Fans applaud politician for revealing atheist beliefs
The Associated Press
News Fuze
Article Launched:03/18/2007 01:28:23 PM PDT

SAN LEANDRO, Calif.- A federal politician who publicly acknowledged last week that he doesn't believe in God appears to enjoy healthy support among constituents.
Rep. Pete Stark, a California Democrat representing suburban San Francisco voters since 1973, received cheers and applause Saturday from about 70 people who attended a regularly scheduled town hall meeting.

Stark, 75, said he was shocked by the volume of letters, phone calls and e-mails since March 12, when he acknowledged his "nontheism" in response to an inquiry by the Secular Coalition for America.

Stark calls himself "a Unitarian who does not believe in a supreme being." He was the only member of the 535-person Congress willing to say he or she was an atheist.

The coalition was offering a $1,000 prize to the person who could identify the "highest level atheist, agnostic, humanist or any other kind of nontheist currently holding elected public office in the United States." The group wanted to highlight the difficulty politicians have declaring they don't believe in God, and organizers expected no one from Congress to come forward.

Stark, a senior member of the House Ways and Means Committee, said he's received more than 500 responses since Monday; about 25 were negative. On Tuesday, the American Humanist Association took out an ad in The Washington Post supporting Stark.

Constituent Chuck Cannon of Concord compared Stark to civil rights leader Rosa Parks, praising him for bucking the trend of politicians who emphasize their religious faith and faithfulness.

"Over the last several years, many of us have felt threatened by organized religion's attempt to force a particular view, through legislation, on all of us, which means we lose our family values," Cannon said at San Leandro City Hall. "I just wanted to commend you for your courageous yet commonsense stance that sets you above the religious pandering that goes on in Washington.

Stark brushed off comments about courageousness.

"It's not courageous to make a simple statement about personal beliefs," he said. "What is courageous is to stand up in Congress and say, 'Let's tax the rich and give the money to poor kids.'"

PETE STARK, a California Democrat, appears to be the first congressman in U.S. history to acknowledge that he doesn't believe in God. In a country in which 83% of the population thinks that the Bible is the literal or "inspired" word of the creator of the universe, this took political courage.

Of course, one can imagine that Cicero's handlers in the 1st century BC lost some sleep when he likened the traditional accounts of the Greco-Roman gods to the "dreams of madmen" and to the "insane mythology of Egypt."

Mythology is where all gods go to die, and it seems that Stark has secured a place in American history simply by admitting that a fresh grave should be dug for the God of Abraham — the jealous, genocidal, priggish and self-contradictory tyrant of the Bible and the Koran. Stark is the first of our leaders to display a level of intellectual honesty befitting a consul of ancient Rome. Bravo.

The truth is, there is not a person on Earth who has a good reason to believe that Jesus rose from the dead or that Muhammad spoke to the angel Gabriel in a cave. And yet billions of people claim to be certain about such things. As a result, Iron Age ideas about everything high and low — sex, cosmology, gender equality, immortal souls, the end of the world, the validity of prophecy, etc. — continue to divide our world and subvert our national discourse. Many of these ideas, by their very nature, hobble science, inflame human conflict and squander scarce resources.

Of course, no religion is monolithic. Within every faith one can see people arranged along a spectrum of belief. Picture concentric circles of diminishing reasonableness: At the center, one finds the truest of true believers — the Muslim jihadis, for instance, who not only support suicidal terrorism but who are the first to turn themselves into bombs; or the Dominionist Christians, who openly call for homosexuals and blasphemers to be put to death.

Outside this sphere of maniacs, one finds millions more who share their views but lack their zeal. Beyond them, one encounters pious multitudes who respect the beliefs of their more deranged brethren but who disagree with them on small points of doctrine — of course the world is going to end in glory and Jesus will appear in the sky like a superhero, but we can't be sure it will happen in our lifetime.

Out further still, one meets religious moderates and liberals of diverse hues — people who remain supportive of the basic scheme that has balkanized our world into Christians, Muslims and Jews, but who are less willing to profess certainty about any article of faith. Is Jesus really the son of God? Will we all meet our grannies again in heaven? Moderates and liberals are none too sure.

Those on this spectrum view the people further toward the center as too rigid, dogmatic and hostile to doubt, and they generally view those outside as corrupted by sin, weak-willed or unchurched.

