HOTBOX RP RECORDS.: DAN BARKER

The very concept of sin comes from the bible. Christianity offers to solve a problem of its own making! Would you be thankful to a person who cut you with a knife in order to sell you a bandage? [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
How happy can you be when you think every action and thought is being monitored by a judgmental ghost? [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
You can cite a hundred references to show that the biblical God is a bloodthirsty tyrant, but if they can dig up two or three verses that say God is love, they will claim that *you* are taking things out of context! [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
I do understand what love is, and that is one of the reasons I can never again be a Christian. Love is not self denial. Love is not blood and suffering. Love is not murdering your son to appease your own vanity. Love is not hatred or wrath, consigning billions of people to eternal torture because they have offended your ego or disobeyed your rules. Love is not obedience, conformity, or submission. It is a counterfeit love that iscontingent upon authority, punishment, or reward. True love is respect and admiration, compassion and kindness, freely given by a healthy, unafraid human being. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
I have something to say to the religionist who feels atheists never say anything positive: You are an intelligent human being. Your life is valuable for its own sake. You are not second-class in the universe, deriving meaning and purpose from some other mind. You are not inherently evil--you are inherently human, possessing the positive rational potential to help make this a world of morality, peace and joy. Trust yourself. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
There is joy in rationality, happiness in clarity of mind. Freethought is thrilling and fulfilling--absolutely essential to mental health and happiness. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
It's not easy to change world views. Faith has its own momentum and belief is comfortable. To restructure reality is traumatic and scary. That is why many intelligent people continue to believe: unbelief is an unknown. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
For my money, I'll bet on reason and humanistic kindness. Even if I am wrong I will have enjoyed my life, the existence of which is under little dispute. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
The longer I have been an atheist, the more amazed I am that I ever believed Christian notions. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
Not thinking critically, I assumed that the successful prayers were proof that God answers prayer while the failures were proof that there was something wrong with me. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
To think that the ruler of the universe will run to my assistance and bend the laws of nature for me is the height of arrogance. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
Without The Law of Moses would we all be wandering around like little gods, stealing, raping, and spilling blood whenever our vanity was offended? [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
Truth does not demand belief. Scientists do not join hands every Sunday, singing, yes, gravity is real! I will have faith! I will be strong! I believe in my heart that what goes up, up, up must come down, down. down. Amen! If they did, we would think they were pretty insecure about it.
Just say NO to religion.
You keep accusing me of blasphemy all of the time, But I cannot be convicted of a victimless crime.
You believe in a book that has talking animals, wizards, witches, demons, sticks turning into snakes, food falling from the sky, people walking on water, and all sorts of magical, absurd and primitive stories, and you say that we are the ones that need help? [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
Faith is a cop-out. It is intellectual bankruptcy. If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can't be taken on its own merits. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
I am an atheist because there is no evidence for the existence of God. That should be all that needs to be said about it: no evidence, no belief. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
If the answers to prayer are merely what God wills all along, then why pray? [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
We were blood brothers, pals forever. He was my very best friend. Nobody else could see him. I now know he was just pretend. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
Faith is a cop-out. It is intellectual bankruptcy. If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can't be taken on its own merits. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
Freethought is respectable. Freethought is crucial. Freethought needs to be publicized. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
Freethinkers reject faith as a valid tool of knowledge. Faith is the opposite of reason because reason imposes very strict limits on what can be true, and faith has no limits at all. A Great Escape into faith is no retreat to safety. It is nothing less than surrender. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
If the answers to prayer are merely what God wills all along, then why pray? [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
To think that the ruler of the universe will run to my assistance and bend the laws of nature for me is the height of arrogance. That implies that everyone else (such as the opposing football team, driver, student, parent) is de-selected, unfavored by God, and that I am special, above it all. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
Some theists, observing that all 'effects' need a cause, assert that God is a cause but not an effect. But no one has ever observed an uncaused cause and simply inventing one merely assumes what the argument wishes to prove. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
I have an Easter challenge for Christians. My challenge is simply this: tell me what happened on Easter. I am not asking for proof. My straightforward request is merely that Christians tell me exactly what happened on the day that their most important doctrine was born. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
Even if it is true that all cultures share a common morality, why does this prove a supreme intelligence? After all, don't we humanists sometimes claim that there is a common thread of humanistic values running through history across cultural and religious lines? [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]
The next time believers tell you that 'separation of church and state' does not appear in our founding document, tell them to stop using the word 'trinity.' The word 'trinity' appears nowhere in the bible. Neither does Rapture, or Second Coming, or Original Sin. If they are still unfazed (or unphrased), by this, then add Omniscience, Omnipresence, Supernatural,Transcendence, Afterlife, Deity, Divinity, Theology, Monotheism, Missionary, Immaculate Conception, Christmas, Christianity, Evangelical, Fundamentalist, Methodist, Catholic, Pope, Cardinal, Catechism, Purgatory, Penance, Transubstantiation, Excommunication, Dogma, Chastity, Unpardonable Sin, Infallibility, Inerrancy, Incarnation, Epiphany, Sermon, Eucharist, the Lord's Prayer, Good Friday, Doubting Thomas, Advent, Sunday School, Dead Sea, Golden Rule, Moral, Morality, Ethics, Patriotism, Education, Atheism, Apostasy, Conservative (Liberal is in), Capital Punishment, Monogamy, Abortion, Pornography, Homosexual, Lesbian, Fairness, Logic, Republic, Democracy, Capitalism, Funeral, Decalogue, or Bible. [Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith]