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Welcome on this site for those who dare to think for themselves, not hampered by prejudice, religion and dogma. However, this site is not intended just for them. For especially those who want to free themselves from these hindrances on the forming of their own critical opinion may derive a better insight into the true meaning of religion on these pages, may understand
how it was man-made and maintained with the primary object to subject others, and to see the damage 'belief' has to inflict on rational thought in order to gain credibility.
For although the believer is free to believe whatever he or she was imbued with in impressionable childhood, the unbeliever prefers to think independently. He or she wants to know instead of just believing what others are saying, wants to inquire, wants to be convinced by rational arguments. Applying pure logic, the unbeliever compares biblical mythology with the explanations science has given us about this wondrous world we live in. The unbeliever also compares the ethics of a desert god as represented in the Bible, with present-day morals and is thankful to be living in a time and a civilization in which the divine rule 'a life for a life, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth' is no longer considered morally acceptable. The unbeliever objects to that cynical corruption of reason that religion requires to survive, thereby keeping a delusion alive that was left over from the infancy of mankind, in order to render power over gullible fellow humans. The unbeliever wants to defend everyone’s right on free thought. Of course this also means that the unbeliever does not scorn those who have fallen prey to this ideology, purely by the accident of have been born of 'believing' parents. After all, they and those parents were indoctrinated daily with the lie that one must "believe" in order to be a decent human being, and who wouldn't want to be that? Moreover, to help them believe in this delusion, the cruel threat of eternal hellfire was employed as an incentive to their gullible minds. We must try to help these subjected fellow humans to free themselves by rational thought from the mental burden of this deception. But It is precisely against those who for their own benefit still exploit this delusion from barbaric times, thus promoting discord and seriously undermining human well-being and happiness, that the atheist speaks out.
Independent thinkers may also be interested in the ideas of other thinkers with the same ideals, individuals whose view on the world has not been clouded over by religion either. On this site they will find a number of articles of great thinkers who were or are not satisfied with these fearful illusions from prehistoric times either. In a modest way, this site wants to offer a meeting place for such like-minded people. Our guest book, in which visitors to this site can vent their thoughts
or offer substantive criticisms
and discuss these with others, offers that opportunity.
Why does this site bear the title "Positive Atheism?" We all know the definition for "soft" atheism: not believing in the existence of gods; or that for "hard" atheism: believing that gods do not exist. However, what is meant by "positive" in this connection?
Well, nothing new really. With that term we only emphasize that atheism, exactly by its denial of the existence of gods, by definition implies a positive attitude toward life. In fact, atheists accept reality, instead of blindly believing in religious myth. This means facing up to one’s own responsibility, instead of being resigned to a destination destined by a phantom. Positive thinking atheists do not lead docile lives waiting for whatever ultimate designs an imaginary god has for this "burdened by original sin" planet. We accept the fact that our planet Earth is nothing more than a tiny spot within an immeasurable universe with billions and billions of stars and their planets, and that man is no more than the highest developed animal among the millions of other animals crawling upon it. We know full well that we thank this exalted status not to the fact that we were on a Friday afternoon knocked together by any old god primitive wanderers in the desert could come up with thousands of years ago, but to a trial-and-error process of evolution that has been going on for billions of years. We accept that man alone is responsible for the way he treats his fellow beings and that only his fellow beings are capable of judging his behaviour, and only in the here and now, because this is the only life nature bestows on us. Unbelievers are aware that if they choose to do good, they do so purely for the benefit of their fellow beings, not in the expectancy of the reward of eternal bliss in a falsely promised hereafter.
Moreover, they are fully conscious of the fact that we all —collectively, but completely independent otherwise — must work on the future of this world. Not with “gods help”, but completely by ourselves as responsible people, by fighting hunger, poverty, discrimination, repression and wars. With concern for the environment, so that even after our demise this world will remain inhabitable. In a word, concerned with everything on which man can exert influence, and where he or she is not subject to whims of nature. Atheists accept their own responsibility within the limitation of their possibilities. However, we do not claim that only atheists display such positive attitude. Many other unbelievers, who need not necessarily have to be atheists — because in childhood they were not subjected to indoctrination, and cannot therefore imagine its evil consequences — and even right-minded liberal believers can show a less fatalistic attitude towards life.
Christians have always been made to believe that to be a good person, one must have faith in a god. Not faith just in any old god, but only faith in the god of their clergy's choice. Because of this, they can hardly imagine that atheists can also lead good lives, since they deny the existence of all gods. Even so, just like we take care to reassure our children that ghosts do not exist, we want to reassure god-fearing Christians that gods do not exist, not even their god. Thank goodness! Just imagine that some being in antiquity which — as its creators attributed to it — would have destroyed the entire world population except for one incestuous family, by slowly drowning everyone over a period of forty days, that such a genocidal brute could have any influence on your life. What an ever-present threat that would be to live under, what a depressing influence that would have on your mind! What a heavy mental burden this must be to carry about for the rest of your life. What an immense inner conflict it must cause for any decent-minded person to have to worship such a megalomaniac mass murderer, only begotten in the imagination of barbaric minds, and to top it all, at the same time degrading oneself even further into a "miserable sinner".
Unfortunately, many Christians have been so conditioned by upbringing and clergy that they will still associate the denial of God’s existence with negative concepts such as, for instance, an immoral life or an anti-social attitude. That is why they are all too easily inclined to emphasize just the denial of the impossible and overlook the positive, and in their arrogance insist that atheism must also mean the denial of ethics. If that really were the case, atheism would be amoral indeed. Gullible as Christians have to be by definition (otherwise, how can one believe in a speaking serpent, or in the virgin birth of a man who walks on water, and who two thousand years before one was born already atoned for the "sins" one still has to commit?), these Christians still identify ethics with obedience to the commandments of a fictitious god whom they literally fear. Given what they believe, that this god and 'loving father' had his own son cruelly tortured to death, that fear is of course not completely unfounded. Christians are not totally stupid. In their Bible, they find many obscene threats and commandments, with the threat of atrocious executions like those that are still committed today by that second largest monotheism, and on the same grounds:
"If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying, let us go and serve other gods, which thou hast not known, thou, nor thy fathers; (namely), of the gods of the people which are round about you, nigh unto thee, or far off from thee, from the one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth; thou shalt not consent to him, nor hearken unto him; neither shall thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal him: but thou shalt surely kill him; thine hand shall be the first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. And thou shalt stone him with stones, that he die; because he hath sought to thrust thee away from the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage." (Deut. 13:6-10)
Those well-versed in the Bible moralists unfortunately do not realize that creating gods has always been a human effort with all its limitations. In the case of the Judeo-Christian god, we must constantly bear in mind the intellectual limitations of nomads roaming the deserts of the Near East more than four thousand years ago, when they created this particular god. These were people with no education, oblivious of the barbarity of the ethics of their time. They have left us no real literature, no great poems, no magnificent buildings, no sculptures, no art. To them, it was only imperative that their god had to be more cruel, more bloodthirsty, and mightier than all the gods of the surrounding tribes put together. For how else could their god protect them against the gods of these hostile tribes? In those days, the most powerful prevailed and in that region that principle still holds. Just consider the way 'Gods chosen people' treat the original population of the country they now occupy.
Living in a twenty-first century civilized society, it is obvious how far ethics have evolved since then, to introduce another word displeasing to god. Thanks to it, laws such as the stoning of a "rebellious" son (Deuteronomy 21:18-21) or of a raped girl (Deuteronomy 22:21) are viewed in the light of today’s ethics. And fortunately, to protect us from divine wrath inflicted by religious zealots, that current insight is also laid down in our secular legislation. And another thing, wishing terrible illnesses and other calamities upon people who disagree with you (Leviticus 26:16), is now frowned upon as being 'not done'.
However, the self-serving clergy kept preaching that this fear for the god of the Bible is a virtue, and that only because of it one can be a good human. And from the observation that the "Almighty God" himself obviously never mastered speaking or writing during all the centuries of his "existence," whereas our children only need a couple of years to learn those skills, Christians still shrink back from drawing the obvious conclusion, if they were for a moment to think for themselves. Their world view would shatter. That’s how fatal the consequences are of the teachings with which they were indoctrinated in childhood.
How on earth could this delusion, the existence of gods, ever come into being? In order to understand this widespread superstition, we must delve into history. We can well imagine that primitive man found himself placed in a world full of natural phenomena that were inexplicable to him. Learning from experience he realized, that some of those phenomena were favorable to him, such as the light and beneficent warmth of the sun that made the grain grow, the water that quenched his thirst, and the shade provided by foliage. However, then there were other phenomena in nature, such as thunderstorms and hurricanes that seemed to turn against him. Early thinkers among them must have searched for an explanation of those inexplicable phenomena. For if one could only discover the driving force behind all these phenomena, one might just be able to influence these to one’s own benefit. The knowledge we have today was still unknown to them then. Therefore, it was not illogical, that those early thinkers suspected the existence of good and evil spirits, invisible to the human eye. At that time, the conclusion was obvious. Those spirits would be held responsible for all natural phenomena. A next and really ingenious subsequent step was to claim that one enjoyed the exclusive privilege to communicate with those invisible spirits. This privilege placed those concerned in a superior — and almost inviolable — position in his community. Hey, presto, the clergy was born! Obviously another ancient profession, even older yet than the one today often referred to as the 'oldest profession in the world'. And it is also one with a morality which certainly is no better!
In the centuries that followed, priests perfected this luminous idea, which had proven so profitable to them. They elaborated on it, embellished it and adapted it to the prevailing culture of the local community. They invented suitable rituals that were supposed to please those spirits, and would promote the solidarity of the believers (read: augment the power of the priesthood) and emphasize their submissiveness. They gave names to those spirits and assigned tasks to them. They began calling them gods and worship them with these new rituals. Priests created gods for love, gods for commerce, gods for the harvest, and especially and not-to-be-forgotten, gods for warfare. All this of course, still under the direction of the same privileged class that invented the idea, for they persisted in their claim that only they could explain the invisibility and apparent whims of those gods.
Based on this ingenious idea a complete pseudoscience, the theology, was developed over time. It is a "science" not based on intelligent reasoning whereby a neutral hypothesis is followed by conscientious research leading to certain conclusions, but depending exclusively on the "divine inspiration" that the non-existent should exist. The mumbo-jumbo of the medicine men of antiquity degenerated into the profound gibberish of modern theologians, neither of which was and is intended to make sense, but rather to impress the gullible. Can you imagine scientific research into the usefulness, necessity and effects of a phenomenon ‘x’, before ‘x’ has been shown to exist?
The University of Staphorst could perhaps do research into the burning question, "Was God a good Christian?" However, real scientists—and not just they—rather devote their time to reality, which is already miraculous and awe-inspiring enough without inventing fairytales around it. (Staphorst is a village in the Netherlands known for its super orthodox Calvinism, and has of course and therefore, no university.)
Based on that rigid prejudice of the clergy, and after tiresome intellectual drudgery, all those contradictory absurdities in "God’s Word" are then explained by it. (And when this proved utterly impossible, there was always the possibility of 'improving' on the translations on which the Bible was founded.) Explanations are presented that are so insanely formulated that they fail to convince anyone, except those who are already believers anyhow. As said, these explanations are not based on logical conclusions derived from empirical evidence, but rely exclusively on the "authority" of that same pseudoscience.
That is not easy. Just try to explain to a grieving mourner why that "merciful" god in his "infinite wisdom" found it necessary to cause a loved one to die prematurely. Or to explain, on a larger scale, why in Africa thousands die daily through starvation. Or why a tsunami can make hundreds of thousands of innocent victims within moments. Or why so many terrible illnesses exist. Or explain why a good god can cause so many victims with his earthquakes. That requires many years of study. Over the centuries, much circular reasoning, many fallacies and other false arguments have been put forth. The medicine men of yore are the present-day professors of theology; the violent fantasies of primitive barbarians are now consecrated as divine revelation, believing in the unbelievable became the paramount virtue. Critical thinking was discouraged and reason scornfully replaced by religious superstition.
