The last part of the article is where he really goes out of his mind by throwing away the dinosaur subject so he can get on with his psychotic, demagogic rants. The rest of his article just comes to show how Ken Ham, who's really more of a self-righteous, bigoted demagogue, who just rants maliciously over everything from poodles to dinosaurs, than a creationist, is no different than any abusive, destructive, bigoted church pastor who uses video games, Jewish people, Rock n' Roll and other types of cultural icons, people of different races, and certain movements as scapegoats for all the bad things going on in the world and people being turned off from church and religion, while being blind and ignorant to their own actions, rants, and dogma that are the real culprits behind the complete rejection of the Christian church, Christianity in general, and all atrocities committed against society.
In my opinion, religious fanaticism and extremism is the real reason why there are atheists in the world. Anyone who promotes Christianity, yet don't practice what they preached is a sure fire way to turn people off from the Church and Christianity as a whole. Especially when one hears some malicious rants like what Ham is displaying in the next segment, Why Does It Matter? (Answer: It don't) where Ham twaddles away about how immorality came about,
Dinosaurs have zero to do with moral and Biblical issues. That's way off the subject of dinosaurs. I don't know why creationists have to shoehorn moral issues into the subject of dinosaurs that has no saying in any type of moral issue whatsoever.
Actually, the evolutionary teachings on dinosaurs that pervade society do have a great bearing on why many will not listen to the gospel, and thus why social problems abound today. If they don’t believe the history in the Bible, why would anyone trust its moral aspects and message of salvation?”
One doesn't need to believe what really translates to “My [Ham's] history of the Bible” to trust any moral aspects and the message of salvation. We don't need to believe and accept the 6,000 year lie to know the message of salvation and trust the moral aspects of the Bible. Ham's stupid lies and his abuse and distortion of the Bible does plenty to degenerate morality, the Bible, and Christianity as a whole. While being blind to his own flaws, what he teach leads people into committing such atrocities, thus setting them up for the fall from grace just as Ham will show to us how,
“If we accept the evolutionary teachings on dinosaurs, then we must accept that the Bible’s account of history is false. If the Bible is wrong in this area, then it is not the Word of God and we can ignore everything else it says that we find inconvenient.”
In other words, if what Ham teaches is found to be false, then kill, murder, rape, rebel, show no respect for parents and/or elders, steal, behave like mindless, savage animals, be like the people living in Pakistan who went berserk the moment after Benazir Bhutto was assassinated, etc, etc. Here, Ham is using the [sic] "evolutionary teachings" of dinosaurs as a scapegoat for all the bad things in the world while being blind to the fact that it is really his own teachings that encourages people to commit crimes the moment they find what evolutionists is saying about earth's long history, dinosaurs, and evolution is entirely true all along.
Ham is actually telling the lay audience to behave like savages the moment they find evolution and long ages to be true. For in his eyes, it is the evolutionists who brought on all the pain misery and suffering in the world, giving the lay audience a false impression of the world being edenic-like prior to the publishing of Darwin's Origins of Species book. This kind of dogmatic teachings is no different than the teachings of Adolf Hitler who blamed the Jews for all the trouble the German's was forced to face when they suffered defeat at the hands of the allied forces during WW1. The lay audience are told to ignore the real history of the world that's heavily involve in wars and bloodshed all done in the name of religion. Wars were fought in honor of their pagan gods, sexual immorality also done in honor of their gods, alleged witches and heretics tortured and burned at the stake to "purify" the Christian community regardless of whether they are responsible for weather woes, animal oddities, “black death”, or not, children sacrificed to pagan gods, and so much more. Even Hitler, a Roman Catholic, and Stalin, a scientific illiterate who rejected evolution in favor of Lamarckism, heavily used Christian religion to supercharge their people into complying with their ways.
While being blind to the fact that even creationists teach evolution themselves only when it suites them, Ham claims,
“If everything made itself through natural processes—without God—then God does not own us and has no right to tell us how to live. “In fact, God does not really exist in this way of thinking, so there is no absolute basis for morality.”
If that's the case, then how do you explain so many evolutionists who are highly devoted Christians, Ham or is this your way of showing hatred and contempt towards them by branding even the most devoted of Christians as “godless secularists” out of your contemptuous hatred towards them? Like all young earthers, Ham has been indoctrinated into hating anyone, even scientists, who oppose the 6,000 year lie, branding them all as godless secularists all because they reject young earth creationism all the way, stating without shame that these godless evolutionists have all fall under God's judgment while being engross in ignorance of the teachings of young earth creationism being truly the one that's leading people to say "There is no God, anything goes, and that we can behave like mindless savages whenever we like." at the same time.
