Camaban

THat was in response to that part of the AIG article.

how they said he sacrified everything.

were they suggesting he lie about his beliefs to stay in? (Or repeat it to himself until he believes it again?)

I hardly think it's evolutions fault that the US Boy scouts are a tad bigoted when it comes to religion (In the Australian one, I can't recall your religion being an issue)

Mageth

THat was in response to that part of the AIG article.

A misunderstanding on my part then, brought about by you posting your response directly below my response to the section of the article.

Grumpy

Forget 9th grade science; I was an atheist long before that.

I remember reading books about <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0385015836//102-4298654-2026556?v=glance" target="_blank">Greek</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0844666920/qid=1036716989/sr=1-2/ref=sr_1_2/102-4298654-2026556?v=glance&s=books" target="_blank">Norse</a> mythology in the 2nd grade. What happened to these gods, I wondered. Are they real or make-believe? And if they are imaginary, what about present-day religions?

AIG should rummage thru school libraries if they want to stamp out anything that might inspire atheism. Hurry, before the 1st graders catch on!

Albion

In order to be good citizen it's necessary to believe in God? Wonder at which point they'll start putting atheists behind bars because atheism is uncompatible with being a good citizen.

Kevin

It's already too late for that. My parents had a set of ten volumes from Collier's Encyclopedia for children. One of those volumes contained some Greek myths, and I wanted to read more. My parents gave me an illustrated edition of <a href="http://www.bulfinch.org/" target="_blank">Bulfinch's Mythology</a> for Christmas, and it was there I read "The religions of ancient Greece and Rome are extinct. The so-called divinities of Olympus have not a single worshipper among living men." It was the germ of a realization that if the Greek and Roman gods didn't exist despite the pious faith of thousands, then people today could certainly be equally mistaken and I made the decision that I wasn't going to believe until I knew it was true. Thus I knew I was an atheist before I was five (although I didn't know the exact word).

You know what? It's just that durned book-larnin' that turns people agin' God! Once you teach them children to read, who knows what'll happen?

American Agnostic

Before I left religion, one thing about christianity always baffled me. If god played the huge role in human affairs before Jesus that the bible claims he did then we did he stop? I didn't really believe in these claims that god still intervines today. What made the past so special I wondered. Now I see that there never was any difference between the past and prestent thanks to skepticism.

Jack the Bodiless

A rather bold statement. As I recall, worship of Bacchus consisted mostly of getting drunk and having orgies. Is nobody interested in doing that anymore?

We freethinkers should always keep our minds open to the possibility that a god exists, even if we've ruled out the Biblical one. Maybe I should consider a research project.

Jack the Bodiless

From the article:
So they're mailbombing this poor kid.
So that's what's at stake: eternity in Heaven or Hell.

These are some seriously twisted fuckwits.

RufusAtticus

Count me as another person who was convinced by Greco-Roman Mythology that Xian Mythology was just stories too.

Blinn

Probably just after the first of the year, when this new Congress convenes.