Desperate Christians

Last night I received a hoax email from my first cousin who is obviously a newly-converted Christian. I regularly receive, or should I say, am bombarded with mails from him, selling Christianity. Up to this point I had politely ignored the mails, quietly deleting them without any complaint. He is a cousin after all, and I didn't have the heart to tell him to stop pestering me with religious pornography. Anyway, I did hint on a few occasions that I was an Atheist, but new-found believers are known to be relentless in trying to convert everyone to their one-tracked, twisted, illogical, and irrational ideology, and so he persisted.

However last night, I totally lost it, when I received the hoax mail about how NASA had proved the bible to be true. The hoax had been around in one guise or another for about 30 years, and had been refuted by several sources over the years. Recently it seems it had gotten a new lease of life and was doing the rounds again, and eventually found its way into my inbox courtesy of my cousin. What annoyed me so much was that anyone with a modicum of intelligence, reading the mail would suspect that it was less than plausible, and would bother to take the time to verify the material before forwarding it any further. It seems that my cousin, and indeed those before him were only too eager to believe (a characteristic of religious people) and passed it on in glee, relishing the thought of proving us heathens, non-believers and sceptics wrong. Indeed, the glowing introduction in the mail to the so-called proof, proclaimed that "Angus Buchan said on his Mighty Men Conference: Faith is believing in what you can not see, The reward is to see what you believe. This is the proof!!!!!"

Essentially the hoax insinuated that NASA, during its research had come across a "missing day" in its calculations which proved certain passages in the bible to be true. Several websites refuted this claim, including a Christian site called answersingeneses.org, yes, that selfsame organization behind the abominable Creation Museum. It is unthinkable that true scientists would be wasting their energies on trying to prove the bible to be true. Imagine NASA spacecraft being built on a wing and a prayer (the scenario is hilarious: NASA announces that their latest shuttle will be powered by a new fuel called faith and all scientists are now required to pray hard that it takes off). Now, after my initial suspicions about the claims in the mail had been confirmed, in a fit of rage, I rushed off a reply to my cousin and all his recipients as follows:

Hi good people,
I don’t know Deborah Elkington, but this hoax mail seems to have originated from her in this thread. I don’ know this Angus Buchan either but he is obviously a monumental idiot as well. I don’t normally respond to hoax mails, and I just delete mails promoting religious rubbish. However, this one needs to be stopped dead, because, not only is this story (urban myth) extremely old, it annoys me that people actually believe such crap. The so-called “proof” below that NASA proves the bible true, was refuted ages ago, and has been around in one form or the other for about 30 years. For those who are religiously inclined and don’t believe me, the story was refuted by a Christian Website called answersingeneses.org. Follow the web link if you have access to the Internet, but I have copied it below for you.
For those of you who would like further “proof” that this story about NASA is bollocks, please refer to the following websites:
http://www.truthorfiction.com/rumors/j/joshuaday.htm
http://www.snopes.com/religion/lostday.asp
http://patriot.net/~jlazio/essays/missing.html
http://www.new-life.net/myths.htm
http://www.about-him.com/guest16.html
There are doubtless more sites with similar refutations. As an atheist, I personally don’t mind other people deluding themselves about the existence of God, but I get really annoyed when un-verified information purporting to be the truth is passed on to me, especially religious dogma. I’ve said all this before, so you are welcome to debate with me on my blog-site: http://lenny-says.blogspot.com/
Thanks for your time
Lenny

This morning, I was a little peeved at myself for being so rash, and unkind to my cousin and was about to send him an apology this evening, when I read a reply to my mail from one of his (my cousin's) original recipients and changed my mind. The person who shall remain nameless was obviously very angry that I had blown their "proof" out of the water, wrote thus:

Thank You sir for your comments below..

I am a Christian , I don’t care about Nasa or anyone else. I am a blessed Christian. To me , Jesus is the way , the Truth and the Life... God Said it , I believe it and that settles it.

Have a good day.

Which, off course ticked me off again, as this is the sort of reply you would expect from a theist, whose faith is increasingly being crushed by damning scientific evidence. It is a cry of desperation, typical of a believer, as the last straws he is clutching onto are slowly but surely snatched way from him. Anyway, I could not resist replying thus:

Hey bro’, believe what you want, it’s no skin of my teeth. I’m not surprised you don’t care about anyone else. All theists are the same – all they care about after millennia of religious brainwashing, is their own personal salvation. Give up your chase of imaginary Gods and concentrate your time and effort in helping your less-fortunate fellow man out of this mess we are in, in the world today, which I may add is largely due to the excesses of religion and the purveyors of religious dogma. You’ll find as I have, that you will much more “blessed” and you soon wont have this irrational fear of non-existent Gods.

Verily I saith unto thee, brother, join me in clear and rational thinking. Blessed is he who forsakes all Gods to help his fellow man. Heaven is here on Earth, look no further, stop destroying her. Now please go forth, and stop with that religious mumbo-jumbo; you’re preaching to he whose mind is free of religious pollution.

I am truly sorry if I have offended thee; I am a real bastard when it comes to
religion, and could not resist.

Regards

Lenny

Now I am feeling sheepish for being a wise-ass and having acted rashly yet again....