With the gradual decline of many ancient civilizations and cultures, many gods who were born in it, died a quiet death. Unfortunately, this was not the case with the god of the Hebrews. Belief in this god was strongly promoted when emperor Constantine issued, in the year 313, the so-called Edict of Milan in order to avert the unrest in his empire. This unrest had come about because various Jesus cults came into conflict with the religion of the Hebrews, who had also been incorporated in the Roman Empire. In this Edict of Milan Christianity was proclaimed to be accepted as one of the official religions of the Roman Empire. And since known instances from that era show that signs of disagreement with the emperor could seriously impair one’s health, the idea was generally accepted. This was an important contributing factor to the later growth of this religion into the largest of the world.
And its power grew supreme; an unfortunate era of stagnation — and decline — in the development of the western world ensued, a period we now call the Dark Ages. The church wielded great political power, suppressed science and used strong arguments, enforced by that infamous crime syndicate called the Roman-Catholic Inquisition, with its torture and burnings at the stake, to help convince the masses. Unfortunately, that power was to last for hundreds of years. Nowadays, in a more enlightened society, the church reluctantly has to make do with 'just' the indoctrination of innocent children, no matter how immoral this practice is, but that limitation first had to be forced upon the church by an enlightened society. Theism was still the norm then, atheism the exception. Confessing to atheism meant putting one’s life at risk. Not until the Enlightenment the idea of man born in freedom was spread widely. Only then people of conscience dared to deny the existence of gods, and exposed the malicious deceit by the clergy, and only then man dared to live according to his own moral standards, aimed at human happiness in a harmonious society. And to this day, we all benefit from the resulting progress of science and culture, even the believers.
The fact that atheism is still seen as a negative attitude is also caused by a misplaced sense of superiority. Unfortunately, Christianity has long been embedded in our western civilization, and many expressions in daily use of our language still show how this delusion became commonplace in our society. Expressions such as "god-willing," or "if God had meant it to fly, he would have given it wings" still show Christianity’s conceit in this respect. Nevertheless, in reality, the only difference between atheists and Christians lies in the fact that atheists only believe in one god less than they do. For out of all the numerous gods man has imagined during his long development, worldwide and in various cultures, the monotheistic believer acknowledges only one, to the exclusion of all others. Why Christians had to choose the god of the Hebrews, shall forever remain a mystery. For it is, and shall be until this figure of the imagination is also obliterated from the minds of the gullible, a curious choice. Anyone who has learned to read, can check the correctness of the following observation by just reading the Bible:
"The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynist, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.Those of us schooled from infancy in his ways can become desensitized to their horror. A naïf blessed with the perspective of innocence has a clearer perception." Richard Dawkins in The God Delusion, chapter 2.
Why does this admiration for a literary monstrosity still persists? Could we possibly recognize anything of this monster in the character or behavior of his followers? No, no, thank goodness, not any more, anyway. It would no longer be a privilege to live in the here and now. Just remember what Nietzsche wrote more than a hundred years ago:
"The Christan church left nothing untainted with its degenerating effect. All that had value it turned into worthlessness; every truth it turned into a lie; every form of integrity it turned into something obnoxious. It lives by the grace of misery. It creates misery in order to survive. For instance, sin was invented by the church and improved upon: This equality of every soul before god is the biggest lie of all times and is the worst thing that ever came upon humanity." Frederick Nietzsche (1844-1900)
Is that worship only lingering on out of fear for eternal torture in an imaginary hereafter, as the Jesus-figure so lovingly promised? Could it be a clinging to a fictitious mighty patron by people in dire need, or with little self-esteem? Is it perhaps because people want someone to whom they can entrust all their petty worries and desires, someone who never objects or interrupts, and never seems to tire of their complaints? Someone who never breaks off a conversation because something is boiling over or there’s someone at the door? For they realize full well that there are thousands of dead Christians daily knocking at the heaven's door.
