Bill Maher’s “Religulous,” Simply Ridiculous
According to Dr. Craig Hazen of Biola University, Bill Maher’s new film, Religulous, most of which is devoted to mocking Christianity, is built upon shaky intellectual foundations. You can read Hazen’s full review here. I haven’t seen the film yet myself.
Dr. Hazen, the head of the Christian Apologetics program at Biola, points out that Maher never bothers to consult any serious scholars for the defense of Christianity, choosing instead to display fringe expressions as if they were representative. His approach is lazy. Of course, out of the billions of religious people in the world, you can highlight examples from kitsch to extremism to make your case the religion is useless at best, dangerous at worst. Isn’t this the basic “straw man” fallacy where you caraciturize your opponent, making it easy to knock him down while avoiding a real confrontation of serious ideas?
Hazen notes that one of Bill Maher’s favorite attacks is that boring old canard that the Bible is unreliable as a historical document because the Gospels were all written generations after the death of Jesus. One of my favorite refutations of that proposition comes from this article in Skeptic Magazine. Non-Christian historian, Robert Sheaffer dismantles the more ludicrous claims of The Da Vinci Code, including the idea that the Gospels are late documents.
Hello, Pastor -
I find Mr. Maher a sad, but disturbing figure in our culture. Sad, because he just doesn’t “get it”. Disturbing, because more folks use a talking head like him as their source for information on faith.
In addition, thank you for posting Ms. Palin’s speech about Mr. Obama’s record when it comes to the abortion problem. I am shocked and saddened by this.
A few weeks ago, I wrote to you regarding my frustration with the Republican Party relative to pandering to us Pro-Life individuals. I can not ignore our God’s Will. I will vote for Mr. McCain.
I believe we need to take a different approach in fighting for these children, these victims of the selfishness that is spreading in America.
I would like to through down the gauntlet, so to speak, to everyone concerned for these little lives.
Please make it a point to write, email and/or call your congressman and the White House on a weekly basis until someone has the courage to do the right thing.
Also, please continue to do the most powerful thing…pray to our God for their welfare.
Paul, in Bethel Park
17 Oct 08 at 12:01 pm
Hi Paul,
Thanks for your comment. I apologize for not getting around to posting your previous one. I was going to wait until I could write some responding remarks and then time simply slipped away. It wasn’t intentional.
God bless.
Pastor Scott Stiegemeyer
18 Oct 08 at 2:03 pm