The problem is that wherever one stands on this continuum, one inadvertently shelters those who are more fanatical than oneself from criticism. Ordinary fundamentalist Christians, by maintaining that the Bible is the perfect word of God, inadvertently support the Dominionists — men and women who, by the millions, are quietly working to turn our country into a totalitarian theocracy reminiscent of John Calvin's Geneva. Christian moderates, by their lingering attachment to the unique divinity of Jesus, protect the faith of fundamentalists from public scorn. Christian liberals — who aren't sure what they believe but just love the experience of going to church occasionally — deny the moderates a proper collision with scientific rationality. And in this way centuries have come and gone without an honest word being spoken about God in our society.

People of all faiths — and none — regularly change their lives for the better, for good and bad reasons. And yet such transformations are regularly put forward as evidence in support of a specific religious creed. President Bush has cited his own sobriety as suggestive of the divinity of Jesus. No doubt Christians do get sober from time to time — but Hindus (polytheists) and atheists do as well. How, therefore, can any thinking person imagine that his experience of sobriety lends credence to the idea that a supreme being is watching over our world and that Jesus is his son?

There is no question that many people do good things in the name of their faith — but there are better reasons to help the poor, feed the hungry and defend the weak than the belief that an Imaginary Friend wants you to do it. Compassion is deeper than religion. As is ecstasy. It is time that we acknowledge that human beings can be profoundly ethical — and even spiritual — without pretending to know things they do not know.

Let us hope that Stark's candor inspires others in our government to admit their doubts about God. Indeed, it is time we broke this spell en masse. Every one of the world's "great" religions utterly trivializes the immensity and beauty of the cosmos. Books like the Bible and the Koran get almost every significant fact about us and our world wrong. Every scientific domain — from cosmology to psychology to economics — has superseded and surpassed the wisdom of Scripture.

Everything of value that people get from religion can be had more honestly, without presuming anything on insufficient evidence. The rest is self-deception, set to music.

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Stark is very brave indeed to come out and say he doesn't believe in the mythology. His bravery is just another piece of wood on the pyre where the gods will burn soon enough.

Hope you're not holding your breath

Why would I be holding my breath? The christian mythology is failing in this country as shown in the last decade, while atheism has rapidly grown and doubled. It's not going to happen over night but all good things take time.

I dont know about brave... but he does have a right to his opinion... ain't America great?

Well it's brave because it's basically political suicide. Even in the latest polls about religion on who people would vote for in this country an atheist came last out of everything else.

I guess it all depends on what state you live in. I think claiming your an Athiest in Washington or most of the PacN'west states would probably go fairly unnoticed.

I think it is quite brave as well. I think we should vote based on the politicians record rather than his religious affiliation. A politician can be a good one (as good as politicians get anyway I guess) whether they believe in god or not.

lol... last time i checked... the evolutionary mythology was losing ground... more and more people are turning to religion every day... but they believe in a higher power... atheists are dumb for one reason... they can't say without a doubt that there is no God...

if you choose to play russian roulette with your soul... that's your business... as the bible puts it... "the fool has said in his heart, there is no God"

even a person that believes in multiple gods or even a different God than the one in christianity is considered smarter than the atheist...

for those that don'e know... evolution is an old idea... read Romans 1... like it says.. "professing themselves to be wise, they became fools"

the proportion of the population that can be classified as Christian has declined from 86% in 1990 to 77% in 2001;

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the greatest increase in absolute as well as in percentage terms has been among those adults who do not subscribe to any religious identification; their number has more than doubled from 14.3 million in 1990 to 29.4 million in 2001; their proportion has grown from just 8% of the total in 1990 to over 14% in 2001;

Source

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As for being less smart then a believer. I don't really judge intelligence when tied to a religious ideal or no ideal at all. That's really up to the person at hand.

Though since we're here and you're soo much smarter then me, surely you can proide some hard proof that your religion is correct? I'll be glad to take a look at it, if it won't be too much trouble for you to provide the evidence.

very unwise statement

Possibly the most ridiculous statement I have ever heard! Don't you see the irony?

Yes.. that's right. The Bible does all the thinking for you doesn't it? that way, you don't even have to know why you hate someone.. as the children's song goes:

"Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so"

If evolution is an old idea, then what does that make Christianity, which is 10x as old? Ancient, primitive, outdated, inferior.. you choose

Topics merged at the request of GoddessWhispers.

