engagement here and there are a few other admins (including Mark Frank) who can wield the big stick. I am a bit time-poor to moderate the comments that might breach Lizzie’s rules. Myself, I would prefer that commenters restrict themselves to specifics, and describe statements as idiotic rather than call those that make particular statements idiots in general.

    PS at everyone, there’s a hint there!

22. Sure but perhaps equally unnecessary.

23. Alan Fox,

    Dionysus is one of my favorites.

24. Here’s 16. There are more.

    Chrishna of Hindostan.
    Budha Sakia of India.
    Salivahana of Bermuda.
    Zulis, or Zhule, also Osiris and Orus, of Egypt.
    Odin of the Scaudinavians.
    Crite of Chaldea.
    Zoroaster and Mithra of Persia.
    Baal and Taut, “the only Begotten of God,” of Phenicia.
    Indra of Thibet.
    Bali of Afghanistan.
    Jao of Nepaul.
    Wittoba of the Bilingonese.
    Thammuz of Syria.
    Atys of Phrygia.
    Xaniolxis of Thrace.
    Zoar of the Bonzes.
    Adad of Assyria.
    Deva Tat, and Sammonocadam of Siam.
    Alcides of Thebes.
    Mikado of the Sintoos.
    Beddru of Japan.
    Hesus or Eros, and Bremrillah, of the Druids.
    Thor, son of Odin, of the Gauls.
    Cadmus of Greece.
    Hil and Feta of the Mandaites.
    Gentaut and Quexalcote of Mexico.
    Universal Monarch of the Sibyls.
    Ischy of the Island of Formosa.
    Divine Teacher of Plato.
    Holy One of Xaca.
    Fohi and Tien of China.
    Adonis, son of the virgin Io of Greece.
    IxiOn and Quirinus of Rome.
    Prometheus of Caucasus.
    Mohamud, or Mahomet, of Arabia.

    Read more: http://www.city-data.com/forum/religion-spirituality/1621178-comparison-jesus-other-resurrected-messiahs-buddhism.html#ixzz2dTgipbKo

    Edited to add:

    http://listverse.com/2009/04/13/10-christ-like-figures-who-pre-date-jesus/

25. There comes a point where charity is ill-deserved, but for the sake of politeness let’s say she is incompetent. This is well documented.

26. petrushka: The anti-vaccine movement in California is more tied to new age woo than to fundamentalist churches. This differs from place to place, but not all stupid people are churchgoers.

    Absolutely!

    However, the religious groups who oppose vaccination provide a community with low vaccine compliance and this leads to the inevitable outbreaks of disease with rapid spread through their community. In the Philadelphia outbreak nearly 1000 people became ill within a short period of time….about a week if I recall correctly. This magnitude of disease outbreaks is what can put the vulnerable in our society at risk from the stupid folks. For the most part the other antivaccinationists are spread throughout the ‘herd’ and outbreaks are prevented due to herd immunity.

    Certainly the folks at Generation Rescue, Age of Autism, and followers of Jenny McCarthy, Robert Kennedy, Jr. and others have no excuse for their stupidity.

27. petrushka:
    To argue that the “teachings of Jesus” are without value because the stories about him are not literally true is to deny the value of myth and fiction, art and music.

    I don’t think I argued that?

    fG

28. I thought I was agreeing with you. Apologies for not being clear.

29. petrushka:
    I thought I was agreeing with you. Apologies for not being clear.

    RIght, and disagreeing with Blas, who bizarrely does argue exactly that: no good can possibly come from something which is not true to begin with. No value in fiction, art, music … how could anybody live such an empty life?

30. petrushka:
    To argue that the “teachings of Jesus” are without value because the stories about him are not literally true is to deny the value of myth and fiction, art and music.

    Every individual seems to draw the line differently between what they accept as fact and what they think is myth. I don’t think it matters unless one side or the other attempts to impose their beliefs on others by force.