Even when God does own us and has the right to tell us how to live, that still doesn't deny us the fact that God also gave us freewill along with the ability to reason, to discern things we don't agree with, and have free thought. If all these things are wrong, then why did He gave us such things to begin with? Why is there verses in the Bible that openly condone reason, condemn legalism, false teaching, and Church abuse? Why is there verses in the Bible that openly uphold wisdom and knowledge and condemn ignorance? Even with God, this doesn't stop wayward religious people, even Christians who honestly do not deny their faith in God, from coming acts of atrocities even at the urgings of their mentally sick spiritual leaders who shout out demagogic rants at their congregation on a Sunday bases. What Ham displays in the article is nothing more than a scare tactic to keep his followers in line and prevent them from turning away from him so he can maintain his power and control over them and their wealth. Ham's ministry is all about wealth and power, not God.
“Without God, anything goes—concepts of right and wrong are just a matter of opinion."
Rather even with God, anything goes. Every concept of right and wrong are all the matters of everyone, including wayward Christians such as demagogue preachers who demand their followers to live by their ways and their rules regardless of what the Bible really say about right and wrong. All abusive and destructive churches should be held accountable for destroying the Christian Faith and ruining the lives of everyone attending their church. In such churches, pastors would shout out threats of death and Hell to anyone who dance, wear make-up, divorce, leave their church, commit suicide, question and challenge their authority, go to innocent places like the mall, and much more. They even would insinuate themselves into having sex with children, including toddlers and even entice their husbands to beat their wives and children if they don't meet up with their demands. They're just as malicious and hateful towards women as Ham and his cronies are towards everyone who oppose their views. And it clearly shows whenever they go about slandering evolutionists and supporters of evolution from all walks of life just for kicks.
"And without a basis for morality, there is no such thing as sin. And no sin means that there is no need to fear God’s judgment and there is no need for the Savior, Jesus Christ.”
Really? If that's the case, then things must have been really bad in the Garden of Eden where there was no basis for morality and no fear of God, who set them all up for the Fall, dishing out judgment on all because all animals and people at any moment because they were highly immoral before Adam sinned.
Not all Christians act badly, however. Anyone, including me, must always keep in mind that not all Christians, including church pastors, behave badly. Just because some Christians and pastors behave badly doesn't mean all Christians and pastors behave the same way. There are great, many, countless multitudes of Christians, including pastors, out there who are among the most well behaved people in the world, knowing right from wrong, do their best to follow Christian Principles and stay out of trouble, and never allowing pathetically sick psychos like Ken Ham to rule over their lives with their demagogic rants and their abusive behavior. These people would rather shun radical, legalistic extremism than allowing themselves to be enslaved by them.
They're not the only ones, though. There are also countless scores of Atheists, Muslims, Jews, Islam and all other types of non-wayward religious groups out there who are also very high in morals, too. They know right from wrong, shun extremism, and do their best to follow the right principles and stay out of trouble. These non-wayward people, Christian and non-Christian alike, all live very happy lives and would much rather avoid living a miserable life under the influence of religious extremists than be indoctrinated by the likes of Osama Bin Laden, Kan Ham, Kent Hovind, and Bill Gothard who may have been the one responsible for leading 2 people into murdering children and several other people on Christmas Eve several days ago – and these 2 criminals came from strong Christian homes and were homeschooled! Not following the teachings of Christ is an unacceptable reason to why do even the most strongly devoted Christians sin.
Sometimes, just because a person comes from a strong Christian family doesn't mean he/she is a high moral person. I remembered when I was listening to a Christian radio station and hearing about James Dobson of Focus on the Family who is baffled by why some people who come from strong Christian homes turn to a life of crime while those who come from bad homes are well behaved with the intent to pursue a high moral, law abiding life. If he would've looked further, then he will find that the answer comes from those who came from strong Christian families that has been indoctrinated into embracing abusive, destructive doctrines taught by wayward pastors, like Ham himself and the pastor who heavily influenced the 2 people who killed several people on Christmas Eve, and those who escape from their abusive parents and/or relatives and get proper help, justice, and rehabilitation to the point where they make a serious commitment to refuse to follow in their parents footsteps and live the same miserable life their parents lived (i.e. Refrain from alcohol, drugs, violence, and destructive churches, find peaceful ways to handle anger, write inspiring memoirs of their experience and how they fought back, etc.).
