Sunday School & Atheism

    In my last blog, I mentioned the new format for the Sunday School we were implementing. Last Sunday it went wonderfully well. The kids were actively engaged in Biblical discussion; they were asking questions, commenting on different ideas, and paging through the Bible. But I wanted to wait one more Sunday before reporting on the program’s success. Because of that, I am all the more excited to tell you that today’s class went very well. We talked about the Trinity, and then God the Father. It was, as you can imagine, a difficult lesson, but I think it went well. We had about ten true-false questions about God, such as “is God a human being?” I had each of the guys answer, and then we read a verse which dealt with that question and answer. Again, there were about ten of these questions, so there was a lot of Bible-searching. I give them a lot of credit for searching through the Bible, because it took a while. So, I appreciate your prayers, and rejoice in telling you that I think there is great potential for fruitful growth.
    In other news, we had an interesting discussion on a chapter from the book Beyond Opinion. The book is a collection of essays composed by christian apologists about a lot of the current attacks on the faith. The one we read this past week, titled “Atheism,” was written by Alister McGrath. I’m sure most of you have seen or heard of Richard Dawkin’s book The God Delusion. Well, Alister McGrath wrote a book titled The Dawkins Delusion. Because of that, I was excited to read what Dr. McGrath had to say about Atheism.
    The essays itself was interesting, informative, and well-written. When I finished it, I thought “now I wish he had written more!” What he did write, though, was very insightful. Most of the chapter was his analyzation of the effects of Atheism. His prime example was the effect Communist Russia had on its Eastern-European buffer-states, or the “Iron Curtain” countries as a certain British chap dubbed them. McGrath explained that the crimes committed under the Soviet rule were not only more in numbers, but more heinous than the crimes committed in the “religious” West, under the banner of religion. His explanation was that when a state is Atheistic, it loses the mentality that one day, it will answer to a higher power for its decisions. Because no one in control of the U.S.S.R. believed (supposedly) that they were going to be held accountable for their actions, the crimes against humanity arose, general well-being declined, etc. So the essence of McGrath’s argument was: “if you think religious persecution hurts a society, look at what atheism does.”
    Other than that, the only thing I have to report is that the weather has been delightful of late. The sun has been shining almost uninterrupted for the last two days, which has made the walks much more enjoyable. I’m sure it will disappear again soon for the next couple of years.