Wednesday

The Jesus Seminar and inclusion of conservative Christian scholars

See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXYWex6F3n8&feature=share
The Jesus seminar invited ALL scholars to participate INCLUDING CONSERVATIVE SCHOLARS.

I quote john Dominic Crossan in this interview "We asked ANYONE who was interested in the New Testament involving Jesus" & "If literalists or fundamentalists wanted to come there and defend their position they could. They would not be ostracised in anyway. They may be voted down."

So much for the diatribe by conservatives that conservative scholars were never invited!

Tuesday

CHRISTIAN DOUBLE STANDARD - BROTHERS / NONBELIEVERS

The cartoon exposes the double standards that Christians have. On one hand a moral couple who are atheist are shunned because of their lack of Christian belief but on the other hand a murdering rapist of 21 women is considered a Christian brother and warmly welcomed merely because he is a Christian.  The cartoon destroys all sense of Christian "justice" as, according to Christian doctrine, the murdering rapist receives no punishment whatsoever as he is now a Christian but the moral atheist couple will burn in hell forever. One could easily swap the atheist couple for a homosexual couple. The same applies.

It would be really nice if Christians someday began treating the atheists, Muslims and homosexuals exactly the same as murdering rapist of 21 women who converts to Christianity. However, most Christians have an unspoke arpartheid and favour the murdering rapist of 21 women who has converted over any nonbeliever.

Monday

Jesus & the woman caught in adultery - Purity Version

From Patti Hornback Mobley

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

What would the Bible be like if God valued purity more than people? Consider how a well-known story might have ended:

The scribes and Pharisees brought to Jesus a woman who had been caught in adultery. Throwing her at his feet, they said to Jesus, "Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. In the law, Moses commanded us to stone such a woman. What do you say?"

Jesus said to them, "...The law is clear. We'll have to kill her."

And saying that, he picked up a rock and threw it at her, striking her in the head.

The scribes and Pharisees joined in with great enthusiasm, throwing stones at the woman until she was dead.

Then Jesus turned to them and said, "Let she who is with sin be stoned."

And the scribes and Pharisees marveled at his devotion to purity.

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DICTIONARY DEFINITIONS OF HOMOPHOBIA THAT HOMOPHOBES DON'T WANT TO KNOW ABOUT

Homophobia is a DICTIONARY term with a definite meaning and not the meaning that homophobes ascribe to it. It includes:
- CONTEMPT OF
- HATRED FOR
- APPREHENSION OF
- PREJUDICE AGAINST
- AVERSION TO
- DISCRIMINATION AGAINST

homosexuals / homosexuality.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
ho·mo·pho·bi·a
n.
1. Fear of OR CONTEMPT for lesbians and gay men.
2. Behavior based on such a feeling.

homo·phobe n.
homo·phobic adj.

The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition copyright ©2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
homophobia
(Psychology) INTENSE HATRED or fear of homosexuals or homosexuality
[from homo(sexual) + -phobia]

homophobe n
homophobic adj
Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
homophobia
fear of or APPREHENSION about homosexuality.
See also: Homosexuality
-Ologies & -Isms. Copyright 2008 The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Noun 1. homophobia - PREJUDICE AGAINST against (fear or dislike of) homosexual people and homosexuality

Based on WordNet 3.0, Farlex clipart collection. © 2003-2008 Princeton University, Farlex Inc.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
ho·mo·pho·bia definition
Function: n
: irrational fear of, AVERSION TO, or DISCRIMINATION AGAINST homosexuality or homosexuals

Merriam-Webster's Medical Dictionary, © 2007 Merriam-Webster, Inc.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
homophobia
noun

an extreme and irrational AVERSION to homosexuality and homosexual people.

http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/homophobia
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
homophobia
1 ( noun ) homophobia PREJUDICE against ( fear or DISLIKE OF) homosexual people and homosexuality

from http://www.definition-of.net/homophobia
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

• HOMOPHOBIC (adjective)
The adjective HOMOPHOBIC has 1 sense:

1. PREJUDICED against homosexual people

http://www.audioenglish.net/dictionary/homophobic.htm

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Definition:
1.[adjective] PREJUDICED against homosexual people

http://www.elook.org/dictionary/homophobic.html
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
homophobic

PREJUDICED against homosexual people

http://www.beedictionary.com/meaning/homophobic
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
homophobia
Definition

noun fear of homosexuality, expressed in a range of ways from DISCRIMINATION in the workplace to USING DEMEANING LANGUAGE and HOSTILE BEHAVIOUR

http://www.mediadictionary.com/definition/homophobia.html

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Homophobia
noun
[mass noun]

an extreme and irrational aversion to homosexuality and homosexual people.
http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/homophobia

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Etymology and usage

Coinage

Psychologist George Weinberg introduced the first scholarly use of the concept homophobia in his 1972 book Society and the Healthy Homosexual,[9] published one year before the American Psychiatric Association voted to remove homosexuality from its list of mental disorders.[10] Weinberg's "term became an important tool for gay and lesbian activists, advocates, and their allies."[11] He describes the concept as:

a phobia about homosexuals….It was a fear of homosexuals which seemed to be associated with a fear of contagion, a fear of reducing the things one fought for—home and family. It was a religious fear and it had led to great brutality as fear always does.[11]

Conceptualizing prejudice against gay and lesbian people as a social problem worthy of scholarly attention was not a new concept, but Weinberg was the first to give the problem a name.[11]

The construction of the word is comparable to xenophobia, a much older term referring to individual or cultural hostility to foreigners or outsiders. However it fails to make sense etymologically, as the Greek 'homo' means 'the same', so, literally, 'homophobia' means a fear of things that are the same.[11] The word homophobia was also used early in the twentieth century, albeit rarely. It then had the meaning of "fear or hatred of the male sex or humankind." In this use, the word derived from the Latin root homo (Latin, "man" or "human") with the Greek ending -phobia ("fear").[12]

Despite its general shortcomings etymologically, the word can be used to describe the fear of a heterosexual that they will be approached romantically by someone of the same sex. It also can describe the apparently fear-based reactions of recoiling from unintentional close contact with another male or of being in close proximity to other males in certain situations such as while in the restroom. These are typically fear-based reactions, but the fear is usually that of the societal stigma of being labelled homosexual. However a disinterested third party might view these reactions and simply conclude that the person displaying the reaction is afraid of others of the same sex, hence, homophobic.

The word first appeared in print in an article written for the American Screw tabloid, May 23, 1969 edition, using the word to refer to straight men's fear that others might think they are gay.[11] A possible etymological precursor was homoerotophobia, coined by Wainwright Churchill in Homosexual Behavior Among Males in 1967.

The first time it was formally used in its modern sense in the press was not until 1981 when The Times reported a General Synod vote where they refused to condemn homosexuality.[13]

from http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/definitions/Homophobia?cx=partner-pub-0939450753529744%3Av0qd01-tdlq&cof=FORID%3A9&ie=UTF-8&q=Homophobia&sa=Search#922

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Man-made bibles are not Dictionaries, nor are they psychiatic manuals or the pronouncements of associations of psychiatrists and psychologists..

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In December of 1998, the Board of Trustees issued a position statement that the American Psychiatric Association opposes any psychiatric treatment, such as "reparative" or conversion therapy, which is based upon the assumption that homosexuality per se is a mental disorder or based upon the a priori assumption that a patient should change his/her sexual homosexual orientation (Appendix 1). In doing so, the APA joined many other professional organizations that either oppose or are critical of "reparative" therapies, including the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Medical Association, the American Psychological Association, The American Counseling Association, and the National Association of Social Workers (1).
....

theories which rationalize the conduct of "reparative" and conversion therapies. Firstly, they are at odds with the scientific position of the American Psychiatric Association which has maintained, since 1973, that homosexuality per se, is not a mental disorder. The theories of "reparative" therapists define homosexuality as either a developmental arrest, a severe form of psychopathology, or some combination of both (10-15). In recent years, noted practitioners of "reparative" therapy have openly integrated older psychoanalytic theories that pathologize homosexuality with traditional religious beliefs condemning homosexuality (16,17,18).


The earliest scientific criticisms of the early theories and religious beliefs informing "reparative" or conversion therapies came primarily from sexology researchers (19-27). Later, criticisms emerged from psychoanalytic sources as well (28-39). There has also been an increasing body of religious thought arguing against traditional, biblical interpretations that condemn homosexuality and which underlie religious types of "reparative" therapy (40-46).

http://www.psych.org/Departments/EDU/Library/APAOfficialDocumentsandRelated/PositionStatements/200001.aspx
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Since 1975, the American Psychological Association has called on psychologists to take the lead in removing the stigma of mental illness that has long been associated with lesbian, gay, and bisexual orientations. The discipline of psychology is concerned with the well-being of people and groups and therefore with threats to that well-being. The prejudice and discrimination that people who identify as lesbian, gay, or bisexual regularly experience have been shown to have negative psychological effects. This information is designed to provide accurate information for those who want to better understand sexual orientation and the impact of prejudice and discrimination on those who identify as lesbian, gay, or bisexual."
http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/sexual-orientation.aspx

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~

It is a very simple matter of human rights just the same as allowing women clergy (for which bible verses were ignored) and the elimination of racism and slavery (which the Old and New Testaments both condone and for which bible verses were ignored).  Only Christians make the matter complex by their addiction to bible verses.


Same-sex marriage has been legal in the Netherlands since 1 April 2001.

On July 20, 2005, Canada legalized same-sex marriage nationwide with the enactment of the Civil Marriage Act which provided a gender-neutral marriage definition.

Same-sex marriage in Spain has been legal since July 3, 2005.

Since 2001, ten countries have begun allowing same-sex couples to marry nationwide: Argentina, Belgium, Canada, Iceland, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, South Africa, and Sweden. Same-sex marriages are also performed and recognized in Mexico City and parts of the United States. Some jurisdictions that do not perform same-sex marriages recognize same-sex marriages performed elsewhere: Israel, the Caribbean countries of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, parts of the United States, and all states of Mexico.
Nor is it a MINORITY that wants same sex marriage.  It is Christian homophobes who are the minority.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A Galaxy research poll released today, ahead of a rally against same-sex marriage in Canberra convened by religious groups including the Australian Christian Lobby, found that 53% of Australians who identify as Christians support same-sex marriage, while 41% oppose. 67% of non-Christians support it.

http://www.australianmarriageequality.com/wp/2011/08/16/poll-finds-a-majority-of-australian-christians-support-same-sex-marriage/
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Who are the main group of people opposing homosexual marriage? Christians. Christians also opposed the abolition of slavery, equal rights for coloured people and the ordination of women clergy - and used bible verses fo their opposition. Christians have a history of denying people their basic human rights.

Thursday

HYPNOTISM USED IN CHURCH SERVICES

From "The Hypnotic World of Paul Kenna" (Faber & Faber; London: 1993) *[...] my additional comments.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The key to identifying trance states is in the fixation of attention, either internally or externally. p. 13

Here are some of the most popular misconceptions ... 'Hypnosis is in some way anti-Christian or the work of the devil.' -According to the New Catholic Encyclopedia, the Catholic church (the largest Christian organisation in the world) feels that "Hypnotism is licit if used for licit purposes.' pp 22-23

Visually I make my first inductions rapid, asking subjects to fall ... backwards (see photograph) *[Looks like "being slain in the spirit"] p.75

An altered state can be induced through the repetition of a word - a popular practice in many of the eastern religions *[and charismatic / pentecostal churches] The word for this is mantra, meaning 'thought' in Sanskrit. The repetition can be of any sound, movement or picture. When something is done or said for the first time it, the conscious mind processes and reality-tests it, but if it is repeated the reality-testing become unnecessary and the stimulus moves out of your conscious awareness and is monitored by the unconscious. ... After initial repetition the mantra is monitored by, and implanted into, the unconscious through the bombardment of repetition. Remember the golden rule, 'You always get more out what you focus on.' That focus can be conscious or unconscious. So by continually focusing upon the mantra you get whatever the mantra means to you. p. 131