In the next segment entitled Millions of Years and the Gospel, Ham claims,
“The teaching that dinosaurs lived and died millions of years before man directly attacks the foundations of the gospel in another way."
It don't. The only thing that is an attack on the foundations of the gospel is Ham's young earth scheme and his ability to set gullible Christians up for the fall from grace.
“The fossil record, of which dinosaurs form a part, documents death, disease, suffering, cruelty, and brutality. It is a very ugly record. Allowing for millions of years in the fossil layers means accepting death, bloodshed, disease, and suffering before Adam’s sin.”
How is it an ugly record, Ham or is this your way of making the fossil record be what you want it to be while ignoring the real ugly record of the 6,000 year lie? In reality, the 6,000 year lie is the true ugly record which documents death, disease, suffering, cruelty, and brutality, and everything else Ham claims the fossil record documents while it in fact don't.
Even death, bloodshed, suffering, cruelty, and brutality happened even before Adam sinned when the animals made the plants kingdom suffer by shedding plant blood, which is sap and leghemoglobin, and no decay ever occurred to cause animals and people to suffer problems from indigestion and maintain the lives of worms and plants that feed on decaying matter. If no death and disease occurred before the fall then it would be useless to have the Tree of Life planted in the Garden and white blood cells inside the human body to fight off disease and illness. Ham has yet to explain logically why did God created parasites along with everything else He created without resorting to “they're degenerate beings that appeared after the Fall” crap. When God created everything in the beginning, He created things that caused people harm, suffering, and pain including predators, diseases, parasites, storms, venom, and sharp objects. You can't expect God to be a just doting god who only makes worlds one see in a fairy tale book where teddy bears frolic and prince and princesses lived happily ever after, you know.
This remark by Ham can give one a false impression that the evolutionary account in the fossil record documents an endless worldwide venatio (Latin word for “hunt”) where all life is constantly at each other's throat as seen in the Roman Colosseum during the time of the Roman Empire. Obviously Ham and others have been getting ideas for their idiocy by watching too many sci-fi movies depicting savage dinosaurs, prehistoric life, and warring cavemen constantly at each others' throat in a venatio-style world, which the real fossil record completely depicts none of. The fossil record in reality is a fascinating account of life that spans billions (not millions) of years.
Throughout the long period of 3.8 billion years, all sorts of animal life have evolved, flourished, and died out only to be replaced by another form of animal life that have developed to fill in the niches previous extinct forms have left behind. And throughout all this 3.8 billion year history of life on Earth, no other animal can do acts of bloodshed, violence, cruelty, spread disease and brutality the way humans do. Humans are in fact the only beings in the world that tend to behave a trillion time more worse than all animals living and extinct put together. No other animal can shed blood, destroy environments, pollute water, air, and land, spread fear, brutality and terror the way humans do. When it comes to violence, immorality, and bloodshed, you can bet the humans race have truly mastered all three.
Ham is aware of how people really need Jesus to save them from their sins. In the next segment, Ham talks about how in order to humans to be saved from their sins, blood has to be shed by stating,
“After Adam disobeyed God, the Lord clothed Adam and Eve with “coats of skins”. To do this He must have killed and shed the blood of at least one animal.”
Otherwise, He must have made the coats of skins appeared on the bodies of Adam and Eve out of nowhere without having to shed animal blood to do it. The Bible doesn't say that God had to kill an animal to clothe Adam and Eve who didn't die the moment they ate the forbidden fruit. This is something Christian fundamentalist demagogues like Ham have all made up to help figure out how did God provide clothing to the first couple and incorporate what they made up about how God clothe Adan and Eve into their dogma.
The next part tells about how in order to have redemption and forgiveness of sins, blood must be shed. Here Ham reasons,
“If the shedding of blood occurred before sin, as would have happened if the garden was sitting on a fossil record of dead things millions of years old, then the foundation of the Atonement would be destroyed.”
Wrong! The foundation of the atonement will prevail even when everything's sitting on a fossil bed that's billions of years old. In comparison with the blood shedding of animals through predation and animal sacrifices in which both did nothing to take the sins away from humans, Christ ultimately became the only one worthy sacrifice to take away the sins and spiritual death from all mankind, thus making animal sacrifices obsolete. If Christ died to take away physical death and physical death is still prevalent all around, then Christ would have been a total failure.
