A few weeks or so ago a British man managed to get the Church of England to officially recognize that he was no longer a member. As a result of the publicity somewhere around 100 thousand Brits have downloaded the form requesting the church quit counting them as members.
As you’ve probably guessed from the title of this post, there’s at least one Christian whose got a problem with this. According to Thomas A. Flynn, requesting that a group quit counting you as a member is an attack upon that group.
The National Secular Society in England has launched an initiative to request a certificate of de-baptism. So far they say that 100,000 Brits have downloaded the document from the Internet, disgusted by the idea of being called a Christian. Some are calling baptism “a form of child abuse”, as if the gift of faith we equivalent to the atrocious situations of violence in the home that we all know so well.
This is just the latest attack by atheistic groups around the globe. Pro-atheism advertisements have been draped on buses in several countries with phrases like “There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.” These, alongside the extensive array of anti-God best-sellers by authors like Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, and Christopher Hitchens, announce that atheism is on the march.
All these Brits are doing is requesting that a group they do not consider themselves a part of quit counting them as members. Nothing more, nothing less. How is that an attack by atheists?
It’s only an attack if you think that anything but absolute silence is an act of persecution. Christians may not be as violent as Muslims, but they are far from the democracy supporting freedom loving sweethearts they insist they are.
{ 36 comments }
Don’t throw us all in the one basket, and paint us with the same brush.
For the most part, the baptism of these people probably wasn’t valid anyway. So it makes no difference. If it was valid, signing a form wouldn’t make a difference.
The Church of England is just following a ‘form’ of religion these days. For the most part, it’s far from what real Christianity is. Sad, but true.
It wasn’t my intent to damn you all. The title of the post is a tongue in cheek response to the whiner’s “complaint” which was titled “Atheism’s Latest Attack”.
However, exactly what is “real Christianity”? You all seem to throw that one around alot, but as a non-member, it wears thin & smacks of you all (meaning generic Christian, not you specifically) simply not wanting to be associated with your more hostile family members.
I suppose you, and only you know what “real” xians are and believe?
Signing a form declaring you no longer wish to be a part of a specific religion wouldn’t count, you say? Sounds almost like ideological hostage taking. “Too bad, you are a part of our religion now, you can never leave!” …..
I don’t know how this can be described as an attack by atheists. Maybe the people wanting to quit that specific church have converted to another one, or another religion entirely and want that to be officially known or something of that nature.
If you have freedom of religion then why is it so difficult to renounce your membership in one? I think they don’t like the idea of officially recognizing someone leaves because it suggests what most of us already know, that is that church numbers are dwindling. They are.
As easy as they allow people to enter into their churches they should allow them to leave.
Well SORREE, mister CHRIST.
We did not MEAN to hurt any of your FEELINGS,
and by no means did we try to INSULT your RELIGION.
We KNOW that A LOT of CHRISTIANS care IMMENSELY about other religions.
YEP. A LOT.
Yes, Christians aren’t as violent as Muslims, that’s why Christian-majority countries like the United States have been involved in constant wars in other countries for decades. It is incredible that in an article meant to decry prejudice on the part of Christians against atheists, you manage to promote religious prejudice against Muslims. Good job.
Actually, my intent was not to decry Christian bigotry, but to point out how once again Christians tend to think that any pushback is an unprovoked “attack” upon them.
As to the Muslim part, you got me. I forgot how easily westerners connect religious violence to Muslims, but ignore religious violence by Christians. My apologies.
Zing!
yep, agreed, we’re not all the same. However, that is hilarious.
The vast majority of Brits are non-religious. The fact that they are all but FORCED to go to friend’s weddings in churches rather than look like a pariah, the fact that they are supposed to stand up at business-meetings in which someone decides to pray thanks, the fact that funerals are rarely held out of churches and the fact that selfish parents unwittingly brainwash their kids to keep this fiction going, still does not detract from the fact that most of us don’t REALLY believe rubbish put out a couple of thousand years ago by a bunch of overgrown farmers…
No one’s FORCED to do anything. Just because society pressures atheists to attend weddings and funerals in churches or to be present when someone prays in public doesn’t mean they are being forcibly coerced into doing so. If you don’t want to participate in these activities, then declare your reasons and don’t. Christians had to to this once as well. As an atheist, I quite enjoy going to church ceremonies and think they are often beautiful and I think it would be selfish for me to complain to my hosts that their private event is being held in a place that I disapprove of.
As far as removing oneself from a church record, that’s a little more important. These numbers constitute demographic data that used for far too many political agendas.
You’re acting as if Christians don’t bash anybody who shows any slight disagreement with them. (In general)
CHRISTIANS had to do this once as well? WHEN was that?
@ Jess Uh huh, and we should allow prayer in (public) schools because any kids that weren’t of a particular faith could just leave the room while everyone else said their prayers. I mean hey, it’s not like kids would ostracize those who didn’t want to pray. Kids never exclude each other based on differences.
As far as weddings and funerals go, if the people hosting them wanted to do them in churches or whatever, as an atheist I wouldn’t care, I’d attend if I was invited because those people must care about me and I would care about them.
