Briar’s Reviews > The Rage Against God: How Atheism Led Me to Faith > Status Update

More on the USSR and this time an attempt at refuting his brother and Dawkins. He brings up their claim of religeon being child abuse. While I do not think religion is always that extreme, he made no counter claim. I think this chapter illustrates how little he has poked at more serious isssues.

More on the USSR? This is getting ridiculos. I am reading this for a good argument. He does a poor job agaist his brother even when he is sticking to the topic. Bsed on the topics I am more familiar with, I am not sure if I can trust what he is describing.
Also, considering the state of most religeously affiliated schools, no private schools seems like a good idea.

I think that Peter does not have a good grasp on what atheism or secularism is. Peter, I want your ideas, not your brothers. I have and am reading him. This book so far seems to be lacking and squabling with Christopher is not helping you.

I was wondering when morality would come up. Peter, even with a god I don't think morality is objective. God is a subject by most definitions. However, we can agree on a principle, say harm reduction? We do not need a cosmic judge. That does not free us from responsibility as you think it does, I think it gives us more. Also, I think you could have addressed Christopher's claims better.

Making a strawman to knock down? Religion has an impact on war but I have met few that would argue it causes all war. Adding nuance to explain this does not help you. 'God is the leftists’ chief rival' is a reductionist statement. Not all on the left are atheists. Secularism and an atheistic state are two different things. Atheists Western countries are more familiar with Christianity so will focus their ire there.

Militant secularist want to bring about an agressive atheism? In this chapter Peter complains about the rise of secularism after the Great War. A paragraph early on makes me wonder if there's a bit of a young earth creationist element in his head. The more I read, the more confused I am. He seems remarkably ignorant of a faith he converted to later in life or its impact on the world outside of Britian.

I can't decied if Peter was trying to be apathetic or angry. He acts annoyed yet at times seems oblivious to the imact of the church. Once he returned to the faith, he wanted it to be harsher than the modern church? At the end of this chapter he wonders at the fury against religion. The fury is for that judgement he wants back in church, for the restrictions many of the religious try to place on others.

Not sure what his little story of his trip to Mogadishu is meant to convey. We catch a glimpse of the decline of the contry. However, besides the snide coment of it could be worse if they were not Muslim, there is not much to chew on beside the obvious poverty.

So a society without Christianity looks like the USSR in it's final years? I think Peter is being rather disingenuous to them and being overly generous to Christianity. The tsar ruled a very devout nation, yet it was rather backwards compared to the rest of Europe. The USSR has many faults, but I think pointing to it being an atheistic state is too simplistic.

This chapter seemed incomplete. The phrase 'cult of the noble death' make is seem like he takes issue with it while he claims to fight back teards during Taps. He says those who love their country should ask more questions yet he does not expound on this. I wonder a bit as to why he compares to world wars and their monuments in Britian to the Vietnam memorial in the US. I'd like further details.