In every literature of theirs, creationists like Ham would distort Romans 8, including verses 19-22, to explain animal and plant suffering as well as human suffering out of gross ignorance of the passages' true meaning which only refer to Gentiles who have yet to hear the gospel of Christ. When creationists used the word “creation”, they intend to refer to everything God has made concerning the earth and all its inhabitants including the plant and animal kingdoms. But the plant and animal kingdoms, unlike the human kingdom, cannot think and reason the way humans do. They don't have the ability to worship the Lord nor follow moral principles the way humans do. They only act on instinct and nothing else. Also, when creationists distort the Romans 8: passage, they intend to ignore the whole context of Romans 8 and other verses in the Bible in which the word “creation” is another word for “creature” and is used to only describe non Christian humans, not animals, not plants, and especially not planet earth itself. Compare the NIV version of Mark 16:15 with the King James Version and then compare the Wycliffe Version of Romans 8::19-22 with the American Standard Version and you'll see what I mean.
Then Ham talks about the New Heaven and a New Earth where sin and curse will be removed and claims if there are animals living in the new world, they will never kill and eat each other and the redeemed people for food. Rich Deem on the other hand has a different outlook on whether there will be animals in the new world or not. And it has to do with the animals' complete lack of souls unlike humans who has them.
Then Ham concludes the segment by claiming,
"Thus, the teaching of millions of years of death, disease, and suffering before Adam sinned is a direct attack on the foundation of the message of the Cross."
Wrong! No teaching of any kind is a direct attack on the foundation of the message of the Cross, except the teachings that deny Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior which especially include the young earth lie which teach that there was death, suffering, and even disease, too happening both before and after Adam sinned through the suffering and death of every plant in the plant kingdom by sickly sweet animals, sufferings of indigestion, and worms and plants suffering starvation due to lack of decaying matter.
Billions of years of Prehistory is neither a direct attack, nor a threat to any foundations of the messages of the Gospel, the Cross, and the Atonement. In fact, billions of years of prehistory, the fossil record, and the concept of dinosaurs living and dying millions of years before humans appeared is entirely 100% irrelevant to all biblical foundations, including the foundations of the Gospel message, the Cross and the Atonement. Ham made up such statements such as “millions of years is a direct attack on the gospel” to entice the lay audience to conform to his ways of ignorance and denial and steer them away from the valid evidence supporting what he blindly calls a lie. The truth of the matter is that these statements, a part of his empty, meaningless rally cry for power, control, and support, all simply translate to,
"The teaching that presents scientific reality through evidence is a direct attack on me [Ham], my power, and my authority!"
Finally, Ham concludes his abridged version of his other idiot book, The Great Dinosaur Mystery Solved! by stating,
"If we accept God’s Word, beginning with Genesis, as being true and authoritative, then we can explain dinosaurs and make sense of the evidence we observe in the world around us. In doing this, we are helping people see that Genesis is absolutely trustworthy and logically defensible, and is what it claims to be—the true account of the history of the universe and mankind.”
Translate all that to,
“If we accept My Word, beginning with my word in Genesis, as being true and authoritative, then we can poorly explain dinosaurs and make no sense of the evidence we observe in the world around us. In doing this, we are helping people see that Genesis is absolutely untrustworthy and illogically indefensible, and is what it claims to be—the false account of the history of the universe and mankind.”
And then goes on,
“And what one believes concerning the book of Genesis will ultimately determine what one believes about the rest of the Bible. This, in turn, will affect how a person views himself or herself, fellow human beings, and what life is all about, including their need for salvation.”
And it all translates to,
"And what one believes concerning my view of Genesis will ultimately determine what one believes about the rest of the Bible to be nothing but fairyland stories. This, in turn, will defect how a person views himself or herself, fellow human beings, and what life according to me is all about, including the urging to reject religion and say 'God is a fraud!'
If we really believe the Bible as seen through the eyes of a right minded biblical archaeologist, historian, and scholar, then we can really see just how pathetically stupid, false, sacrilegious, blasphemous Ham's 6,000 year scheme really is and how his distortions of the Bible have done much to fall many people from grace the moment they realized that Ham has lied to them about everything from dinosaurs to poodles and everything else in between.
