Sunday Assembly Detroit [[aka Atheist Church)

[jt1]

I believe the children are our future.

teach them well and let them lead the way

[subsidized]

I figure this is as good a place as any to say, Wu-Tang..... Wu-Tang is the greatest.

[Detroitnerd]

A prejudice by any other name is still a prejudice.

http://atheism.about.com/od/atheistb...heitsHated.htm

Every single study that has ever looked at the issue has revealed massive amounts of bigotry and prejudice against atheists in America. The most recent data shows that atheists are more distrusted and despised than any other minority and that an atheist is the least likely person that Americans would vote for in a presidential election. It's not just that atheists are hated, though, but also that atheists seem to represent everything about modernity which Americans dislike or fear.
The most recent study was conducted by the University of Minnesota, which found that atheists ranked lower than "Muslims, recent immigrants, gays and lesbians and other minority groups in 'sharing their vision of American society.' Atheists are also the minority group most Americans are least willing to allow their children to marry."

[Hermod]

A prejudice by any other name is still a prejudice.

http://atheism.about.com/od/atheistb...heitsHated.htm

Every single study that has ever looked at the issue has revealed massive amounts of bigotry and prejudice against atheists in America. The most recent data shows that atheists are more distrusted and despised than any other minority and that an atheist is the least likely person that Americans would vote for in a presidential election. It's not just that atheists are hated, though, but also that atheists seem to represent everything about modernity which Americans dislike or fear.
The most recent study was conducted by the University of Minnesota, which found that atheists ranked lower than "Muslims, recent immigrants, gays and lesbians and other minority groups in 'sharing their vision of American society.' Atheists are also the minority group most Americans are least willing to allow their children to marry."

How can you tell if someone is an atheist unless he is obnoxious about it? It has been years and years since anyone asked me what religion I follow. You just show respect, bow your head, and keep quiet when a prayer is offered. You can take part and join in the Christmas carol sing-a-long or you can plead more urgent business.

[Detroitnerd]

How can you tell if someone is an atheist unless he is obnoxious about it? It has been years and years since anyone asked me what religion I follow. You just show respect, bow your head, and keep quiet when a prayer is offered. You can take part and join in the Christmas carol sing-a-long or you can plead more urgent business.

I don't think that answer shows a great deal of thought, Hermod. Is it not common for religious people to ask strangers and new acquaintances what church they attend? You don't have to be a pushy, proselytizing religious person to feel people out about religion early on, just a religious person. And I've had people I think I know well sit around me at the bar and talk about "those atheists." It's really odd to overhear people say, "Atheists are the worst people in the world." It makes me smile and want to ask more about these "atheists," of which I am one, but enjoying seeing groupthink in action.

These anti-atheist prejudices are amusing and contradictory.

Atheists are incapable of belief.
But also atheists are unreasonably certain of their beliefs!

Atheists are angry, pushy, scary!
But, oddly, they also don't care!

Atheists don't have a moral compass and are more likely to sin.
But studies show that atheists have better statistics when it comes to violence, crime and divorce.

I figure a lot of this prejudice is based on projection. That pushy, religious people look into their supposed "other" and see their own excesses reflected back at them in their fevered imaginations.

I am a cheerful atheist. I don't push my philosophy on anybody else, and I don't want their philosophies pushed on me. I think religion is poetry and art, and appreciate it as such. I don't know the answers, but I appreciate the beauty of the mysteries of the cosmos and wouldn't intrude on their mysteriousness by pretending to know all the answers.

[noise]

How can you tell if someone is an atheist unless he is obnoxious about it? It has been years and years since anyone asked me what religion I follow. You just show respect, bow your head, and keep quiet when a prayer is offered. You can take part and join in the Christmas carol sing-a-long or you can plead more urgent business.

Yeah, like those obnoxious blacks fighting for civil rights. And those detestable gays fighting for equal rights. Atheists are completely respected throughout the world!

Without snark, since religion isn't part of my life, it only comes up when others bring it up. Typically Christians. "God" comes up at least a few times a year, and since I have no shame in being an atheist, I don't have a problem making that clear.

[noise]

I figure this is as good a place as any to say, Wu-Tang..... Wu-Tang is the greatest.

And nothing to F with.

[noise]

A church without God is NOT a church! I'm not interested of join that club. Sunday Assembly Detroit is not a church, it's a cult-like club compared to Jim Jones' People Temple, Doe and Ti's Heaven's Gate and David Koresh's Davidians and Prophet Jones' Dominionites.

