Talk:Atheistic evangelism

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This article claims Huxley as the first atheistic evangelist, then goes on to say Huxley coined the term and identified himself as, agnostic. What is the source then, of saying Huxley was the first AE? -killing sparrows 05:37, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Contents 1 This Article Needs a LOT of work, if it is even worthy of staying. 2 Comments from the originator of the article 3 Better with "militant atheism" 4 Removal of "Atheangelism"

[edit] This Article Needs a LOT of work, if it is even worthy of staying.

"Atheists claim that Christian apologists unfairly portray their zeal for intellectual integrity as ridicule." --This claim is just wrong. I'm an atheist and do not make that claim. Also the Dan Barker quote referencing ridicule seems like a quote mine: he continues the article saying that using ridicule is not a good approach. The term "atheangelism" turns up only 1 google hit, and that is someone's blog. I will try to address more this weekend.Archer3 16:26, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I have my doubts about 'atheangelism' as well. However "Atheistic evangelism" and

"evangelical atheism" give about 700 hits each. Some other combinations of the term drive the hit count further up. How about changing the name of the article to "Atheistic Evangelism"? Sander123 16:39, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Agree that this needs a lot of work. In any case, Urban Dictionary had a funny entry, especially: The Evangelical atheist usually seeks to "convert" borderline theists, often by engaging in debate with fundamentalists. --Merzul 20:38, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Comments from the originator of the article

All three of you raise very good points.

I would ask killing sparrows to review the additional comments made on why Huxley is considered the father of "atheangelism" or "atheistic evangelism" despite the fact that he called himself an agnostic. The key difference here is that Huxley aggressively used Darwinism at every opportunity to tear down the Anglican Church hierarchy as well as Christian faith. As with anything, if you don't agree with the way the article is written, please make a change or edit. The idea here is to truly capture both the Christian apologist and atheist view on the matter.

Contrast Darwin's agnosticism to Huxley's. You must acknowledge a significant difference in their approach. Darwin's agnosticism was private. Huxley's was public, blasted over two continents, using the mallet of Darwinism to make the concept of God -- and religion -- unnecessary.

Christian apologists compare the world of 1850 -- where Science and Faith appeared to be in harmony -- to the world of 1900, where many considered them in conflict, and only 40% of all scientists believed in God, and ask themselves what happened ?

And the answer is simple, I think. Darwin's theory provided men like Huxley and Buchner a very good mechanism to mount a very effective communication campaign in favor of disbelief. If all life sprang from a lone single cell being a billion years ago, and natural selection was the mechanism for creating all the species of life we see, what role is their for God ? And if that lone single cell arose through spontaneous generation, or some kind of abiogenesis from a primeval chemical soup, why was there a need for even a Deist Clockmaker kind of divine being ?

There were no similar surveys done in 1850, but my guess is the number was more like 80%. (Note -- the source for the 40% number is a survey by the psychologist Leuba, done in 1914. I can give exact details on the study if anyone is interested).

As to Archer3, you may well be correct that the statement "Atheists claim that Christian apologists unfairly portray their zeal for intellectual integrity as ridicule." is wrong. What I was trying to do was to give a balanced view -- the atheist response to the Christian apologist view of "atheistic evangelism". I think it would be most helpful if you could craft that view here yourself.

The article does need a lot of work, and probably from the atheist perspective. We are not creating anything original in the article, we are simply trying to articulate and describe a movement, as seen by the two parties most directly affected by it --Christian apologists and atheists.

As to Sander123 and Archer3's comments on the relative rarity of the term "atheangelism" on the internet, you are both correct in that, though it is used in dialogue among Christian apologists.

There are hundreds of google hits, as Sander123 points out, for the term "atheistic evangelism" on the internet, and most of those hits show blogs or articles that discuss the general phenomonon of the active promotion of atheism.

The trouble is these discussions are all over the map, and can refer to anything from just one atheist trying to convert his friends, to Christians bemoaning all sorts of cultural issues (the term secular progressivism comes to mind). Many, but not all of these googled articles do really focus in on "atheistic evangelism" in the way that it is described in this article -- a very powerful, highly communications oriented movement to promote atheism. Both Christian apologists and atheists have a point of view on this movement. Both points of view should be included in this article. If the article to this point fails to accurately portray the atheist view point, please feel free to include it.