Another very hypnotic experience is going to church. There is the cross to fixate upon, and then the repetition of prayers and closing your eyes *[and singing Jesus Jingles over and over again ... and repetitive praise slogans like "Praise the Lord! Glory to God! Bless the Lord! Amen! Jesus, Jesus, Jesus!"], and in some cases the personal magnetism of the priest or vicar can carry you away. Many of the American TV evangelists are really effective hypnotists. Listen to the content of what they are saying. 'Close your eyes and let the Lord come into your life' is very similar in structure as my telling hypnotic subjects on the stage to close their eyes and let relaxation come into their bodies. pp 204-205

... today's spiritual groups and cults. During a meditation session *[aka church service], which is a consciousness-altering process, a cult member may receive suggestions that mold him or her to the cult's doctrine. Disruption of eating and sleeping patterns, restricted contact with the outside world, repetition, forced attention and hyperventilation are disorientation tactics which alter awareness and reduce a person's critical faculties. Then irrational beliefs can be implanted, such as 'The outside world is the area of falsehoods' or, 'The cult is made of chosen people who have to save the world.' many of today's cults practise mind control in a social context. Individuals are immersed in a social environment where they must let go of their old identity and assume the new one of the group. The process can take place within a few hours and then a few days later will be established. The fundamental essence of mind control is to encourage dependence, conformity and devotion and discourage individuality and personal freedom *[IOW what church is all about] p.209

Monday

Finding Missing Children the Christian Way


As I write, police are looking for the body of Daniel Morcombe, a 13-year-old Australian boy who was the victim of a presumed abduction from the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, on 7 December 2003.

Why has no-one thought of the Christian method of finding missing children?

Millions of Christians world-wide claim to have a "personal relationship" with Jesus and speak with him daily. If that is true why can't they ask Jesus where the missing children are?  "Jesus loves the little children, all the children of the world ... all are precious in his sight"  Jesus should be eager to tell Christians where the missing children are.

Or are all current Christians not true Christians because Jesus refuses to speak to them on this matter?

Or maybe the relationship they have with Jesus isn't all that personal after all.

Saturday

God has a wonderful plan for your life ...

Think about it.

No, REALLY think about it.

CHURCH ATTENDANCE IN AUSTRALIA

See http://wiggidygirl.blogspo​t.com/2010/08/religious-st​atistics.html

"No religion” (which includes atheists, agnostics, humanists and secularists) in 2006 are 127.5% of 2001 numbers. And Christianity in 2006 is 99.4% of 2001 numbers. ... Overall, non-religious affiliation as a percentage of total population has increased by 3.19% Overall, religious affiliation as a percentage of total population has fallen by 4.61%"

Of the roughly 64% identifying as Christian in 2006, the largest proportions were either Roman Catholic (25.8%) or Anglican (18.7%), with the third largest group being the 5.7% affiliated with the Uniting Church in Australia. Baptists account for 2.5% of the total Christian population. The National Church Life Survey found about 8.8% of the Australian population attended a church in one of the covered denominations in a given week in 2001. That means that 91.2% of the population didn't attend church. I'm looking forward to the new survey September - November 2011. I predict that numbers will have again fallen.

Monday

Jesus and the Easter Bunny







The Holy Gospel of the Easter Rabbit
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tyLQIKl97Es
Jeshua Cottontail - Proof that the Easter Bunny lives. All you have to do is believe ... just like you do with Jesus.

It is utterly appropriate to link the current existence of Jesus and the Easter Bunny together. Both are related to ideas about resurrection. Some humans think that both exist and are alive now.  One could make the argument that the Easter Bunny (just like Jesus) is an historical subject, and indirectly through the rabbit spirit a post-bunny subject that can be accessed through mystical experience, chocolate eggs, and particularly through face to face meeting that is supported by love. This can be verified and falsified in exactly the same way as Jesus - subjective arguments with unprovable premises.

Observational evidence is indispensable for knowledge of an observable historic Jesus of Nazareth (not your invisible mythical Christ of faith). If, as Christians claim, Jesus is alive, where is he so we can observe him? Or is the historic Jesus is not alive like other humans? Or can't the historic Jesus currently be observed as he has magically turned into the mythical Christ of faith? How did he do that miracle? Theological pixie dust! Done through special pleading for Jesus - "He's there but he's hiding!" Special pleading is a form of spurious argumentation introducing favorable details and / or excluding unfavorable details by alleging a need to apply additional considerations without proper criticism of these considerations themselves. It cites something as an exemption to a generally accepted rule, principle, etc. without justifying the exemption. It is a double standard often used by Christians in relation to Jesus.  Jesus is special.  However, the Easter Bunny may also be special.