Ironically enough, all of these were self-proclaimed to be Christianity-based.

[Honky Tonk]

More wars have been fought, more people killed, more blood shed over Religion, then anything else. Each aggressor always claimed "God was on their side".

[noise]

As an Atheist, I have NO need to get together On Sunday. Why would that day be the one to congregate?

Why not choose a weekend day when more people are free and much of the world is already congregating?

[Gistok]

I usually like to sit back whenever one of these threads comes out, have a bowl of popcorn... and listen to you all preaching to the choir... ops, did I say preaching and choir!!

[noise]

I usually like to sit back whenever one of these threads comes out, have a bowl of popcorn... and listen to you all preaching to the choir... ops, did I say preaching and choir!!

Depending on your disposition, that could apply to almost every thread on this board!

[poobert]

While I'm a religious person, I like to think I'm not a religious person. I take all faiths, including my own, with a grain of salt. I don't think somebody is orchestrating our lives, and I don't really know if there is an afterlife. I have a natural distrust of clerics, and don't believe anyone has a monopoly on the truth. That said, something inside me has always reached for the spiritual.

This is a strange concept for me, though. If I were an atheist [[I was certainly agnostic during my life), why would I do what appears to be "playing church"? I'd much rather be at home reading the Times.

I think the real issue here is the loss of community. People no longer get involved with their neighbors, serve with fraternal organizations, go to lectures or speeches together, or volunteer. This appears to me, anyway, to be a substitute for all. With everyone nowadays it's stare at the phone, all day, every day. Hundreds of channels but zero friends. You live in a pristine community but don't know your next-door neighbors.

Seems like an a-okay way to spend some time, though, so what do I care? I certainly fully support their right to assemble peaceably and would die to defend such a right.

[noise]

While I'm a religious person, I like to think I'm not a religious person. I take all faiths, including my own, with a grain of salt. I don't think somebody is orchestrating our lives, and I don't really know if there is an afterlife. I have a natural distrust of clerics, and don't believe anyone has a monopoly on the truth. That said, something inside me has always reached for the spiritual.

This is a strange concept for me, though. If I were an atheist [[I was certainly agnostic during my life), why would I do what appears to be "playing church"? I'd much rather be at home reading the Times.

I think the real issue here is the loss of community. People no longer get involved with their neighbors, serve with fraternal organizations, go to lectures or speeches together, or volunteer. This appears to me, anyway, to be a substitute for all. With everyone nowadays it's stare at the phone, all day, every day. Hundreds of channels but zero friends. You live in a pristine community but don't know your next-door neighbors.

Seems like an a-okay way to spend some time, though, so what do I care? I certainly fully support their right to assemble peaceably and would die to defend such a right.

Before I went to the link, I thought, "I don't need that."

But this made it sound nice to me:

Sunday Assembly is a godless community that meets monthly to hear great talks, connect for service projects, sing songs and generally celebrate life.

Granted, it's still not for me.

[Wesley Mouch]

This thread kind of makes me sad. Tolerance should a motto.

Tolerance does not mean you have to agree. Unfortunately, a lot of people require agreement when they ask for tolerance. For example, its not possible to dislike gay lifestyle/activities and not be painted as 'homophobic' by those who want tolerance.

I advocate for pure tolerance, untainted by agreement.

[DetroiterOnTheWestCoast]

Tolerance does not mean you have to agree. Unfortunately, a lot of people require agreement when they ask for tolerance. For example, its not possible to dislike gay lifestyle/activities and not be painted as 'homophobic' by those who want tolerance.

I advocate for pure tolerance, untainted by agreement.

FYI, it's not a "lifestyle", its what people are. You seem to basically be saying someone who doesn't like gay people is called homophobic. I'd say that's pretty accurate.

[Gistok]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plwq4jE8O1o

"On Sunday, who knows, you might spot a herd of Lutherans"...

[noise]

Tolerance does not mean you have to agree. Unfortunately, a lot of people require agreement when they ask for tolerance. For example, its not possible to dislike gay lifestyle/activities and not be painted as 'homophobic' by those who want tolerance.

I advocate for pure tolerance, untainted by agreement.

What does "agreement" have to do with any of it? Why would anyone "dislike gay lifestyle/activities", whatever that means? If it has nothing to do with me, why would I either like or dislike it?

