“No god? … No problem!” reads the advertisement featuring the smiling faces of people wearing Santa Claus hats. “Be good for goodness’ sake.”
Over the next two weeks, 270 of the ads will go up on city buses and trains in the Washington area as part of the holiday kickoff to campaigns sponsored by secular groups in cities around the country and abroad. If last year was any indication, the signs are likely to spark a theological war of words.
“We don’t intend to rain on anyone’s parade, but secular people celebrate the holidays, too, and we’re just trying to reach out to our people,” said Roy Speckhardt, the executive director of the American Humanist Association. “To the degree that we are reaching out to the godly, it’s just to say that you can be good without god…”
Elsewhere, this year’s secular signs vary in tone.
In Seattle, this year’s signs say “Millions are good without God.” In Las Vegas, signs to be put up this week will say “Reasons Greetings” and “Yes, Virginia … there is no God…”
The campaigns come against a backdrop of a growing number of nonbelievers. Fifteen percent of Americans identified themselves as having “no religion” in a 2008, up from 8 percent in 1990, according to a study by the Program on Public Values at Trinity College in Hartford.
Overdue.
#22–sargasso==the “best” answer to that is to recognize that all atheists are just like you==rejecting 99% of all the idiot beliefs in the world in the correct analysis that “they don’t make any sense” and are really an insult to a rational man contemplating a natural world==THEN, using all the same insights and values, the atheist just “includes” your slice of pie.
Some of the comments here are hilarious. One Humanist group expresses an OPINION – “You can be good without god” – and the responses are “This new breed of atheists supremacists give me the creeps” or “So your aithiests bigots, most of us care as little about them as little as we care about you”.
Don’t you Americans know anything about your own history? Your beefs with England weren’t just about Taxation without Representation, there was also the little matter of religious oppression, which caused a group of Puritans to jump on a ship called the Mayflower. The Declaration of Independence, which talks about the right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”? No religion is required for any of that. The Bill of Rights, with the 1st Amendment? Jefferson and his “wall of separation between Church and State”? The Treaty of Tripoli, which states unambiguously that “the United States is not founded upon the Christian religion”?
Do you really think that all the meaning in your life comes from your religion? If I said that, you’d be insulted, and rightly so. So, do you accept that people can have a full and meaningful life without religion? If a group of people does no harm, to you or anyone else, does it matter what they believe – or don’t believe?
#30
it doesn’t. The fact that atheists want to make everybody else stop believing is the sticking point
the country was founded on religion and freedom TO worship as you please without govt interference. NOT freedom FROM religion as atheists would have you believe.
Google George Washington’s first Thanksgiving decree after becoming President. There are hardly any sentences in the whole thing that Don’t mention God. If a President were to do that today he’d be crucified by the militant non-believers
I can’t comprehend the issue here, some humanists are basically trying to extend an olive branch and say “happy holidays” from your good natured godless ones and people are spewing their christ-mongering hexes at them. If in all of man’s time, many religions have come and gone, why have the big three stayed in fashion for so long? Why? It is because if anyone came up with such a load of crap today it would be laughed at. But somehow the fact this crap is a little over 2000 years old with nothing left but anecdotal evidence to back it up, it is somehow believable.
Atheists out preaching and trying to get converts. Now I’m really confused.
#31–jman==you say: “NOT freedom FROM religion as atheists would have you believe.” /// The USA Supreme Court disagrees and it is the settled law of the land. Freedom FROM religion must be understood in its proper application otherwise there is in fact no freedom OF religion. IOW==YOU can worship as you please without interference or influence====but so can I.
Ain’t freedom a bitch???
It’s a truism by now that the red states have higher levels of “sin” — teenage pregnancy, sex crimes, alcoholism, divorce, etc. I suspect that the fundamentalist types lack some kind of internal governor, some essence of self-discipline that stops them from “sinning”. Maybe those types really do need the threat of a big angry guy in the sky to make them behave. And they assume that everyone is like them and needs that threat too.
While those of us with the internal governor are just baffled at the fundie types.
Maybe it just comes down to moral development. People do the right thing for one of two reasons: one, because they might get caught and punished if they don’t; and two, because internally they believe it’s the right thing to do. Maybe some people never internalize any moral values, and have to be constantly threatened for them to behave morally. Who knows?