Science is the very best method we have for understanding observable items. The human Jesus of Nazareh (not the mythical invisible Christ of faith) was an observable item in first century Palestine. Therefore science is the very best method we have for understanding the human Jesus of Nazareth.


Unfortunatley Jesus was never observed by a scientist with current knowledge at that time.  All that we have now to look at the historic Jesus is history which uses a narrative to examine and analyse the sequence of events and to investigate objectively the patterns of cause and effect that determine events dealing with Jesus.

We have no primary evidence for Jesus nor eyewitness accounts only dubious third hand testimony or worse contained in the gospels. (Paul never met the historic Jesus.). So Christian objective claims about Jesus being God and being alive now must be treated as merely subjective opinion on the same level as children's belief in the Easter Bunny.

The invisible mythical Christ of faith is supposedly what Jesus turned into through magic pixie dust that cannot be verified or falsified. We have no scientific or historical evidence to support that Jesus is indeed now the invisible Christ of faith. All we have is the subject opinion found through theology and based upon dubious bible verses.

How then can Chrisians continue in the hypocrisy of preaching this subjective opinion as objective fact in creeds, dogmas, sermons, evangelisation, etc?

Sunday

God's Footprint

In Christianity God is viewed as an existent being. God has to be that way for Christians if Jesus is God. If we "live and move and have our being" in God then the universe is God's footprint as we have our existence in the universe. We can empirically study that footprint. The footprint doesn't lead to a personal Jesus. It leads to impersonal space / time matter and energy. It is not science that is wrong, it is our notion of God. Theology does not inform science but science should inform theology.

When theology informed science the the sun supposedly rotated around the Earth. We now know that to be incorrect. We now know that there is no being out there in the universe who is God - including Jesus. If god Jesus literally ascended from a mountain top then even travelling at the speed of light he is still within the Milky Way. If he has already gone to "heaven" and is seated next to an existing God who is a being on a real throne then logically "heaven" is in the Milky Way. Where? Now if you think all that is nonsense as we are talking about an "spiritual" realm then HOW does one prove that spiritual realm exists? Is it on the same level as the mythical Narnia or Atlantis? Both have books and oral traditions that say they are real. C S Lewis' "The Chronicles of Narnia" states that Narnia is real. Plato stated in "Timaeus and Critias" that Atlantis was real. Is something real just because it is handed down by oral tradtion or quoted in a book? If not, then how is the Christian oral tradition and bible book any different? One can never prove a negative so one can't really prove that there is no Narnia or Atlantis. Should we then believe in both? Why or why not?

All items to believed by faith alone are on extremely shakey ground

Saturday

Why don't I allow comments on this blog?

Why don't I allow comments on this blog?

Easy. The reason is the hate-filled bile one has to put up with from rabid Christians who think that you cannot express any opinion different to theirs.  They want to have all opposing opinions banned or censored.  I'm not willing to play their silly games.

####################################################################
from James Barr "Fundamentalism" (SCM Press:1977)

The real and fatal cost of fundamentalist doctrine and ideology, as a system of life, is not its inner logical inconsistency, but rather its personal cost: it can be sustained as a viable way of life only at the cost of unchurching and rejecting, as persons, a thinkers or scholars, as Christians, all those who question the validity of the conservative option. The presence of the questioner breaks down the unnatural symbiosis of conflicting elements which makes up the total ideology of fundamentalists. We can thus understand why 'liberals' and other non-conservative persons have not only to be disbelieved, discredited and overcome in argument; they have, still more, to be eliminated from the scene altogether. The fundamentalist policy is to not listen to the non-conservative arguments and then reject them: it is that the non-conservative argument should not be heard at all. Fundamentalism as an ideological option is profoundly threatened by the presence of people who do not believe in it, who do not share it, who question it. pp. 314-315

Accordingly, where it comes about that fundamentalists have the power, it must be expected that they will use that power to silence those of contrary opinion.  They will seek to eliminate from structures of church and education persons who are not sufficiently conservative.  The history of fundamentalism shows this clearly. Like other conservative movements, it has sought not merely the means to witness, to state its own position, but control, the power to silence or to remove from positions of responsibility any persons who did not conform. p. 316

Friday

Jean-Paul Sartre & God

Quoting from Sartre in Simone de Beauvoir's 'Adieux: A Farewell to Sartre' (Translated by Patrick O'Brian; Penguin; London:1984) p 436 - 443 ... interviews with Sartre just before his death

[DB = De Beauvoir S = Sartre]

**************************
DB: Among these friends were there any who tried to persuade you - I don't say convert you - but to persuade you of God's existence?