[Wesley Mouch]

FYI, it's not a "lifestyle", its what people are. You seem to basically be saying someone who doesn't like gay people is called homophobic. I'd say that's pretty accurate.

This thread's about atheism. I only used the intolerance of gay rights advocates as an example of advocacy gone wrong.

I may not agree with Atheists, but I've complete tolerance for people getting together peacefully and for better purposes.

On gay-dom, you are right that if you dislike gay people as a class, you are by definition homophobic. What I was saying is that you can disapprove of the ACTIONS of gay people, and not be homophobic. Hate the sin, love the sinner. For the record, I do NOT see gay acts as a sin. I often do see gay pride as being [[the sin) 'Pride'.

[noise]

What I was saying is that you can disapprove of the ACTIONS of gay people, and not be homophobic.

Can you explain this further? Any way I cut it, I can't make sense of it.

I fail to see the differentiation, unless I view it as a game of semantics. When we're making a judgment on actions that don't involve us and don't affect us, our "tolerance" can be called into question.

[DetroiterOnTheWestCoast]

Can you explain this further? Any way I cut it, I can't make sense of it.

I fail to see the differentiation, unless I view it as a game of semantics. When we're making a judgment on actions that don't involve us and don't affect us, our "tolerance" can be called into question.

I think you can't make sense out of it because, in my opinion, there isn't any. I think it really is just a game of semantics. If one "disapproves" of gay "actions" one really just does not like gay people. More and more, people just will not own their homophobia. What's a gay "action" anyway? Sex? Same-gender attraction? The whole "hate the sin but love the sinner" schtick is simply thinly-veiled homophobia too. "I love you, but just not who you are..."

Its like someone saying "I'm not a racist, I just think the races shouldn't mix."

[Wesley Mouch]

Can you explain this further? Any way I cut it, I can't make sense of it.

I fail to see the differentiation, unless I view it as a game of semantics. When we're making a judgment on actions that don't involve us and don't affect us, our "tolerance" can be called into question.

Example, I do not agree with the act of 'gay marriage'. I'm however tolerant and willing to grant exactly the same rights -- except the word 'marriage' -- because in my view that word is taken. Am I homophobic?

To pull us back to the thread... I ask that we be tolerant. And that includes tolerant of those who are not has 'enlightened' as we are. So long as their actions don't cause us tangible harm.

[DetroiterOnTheWestCoast]

Example, I do not agree with the act of 'gay marriage'. I'm however tolerant and willing to grant exactly the same rights -- except the word 'marriage' -- because in my view that word is taken. Am I homophobic?

To pull us back to the thread... I ask that we be tolerant. And that includes tolerant of those who are not has 'enlightened' as we are. So long as their actions don't cause us tangible harm.

My final post on this thread, but its pretty much impossible to confer all of the rights of marriage without calling it....marriage. And to do less, is to cause tangible harm.

[noise]

Example, I do not agree with the act of 'gay marriage'. I'm however tolerant and willing to grant exactly the same rights -- except the word 'marriage' -- because in my view that word is taken. Am I homophobic?

To pull us back to the thread... I ask that we be tolerant. And that includes tolerant of those who are not has 'enlightened' as we are. So long as their actions don't cause us tangible harm.

Sure, I'll challenge all of this...

So which is it? You do not agree with the "act" of gay marriage or you're okay with the "act" but not the descriptor? You can't have it both ways.

This "argument" has circulated through homophobic circles long enough to have been long ago discredited by anyone interested in its validity. It seems only to persist for homophobes to feel better about their homophobia. You're not fooling anyone other than yourself.

I mean, it's an argument about the word. And for that matter, it's a word with an add-on. It's "gay marriage". What changes? Why does it matter? Definitions have evolved for as long as language has existed. This is manufactured outrage over an issue you're not honest with yourself about.

As far as your convenient "tolerance" comments go...being tolerant does not extend to intolerance. That's as intellectually dishonest as it comes and is an embarrassing refrain most often used by conservatives who think they're being witty. It doesn't work.

Denying rights, even when carefully veiled, definitely does do everyone tangible harm.

I'm totally riding the wave on this thread. I hope nobody chokes on their popcorn.

[Detroitnerd]

During National Brotherhood Week,
National Brotherhood Week,
It's National Everyone-Smile-At-One-Anotherhood Week.
Step up and shake the hand,
Of someone you can't stand.
You can tolerate him if you try!

--Tom Lehrer