RICHMOND, Va. (BP)- I must admit to being a little perplexed about atheists who protest injustice. The United States Supreme Court has heard arguments from California atheist Michael Newdow that school children are religiously coerced when they recite the Pledge of Allegiance -- infamous these days because it includes the words "under God." If that's true, it's hard to understand why Mr. Newdow believes he has any rights to be violated. If Creator God isn't real, then we are all just animals in an accidental universe. What justice do animals know other than the law of the jungle? The first amendment to the United States Constitution does indeed say Americans have a right to be free in matters of religion. But why do we have any "human rights" at all? How do we know what they are? The most direct answer to that question is in the document that explains why this nation was founded - the Declaration of Independence. All people, it says, have the "unalienable" right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness because those rights are given to us by God. Attention, Mr. Newdow and all atheists: If God isn't real, then our founding documents aren't worth the paper they're written on. There's no such thing as right and wrong, and you haven't got a right to complain about being "coerced" to recite the pledge or use currency that has "In God we trust" stamped on it. I am regularly taken to task by atheists who don't like what I write. They criticize Christians for "forcing" our values on others who don't share them. They make it very clear that, unlike Christians, they don't believe there are standards of right and wrong that apply to everyone, everywhere, all the time. See Section on Pluralism -
It is tragically true that few of those who believe that all spiritual beliefs are valid paths to God seem to have made an in depth study of various religions to see if their claims are based on fact, or fairy dust. Fine. There's no such thing as right and wrong. So how can it be wrong for one person to force his beliefs on someone else? People who deny God's reality and reject the idea that there are standards of right and wrong that apply to everyone don't seem to realize that their worldview doesn't include the right to complain about any perceived injustice - or to criticize the ones inflicting the alleged injustice. Atheists want to be free of God and his moral code, but they don't want to be treated like just another animal in the jungle. You can't have it both ways. The only way people have human rights is if they are created in the image of God. The only way the concept of justice makes any sense is if there is a God who created it. Without a God to create human rights, the only other "rights" people can have would be whatever the ruling authority grants them. And in a democracy, that authority roughly equates to the opinion of the majority. Unfortunately for Mr. Newdow, the overwhelming majority of Americans seem to want God in the language of the state. The only way he could justify his complaint is to appeal to a higher authority that supersedes the will of the people – but a Higher Authority is exactly what he denies. The fact that Newdow's world view is nonsense wouldn't keep the Supreme Court from ruling on his complaint. The court has repeatedly demonstrated its willingness to split legal hairs while ignoring weightier matters of justice. The "justices" - like most Americans - hold a worldview that says God is a mere belief that one can choose whether or not to accept. God's reality, however, is not an issue of personal belief; it is an issue of fact and whether that fact can be proven to be true. See link below If God's reality cannot be proven to be true, then America needs to throw out the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution and quit talking about justice and human rights - and Mr. Newdow should take his case to the streets because, in a world without God, only might makes right. The good news is that God's reality can be proven. (See Link Below) For the better part of a century, the leading edge of virtually every field of science has been amassing evidence that the universe is too complex and too finely tuned to be a cosmic accident. Apart from a Creator, no one can even explain where it came from, much less how it developed into such a marvelous place. The best science says God is real. Mr. Newdow says, "I don't believe God exists." It doesn't matter whether he believes it or not; God's reality is a fact. Every individual and nation is "under God," whether they choose to acknowledge His existence or not. If America has to accommodate whatever idea anyone might believe - even if it contradicts the facts, even if it makes no sense - then we'd better prepare for the lawsuit from the Flat Earth Society. Because we'll also be needing to remove all the globes from America's school rooms. Choose Life That You Might Live Many, if not most, non-Christians assume that Christianity is a "blind faith"... that Christians ignore reality and have unquestioning loyalty to an absolute belief system without proof or evidence. In fact, that they believe contrary to all evidence and facts. Much to the contrary, the Christian faith is a commitment based on evidence. The Judeo-Christian faith consistently stresses the importance of truth, and makes appeal to evidence to support it's truth claims. In fact, it is actually quite remarkable as to how many times, God, Jesus, and the prophets of both the Old and New Testaments, appealed to facts to support what they said and taught. This evidence includes the Bible’s humanly impossible authorship, it's candor about the faults and failings of it's main characters, fulfilled prophecy, and it's archaeological and scientific accuracy... none of which are seen in the books of other religions. However, the Christian position only asks that the same criteria used to judge the truth of other ancient documents, that told us about historical people and events, be applied to the Bible. Bias aside, the question that must be honestly answered is whether or not the New Testament records fulfill the historian's requirements of internal, external and transmissional reliability. In other words, when were the Gospel accounts written, were they authored by the people whose name they bear, did the authors intend to record history, or did they have a hidden agenda? Finally, can we be reasonably certain that the text we have to today is what was originally written. And why is this important? Simply because far from being outdated, out of touch, and largely irrelevant to modern society, the Kingdom of God Jesus was sent to earth to proclaim (No, His main message wasn’t about ‘love’) is exactly the utopian world most men and women can only dream of. However, there is also a warning. The Bible very clearly tells us that we all have a choice to make in this life - the most important decision we will ever make. And, if the Bible is indeed the word of God, as it claims to be, and Jesus is the Son of God as He said He was, the consequences for the individual who chooses to ignore, or counter the evidence with clever arguments, will be fatal. | 
