The End of Christianity (51 page)

5.3. The “true facts” for any
L
regarding “all their preferences” and the “total outcome” of “every possible behavior for them in the same circumstances at that time” and what “behavior whose outcome they want
_p
more than any other outcome” (as far as “they can reasonably” then know) are all empirical facts.

5.4. Science can discover any empirical facts that it develops methods capable of discovering.

5.5. Therefore, if science can develop the required methods, then science can discover the “true facts” for any
L
regarding “all their preferences” and the “total outcome” of “every possible behavior for them in the same circumstances at that time” and what “behavior whose outcome they want
_p
more than any other outcome” as far as “they can reasonably” then know.

5.6. Science can develop the required methods (to at least some degree).

5.7.
Therefore, science can discover T (the true moral system) to at least some degree.

by Dr. Robert M. Price

I
t used to be the Evangelicals and Fundamentalists would never darken the door of movie theaters, even if Corrie ten Boom's The
Hiding Place
was showing (I kid you not!). Now that's moot, especially in the wake of home theater technology. They wouldn't dance, because it was supposedly arousing, essentially mating behavior—which it obviously is! But now they've skipped the preliminaries (keep reading).

More significantly, they were very much against divorce and had a low incidence of it. But that, too, has changed. Evangelical churchmen and seminary professors found they just could not thunder against divorce any more once their own grown children were getting divorced. The same problem came with women working outside the home. Economic realities dictated theology just as sure as the Fed's threats to the Mormon Church miraculously prompted new LDS revelations to abandon first polygamy, then racial discrimination in the Melchizedek Priesthood.

Homosexuality is next on the list. More and more educated Evangelicals seem to feel they must find a compromise between the inherited party line and their liberal social conscience. This is especially true with seminarians and young ministers. And such theological accommodations are not hard to find. It doesn't take as much text twisting as slave abolition or feminism, that's for sure. And it was secular feminism challenging the church that led, more than anything else, to the great inerrancy crisis among Evangelicals in the 1970s. Prayer changes things? Things change prayer.

Recent surveys indicate that more and more Evangelicals are questioning or rejecting the doctrine of an eternal hell as well as the idea that non-Christians will not be saved in the afterlife. You can see where this is headed: they are making their way toward being one more tolerant, live-and-let-live mainstream denomination. I am not complaining. I doubt many of us are really that vexed by the particular beliefs any fundamentalist happens to hold. No, what we find vexing are the pugnacious, obnoxious attitudes that so often accompany their beliefs. But what if they drop that attitude? Why would they?

It was for the sake of feeling uniquely indwelt and transformed by the Holy Ghost that they have erected attitudinal walls against non-coreligionists. It was a mind game to protect their cherished in-group and their firmly cemented membership in it. But the more you become like the mainstream, the less that separates you from everybody else, well, the more difficult it becomes to feel special, uniquely connected to God and sanctified by Jesus. It's not like they ever wanted to relegate everybody else to the Lake of Fire. It just seemed necessary in order for them to rejoice in not being relegated there themselves. And now feeling so different is no longer the priority. Attitudes affect doctrines, which affect attitudes.

But the thing that will sooner or later bring the Evangelical Wailing Wall down is sex. More and more, middle school, high school, and college Evangelicals admit to having sex in the same casual way as their “unsaved” contemporaries. That is, premarital, recreational sex. Having been so long Apollonian, they are itching to yield to Dionysus. But the Gospel teaching of Jesus happens to be far more Apollonian than Dionysian. (Give ‘em time, though, to discover the Q Source Jesus of Leif Vaage, Jesus as a “first-century party animal,” and they'll be boasting of their biblical fidelity again.)

From the standpoint of sect-maintenance, this shift is fatal for two reasons. First, and most obviously, if this fundamental plank of the Evangelical platform rots and snaps, you can find little of similar magnitude to point to as the signal difference between the saved and the unsaved. I admit, there are a few more that would be similarly fatal, such as a casual permissiveness of drugs and alcohol.

Again, I admit that there are matters of graver moral content. A Christian ought to be able to say, for example, “Jesus saved me from lying, from being insensitive, from being self-centered, cowardly, evasive, materialistic,” and so on, and those things might be more important. I'd say they are. But you see, everybody accepts and admires those values. They don't give Evangelicals special bragging rights like the sexual and other behavioral codes used to do.