#3, Mikey Twit
I wish I knew more atheists like you. I think if all atheists shared your beliefs and all Christians actually practiced what they preached (i.e. love thy neighbor), the world would be a much more peaceful place.
As for being saved, as a Christian, I hope that one day you do realize and accept your salvation, but it is solely up to you (and God) if/when you do so.
“We don’t intend to rain on anyone’s parade, but secular people celebrate the holidays, too, and we’re just trying to reach out to our people,”
Secular people celebrate a Christian holiday?
That is like the KKK celebrating Black History Month as in the ridicules made-up quote below.
“We don’t intend to rain on anyone’s parade, but racists people celebrate the Black History Month, too, and we’re just trying to reach out to our people,” said David Duke, the executive director of the KKK. “To the degree that we are reaching out to the politically correct, it’s just to say that you can be tolerant without tolerating black people…”
#36 GlowWorm – You don’t see the condescension in your last statement? This is why what you want to happen (your first statement) is impossible. Those that take exception to your beliefs will be offended by your offer no matter how well intentioned.
Make that #37 GlowWorm.
So is it secularists, or atheists? Seculars don’t have an opinion if there is a God or not. Atheists seems to want to tell everyone there is no God; which is a very bold step. I mean, even Satan believes there is a God.
#38 Sorry to rain on your parade, Benjamin, but having a celebration on the shortest day of the year is way older than Christianity. You guys hijacked it, fine, religions do that all the time. Just don’t pretend you came up with the idea. I’m an agnostic, and I like the symbolism of noting the shortest day of the year and celebrating that the days start getting longer after that. Your analogies are bogus.
#41 I’m an agnostic. I don’t know, nor do I care, whether there is a god or gods. I wouldn’t live my life any differently either way. So it doesn’t matter to me. Whereas the average fundie… I have the sneaking suspicion that if he decided there was no god, he’d go rape, burn and pillage.
And I agree that atheism is faith of a sort too. I mean, think about it… you disbelieve in many gods… zeus, krishna, zarathustra, etc. An atheist just disbelieves in one more god than you do. So you’re not that different.
How I wish we had Xmas like that of the Futurama show. Wishful thinking… 🙁
I see the Spirit of the Age is alive and well on planet earth…
I wish people could get their history straight instead of making it up. Christmas is the day celebrated. There are several religious and pagan concepts attached to this day.
It wasn’t until shortly after the US became a nation that Christmas was celebrated with any enthusiasm. Before that time it was Easter and Thanksgiving that were celebrated and Christmas was a very quiet affair usually noted in church if at all. NOTE: Washington undertook his attack on Trenton NJ on Christmas day as an example of the strength of this day in Colonial times. This would not have happened on Easter or Thanksgiving.
Gift / treat giving is an old tradition from several ancient cultures, including Jews, Celts and Norse. Often times this would coincide with the solstice. Usually, this was nuts / candy for “good” children. Sometimes socks were used, other times shoes.
Christmas trees are a Celtic tradition that came first to America then England. They were originally used in Germany to celebrate the winter solstice. By 1850 they were being used in America to celebrate Christmas.
While Christmas is currently a Christian holiday, it started as a pagan celebration. During the Spanish Inquisition, reformation, and other Christian impositions, pagan celebrations were hidden behind Christian holidays. This can still be seen in the different traditions among the various “Christian” countries.
(Christmas trees and Easter eggs / bunny)
BTW, even though “Christmas” is celebrated both as a religious and secular day, all days of the week and most months have a pagan history to them. Holding significance to a name as a reason for doing something today is pretty silly.
If its wrong for athiests to want to celebrate religious holidays (putting aside the fact that the winter holiday season predates christianity), than is it ok to say that it is wrong for the religious to celebrate “athiest” holidays (ie a holiday that does not revolve around religion)?
#47–Migu==no. Big difference between celebrating something irrelevant to your core beliefs versus something anti-thetical to your core beliefs.
Noting the historical etiology of Christmas is NOT a celebration of its pagan roots. I certainly “hope” most atheists are non-believers of all belief systems. WHY celebrate the solstice? After a few thousand years, the novelty of being able to predict when days will get longer should lose its appeal? On to nanobots!!!!!!!