    I say both yes and no to this. On the one hand, whether truth or fiction, the Bible has abundant material for aphorisms and some really nice parables — some of which are even presented as such. One of my favorites has always been the story of the man who’s donkey fell in a pit on the Sabbath, and the lesson “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath”. There are, of course, also the abundance of really horrible lessons that, on the balance, negate the valuable ones for me. If myth can create value, it can also destroy it.

    But on the other hand, there are those other “head of a pin” arguments that provide no larger lesson. The whole “Did Jesus say that he is God, or did he say he’s the Son of God, or did he say he’s on the same level as God…” These might have some value to a believer in that it can help them define the boundaries of their belief. But for a non-believer to get involved in such discussions is really no more productive than to argue whether Gandalf or Saruman was the more powerful in the beginning. We all have better things to do.

31. vjtorley,

    vj

    Thanks for this. I didn’t realise that people other than Denyse posted under News. It is not nice to call anyone an idiot and not in the spirit of this blog. I am not sure how to moderate so I will simply record my agreement (along with many others here) that it is not appropriate. Anyhow you are more than welcome here and I am sure would be a great asset as an respected, polite but contrary opinion.

    I think you will find that in general the behaviour on TSZ is far better than on UD. Denyse is not shy of calling “Darwinists” all sorts of insulting things. And, while I appreciate it would be impractical for you censure it every time Chris Doyle, Joe, etc called me an idiot- it would be nice if it happened just occasionally 🙂

    I am very surprised that you think singing carols and reading TS Eliot on your deathbed was evidence someone was a theist. As I say in my OP – atheists are not cut off from their religious roots.

32. Unproductive, other than to show the Bible isn’t a coherent text.

33. And the bulk of TS Eliot’s poetry is not religious!

34. vjtorley: As for “60 religions sharing similar stories of birth, death and resurrection,” all I can say is: name one. (Yes, I’ve read about Horus, Krishna and Mithra. Have you?)

    You’ve had your request satisfied, in spades. A list has been provided. I’d be interested to see your response to that, as you asked for it in the first place.

35. petrushka:
    I never used the term or the concept “leads to.”

    But among readers of literature there is an aphorism,“Fiction is a lie that tells the truth.”

    And in base of what logic you decided that the teachings of Jesus are true but the claim to be the Son of God is false?

36. Hi everyone,

    Thanks for your comments. Just a couple of points I’d like to clear up.

    1. I agree that Joe G.’s language is impolite on occasions.
    2. For what it’s worth, I have vouched for Mark Frank’s good character and sincere motives over on UD, on a couple of occasions.
    3. It seems that quite a few people in the U.K. see nothing at all incongruous in an atheist reading T. S. Eliot on their deathbed, or playing Christmas carols every year. I guess it must be an Anglican thing – it sounds like a very broad and tolerant church, embracing all shades of belief (and unbelief). Well, I suppose it’s possible that an atheist might do both of those things, if enough skeptics over in the U.K. find it unsurprising.
    4. Regarding the allegation that key articles of the Christian faith were copied from other religions: I’m surprised that people over here are so gullible on this point. Here are a few Websites that should set you all straight:

    http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/3054/was-jesus-copied-from-the-egyptian-god-horus (Horus)
    http://www.blackapologetics.com/bamanswerantiquity.html (Krishna)
    http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_jckr1.htm (Krishna)
    http://pleaseconvinceme.com/2012/is-jesus-simply-a-retelling-of-the-mithras-mythology/ (Mithras)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mithras_in_comparison_with_other_belief_systems#Mithraism_and_Christianity (Mithras)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dionysus#Parallels_with_Christianity (Dionysus)
    http://beginningandend.com/jesus-copy-horus-mithras-dionysis-pagan-gods/ (General)
    http://www.preventingtruthdecay.org/copycats.shtml (General)
    http://www.patheos.com/blogs/bibleandculture/2012/06/11/bart-ehrman-on-did-jesus-exist-part-seven/ (Interview with Bart Ehrman)

    Bart Ehrman’s concessions are telling:

    “As I spell out at greater lengths on one of my blog posts, even though there are numerous instances of divine men who are supernaturally born, there is no instance of a divine man being born to a “virgin,” as happens in the case of Jesus, for example in the Gospel of Matthew.”

    “All the deities that have been identified as belonging to the class of dying and rising deities can be subsumed under the two larger classes of disappearing deities or dying deities. In the first case the deities return but have not died; in the second case the gods die but do not return. There is no unambiguous instance in the history of religions of a dying and rising deity. (Jonathan Z. Smith, “Dying and Rising Gods,” Encyclopedia of Religion, 2nd ed. Lindsay Jones, (Detroit: Macmillan, 2005 [original: 1987]), 4:2535)”

    Hope that helps.

    Best wishes,

    Vincent

37. No it’s not an Anglican thing. FWIW, TS Eliot was a heretic for a large part of his poetic career.

    I personally don’t worry too much about whether there are or are not unique features in a story. Every rational person should know that uniqueness has no bearing on a story being true.

38. vjtorley:
    3. It seems that quite a few people in the U.K. see nothing at all incongruous in an atheist reading T. S. Eliot on their deathbed, or playing Christmas carols every year. I guess it must be an Anglican thing – it sounds like a very broad and tolerant church, embracingall shades of belief (and unbelief). Well, I suppose it’s possible that an atheist might do both of those things, if enough skeptics over in the U.K. find it unsurprising.

    No, it’s not just a UK thing, nor an Anglican thing. Try an east-coast, midwest, and west-coast USA thing, too. You’d be a lot more believable if you just admitted you made a dumb mistake with your un-evidenced assumption about whazzizname being a christian because he played christmas carols and read poetry. Honestly it would not hurt you one bit to admit you jumped to that conclusion for the wrong reasons, or maybe for no reason at all.
    It’s a whole nuther thing to pretend that whazzizname being christian – if indeed he were a christian after all – somehow refutes Coyne’s accurate statement about the public health threat from christian faith-healing denominations. But that’s a subject for another day. FIrst, admit you were just plain wrong about that one silly little bit abut the carols. Baby steps, baby steps.

39. http://www.nairaland.com/193520/there-many-other-virgin-births

40. hotshoe,

    VJ is a polite, intelligent and well read debater and I have immense respect for him. I just told him that the people here would be far better behaved here than on TSZ and small things like the tone of language can rapidly spoil that. If you disagree why not give some evidence or make an argument rather than just telling him to admit he made a dumb mistake?

41. Agreed. VJT puts me to shame!

42. Mark Frank:
    hotshoe,

    VJ is a polite, intelligent and well read debater and I have immense respect for him. I just told him that the people here would be far better behaved here than on TSZ and small things like the tone of language can rapidly spoil that. If you disagree why not give some evidence or make an argument rather than just telling him to admit he made a dumb mistake?

    Mark, you’re talking to the wrong person when you say “why not give some evidence or make an argument” – you should have addressed that to Torley.

    Let’s recap:
    A few days ago a post in “News” at UD, (assumed to be written by Denyse) attempted to rebut Jerry Coyne’s quite reasonable point about the pubic health problem of faith healing in regards to infectious diseases

    [WEIT wrote]This is one of the more palpable dangers of faith: disease spread by a refusal to accept modern medicine, itself based on the assumption that God will heal you.

    The ID author (who turns out to be vjtorley, as he came here to tell us) complained that Coyne only mentions one measles outbreak in the US, and then Torley wrote a long paragraph about Muslim/Nigerian resistance to vaccination, then a shorter distraction about public health failure in the Ukraine.
    All of that is flawed, and we could have made arguments about any or all of it, but we didn’t because that’s not the topic of this thread.

    What caught your eye, and what we’re responding to here in your thread, is Torley’s patently ridiculous notion that Torley can assume Dr Enders’ faith from the fact that Enders played carols at Christmastime and read T.S. Eliot (on his deathbed).

