Secular Sanity

By Marie Alena Castle

Ever wondered why atheists rank at rock bottom in public acceptance? Even below Muslims right after 9/11?  Blame the media and their religious reporting. A fine example is the Minneapolis Star Tribune, whose weekly Faith & Values pages consistently promote faith only, never secular values. We get to read about trivial do-gooder articles and even more trivial doctrinal and ritualistic beliefs. On March 24 they had a huge article with photos about the Catholic Church’s reinstatement of its imaginary indulgences that supposedly lessen one’s time in an imaginary purgatory in which one works off the residual punishment for largely imaginary sins (pretty much anything related to sex). Meanwhile, on March 12, we sent the Strib editor and also the religion editor the following email. There has been no response:

NEWS SUGGESTION

TO: Nancy Barnes and Jeff Strickler

You have no doubt been reading about the increasing number of nonreligious people in this country, now at about 15%, as reported in your March 9 issue. It might be of considerable public interest to know more about this demographic. What does the increase mean in terms of the political and social effects? What would the godless do if they organized as aggressively as, say, the religious right? What political and social values do the nonreligious have? I’m sure you can think of other good questions and issues to explore.

We have several nonreligious organizations in the Twin Cities area that would be excellent sources for interviews. Most of the members come from religious backgrounds, so can provide some insight into the reasons for the increase, as well as the social/political ramifications of possibly increased influence. They are:

Atheists For Human Rights, http://www.atheistsforhumanrights.org/

Minnesota Atheists, http://www.mnatheists.org/

Humanists of Minnesota, http://www.humanistsofmn.org/

Campus Atheists & Secular Humanists (CASH), http://www.cashumn.org/

Given that surveys always show nonbelievers to be the most unpopular group in society, this would be a good opportunity to show to what extent, if any, such antipathy has any factual basis.

Please contact me if you would like more information or sources of information. Thank you.

Marie Alena Castle, Communications Director, Atheists For Human Rights

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By Marie Alena Castle 

Michael Gerson’s March 12 column is a fine example of human imagination running amok. His opposition to Pres. Obama’s reversal of the Bush administrations abortion-related restrictions on funding for family planning and stem cell research is based on the bizarre premise that there are such things as single-celled persons and that to destroy a microscopic cluster of 150 undifferentiated cells (blastocysts) containing human DNA is tantamount to murder.

This sudden concern for single-celled life is a bit odd, given that, for 25 years, fertility clinics have been disposing of about 600,000 blastocysts annually as medical waste, with no noticeable outcry from the “all life is sacred” contingent of the religious community. What appears to be operating now is a drive to use stem cell research to elevate a religious belief to a position of authority and control in matters of public policy.

And it is entirely a religious belief that moves Gerson to assign personhood to stem cells and blastocysts. His Catholic religion has taught him that their god implants an immortal soul into each fertilized egg at the moment of conception, and that ensoulment is what creates a person. People are entirely free to believe this but, unless they can prove this actually happens, they should not expect that belief to be implanted in the laws of our land.

Gerson is dismayed that a Catholic (Kansas governor Kathleen Sebelius) will be in charge of the Dept. of Health and Human Services, which oversees these matters. He should be pleased when public officials put the Constitution and its First Amendment ahead of this nation’s numerous, conflicting, and-as the stem cell controversy shows-sometimes absurd religious doctrines. It’s what they took an oath to do.

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By Marie Alena Castle

The debate over whether climate change is happening, and whether nature or people are causing it, is beside the point. Either way, the climate always has and always will change. We are in trouble today because of overpopulation. Ages ago, when rivers dried up or glaciers advanced, people moved to other areas. They simply got out of the way of nature.  

That option is no longer available. If it were, we would not be cutting down rainforests to create needed cropland, building cities on flood plains and tectonic fault lines, and putting villages on the sides of volcanos. We would not be draining our aquifers and depleting fishing grounds faster than nature can replenish them — or perhaps spewing more global warming pollutants into the air than the climate can tolerate. The president of the Maldive Islands (eight feet above seal level) would not be desperate to buy tropical property where he can resettle his 300,000 people if global warming swamps the islands. Good luck to him on finding anything livable but uninhabited. We might not even be in economic distress if there were not too many people for the available jobs and/or too many people too poor to keep up mortgage payments.

Overpopulation is the most serious problem we face, and may even underlie most other problems, yet none of our leaders seem to be aware of it.

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