BuzzFlash Reviews

BUZZFLASH REVIEWS

You won't find a Democratic candidate quoting Sam Harris. He's too hot to handle, because he takes the dogmatic, hateful, exclusionary beliefs of the religious right head on -- and leaves ashes in his wake.

And that's not considered a politically correct stance nowadays, because the power of "Bush's base" has been built up to mythic proportions. They are like the NRA with a Bible in the eyes of jaded political consultants.

Nevertheless, this is a best selling book nationally. In fact, it's red hot.

According to Harris, "Forty-four percent of the American population is convinced that Jesus will return to judge the living and the dead sometime in the next fifty years. According to the most common interpretation of biblical prophecy, Jesus will return only after things have gone horribly awry here on earth. It is, therefore, not an exaggeration to say that if the city of New York were suddenly replaced by a ball of fire, some significant percentage of the American population would see a silver lining in the subsequent mushroom cloud, as it would suggest to them that the best thing that is ever going to happen was about to happen—the return of Christ. It should be blindingly obvious that beliefs of this sort will do little to help us create a durable future for ourselves—socially, economically, environmentally, or geopolitically. Imagine the consequences if any significant component of the U.S. government actually believed that the world was about to end and that its ending would be glorious. The fact that nearly half of the American population apparently believes this, purely on the basis of religious dogma, should be considered a moral and intellectual emergency.The book you are about to read is my response to this emergency..."

Harris also notes, ""Thousands of people have written to tell me that I am wrong not to believe in God. The most hostile of these communications have come from Christians. This is ironic, as Christians generally imagine that no faith imparts the virtues of love and forgiveness more effectively than their own. The truth is that many who claim to be transformed by Christ’s love are deeply, even murderously, intolerant of criticism. While we may want to ascribe this to human nature, it is clear that such hatred draws considerable support from the Bible. How do I know this? The most disturbed of my correspondents always cite chapter and verse."

We've become so politically intimidated by the political conventional wisdom that religion has to be respected (which it should when it is embracing and benevolent) that we have come to condone hate, spite and intolerance as an accepted form of religious practice.

As far as BuzzFlash is concerned, if any person's religious belief doesn't bring out the best in the spirit and the goodness of men and women, it's not a religion; it's an excuse for being a bigot.

America was founded upon the notion that its doors were open to people of all faiths -- and people of no faith.

Sam Harris is one of the latter. He has a lot to say about how some religious hucksters and their followers have tried to derail our nation's Constitution and acceptance of all people, regardless of their religious outlooks.

Personally at BuzzFlash, we believe that God is in men and women -- and that we are all responsible for acting with divine grace and care in regards to each other.

To those persons who deflect responsibility for their actions by claiming all life has been predetermined by a wrathful God, we say go about your business in your homes and religious places of worship. That is your right.

But leave the rest of us Americans alone.

The American Constitution obliges you to do so.

BUZZFLASH REVIEWS