Thank you, Sami and the Praise Team!

Blasphemous.

Most of us were indoctrinated with one religion or another as children. A few of us were fortunate enough to have subsequent experiences that gave us the tools to undo that indoctrination. EUDEMONIA (or Human Flourishing) October 2024 Why there is ‘Something’, instead of ’Nothing’, is a mystery. It confounds philosophy, quantum physics, and cosmology. Whence came energy, and matter, and the laws of nature? Were they deftly ordained by a Divine Creator? No, a god can’t be the answer, it begets a two-part question, what begot that god, is there an infinite regression? Theology’s sophistries use special pleading in etiology, the illusion of design, and tendentious teleology. Stone Age people, for want of any science education, invoked gods and spirits in their explication of forces of nature, both wondrous and frightening, like fire and flood and thunder and lightning. Their superstitious beliefs they thought made sense of a world incomprehensible, mired in their ignorance. From shamans in trances to preying priests on a mission, mankind’s ‘Original Sin’ was ‘The Fall’ for superstition. Since the brutal Bronze Age we suffered the Inquisition, the Crusades, the Holocaust, and the many Wars of Religion, yet the gods in their abode remained silent and invisible, though they still begot theology that’s really quite risible. If just one were real, to spare us havoc, it would reveal its plan, but the gods, all, were made in the image of man. So, what confounds the concept of objective morality? Why, all the gods who condoned their own immorality. Could an ethical god create a congeries of carnivores, with canine teeth, raptorial beaks, venomous fangs, and claws? Did a god create parasites, bacteria, and viruses like herpes, but keep hidden from us that germs can cause diseases? Did it make men strong, but some, brutal in seduction, yet give women all the burdens of human reproduction? No! A moral agent, to be ethical, accepts their duty of care, so, not one of mankind’s gods could be ethical, just, or fair. Jehovah, Christianity's Almighty Lord God, lords it over Heaven, though he's a sordid old sod. He's malicious, capricious, jealous, and genocidal, homophobic, misogynistic, and megalomaniacal. He tasks his sidekick, Satan, with cruel sadism in Hell, torturing 'sinners' for all eternity, and atheists as well! So, as the problems with theodicies remain unresolved, Jehovah, from his turpitude, cannot be absolved. See the Sikh, Muslim, Jain, and Buddhist, Zoroastrian, Baha’i, Mormon, and Scientologist, Spiritualist, Wiccan, Christian, and Jew, Confucianist, Shintoist, Taoist, and Hindu. Yea verily, the faithful at prayer all look dopey; prayer doesn’t work, it's superstitious baloney. If praying to your god really worked, just imagine, our world a better place, sans plague, sans war, sans famine. So, why should yours be the 'One True Faith' in a magical, phantasmagorical, astral wraith? The varieties of religious experience reveal feelings of a god's immanence might seem quite real, but feelings of the numinous are clearly psychological, so belief in any god is really quite illogical. Does your faith afford you comfort, in times of strife, or do you fret about cruel punishment, in a mythic afterlife? It should be evident we have just this one life, with all its pleasures, challenges, toil, and strife. As social beings we evolved our moral sensibility, combating selfishness, lust, and venality. Human evolution's due to Natural Selection, so life derives no purpose, at any god’s direction. Purpose implies design, for it to make rational sense, but for a rational designer, there’s no objective evidence. To give one’s life meaning, choose a purpose or mission; it’s a betrayal of reason to put one’s faith in a religion. The faithful think their god bestows blessings or strife, so they’re judgmental, but it’s chance that rules one’s life. Religion’s harm exceeds its good, the rationalist laments; false beliefs foment fear, injustice, and malevolence. When faith deposes reason, tyranny stalks the land, where flames of fear and bigotry are fanatically fanned. Religion should have no say in the politics of a nation; its revelations and dogmata lack a rational foundation. Aristotle’s eudemonia, or human flourishing, conflicts with the social engineering that religion inflicts on societies that could democratically endorse rationality-based ethics, mores and laws. The most religious nations often are the most barbarian, whereas the least religious are the most egalitarian. Religion validates discrimination and oppression; religious faith stifles policy on research and education. Moderate religion's like fertile soil, full of pious ordure, wherein extremism takes root, to terrorize and torture. Holy texts, from ancient times, in ignorance divine, were blind; LGBTQ and straight folk are all equally fine. See, a new era beckons, where humanity could be, as reason infers, one great family. You can blame wishful thinking, religious indoctrination, and maybe, psychotic delusion or hallucination, but there’s no need for you to blame your genes, your faith’s also fomented by religious memes. They corrupted your mind with a contagious infection of superstitious ideas that can’t stand close inspection. So, cast them out, get rid of that insanity, then you can revel in your unfettered Humanity!

Good Sermon, Pastor Sami.❤

Thank you for the service. Very nicely done

Good sermon Pastor.

Thank you for that wonderful service Pastor. God Bless You.

Beautiful service!

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Wow great sermon as always!

We will, and we ask God to help and guide us