re: The “Freedom From Religion Foundation” warns Auburn University

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So if you work for a public school you can't go to church? That don't make no sense

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Strawman

I would love to witness the shock on your face on that certain day.

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Wrong question - when was the last time someone tried to enforce their religious beliefs through legislation?

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Legit. Trouble with that would be that just because a religious person wants something does not mean that a lot of non-religious people want the same thing, so is it really a religious push if nonreligious people want it, too?

For instance...there are a lot of non-religious people who are against abortion.
There are a lot of non-religious people who do not want special rights afforded to LGBTQ+ groups.

So, how do you define something as a religious group wanting to enforce something through legislation?

I mean, if some atheists want a certain law to pass does that make it atheists are pushing their views?

If an atheist through their own conscience does not want abortion to be legalized does that mean they are pushing their beliefs on everybody, therefore they are wrong to do so?

I agree - many non- religious people do align with religious values. Yet, they tend to be the minority of that belief system.

I’m sure that in Iran, there are non-religious people who hold have the same value system as the Taliban. Yet, it is the dominance of the Islamic organization which can impose the wearing of burqas.

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The moral law of the God of the Bible, Yahweh

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69% of humanity disagrees with you.

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Truth is not determined by majority rule. Do you disagree with that? I'm sure you do, because it seems like you would not call your self a religious person, based on the comments you've made so far, and yet the vast majority of the population of the earth, both today and throughout history, adhere to some for of religious belief. I'm sure you wouldn't say that the belief in the spiritual and supernatural by the majority of people who have ever lived means that the spiritual and supernatural exists, would you?

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How are you so sure you—and not they—are correct?

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There are many reasons why I believe the truth claims that I adhere to are correct while the others are not, but I'll just provide a few.

1. Truth is not determined by majority opinion (as I already covered).

2. The law of non-contradiction prevents competing truth claims from all being correct at the same time. While we all might be wrong, we all can't be right, and the 69% of humanity has a mixture of competing beliefs that all cannot be correct at the same time, either.

3. Only the God of the Bible has the attributes necessary to supply the preconditions of intelligibility for reality. In order for us to know anything, there must be certain things that are already existent that lie behind our understanding. Things like immaterial, universal, and unchanging laws of logic (which reflects the mind of God) and moral truth (which reflects the character of God) are used all the time for understanding and relating to the world around us, yet have no basis in objective reality without the God of the Bible.

The scientific method requires the uniformity of nature for it to work, yet in a universe that appears to go from order to disorder, there is no basis for order we do see arising out of the chaos of purposeless chance of a universe without God. In addition, the randomness and mutability of the universe does not present a basis for immutable "laws" and other unchanging principles that are entirely necessary for us to measure and understand the world around us.

God is infinite, eternal, and unchanging in all His attributes, and His revelation about Himself comports to what is necessary for epistemology whereas other belief systems are not consistent or provide such a basis for epistemology, or they are contradictory in their teachings to our understanding of the basic elements of reality.

4. Religions tend to fall into a few different buckets for how their truth claims were given to humanity. You have the religions (or religious beliefs) that are based purely on wishful thinking (a person just believes what he wants to believe based on his experiences and emotions and what he hopes is true without any form of external revelation to provide those beliefs. Many Theists fall into this category, where they have rejected the Bible but have perhaps grown up in a Christian sort of culture and like the concept of God but don't want the particulars of the God of the Bible, so they believe in a "higher power" or "God", but one of their own imagination. A person who creates their own version of God in their mind has no basis for claiming their belief is true at all since it all boils down to arbitrary opinion, and that is no threat to Christian rationality.

Next, you have religions based on some sort of great prophet or wise man that passed down beliefs to followers. What one man (who claims to be just a man) says is no basis for objective truth in and of itself. Whether a person is a "good person" or "wise" is based off of certain standards, and if those standards are not predicated on a universal and unchanging source of truth like God, then the wise man has nothing more than arbitrary opinions.

Next, you have religions based on books that undermine intelligibility of reality like the Bhagavad Gita and Vedas that attempt to make known a god who is unknowable (a contradiction in itself) or present a view of reality (or an ideal of reality) that removes all logical distinctions, making it irrational in its very essence.

Lastly, you have religions based on the Bible, which is revelational in its epistemology and which at least appeals in some way to the God that provides intelligibility to reality. These religions--Islam, Mormonism, Jehovah's Witnesses, etc.--actually contradict the Bible in their teaching about God, man, and our relationships with one another, and therefore must be judged according to the Bible that they claim to be based on or give respect to. For instance, Islam claims that the shedding of blood is not necessary for forgiveness, yet appeals to the Psalms of David in the Old Testament and the Gospels of Jesus in the New Testament of the Bible that says that forgiveness comes through the shedding of blood (which is a necessary condition of Jesus Christ's atoning work on the cross to remove the guilt of our sin). Another way would be how the Qur'an says that God cannot have a son, yet the Gospels teach that Jesus is the Son of God. The same thing can be done for Mormonism and the rest. Judaism, also, can be shown to be a rejection of Jesus Christ who fulfilled the law and the prophets of the OT and was the promised Messiah of the OT.

There are many more reasons for why I believe that the Bible is true and the other religions are false, but I'll leave it at these 4 for now.

lol. Your religion, despite all your rationalizations as to why it is more believable than the others, rests on the same poor foundations the others do…just packaged differently. A book and stories, crafted by men long ago, to influence the actions of other men.

We know it was written by men. Believers choose to believe they were divinely inspired—this part is not provable.

Which is fine. For you and for others that seek it. Believe whatever you want.

Just know that when you bring it to those that aren’t seeking it because you judge them (based upon your religion’s values) to be “living in sin” or somehow deficient of character because they don’t believe, they are entirely justified in being offended that you have judged them so.

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It is inappropriate and unconstitutional for university employees to use their university position to organize, promote or participate in a religious worship event,

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How are people this fricking stupid?

Barring anyone from participating in a religious worship event is a direct violation of the First Amendment.

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That includes you

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That’s your belief. In mine, I buy my kids the gifts from Santa, put the dollar under their pillow from the Tooth Fairy, and believe that once I die, it’s over for me.

Don’t put your beliefs on things you cannot know on others.

Ok. Believe me, I understand your position and accept and respect it as your position. Believe me when I say that even though we don’t know each other, I care for your eternal soul and the souls of your family. And I know that it is impossible for one man to change another’s heart - especially over a public message board lol. That can only come from God. But if you have doubt of my intentions, please understand I am not “attacking” you or trying to prove you wrong or be a keyboard warrior. I am simply sharing with you what I know to be true from my own experience and faith. Thanks for the rapport, and I will pray for the well-being of you and your family my friend.