The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #153625   Message #3603321
Posted By: Steve Shaw
20-Feb-14 - 03:28 PM
Thread Name: BS: Militant Atheism Threads
Subject: RE: BS: Militant Atheism Threads
You're being particularly idiotic on this, Keith, even for you. Take this wiki snippet:

Society in the United Kingdom is markedly more secular than in the past and the number of churchgoers fell over the second half of the 20th century.[48] The Ipsos MORI poll in 2003 reported that 18% were "a practising member of an organised religion".[42] The Tearfund Survey in 2007 found that only 7% of the population considered themselves as practising Christians. Ten per cent attend church weekly and two-thirds had not gone to church in the past year.[45][49] The Tearfund Survey also found that two thirds of UK adults (66%) or 32.2 million people have no connection with the Church at present (nor with another religion). These people were evenly divided between those who have been in the past but have since left (16 million) and those who have never been in their lives (16.2 million).
Currently, regular church attendance in the United Kingdom stands at 6% of the population with the average age of the attendee being 51. This shows a decline in church attendance since 1980 when regular attendance stood at 11% with an average age of 37. It is predicted that by 2020, attendance will be around 4% with an average age of 56.[48] This decline in church attendance has forced many churches to close down across the United Kingdom with the Church of England alone being forced to close 1,500 churches between 1969 and 2002. Their fates include dereliction, demolition and residential conversion.[50]


We can argue 'til the bloody cows come home about who's an atheist and who isn't (I don't even know whether I am fer chrissake!), but there's no escaping the evidence presented by the bums-on-pews stats. There may not be billions of us militant atheists, but there are truckloads of people who don't give a flying monkey's fart about religion. In fact, very few people do (and, did you know that, in this Christian culture of ours, more Muslims go every week than Christians?). Considering that most people are brought up in religion to fear the power and the glory, it doesn't say much for the pull of religion, does it?

Actually, I think I'll sign up to being a Catholic again, then promptly proceed to not give a shit. I reckon the non-givers of a shit are the happiest people of all. After all, they're the people who are merely reverting to the true default position of the human race!