Second, relaxing the sexual code is symbolically significant. Any group's mores concerning food and sex are symbolic of their social boundaries and the shape of their self-identity. A group does not necessarily have both indices. One will do, though usually there are both. Old Testament Israelites were separated from rival cults/cultures by upholding inflexible restrictions on permissible food and on possible intermarriage partners. Sexual fidelity had a lot to do with guaranteeing that one's true heirs inherited one's land and name. Jewish Christians were alarmed at Paul being willing to abolish Jewish dietary and other ceremonial scruples to make it easier for Gentiles to join Christianity. They could see instantly that such a move would result in Jews being squeezed to the margins of the new religion—and it did. Jewish identity within Christianity was lost. Similarly, among American Jews today it is not bigotry when Orthodox rabbis discourage mixed marriages with non-Jews. Allow that, and you can say the big goodbye to Judaism in America. It will be only a matter of time before intermarriage with well-meaning and good-hearted non-Jews will completely erode American Judaism. The hybrid “Chrismika” is only a stop along the one-way track. Maybe there will be an Orthodox farm next to the Amish farm.

Well, when the sex barrier falls, the same fate is in store for Evangelical Christianity. (There never was a consistent Evangelical food boundary; even the Reformed drank alcohol.) And when the new generations are none too sure that nonbelievers are headed for hell, it becomes inevitable that American Evangelicalism will ease into the acid bath of American Pluralism. And it may happen sooner than you think. And then all those megachurches will be up for sale. Unless, of course, they find a new product to sell. TV preacher Joel Osteen has done just that. His Evangelical belief is merely vestigial; he has converted to New Thought. It is no coincidence that he fills that stadium. Others may not be so lucky.

INTRODUCTION

1
. See, for instance, David Eller's chapter for
The Christian Delusion
, “Christianity Does Not Provide the Basis for Morality,” and references therein, ed. John Loftus (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2010), 347–67.

2
. It should go without saying that the contributors to this book don't always agree with each other, because that's the nature of the quest for knowledge. Unlike most Christians who are enslaved to dogma, we are free to disagree. In either case, Christian morality is not an objective alternative anyway. Carrier makes that point quite clearly in his chapter.

3
. See my discussion of this point in Loftus, The
Christian Delusion
, 94–102.

4
. This science is discussed in Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons,
The Invisible Gorilla: And Other Ways Our Intuitions Deceive Us
(New York: Crown, 2010); and Cordelia Fine,
A Mind of Its Own: How Your Brain Distorts and Deceives
(New York: W. W. Norton, 2008). See also Loftus,
The Christian Delusion
, particularly the early chapters by Valerie Tarico, Jason Long, and myself.

5
. Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson,
Mistakes Were Made (But Not By Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts
(Orlando, FL: Harvest, 2007), 2.

6
. As reported by
Boston Globe
political writer Joe Keohane in “How Facts Backfire,” July 11, 2010, found online at
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2010/07/11/how_facts_backfire/
.

7
. Marlene Winell,
Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion
(Berkeley, CA: Apocryphile Press, 2007).

PART 1

CHAPTER 1

1
. Muhammad al Naquib al-Attas,
Islam and Secularism
(Delhi, India: New Crescent Publishing, 2002), 32–35.

2
. David B. Barrett, George T. Kurian, and Todd M. Johnson,
World Christian Encyclopedia: A Comparative Survey of Churches and Religions in the Modern World
, 2nd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001).

3
. “Methodist Family,” Association of Religion Data Archives,
http://www.thearda.com/Denoms/Families/Trees/familytree_methodist.asp
, accessed June 28, 2010.

4
. Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger, eds.,
The Invention of Tradition
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 1–2.

5
. Anthony F. C. Wallace, “Revitalization Movements,”
American Anthropologist
58 (1956): 265.

6
. Ibid., 277.

7
. Justo L. Gonzalez,
The Story of Christianity Volume I: The Early Church to the Dawn of the Reformation
(New York: HarperOne, 1984), 10.

8
. Ekkehard Stegemann and Wolfgang Stegemann,
The Jesus Movement: A Social History of Its First Century
(Minneapolis: Fortress, 1999), 1.

9
. Gerd Theissen,
Sociology of Early Palestinian Christianity
(Philadelphia: Fortress, 1978), 1.

10
. Ibid., 17.

11
. Gonzalez,
The Story of Christianity
, 31.

12
. Theissen,
Early Palestinian Christianity
, 60.

13
. Elaine Pagels,
The Origin of Satan
(New York: Random House, 1995), 89.