I'm one of God's dupes. And proud to be one.

The same can be said for Abrahamics as they can't prove without a doubt there is a God. Though I am not an Atheist I find the Atheist on this site to be extremely intelligent.

*cough choke cough*

Is that to say you support the people spray painting hate messages on the busses? That's who GW was referring to as "god's dupes".

Correction. "Gods Dupes" was a title applied by Kratos, Not I. I'm the one with the merged topic/title:Fans applaude....

Sorry about that The devil made me do it!

I was actually just reading through the atheist news and found the article and figured I'd post it because it makes some good points.

I think the support for this Representative is awesome.



Voters unfazed by Stark's atheism
EAST BAY
Voters unfazed by Stark's atheism
Response to his revelation has been positive, he says
John Wildermuth, Chronicle Political Writer

Sunday, March 18, 2007


Atheism might be the last political taboo, but it doesn't seem to have hurt Rep. Pete Stark in his East Bay district.

In town hall meetings in Newark and San Leandro on Saturday, the 35-year congressional veteran received only cheers and applause when a speaker brought up a survey this week that named Stark as the highest-ranking politician in America who was willing to admit he doesn't believe in God.

Stark waved away any suggestion that he was being courageous when he described himself to the Secular Coalition for America, an association of atheist and humanist groups, as "a Unitarian who does not believe in a Supreme Being.''

"It's not courageous to make a simple statement about personal beliefs,'' he told about 70 people at the San Leandro City Hall. "What is courageous is to stand up in Congress and say, 'Let's tax the rich and give the money to poor kids.' Now that's courageous.''

Since the survey results were released, Stark has been bombarded by letters, phone calls and e-mails, almost all thanking him for making his position public.

The response astounded the 75-year-old Stark, a dyed-in-the-wool liberal who's received plenty of nasty mail over the years.

"The attention is amazing,'' he said. "I don't know what the guys who put out the press release did, but I'd like to hire their PR person to run my next campaign. I have been inundated (with responses) from literally all over the world.''

Of the 500 or so responses Stark has received, all but about 25 have been supportive. Even critics didn't write the type of harsh screeds that might be expected on a hot-button topic like religion.

"The negative responses were the most reasoned and reasonable I've ever received,'' he said. "In this instance, the people who have disagreed with me have been polite and reasonable. All in all, this has been a pleasurable experience.''

But Stark's casual admission of disbelief was an important moment for local atheists. Chuck Cannon of Concord compared Stark to civil rights heroine Rosa Parks for his willingness to go against the long-accepted political wisdom and put himself on the side of American atheists.

"Over the last several years, many of us have felt threatened by organized religion's attempt to force a particular view, through legislation, on all of us, which means we lose our family values,'' he said. "I just wanted to commend you for your courageous, yet commonsense, stance that sets you above the religious pandering that goes on in Washington.''

Stark was quick to admit that in many other issues, his district's liberal leanings make it possible for him to take public positions that could have serious political costs for other Democrats.

When explaining, for example, why trying to impeach President Bush or immediately pulling out of Iraq is something even a Congress controlled by Democrats is unwilling to do, he pointed out his party's diversity -- racial, geographic and ideological.

"What I would do tomorrow would get a lot of my colleagues defeated,'' he said, mentioning his willingness to raise taxes to pay for universal health care.

Still, Stark was struck by the fact that not one of his 534 colleagues in the House or Senate was willing to say he or she was an atheist.

"They were looking for the highest-ranking politician who would state his or her (lack of) belief in a supreme being,'' Stark said. "Well, I was the first and the second was a former member of the Berkeley school board. That's a pretty big gap.''

That's not surprising, said Mark Thomas, assistant state director of American Atheists and the man who nominated Stark for recognition as the nation's highest-ranking "nontheist" politician -- and won a $1,000 prize for it.

"With the current political climate, many think it would be difficult to come out and say they don't believe in God,'' he said after speaking with the congressman outside Newark City Hall. "But Pete Stark hasn't paid a political price.''

Thomas was even happier to see that most of the people at the town hall meetings weren't interested in talking about Stark's position on God. Instead, Iraq, health care, global warming, immigration and other national issues drove the hourlong sessions.

"It's great that (atheism) didn't come up,'' he said. "There are far more important things to be concerned about than what Congressman Stark believes.''