S: No, never. .....

DB: There was a time when you knew some Christians very intimately, and that was in then prison camp. Indeed your best friend was a priest.

S: Yes, most of the people I mixed with there were priests. But at that time, in the prison camp, they represented the only intellectuals I knew. ....They were intellectuals, people who thought about the same things as I did. Not always as I thought, but even so reflecting upon the same things was a bond. ... The Abbe Leroy told me quite spontaneously that he would not accept a place in Heaven if I were turned away. ...

DB: And when you wrote Being and Nothingness did you vindicate or try to vindicate your disbelief in God philosophically?

S: Yes, of course, it had to be vindicated. I tried to show that God would have to be the "in-itself for itself," that is, an infinite in-itself inhabited by an infinite for-itself, and that this notion of "in-itself for-itself" was it self contradictory and could not constitute a proof of God's existence. ... In Being and Nothingness I set out reasons for my denial of God's existence that were not actually the real reasons. The real reasons were much more direct and childish - since I was only twelve - than theses on the impossibility of this reason or that for God's existence. ... Even if one does not believe in God, there are elements of the idea of God that remain in us and that cause us to see the world with some divine aspects. ... I don't see myself as so much dust that has appeared in the world, but as being that was expected, prefigured, called forth. in short, as a being that could, it seems, come only from a creator; and this idea of a creating hand that created me refers me back to God. ...

DB: Apart from the feeling of not being here by chance, are here other fields in which there are traces of God? In the moral field, for example?

S: Yes. In the moral field I've retained one single thing to do with the existence of God, and this is Good and Evil as absolutes. ...

DB: Or as Dostoievsky says, "If God does not exist, everything is allowed." You don't think that, do you?

S: In one way I clearly see what he means, and abstractly it's true; but in another I clearly see that killing a man is wrong. .... I look upon the absolute as a product of the relative, then opposite of then usual view. ... it is certain that the notions of absolute Good and Evil arose from the catechism I was taught. ... That's what I mean. I think the objects I see here do indeed exist apart from me. It's not my consciousness that makes them exist. They don't exist for the sake of my consciousness and merely for that; they don't exist for the sake of the consciousness of mankind and merely for that. They exist without consciousness in the first place. ....

DB: When a man like Merleau-Ponty ... said he believed in God, or when your friends the priests, the Jesuits, said that they believed in God? On the whole what do you think the fact of stating that he believes in God represents the way a man leads his life?

S: ... At present .. there is no intuition of the divine. I think that nowadays the notion of God is already dated. .... They have a vision of the world that belongs to a past age. ...

***************

Sartre's above proof of God's non-existence also requires a thorough knowledge of philosophical terms that most Christians have no idea about. Sartre wrote in French and so as English speakers and reader we only have a very poor translation to work with. Namely:

"Being is. Being is in-itself. Being is what is is." Being includes both Being-in-itself and Being-for-itself, but the latter is a nihilation of the former. As contrasted with Existence, Being is all-embracing and objective rather than individual and subjective.

"Being-for-itself" is the nihilation of Being-in-itself; consciousness conceived as a lack of Being, a desire for Being, a relation to Being. By bringing Nothingness into the world the For-itself can stand out from Being and judge other beings by knowing what it is not. Each For-itself is the nihilation of a particular being. It is the human way of Being which is fluid and open to possibilities and imagination.

"Being-in-itself" is non-conscious Being. It is the Being of the phenomenon and overflows the knowledge which we have of it. It is a plenitude, a fixed and complete being, and strictly speaking we can say of it only that it is. It has no relation to itself or to anything else.