14
. Theissen,
Early Palestinian Christianity
, 115.

15
. Robert Wright, “One World, Under God,”
Atlantic Monthly
, April 2009.

16
. Gonzalez,
The Story of Christianity
, 17.

17
. Ibid., 16–17.

18
. Roland Bainton,
Christian Attitudes Toward War and Peace: A Historical Survey and Critical Evaluation
(New York: Abingdon, 1960), 88.

19
. Gonzalez,
The Story of Christianity
, 125.

20
. Theissen,
Early Palestinian Christianity
, 119.

21
. Leonard W. Levy,
Blasphemy: Verbal Of fense against the Sacred, from Moses to Salman Rushdie
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1993), 44.

22
. Alexis de Tocqueville,
Democracy in America
, trans. George Lawrence (Garden City, NJ: Anchor, 1969), 574.

23
. Eugene Taylor,
Shadow Culture: Psychology and Spirituality in America
(Washington, DC: Counterpoint, 1999), 18.

24
. Quoted in Martin E. Marty,
Pilgrims in Their Own Land: 500 Years of Religion in America
(New York: Penguin, 1984), 210.

25
. Quoted in ibid.

26
. Quoted in Nathan O. Hatch,
The Democratization of American Christianity
(New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989), 168. [Editor's Note: For further discussions of religious (and specifically Christian) diversification in the United States, see: Roger Finke and Rodney Stark,
The Churching of America,
1776–1990
: Winners and Losers in Our Religious Economy
(New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1992); Barry Kosmin and Seymour Lachman,
One Nation under God: Religion in Contemporary American Society
(New York: Harmony Books, 1993); Stephen Prothero,
American Jesus: How the Son of God Became a National Icon
(New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2003); and J. Gordon Melton et al.,
Melton's Encyclopedia of American Religions
(Detroit: Gale Cengage Learning, 2009).]

27
. Quoted in Karen Armstrong,
The Battle for God
(New York: Ballantine, 2000), 310–11.

28
. The websites for the networks mentioned are, in order,
http://www.cbn.com/
;
http://www.ewtn.com/
;
http://www.tbn.org/
;
http://www.daystar.com/
.

29
. The
Left Behind
computer game series can be found at
http://www.eternalforces.com
.

30
. This quotation is usually attributed to Sam Pascoe, but as the organization Religious Tolerance (
http://www.religioustolerance.org/christ.htm
) notes, it is also sometimes attributed to Richard Halverson, a former chaplain of the United States Senate.

31
. Louise M. Burkhart,
Before Guadalupe: The Virgin Mary in Early Colonial NahuatlLiterature
(Albany, NY: Institute for Mesoamerican Studies, 2001), 3.

32
. Jean Comaroff,
Body of Power, Spirit of Resistance: The Culture and History of a South African People
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985), 2.

33
. John L. Comaroff and Jean Comaroff,
Of Revelation and Revolution: The Dialectics of Modernity in a South African Frontier
, vol. 2 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991), 6.

34
. Maia Green,
Priests, Witches, and Power: Popular Christianity after Mission in Southern Tanzania
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 49.

35
. Marshall Murphree,
Christianity and the Shona
(London: Athlone, 1969).

36
. Philip Jenkins, “The Next Christianity,”
Atlantic Monthly
, October 2002: 54.

37
. Ibid.

38
. Ibid.

39
. Philip Jenkins, “Defender of the Faith,”
Atlantic Monthly
, November 2003: 46.

CHAPTER 2

1
. Richard Carrier,
Not the Impossible Faith: Why Christianity Didn't Need a Miracle to Succeed
(Raleigh, NC: Lulu, 2009). I have also discussed the evidence in “Why the Resurrection Is Unbelievable,” in
The Christian Delusion
, ed. John Loftus (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2010), 291–315.

2
. Carrier,
Not the Impossible Faith
, 407–47.

3
. See Pliny the Younger,
Letters
10.96; with discussion and analysis in Carrier,
Not the Impossible Faith
, 418–22. Further reflecting their insignificance, the emperor replied to Pliny that in fact there wasn't even any particular law against Christianity (Pliny the Younger,
Letters
10.97), and he wasn't to bother hunting them down.

4
. See Carrier,
Not the Impossible Faith
, 435–40; and Richard Carrier, “Christianity Was Not Responsible for Modern Science,” in Loftus,
The Christian Delusion
, 413 (and 419, note 57); for broader perspective, see Richard Carrier,
Sense and Goodness without God: A Defense of Metaphysical Naturalism
(Bloomington, IN: Author-House, 2005), 257–68.

