The New Atheism Atheism Remix r. Albert mohler jr.

THE ASSAULT ON THEISM

THE FOUR HORSEMEN OF THE NEW ATHEIST APOCALYPSE

1- Richard Dawkins Born in 1941 in Kenya to a British Family Doctorate in Zoology – Oxford University In 1976 he wrote the book that established his mass reputation: The Selfish gene (Explains the Evolutionary Theory) He considers himself as an Evangelist for Evolutionary Theory In 2003 he declared himself as the devil’s minister in his book: Devil’s Chaplain (Book) In 2006 he wrote: The God Delusion ( The Book that became his landmark best seller)

Good & Bad Reasons for Believing In his book the Devil’s Chaplain, Dawkin addressed his 10 year old daughter about three bad reasons to believe in any truth claim: 1- Tradition: Children are natural receptors of tradition 2- Authority: There is no reason to believe someone who says something is true 3- Revelation: Something impossible, and any claim of truth based on Revelation should be dismissed

2- Daniel Dennett Born in 1942 in Boston A Philosopher of mind and of Science Bachelor of Arts from Harvard, and Doctorate of Philosophy from Oxford In 1992 he published his great life project to prove that Evolution alone explains human consciousness: Consciousness Explained Book (Human Consciousness has to be reduced to a mechanistic and naturalistic understanding)

2- Daniel Dennett In 1996 he published his book: Darwin’s Dangerous Idea (He thought that Darwinism is powerful and corrosive as a Universal Acid that dissolves everything and no container could contain it) In 2006 he published: Breaking The Spell : Religion as a Natural Phenomenon (Belief in Belief ) He suggests that not all persistence of belief is believing in God, many people believe in belief. Golda Meir (Israeli Prime Minister) was once asked if she believed in God, her response was: “The Jews believe in God, and I believe in the Jews”

3- Sam Harris Born in 1967 Doctor of Philosophy of Neuroscience In 2004 he published : The End of Faith (Where Harris suggested that belief in God is evil, beginning in evil mental and spiritual responses and leading finally to evil social effects) In 2006 he published: Letter to A Christian Nation (A book actually addressing the secularists not the Christians, to arm them to believe that religion should be kept out of public policy)

3- Sam Harris Harris thinks that God Himself is a monster, especially the God of the Bible, and that belief in God corrupts human beings. He thinks we have deluded ourselves and allowed religion to persist as a private matter, while it is a public danger.

4- Christopher Hitchens Born in 1949 He is an intellectual, author,analyst, commentator and critic In 2007 he wrote his book : God is not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything (In this book he speaks about his Anglican boyhood)

4- Christopher Hitchens Hitchens suggested four irreducible objections to religious faith: 1)It Misrepresents the Origins of man and cosmos 2)Religion manages to combine the Maximum of Servility, Maximum of Solipsism (Believers do not respect others in mind, and completely self referential when it comes to truth) 3)Religion is the great cause of Sexual Repression 4)Religion is Ultimately grounded in Wishful Thinking

What we should learn here A lukewarm introduction to Christianity turns out to be a poor preparation for life, and even a poorer preparation for hearing the Gospel All of the Four Horsemen are not necessarily trying to convince believers to abandon their belief. They are all seeking to create a cultural momentum, to encourage others to be vocal in their unbelief

Criteria of New Atheism 1- New Boldness: Shame on those who still believe in God 2- Specific Rejection of God of The Bible:  He doesn’t prevent moral evil,  He is not responsible for His creation,  Eternal torment in hell waits 90% of people

Criteria of New Atheism 3.Reject Jesus Christ:  Christ approved the Bible (and the Old Testament)  Christ in the book of Revelation is more vengeful  His language is just as Exclusivistic as the language of Israel in the Old Testament 4. Grounded in scientific Arguments  Science must explain everything  Chemicals of the brain are behind all  Science is the way of liberation, freedom & enlightenment

Criteria of New Atheism 5- Refusal of Liberal forms of Belief: New Atheist no longer sees moderate and liberal forms as societal good (Moderate Christians are regarded as dangerous, because they are use liberal forms to give a cover to true God- Believers and make them socially acceptable) 6- Attack on Toleration: Religion is not anymore tolerant to people (They think that the idea of freedom of expression is too dangerous)

Criteria of New Atheism 7. Teaching Religion by Parents is a kind of Child abuse 8. Religions should be eliminated in order to preserve human freedom

All Things Work for Good The World is looking for an evangelical demonstration of Christianity not merely an Intellectual Defence Atheism may indeed strengthen Christianity by forcing identification of bad arguments and the development of better intellectual defences of faith