Alternatively, does that attitude perhaps also touch on the so-called "Stockholm Syndrome" (a psychological response sometimes seen in abducted hostages, in which the hostage shows signs of loyalty to the hostage-taker). A distinct parallel comes into view, if we were to accept what the clergy propagates. For if all were true, the believer would be totally dependent on that imaginary god for all necessities of life, necessities which this god would grant indeed. Nevertheless, also according to "His Word", that god would be mercilessly cruel in case of apostasy. Do you see how cleverly all this is thought out? If one believes in that myth, one becomes thankful for everything "God bestows". Yet, it still remains a riddle how even intelligent people can keep cherishing that fear of God. It is food for thought for psychologists perhaps. To me, it is just further evidence in support of my thesis: "Religion corrupts common sense."
Whatever the reasons may be for this superstition, the atheist denies the existence of even this last "surviving" god, and does so for sound reasons:
"Religion supports nobody. It has to be supported. It produces no wheat, no corn; it ploughs no land; it fells no forests. It is a perpetual mendicant. It lives on the labor of others, and then has the arrogance to pretend that it supports the giver." Robert G. Ingersoll in "A Christmas Sermon" in de Evening Telegraph of 19 december, 1891
What is the purpose of this site?
Nowadays, more than two-thirds of Dutch people don’t go to church any more. This proportion has grown spectacularly over the past decades, from 16% in 1958 to 66% in 2006, and the number of nonbelievers is still growing. The rest of the population is divided (literally!) into various denominations, the most important of which are, in order of size, Roman Catholic, Dutch Reformed, Christian Reformed, Muslim and Hindu. All of these denominations are divided again in an amazing number of sub denominations, all of which disagree with each other, but all claiming to hold the exclusive divine truth.
By way of illustration, the headline of an article about the current proportions in NRC Handelsblad, (one of the most prestigious daily newspapers in the Netherlands) of September 5, 2006 says:
Protestants and Catholics are becoming minorities
'The secularization process in the Netherlands continues, but its speed is decreasing. In 2020, 72% of the population will be non-believers. Among the younger population born after 1975 that figure has already been reached. In 2020, Protestants and Catholics will only be small minorities. Although churchgoing is declining among the Dutch population, religious views do not keep equal pace with it. Between 1991 and 1996 the number of people believing in an afterlife increased from 48% to 53 %. After that the figure decreased somewhat. The percentage of people who believe in miracles rose from 31% in 1991 to 43% in 2004. According to SCP prognosis, the number of Catholics is decreasing from 42% in 1958, 17% in 2004 to 10% in 2020. The number of Dutch Reformed believers reduced from 23% in 1958, to 6% in 2004, and to 2% in 2020. For Christian Reformed believers these figures are respectively, 8% in 1958, 4% in 2004 and 2% in 2020. The SCP expects the number of adherents to the remaining churches to increase to more than 7% in 2020.'
If, within this context, we leave out the religions of immigrants, this shows that only less than one third of the Dutch population is registered as religious. And how reliable are these figures? For how many of them would be registered as such solely because their parents put that label on them at birth, long before they could form an opinion about anything at all?
A typical example of the "universal truth" of Christian faith is the listing of churches of various denominations in the municipal guide of a provincial capital of 90,000 inhabitants, showing a list of thirty (!) different Christian denominations. If, for the sake of convenience, we were to apply the countrywide average — one third — to the population of this town, it turns out that 30,000 people adhere to thirty various denominations. The 'universal truth' does not sound very convincing that way. (For the benefit of the interested reader, these thirty denominations are mentioned by name in the addendum). In one’s own hometown, one may find a similar picture.