    So various responders have provided evidence that playing carols and reading T.S. Eliot (although not, as far as we know, on any of our deathbeds) is part of atheists’ culture as well as christians’, and what does Torley do? Xe comes back with the even-more ridiculous assumption that our responders are all from the UK and

    it must be an Anglican thing

    and dimly concludes:

    I suppose it’s possible that an atheist …

    What? Wait, what? Xe supposes it’s possible? Supposes? Possible? Xe just read personal testimony that it’s not merely possible, that it absolutely is a fact that self-identified atheists play carols and read Eliot.

    Which is where I come in to say “Torley, you made a dumb mistake. No point in trying to paper over your mistake with UK thing/Anglican thing/possibly/suppose. Just admit it and move on.”

    If the only way I can meet your standards of “being better behaved” is to never be bold enough to tell someone they should admit their mistake, then I flatly refuse to be “better behaved”. I will point out mistakes, I won’t play favorites, I won’t give a pass to those on “our side” and pick on only those mistakes from the “other side”, and I won’t shut up either.
    .
    If I were Torley, I’d be furious right now with your implication that I’m too fragile and sensitive to handle being told that I made a dumb mistake. Good thing that’s not exactly what you meant. Maybe you should be more careful what you say about people and how you say it in the future.

    People make mistakes. We all do. What’s important is to admit our mistakes, so we can (I hope) learn from them.

43. hotshoe,

    This was specificallyd directed to husbands when it was written but I think it applies equally well to most other places too.

    To keep your marriage brimming
    With love in the loving cup,
    Whenever you’re wrong, admit it;
    Whenever you’re right, shut up.

    http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/a-word-to-husbands/

44. Let’s hope he has some lasting influence on you! 😉

45. I would like to thank Mark Frank for speaking in my defence. I must say I’m amazed that a comment of mine has provoked such a firestorm of controversy. I’ll confine myself to a few brief remarks; this will be my last post on this thread.

    1. Here’s what I wrote in my original post on UD (see here ):

    Does any reader know of an atheist who plays Christmas carols every year in front of his family and lab staff, and who reads T. S. Eliot aloud to his wife and daughter on his deathbed? I certainly don’t. I’d be willing to bet Professor Coyne that John Franklin Enders, who has been called “The Father of Modern Vaccines,” believed in God and didn’t view religion as a cause of sickness.

    None of those sentences could possibly be described as a “dumb mistake.” The first is a question. Only statements in the indicative mood can be described as right or wrong. The second is an empirically true assertion about my own life experience – a point to which I’ll return below. The third is an offer – hence, once again, neither true nor false.

    2. In comment #4 on the same thread, writing as “News”, I conceded that “a secularist might enjoy some Christmas carols” and cited Richard Dawkins as an example. I chose him for a reason: he was about the most “hymn-friendly” atheist that I knew of. However, I added that “if I were a secular scientist, I’d feel very awkward about doing that in front of my own lab staff” – as I’m sure Dawkins would. I also said that I found it difficult to imagine a secularist reading T. S. Eliot on his deathbed.

    3. I gave the last word to Mark Frank in our exchange, in comment #11, where he wrote that his wife (who is an atheist) “is a long-standing member of the [church] choir” and rhetorically asked, “[W]hy wouldn’t carols, TS Eliot and even the Bible be an important part of my life – just like Shakespeare and the Greek myths?” Fair enough. And that was the end of that – or so I thought, until I stumbled across this post on TSZ.

    4. Let me add that I have family members who are atheists, and I got to know many atheists while living in Australia. I can only say that if any of the atheists I know were invited to sing in a church choir, they’d say, “No thanks – I think I’ll pass on that.” I should add that during my late teens and my twenties, I sang for many years in a Catholic church choir. I met people of many theological views, including some who entertained religious doubts (as I did, myself) – but not one atheist. That’s my personal experience. As for Eliot, I had imagined that most atheist readers would would have found his later poems somewhat distasteful, as Orwell did, for instance (see here ). On this point, I’m happy to concede that I was wrong. I still think, however, that if I were on my deathbed, I’d prefer to read the works of a poet whose philosophy of life more or less reflected my own, and I find it hard to imagine anyone not feeling that way. (Death is, after all, a statement.)

