Who Killed More in History – Christians or Atheists?
Atheists always use the same argument.
“Christians have a horrible history of starting wars and killing innocent people.”
This throws off a lot of Christians. Makes them nervous.
Not me.
In fact, I rather like the jab at Christian history. As is typical for me, the Christian Atheist, I am not shaken by any reality. I don’t need to be. I have been on both sides of this debate and now find myself solidly standing on the side of belief in the Christian God.
Lots of compelling evidence drew me to that conclusion. But for now, let’s just take the atheist’s bait and look squarely at Christianity’s dark underbelly. It’s an easy task.
History is littered with Christians behaving badly.
Most people start with the Crusades, where Christian soldiers murdered, raped and pillaged their way to the Middle East to oust the Muslim infidels from Jerusalem - All supposedly in the name of the Church. Once you are done there, you can go to the Spanish Inquisition, or the many, many people who died at the hands of corrupt popes and bishops throughout the history of Catholicism. Oh, and don’t let the Protestants off the hook. The witch hunts? The slaughters over religious doctrine like the Baptists and Anabaptists?
Both Catholics and Protestants have a very colorful history. Unfortunately, that color was far too often red with copious amounts of innocent blood shed throughout the last 2000 years. Christianity became a tool to control, to seize power, and to oppress the masses. There’s a lot there. Have at it.
I don’t fight any of it. I make no excuses for historical Christians’ malfeasance. I don’t need to. They were awful, brutal and horrific. There is no excuse. And I feel no need to defend their behavior. In fact, I join my atheist friends in wholeheartedly condemning it.
It also does not shake my faith in any way. What sets Christianity apart from its atheist prosecutors is the Christian doctrine, itself. It is solidly founded in human dignity, right to life, and the belief that peace and freedom are indeed human rights. In fact, Christian doctrine is the hammer atheists use to pummel Christians.
“Christian doctrine is the hammer atheists use to pummel Christians.”
WHY?
Because atheism is devoid of any concept of human rights, or human value and dignity. Atheists need Christian doctrine to accuse their Christian friends and neighbors of historical malfeasance.
Just for fun, let’s turn the accusing finger the other way. How many people have atheists killed? I also don’t need to reach very far. You will know some of the famous ones. Stalin comes to mind. And his Chinese contemporary, Mao Zedong. These two killed somewhere between 40-60 million of their own people.
Adolf Hitler was technically not an atheist. But he loved its principles. His eugenics beliefs as well as his overall mission of building the master race is drawn directly from atheistic evolution. With him, Hitler tops their number off by adding another 20 million more, including 6-million Jews. So, roughly 80-million murders fully supported by atheism. And it didn’t take these guys 2 millennium to do it. They did all that in record time - just the last 75 years.
So what ethical codes can atheists site to call out their moral monsters? There are none. Philosophically, Stalin, Mao and Hitler were all operating completely within their atheistic principals. They all hated Christianity and its principles. Stalin and Mao outlawed it. Hitler manipulated it. Hitler in fact called Christianity a “Rebellion against the natural law of selection.”
He was right. It is. It rejects natural selection for human beings and replaces it with human values.
Atheism has no human values. All decent, morally responsible atheists must steal their values from elsewhere. In the words of Richard Dawkins and many other famous atheists, "The universe gives human beings no meaning and no purpose.”
Well then if my life is meaningless – And your life is meaningless, then any human life truly has no value. So why do atheists complain when people mistreat others? According to atheist beliefs, it really shouldn’t matter.
My atheist friends hate the fact they must use Judeo-Christian principles to become decent human beings. But they do. Their philosophical ancestor Nietzsche hated this as well. But atheists today must abscond human rights from Christianity in order to beat up Christianity. I don’t mind this at all. It ultimately exposes atheism’s moral bankruptcy.
What surprises me is the fact that most atheists don’t look at the full implications of their own beliefs. Intrinsically, deep within the soul they deny they have, atheists know humanity has value and purpose and meaning. That’s why they find those unseemly parts of Christian history so repugnant. And yet they doggedly hold to a belief system that has no foundation for human rights.
This is one of the major falsehoods of atheism that led me to consider, and now adopt, Christianity
– A belief that solidly uplifts the value of humanity and requires people be treated with dignity and freedom. And it has the means to wholeheartedly judge people who do not adhere.
At the end of the argument, Christianity can face its own history and judge it decisively and accurately. Those moral monsters that used Christianity to abuse people are soundly judged for what they were. Atheism can assert no such higher ground. It crumbles at any moral claims and must steal human values from elsewhere in order to make any assertion of human rights.
“I have said it many times. I reject atheism, not because it is illogical. I reject it because it is inadequate. ”