And yet, it is remarkable how those Christian minorities continually try to force their opinion upon us, and want to impose their specific values and norms upon nonbelievers. For what does unite them in all their diversity is their typical missionary urge. For instance, a shameful spectacle took place a few years ago when Dutch parliament was democratically debating the introduction of new euthanasia legislation. A group of pupils of a Christian school was sent to Parliament Square by their teachers to protest against a subject about which they could not yet possibly have formed an independent opinion. There is much more; the reader will experience it daily.
In this connection, the fact is also meaningful that in this country a large political party was formed several years ago by a combination of Christian political minorities, which at an opportune moment bargained away their mutually conflicting principles in an effort to regain lost political power. This happened in a country that since the Enlightenment has strived for separation of Church and State! As a result, we are confronted daily by Christian political manifestations in word and writing, in picture and sound, under the arrogant pretense that these values and norms have universal validity for all humanity. On the edge of our new euro coins even now, in the twenty-first century, that naive plea is repeated, "God be with us!" Nearly the same heartfelt cry, but more in accordance with national character formulated as an order, "Gott mit uns, (God with us)" was depicted on the belt buckles of our occupying forces during WW II. This God/Gott must have been really busy indeed, because as we know, he also fought on the allied side.
Even though not all of these Christian utterances are equally objectionable, and since in our democratic system everyone is permitted — within the limits of propriety — to proclaim his own opinion, this not only gives a one-sided and strongly distorted picture of the daily perception of most Dutch people, but also that of most Western Europeans. On the other hand, serious and critical comments by great thinkers and scientists, concerning the origin and consequences of Christianity and its Bible, pointing out the abuses caused by it in our society, are not only rare in our daily literature, but also in Dutch-language publications on the internet. This is possibly a reflection of the unawareness of many nonbelievers, who fail to realize how differences in our society are thus knowingly maintained and even promoted, and the dubious consequences that Christian influence can have on our lives. See, for instance, the discussions concerning the legislation on abortion or euthanasia.
On this site, we endeavor to fill this gap with translations of articles concerning this subject on English-language websites. For English may be the web language "par excellence", and a great deal of what great thinkers have written is published in that language, unfortunately this is not always accessible to everyone. In addition, those rare articles of atheistic thinkers which are published in our country, will find their place right here, wherever possible and applicable. We do hope this site may contribute a little to a deepening of insight!
For whom is this web site intended?
Basically, of course, for everyone who is interested in this subject. Especially, it is intended for those who are wondering how this delusion of a primitive tribe in Oriental antiquity could survive in the western world, even into the twenty-first century. It is the inestimable merit of internet that it allows everyone, including the critical thinker, to publish his or her opinions on it uncensored. Naturally, it remains the responsibility of the reader, and his exclusive privilege, to separate the chaff from the wheat in this virtually unlimited amount of information. This also holds, of course, for the reader of this site. He or she is fully entitled to disagree with the arguments presented here, for we completely lack missionary zeal. We gladly leave that to the believers. They need it to in order to earn their place in heaven.
We have especially in mind those who as innocent children were sent to Christian schools, or were raised in a Christian environment. A "conviction" was forced upon them purely by the blind luck of having been born in a Christian family. Maybe some may have begun — even in childhood — to think critically for themselves, which at least must have caused doubt. Others perhaps came to that later in life, on grounds of reality as they saw it, augmented by pure common sense. The resulting inner conflicts must never be underestimated.
The devastating effect of the conjured up visions of torture in eternal hell fire for apostates, as indoctrinated into the impressionable mind of a child, is enormous. Once conscripted into the realm of fear, one needs great moral strength to liberate oneself from it. This becomes even more difficult if one was always told that reasonable doubt constituted "sinful thought" inspired by the "Devil," which had to be suppressed at all cost.
This site is not meant for convinced Christians
It may be obvious from the above that this site is not intended for Christians, who are convinced of deriving strength from religion for their daily lives, and feel they actually experience that strength. For apart from trusting one’s own intelligence and sense of responsibility, we can offer them no alternative for moral support. This they must find in their own minds and in their community, because there is no mythical heavenly father who looks after them. Besides, we do not intend to undermine their deepest convictions. We are not a missionary society. For them this is the right moment to shrug their shoulders and to continue living in religious bliss.
