Why was Martin Luther, the father of the Protestant movement, so against reason? Because faith in gods and books like the Bible is easily shaken by the simple act of thinking objectively about what you’re believing in.
He appears to have been a true believer, and he fought against The Church at a time when that was a dangerous thing to do. He did it because of his faith. Because of his faith, he has been a major influence on the Christian world, but exactly what did his faith get him?
Believing in his interpretation of the Bible the way he did gave him a unique perspective, and gives us a window on where it can lead if taken too seriously. Here is a list of some of the things he did:
- Left law school to become an Augustinian monk.
- Taught theology at the University of Wittenberg.
- Openly opposed teachings and actions of The Roman Catholic Church.
- Defied church orders and allowed himself to be excommunicated knowing it was a likely death sentence.
- Translated the Bible into German, and wrote several books of his own on Christianity.
- Came out of hiding to give eight “Invocavit Sermons” on the “Christian values” such as love, patience, charity and freedom.
- Wrote On the Jews and their Lies, a book advocating the persecution of Jews since they were, in his mind, no longer “God’s chosen people”, but “the devil’s people”. This book was later used by the Nazis to support their persecution of the Jews.
- Gave a final speech, 3 days before his death, entirely devoted to the subject of Jews and the urgent necessity of expelling them all from German territory, unless they became Christians.
Martin Luther found justification for his love and his hate in the Bible. Rather than follow this example, we should simply look for truth wherever we can find it. The Bible contains many good ideas that we can use to improve our lives without believing in anything supernatural, and without accepting all of the terrible ideas and vile practices and beliefs that the Bible also supports.
We need not look for justification in the Bible. Love needs no justification, and hate has none.
“Reason must be deluded, blinded, and destroyed. Faith must trample underfoot all reason, sense, and understanding, and whatever it sees must be put out of sight and…know nothing but the word of God.” – Martin Luther
What is better than faith?
Reality and reason.
“Whoever wants to be a Christian should tear the eyes out of his reason.” – Martin Luther
Why does this site exist?
Although I have been an atheist since leaving Christianity as a teenager, I still bought into the idea that people’s faith should be respected, not questioned or put down. Even seeing the harm it could do didn’t make me think about breaking that taboo except with close friends.
Fortunately, I have since been awakened to the possibility, even need to open up to a wider audience. Over the last couple of years, the excellent books by Richard Dawkins (The God Delusion), Sam Harris (The End of Faith and Letter to a Christian Nation), Christopher Hitchens (God is Not Great) and others have made me realize that it is okay for us to question people’s religious beliefs just like their political beliefs or anything else. We don’t have to respect unfounded faith in imaginary things, and given many religious people’s ideas and their plans to force them on the rest of us, it is not safe to ignore them.
After reading those books I had been looking for ways to more actively help the situation, and when I started regularly visiting Mill Avenue near ASU in Tempe, AZ again in 2007, I found a way.
As with many crowded areas, street preachers are common on Mill. I, and hundreds of other people, had Christian propaganda shoved into our hands and shouted at us through a microphone every week. Although there were occasionally people there to argue with them, no one was doing so publicly and on a regular basis, and no one was handing out literature to refute what the preachers were saying, so I took the job.
In the last few months things have turned around significantly. It’s hard to know what impact either side is having, but I continually see more support for our side, and our group now regularly rivals or exceeds the preacher group in number.
This site was created to support our local community as well as to help create and spread useful content in the hope that other communities with similar problems will gain both the tools and motivation to fight back.
If you are interested, please visit our forum and download some materials to pass out. Whether you base your community’s online presence here or elsewhere, we wish you the best and we’ll be happy to help you if we can.
By the way, if you are looking for people to join this kind of a group in your area, a good place to look is on or near college campuses when the craziest of the street preachers are around. People like Brother Jed. They are likely to attract a crowd of people, not for but against them. This is where much of our community has come from, and it’s a good place to start.