5
. For examples, see: W. V. Harris, ed.,
The Spread of Christianity in the First Four Centuries: Essays in Explanation
(Boston: Brill, 2005); Richard Horsley,
Jesus and Empire: The Kingdom of God and the New World Disorder
(Minneapolis: Fortress, 2002) ; Bruce Malina,
The Social Gospel of Jesus: The Kingdom of God in Mediterranean Perspective
(Minneapolis: Fortress, 2001); Bruce Malina and Richard Rohrbaugh,
Social-Science Commentary on the Synoptic Gospels
, 2nd ed. (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003) , and
Social-Science Commentary on the Gospel of John
(Minneapolis: Fortress, 1998); Jack Sanders,
Charisma, Converts, Competitors: Societal and Sociological Factors in the Success of Early Christianity
(London: SCM, 2000); Thomas Finn, “Mission and Expansion,”
The Early Christian World
, ed. Philip Esler (New York: Routledge, 2000), 1:295–315; David DeSilva,
Honor, Patronage, Kinship&Purity: UnlockingNew Testament Culture
(Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2000); Keith Hopkins, “Christian Number and Its Implications,”
Journal of Early Christian Studies
6, no. 2 (1998): 185–226; Rodney Stark,
The Rise of Christianity
(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1996); Robin Lane Fox,
Pagans&Christians
(New York: Knopf, 1987).

6
. For the relevant evidence and scholarship on Inanna and all the other gods and cults here discussed (including the Jewish views to be discussed), see Carrier,
Not the Impossible Faith
, 17–63.

7
. This quote comes from Seneca's lost work
On Superstition
, written before 65 CE but quoted by Augustine in
City of God
6.10 in the early fifth century.

8
. Carrier,
Not the Impossible Faith
, 24–30, 373.

9
. This is stated most explicitly in Daniel 9:26. But for more evidence, see Carrier,
Not the Impossible Faith
, 34–44, and Loftus,
The Christian Delusion
, 306. Jewish reverence for the trope of a “humiliated righteous man” (often associated with expectations of divine vengeance) is well established (e.g., Wisdom of Solomon 2–5, Isaiah 52–53, 1QIsa
^a
52.13–53.12; George Nickelsburg, “First and Second Enoch: A Cry against Oppression and the Promise of Deliverance,” in
The HistoricalJesus in Context
, ed. Amy-Jill Levine, Dale C. Allison Jr., and John Dominic Crossan [Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2009], 87–109, and “The Genre and Function of the Markan Passion Narrative,”
Harvard Theological Review
73.1/2 [January-April 1980]: 153–84; Thomas Thompson,
The Messiah Myth: The Near Eastern Roots of Jesus and David
[New York: Basic, 2005], 191–93; and John Meier,
A MarginalJew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus
[New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1991], 1:170–71).

10
. Carrier,
Not the Impossible Faith
, 55–63, 66–70, 323–28 (the “hickness” of Nazareth and Galilee is also often exaggerated: ibid., 63–66). That Christianity very aptly exploited social discontent to gain converts is further shown in ibid., 147–60 (just like other movements of the time: ibid., 259–61).

11
. See Margaret Williams, “VII.2. Pagans Sympathetic to Judaism” and “VII.3. Pagan Converts to Judaism” in
The Jews Among the Greeks and Romans: A Diasporan Sourcebook
(Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998): 163–79.

12
. Carrier,
Not the Impossible Faith
, 51–53, 432–35.

13
. See evidence, sources, and discussion (for this and following points) in ibid., 85–127.

14
. I document over two dozen such stories in ibid., 86–89.

15
. See Origen,
Contra Celsum
3.24 and Justin Martyr,
Dialogue of Justin and Trypho the Jew
69. For attestations to Asclepius as both
resurrected
and
resurrector
, see Edelstein and Edelstein, eds.,
Asclepius: Collection and Interpretation of the Testimonies
(1945): esp. §66–93, §232–56 (and §382–91, §443–54).

16
. Carrier,
Not the Impossible Faith
, 113–27.

17
. Ibid., 115 (with notes on 126). See also Loftus,
The Christian Delusion
, 306.

18
. Justin Martyr,
Apology
1.21.

19
. For evidence and scholarship on all these points, see Carrier,
Not the Impossible Faith
, 135–45.