    5. In a comment above, I speculated that among Anglicans, who are more tolerant of theological diversity than Catholics, the notion of an atheist singing regularly in a church choir might not sound so incongruous. And for that I was bucketed. Bizarre.

    6. The fact that a large number of atheists on this thread find nothing out of place in a skeptic singing Christmas carols proves nothing as to whether their attitude is widely shared among (a) atheists as a group, or (b) atheists in countries outside the UK. Birds of a feather flock together, as they say. You’d need to select a random sample, to resolve the question. Until then, I can only say that my own experience of the atheists I’ve met as no less valid than the collective experience of readers of this thread, who are (whether they like to admit it or not) a biased sample. I may well be wrong – but I’d be foolish to concede as much, based on the evidence available to me at this point.

    7. I also pointed out above that one could argue on probabilistic grounds that John Franklin Enders’ carol-playing and reading of T. S. Eliot lend support to the hypothesis that he believed in God, even if they don’t prove that he did. To refute my argument, you’d have to show that the proportion of carol-singers is just as high among atheists as among believers – something I don’t think anyone would want to argue, even on this thread.

    8. In my reply to Mark Frank on UD, I pointed out that NNDB lists John Franklin Enders’ religion as Anglican/Episcopalian. No-one has remarked on that.

    9. In response to a query, I also provided extensive links above showing that Christianity is not a copycat religion based on the myth of Horus / Krishna / Mithras / Dionysus. Now that is a substantive issue – unlike this silly argument we’re having about carol-singing. I have yet to see any concessions along the lines of “Gee, I was wrong about the Jesus story being a copy of Horus.” And I’m not waiting for one. But I would like to hear from someone who had a look at the articles I linked to and conceded that the evidence for Christianity being a copycat religion was a lot weaker than popularly imagined.

    I’ll leave it there for now. Thanks for the exchange, Mark.

46. Just a nitpick:

    the phrase “No surprise, Denyse is an idiot” appeared. I think we should limit ourselves to describing specific statements as idiotic rather than labelling people as “idiots” in general.

    As you say “People make mistakes” and we should leave the door open for the possibility that someone can see and acknowledge an error.

47. I have yet to see any concessions along the lines of “Gee, I was wrong about the Jesus story being a copy of Horus.” And I’m not waiting for one. But I would like to hear from someone who had a look at the articles I linked to and conceded that the evidence for Christianity being a copycat religion was a lot weaker than popularly imagined.

    Blimey, Vincent, give us a chance. Didn’t know there was a time limit for responses. I have a life beyond blogging and I know other people do too. Why not see what transpires.

48. Moved

49. Comment moved to guano

50. My main concern was to try to take the emotional heat out of these exchanges which so often makes them barren and repetitive. So far I seem to have failed for which I take the blame!

    My favourite phrase in this context is “mutual respect”. And I can assure everyone concerned in this debate that everyone else deserves respect.

    With respect to Vincent’s reply.

    The carol business is a more important than Vincent realises. It relies on a theist image of an atheist is which is certainly not true of many atheists I know. The image is of someone who despises religion and theists; will have nothing to do with religion and maybe actively campaigns against it. Some atheists fall into this category. I have no idea how large a proportion but many atheists quietly get on with their lives, appreciate many aspects of religion and respect theists. Such people would not have even bothered declaring their atheism 50 years ago as it made life much simpler to just tick the box for whatever tradition they were brought up in and if you are an atheist it is not a big deal what you say about your religious beliefs. Nowadays it is not necessary to do this in Europe – there is no issue about being an atheist. I think it is still a bit harder in the USA.