Addendum
A summary of the above-mentioned Christian denominations in a provincial capital:
1. Evangelical Church - 2. Lutheran Church - 3. Full Gospel Church - 4. Full Evangelical Church Perspective - 5. Free Evangelical Church - 6. Calvinist Reformed Church - 7. Reformed Congregation - 8. Christian Reformed Church - 9. Orthodox Reformed Church - 10. Protestant Congregation - 11. Roman-Catholic Church - 12. Ark of the Covenant Church - 13. Baptist Church - 14. Bethel Pentecostal Church - 15. Mennonite Church - 16. Church of God - 17. Jehova’s Witnesses - 18. Jewish Congregation - 19. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints - 20. Salvation Army - 21. Liberal Jewish Congregation - 22. New Apostolic Church - 23. Ecomenical Basis Church - 24. Orthodox Church of St. Panteleimon - 25. Pentecostal Church - 26. Remonstrant Church - 27. Together Church - 28. Free Catholic Church - 29. Free Baptist Church - 30. Seventh-Day Adventist Church.
Note: The above review is a snapshot made in 2005. More recent research in 2007, brought new churches to the fore, while some others seemed to have disappeared. This may be the result of the fusion under the name PKN ( Protestant Churches in the Netherlands), which after a great deal of internal conflict came into being in 2006.
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More articles available in English:
➤ Albert Einstein - 'Religion and Science'
➤ " " 'Science and Religion'
➤ Ambrose Bierce - 'The Devil's Dictionary'
➤ Annie L. Gaylor - 'Women without Superstition'
➤ Bertrand Russel - 'Is there a God?'
➤ " " 'Why I am not a Christian'
➤ " " 'Has religion made useful contributions to civilization?'
➤ " " 'Am I an Atheist or an Agnostic?'
➤ Chapman Cohen - 'Deity and Design'
➤ " " 'Morality without God'
➤ Clarence Darrow - 'Absurdities of the Bible'
➤ " " 'The Myth of the Soul'
➤ " " 'Why I am an Agnostic'
➤ Frank R. Zindler - 'How do you know God doesn't exist?'
➤ " " '"Creation Science" and the Fact of Evolution'
➤ " " 'Did Jesus Exist?'
➤ " " 'Ethics without Gods'
➤ " " 'Spirit, Soul and Mind'
➤ " " 'Why is Religiosity so Hard to Cure?'
➤ " " 'An Interview'
➤ Jim Walker - 'The Dark Bible"
➤ " " 'Did a historical Jesus exist?'
➤ " " 'Martin Luther's dirty little book'
➤ Jonathan Petropoulos - 'The Vatican Ratline'
➤ Mark Twain - 'Thoughts of God'
➤ Marshall Gauvin - 'Did Jesus Christ Really Live?'
➤ " " 'Is There A real God?'
➤ Max Hastings - 'Save us from politicians with God on their side'
➤ Nicholas Humphrey - 'What shall we tell the children?'
➤ Paula Kirby - 'Fleabites - 1'
➤ " " 'Fleabites - 2'
➤ Peter van Montfoort - 'A Blasphemer's Prayer"
➤ " " 'The negative effect of church on society'
➤ " " 'The glorification of an instrument of torture'
➤ " " 'Thoughts on the creation, development and maintenance of gods'
➤ " " 'Vatican and Dictatorships'
➤ Robert Ingersoll - 'About the Holy Bible'
➤ " " 'The Gods'
➤ " " 'What would you substitute for the Bible as a Moral Guide?'
➤ Raymond D. Bradley - 'A Moral Argument for Atheism'
➤ " " " 'It All Began with Santa'
➤ " " " 'The Meaning of Life'
➤ " " " 'God's Gravediggers: Morality and Science'
➤ Scott Bidstrup - 'Bible and Christianity'
➤ " " 'The Mind Virus'