A BIG BANG? - NO, IT WAS A BUTLER'S REVENGE.

I'm writing this post under The Religious Curmudgeon banner but it might easily have gone under The Polemical Curmudgeon, The Philosophical Curmudgeon or The Aluminium Foil Curmudgeon.

Robert the - well, you know, said this in his latest post.

I often hear the accusation that religious belief is irrational, childish, wishful thinking, a crutch, and the opiate of the masses. Well Curmudgeon said this once. Not all at the same time. But he did mention one of them, at least, maybe under his breath.
Anyway, I'm all fired up to answer these accusations.
You see, none of these actually prove the falsehood of God! Their attempt to disprove God backfires. And backfires alarmingly. With a big bang.
Well that's it really. The burden of proof is with the atheist.

That's what he said in full really - I didn't include the image of a suspicious looking Belgian priest who said that he proved Einstein to be wrong though. I don't know why Robert used that - probably thought he was wheeling out the 'big guns' to support his "answer these accusations."

Georges Lemaître  was a very, very clever man who lived and worked among other very, very clever men like Einstein and Hubble. They didn't always agree however with Lemaître stating that Einstein was wrong in some areas and Einstein disagreeing with Lemaître  over many of his papers although Einstein, to his credit endorsed Lemaître's theory of the expansion of the universe. I think Robert was trying to snipe at Richard and me and all of the other atheists out there by using Lemaître as a kind of champion to 'prove' that atheists are wrong. Well, I think that he got in the way of his own backfire.

I found reading about Georges Lemaître interesting. I had heard of him but hadn't read much about his body of work which is substantial and still respected. What I can't fathom though is why someone as intelligent, educated and open-minded as he was, believed in mythical beings and a religion that sought and seeks to confuse, hoodwink and rort its followers - but, that might be a discussion for another day.

Today I want to highlight a couple of statements in Robert's post.

First this: "Anyway, I'm all fired up to answer these accusations".

And then this: "Well that's it really. The burden of proof is with the atheist."

There's a hell of a disconnect there. He gets us all excited by stating that he was going to answer "the accusation that religious belief is irrational, childish, wishful thinking, a crutch, and the opiate of the masses." but instead drifts off into spurious allusion to a Catholic scientist and his brilliant work trying to infer that this defeats 'atheist thinking'. Well, that's about as tenuous as you can get.

After this - and I admit it was interesting and spurred me to read about Georges Lemaître on Wikipedia - Robert wrapped it up saying that 'the burden of proof is with the atheist.' What a crock of shit.

THE WISDOM OF ROBERT - PART ONE

Most of Robert (Robert the apathetic sanctimonious sinner, toilet cleaner, threatener of eternal damnation, music snob and sucker)'s writings, in his posts and comments, go unnoticed or are quickly deleted and therefore lost to posterity (or, maybe appropriately enough lost to 'posteriority' as he would write).

I thought that a series made of snippets from these before they disappear into the ether might be a good idea. Post series are always a good idea and on The Curmudgeons Inc.ⓒ have proven to be very popular.

I noticed this comment from Robert on one of Richard's recent posts*:

This stood out as it is even more bizarre than his usual insane religious observations and needs to be preserved.

Close observation of cats may indicate that they are involved in deep spiritual activity. They frequently stare at walls, out windows or, disturbingly, at you. They 

are quite obviously having religious experiences and contemplating the universe. creation and ... god.

Yeah right. That's slipping into the realms of fantasy as Captain Mainwaring would say to Lance Corporal Jones.

* For quite a long time this post will remain as Richard's latest post because he doesn't write much nowadays.

IT'S ALL GREEK TO ME

I read something interesting today that kind of upsets Robert's take on Jesus being a one-off and the Catholic Church being the "one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church".

This old Greek saying came to mind*:

“The excess of a virtue is a vice.”

  – Greek Proverb

Mind you, this old Greek saying might be more applicable:

“Wise men speak because they have something to say; Fools because they have to say something.”

        – Plato

This is what I read:

THE ANCIENT GREEK JESUS CHRIST : APOLLONIUS OF TYNA

Which is about a doppelgänger for Jesus who is said to have lived around the same time, did the same things, was put on trial and disappeared in mysterious circumstances - maybe ascended into heaven.

The Jesus followers had better artists than Apollonius's acolytes.

To save readers from trawling through the article which doesn't have any references to Robert and very few pictures, here's a summary for you:

• Greek philosopher Apollonius of Tyana from the Roman province of Cappadocia, who lived in the first century CE, is often linked with Jesus Christ. His amazing story that parallels Jesus has raised controversy among historians and theologians for centuries. He was Jesus Christ’s contemporary and lived circa 3 BC to around 97 CE. Many people at the time believed he was a divine figure who could save humanity.  They both are said to have ascended to Heaven. There are stories of both performing miracles. They were both spiritual teachers.

• Before he was born, his mother had a visitor from heaven who told her that her son would not be a mere mortal but in fact would be divine. His birth was accompanied by unusual divine signs in heaven. As an adult, he left his home to engage on an itinerant preaching ministry. He gathered a number of followers around him who became convinced that he was no ordinary human, but that he was the Son of God.

• He performed miracles  like healing the sick, casting out demons, and raising the dead. At the end of his life, he aroused opposition among the ruling authorities of Rome and was put on trial. But they could not kill his soul. He is said to have ascended to heaven and continues to live there.

• To prove that he lived on after dying, he appeared again to at least one of his doubting followers, who became convinced that in fact, he remains with us even now. Later, some of his followers wrote books about him, and we can still read about him today.

• Apollonius defied the bloodiest tyrants who ever sat on the Roman throne—Nero and his successor, Domitian. Apollonius fearlessly traveled from one end of the Roman Empire to the other, inciting revolutions against the despots, and establishing egalitarian communities among his followers, who bore the name of Essenes, early Christians.

• Jesus-like miracles performed by the Greek philosopher. Among the miracles that were attributed to him by Philostratus, was saving the city of Ephesus from a plague. It is also claimed that he brought the daughter of a Roman Senator back to life. In one case, he stopped a follower from marrying a woman who turned out to be a “lamia,” a type of disguised demon, and, in doing so, saved his life.

Spooky eh?

* I'm lying. I had to do a Google search to find it.

FLOATERS

Noah's Ark popped up again or was briefly mentioned in comments on Robert's blog.

Richard started it with this:

Robert answered with this:

And I lobbed this in:

Well, to date no views have been received from Robert, The Vatican, Trent Horn or Stefan the Polish person so we really don't know what Robert meant by saying that 'protestants' are removing sections of the bible.

As the Religious Curmudgeon I frankly can't be stuffed researching, interpreting and writing a post on something as patently silly as The Flood and Noah's ark so have just found a cartoon that highlights the nonsense.

Yes, that's right, Robert's god threw their* toys out of the cot when he realised that they had fucked up.

"5The LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. 6And the LORD regretted that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart. 7So the LORD said, “I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens, for I am sorry that I have made them.”"

Genesis 6:5-7

* Note the use of the gender inclusive term 'their'. While I don't like the use of this term, when it comes to referring to God it saves me from having to write 'he/she/it'.