> I have come across tolerant and intolerant Christians, and tolerant and
> intolerant atheists. Not that I think tolerance arises from a wishy-washy
> "it doesn't matter what you believe" kind of thing. But as a Christian
KS>
KS> I would otherwise agree with the statements. Unfortunately
KS> Christianity has had its dark ages when the evangelism effort of the
KS> good message had produced very aggressive and cruel actions. In other
KS> words Christianity as any other mass movement systems relies on the
KS> internal inertia, and sometimes this social force could mutate into
KS> something that the original idea opposed.
True indeed. But atheism has also had its dark ages. Just consider the last 70 years or so in the USSR, where some 20 million people perished because they failed to understand the only way to universal happiness.
Of course you could say that that wasn't your brand of atheism, but I could equally well say that the other wasn't my brand of Christianity.
The most we can say is that some people feel that it is necessary to hate, and whether they are Christians or atheists seems to make very little difference.
Well, not quite. I don't think there's much difference in the quality of the hate or its effects, but it does make the Christians more hypocritical, because what they believe should make them see hate as wrong, whereas there is no _necessary_ connection between atheism and thinking that hatred is a good or a bad thing.
... Steve Hayes, Editorial Dept, University of South Africa, Pretoria
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