The term "atheangelism" has the advantage of clarity in this regard. It focuses exclusively on this movement. Though I acknowledge it is a relatively new term, I think it makes sense to keep it in the article.

The "atheangelism" article is now simply redirected to "atheistic evangelism", which makes sense to me.

Please keep the dialogue going on this. I think we are making great progress. mpleahy 20:45, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Hi mpleahy, I agree with the redirect to this page. My comments re Huxley are not so much a disagreement as a request for a source, otherwise it seems like original research. I have not seen Huxley referred to as such elsewhere. I am going to try some edits of this in the next few days and we can compare notes as this evolves. Part of my interest in this article is that I hear much clamor from the "radio right," Christian and political, about how the secular progressives or atheistic humanists or whoever are actively and aggressively working to bring about the downfall of America, western civ, our youth and frankly I don't see it. Anyway, thanks for your work and input here. -killing sparrows 08:43, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Hi killing sparrows. Your comments on the clamor from the "radio right" and other similar points of view I think re-enforce the need for a clear description of "atheistic evangelism" which accurately reflects the views of both Christian apologists and atheists on the topic.

The general clamor you reference is a set of very broadly based complaints that encompass all sorts of issues -- "secular progressivism",for instance, and probably also "left of center" political philosophies.

Discussions around "atheistic evangelism" should be much more narrowly focused, and really should have nothing to do with political philosophies.

I think Wikipedians from the Christian apologist and atheist point of view can do a great service by accurately describing the existing thoughts of both camps on this topic. Thanks for thinking about this, and wanting to get it right.

With regards to Huxley as the "father" of atheistic evangelism, I do concede that he called himself an agnostic, and that Darwin biographer Janet Browne considered his claim that he was not an atheist to be sincere. Personally, I don't share Professor Browne's opinion. I think Huxley coined the term agnostic to limit the public approbation of his "atheism" or disbelief. I also think that his support of Darwin was much more calculating. He saw Darwinism as the perfect vehicle for the promotion of his "religious" views. Look for instance at how he carefully distanced himself from fully embracing natural selection, which was the core of Darwinism. Why was that, I wonder ? One possible answer is that he needed "science" to be supreme, and that if Darwin was wrong on natural selection, he needed to be able to distance himself.

Look at Asa Gray's comments on "English--materialistic--positivism" for an 1860's version of our current Christian apologist/atheist discussion of the topic.

The key question to answer on the issue of the origin of atheistic evangelism is this -- How did views on God change so rapidly within the scientific community from 1850 to 1900 ? Darwin didn't promote those changed views. Someone did, and Huxley in England and Buchner in Germany were its leading proponents. If anyone has an alternative possibility, please include it in the article.

mpleahy 12:45, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Better with "militant atheism"

I have a problem with this article because of the term "evangelism" which I consider derogatory. I'm fine with the term "militant atheism", which imho should mean the same, i.e. atheists speaking out. But "atheistic evangelism" is derogatory, because it's just a way of saying "you're not any better than us" by using a very loaded word that Atheists object strongly to. Dan Barker is not our pope, so his wording does not constitute general Atheist endorsement of the term.

So, I suggest that the main sentiments of this article be moved to militant atheism or a section of criticism of atheism and this page should refer to either of them.

In addition, the article needs to clarify the specific American situation where Atheists are frowned upon, something which may explain this supposedly unheard of aggression. --Strappado 09:04, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

To my ears militant is the aggressive sounding word, but I'm neutral on the point, a name change is fine with me.

What is more important I guess is what this article is about. I guess there are two subjects running through each other

• This article is an overview of the criticism of Christians on outspoken atheist who try to convert persons to atheism.
• This article is overview of the arguments some atheist use to convert persons to atheism.

If the topic is the former, and Atheistic evangelism is the way these atheist are referred to then I'd say leave the title as it is. Sander123 10:30, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Removal of "Atheangelism"

I have removed this word. I believe it was made up for this article. Google only returned 1 hit for the word, and it was in a blog. "OneLook" dictionary web search returned zero hits. Wikipedia is not for "original material."