I am always amazed how a non-theological, but philosophical point of view can make so many people insecure, angry, or hateful. I suspect Ghandi would have been delighted by this ad.
yeah, I don’t see you people jumping up and down for Ramadan. That gets pretty much left alone, but yet for some reason you feel compelled to take Christmas away from Christians….
Watching Atheist discuss God is like watching a blind man search the room for a grenade pin that fell out the window.
51–SweatBox==ha, ha. “Be good for goodness’ sake.” IS EXACTLY the incentive.
Your question is even more directly obvious than “Whats the incentive in “Win a Date with the Worlds Sexiest Woman.”
YOU are just like that idiot woman in some commercial that says insurance is too expensive and holds up a mannequins arm and leg and then has to SAY those words for those too clueless to “get it.”
Get it?????
#52 Dr. Dud – A blind man searching for the pin of an imaginary grenade that another person told him was thrown into the room?
5 smartalix
“Christmas is a non-secular American holiday by law anyway. You can celebrate it as such without even dealing with religion.”
I’ve been telling my Jewish friend that for years. Hasn’t helped.
RBG
Ovenmaster, the ‘reward’ is immediate, in that I can contribute to a stable and friendly society and live in that society without fear. There is also the biological reaction of feeling elated when helping someone in need who appreciates that help, including the rest of society who benefits as well by my being good. I don’t expect anything more, or feel the need to be paid back a reward, an afterlife like Heaven, for my goodness. My behavior regulated by calculating reactions and consequences, just like yours are. Take away “God” and I bet your behavior wouldn’t change… unless you have a mental disability to cope with living if you don’t have a master. I would expect that very few fall into that category… probably the same few who are considered religious extremists.
YOU KNOW…what with manufacturing now calculated down to the 0.00000001¢
-This could be as simple as the fact that given the volume of “xmas” signs, cards, and posters that are printed at this time of the year, i imagine at least half a billion dollars is saved in ink by using “xmas” instead of the longer “christmas” (esp in light of the fact that for us consumers, printer ink is probably the most expensive fluid on the planet at roughly $5000 a gallon).
-Since politics, religion (and selling copy) mandates that the people must always be polarized (divided) in order to control and profit from them..
..It is only natural to exploit for political, religious and monetary gain, -the modern cost cutting measures to extract even more profit from this seasonal bonanza.
Simple social and economical engineering. yes?
-s
#55, RBG,
Most Jews I know celebrate Christmas although not as overtly as Gentiles. I know of no Christians who celebrate Hanukkah by any measure.
You’d better not shout, you’d better not cry, and you’d better not pout… because I’m making a list.
Mikey Twit: nice
Eric Morris: nice
Loupe Garou : nice
smartalix: nice
Greg Allen: naughty (for crying)
gal416: naughty
dusanmal: nice
trirnoth: nice
Breetai: naughty
notgonna: naughty
jj-man: nice
rasnsasnberry: naughty
Darrell: nice
Jared: naughty
pfkad: nice
sargasso: nice
Benjamin: naughty and oblivious
bobbo: barely nice. it’s a good day so far…
Zybch: pending
qb: Always nice… such a good boy.
brian t: nice
jman: naughty
Just_Say_No_to_gods: nice (barely)
MikeR: naughty (being confused not allowed)
Phydeau: nice
GlowingApple: nice until Monster’s Lawyer spoke up.
Monster’s Lawyer: nice (-ly done)
kmorrisonca: barely nice. I’m watching you.
The0ne: nice
Thinker: nice
Mr. Fusion: Nice, but I’m not holding my breath.
MrMiGu: nice
OvenMaster: naughty (half baked comment)
Dr Dodd: naughty (retarded joke)
RBG: nice
JimR: You are the nicest… also intelligent and handsome
OvenMaster said, on December 2nd, 2009 at 1:24 pm
“At least with religion, you’re told you’ll be admitted to heaven.”
Not true. Only through faith in Jesus Christ can you get into heaven. Your own good works aren’t powerful enough to get you into heaven. Christians do good works to be more like Christ, not to get into heaven.