But as far as prayer in public goes, well, you and I starkly disagree. Because when I think public, I think, schools, hospitals, court rooms, government buildings etc. I don’t want religion to be so pervasive in society, so ubiquitous you can’t go anywhere without being surrounded by religious iconography or psalms or concrete monuments of the 10 commandments, that really does happen in a lot of places. Give people an inch, they’ll take a mile.
Moderate away.. those who sacrifice reason in favour of blind faith will always ensure their views are upheld – HOPEFULLY in the states at least, Obama is about to put the kybosh on that – PRAISE BE to the man that puts science FIRST
Obama kept Bush’s faith-based office which the Supreme Court declared to be off limits to protest from American taxpayers & has stacked it with fundy loons. If he put reality first, he’d done away with it.
Sad as it might be, you will always be judged by the craziest member of your group. Atheist’s will have Stalin held up, Xtians get Faldwell and other bigots, Muslim’s get the 9/11 guys, and so on and so forth.
Where can I download this form? It makes absolutely no difference to my life being on the records, but it would be helpful to them if they had more accurate membership figures.
Do they have one of these things for the Catholic church? Maybe I can just request an excommunication
so where can i sign up…err..sign out?
Where do I find said form online? Are there equivalent forms for Roman Catholics or otherwise? I’d like to make sure I’m not counted among the stupid religious in my country. Thanks
The other thing about Christians is that they have no problem saying that you’re wrong but as soon as someone says that they don’t agree they flip out. I know there are individuals, but this is as a whole.
NO, you are being a BIGOT and BIASED.
CHRISTIANS are CARING, SENSITIVE and CONSIDERATE OF OTHERS BELIEFS. You can CLEARLY demonstrate it using a RANDOM PERSON on the VERY RELIABLE INTERNET.
I saw this website (the one mentioned in the post) and it didn’t really incite much more than a sigh from me. I mean, really? They mention that it’s becoming harder and harder for christians to express their faith, but 1) how this is so, and 2) what this has to do with debaptism, a personal decision made by individuals for reasons other than spite, is yet to be shown. Not even worth a rant, methinks, after all, what happens after they collect 10 000 names? Like a Christian blogger said on the topic, it’s a bit like a locker-room showdown, completely counterproductive and meaningless. It doesn’t prove anything.
And of course, the Church is not attacking any Atheists in THEIR beliefs.
Not at all.
‘Attacking’.
“I Don’t want to be a part of your group. Here’s a polite form”
*randomly at the street, hold back a person and keep telling him he’s going to hell.*
While I like your piece and agree with you on the bogus idea of requesting to be “de-baptised” as an attack, I would like to point out that the vast majority of Muslims are not violent and there is just as much violence (if not, more) that Christians are responsible for. There have been plenty of killings, genocides, and brutality in the name of Christianity. Ask some Native American Indians about that, just to name one group. To say that Christians are not as violent as Muslims is extremely unfair, biased, and inaccurate. Oh, and for the record, I would be classified as a Skeptic. Anyone that wants to learn what is behind any religion should study some secular history.
The UK is miles ahead of the US on this religion business.
Fundamentalism in all its forms will bury us yet
Rallie: “…you manage to promote religious prejudice against Muslims.”
I think they manage to do that themselves pretty efficiently!
Good read. That is pretty sad that someone would try and twist this act into an attack upon christians. Maybe we should count that guy as an atheist and see what he says.
Where can I get this form? Am I being counted as a Christian in the US? I sure hope not. If so, I’d like to be de-baptized please, regardless of how “invalid” the form is. It’s still a mark of achievement for me.
There is no god. Get over it.
One more jab at the Christians! Hoorah! I’m so sick of it all. I want freedom FROM religion.
How about making the print on your site bigger so i don’t get eye strain trying to read it.
Not sure what the problem is. The font is set at 14. That should be viewable at the resolution you’re using.
Ctrl and + bumps up font size (on Firefox at least). It is a little small for me on default though.
A great many Christians have a highly developed persecution complex, and essentially will find themselves being persecuted in any situation. Not all of course – I have quite a few friends who are Christian and couldn’t care less about that kind of thing – but I’m intrigued by what you said about “real Christianity.”
It tends to trouble me that so often a church will speak of the millions of Christians worldwide to demonstrate Christianity’s vast acceptance, when truthfully the only belief most of the varying denominations have in common is that Jesus Christ is their savior. On the flip side, anytime any of those denominations do something crazy, they’re shrugged off as not “real” Christians, thereby removing any sense of responsibility for their actions, all the while still including the denomination in the total numbers.
To me it seems disingenuous, and an attempt to have the best of both worlds: the strong numbers and lack of responsibility for the terrible things some (usually very small percent) of those numbers do.
I’m an atheist myself, but overall have no problem with people believing what they wish to believe, but if another atheist does something stupid in the name of atheism, I’m not going to shrug, roll my eyes and say “well he’s just not a real atheist.” I’m going to call him (or her) out on doing something stupid. He’s still a real atheist, just a dumb one that’s making the rest of us look bad!
Sorry for the rant .. good blog posts often do that to me
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