THE

$2.50

AMERICAN ATHEIST
A Journal of Atheist News and Thought

(VoI.25, No.1) January, 1983

Uncle Sam & Christ The Illicit Connection

by Madalyn Murray O'Hair

The Lord And The

Intellectuals
by Christopher Hitchens

Broadening Religious
Tax Exemptions
A Report from Utah

Where Religion Denies

Children Happiness
A Report from India

1983

1963
AMERICAN ATHEISTS

is a non-profit, non-political, educational organization, dedicated to the complete and absolute separation of
state and church. We accept the explanation of Thomas Jefferson that the "First Amendment" to the
Constitution of the United States was meant to create a "wall of separation" between state and church.
American Atheists are organized to stimulate and promote freedom of thought and inquiry concerning
religious beliefs, creeds, dogmas, tenets, rituals and practices;
to collect and disseminate information, data and literature on all religions and promote a more thorough
understanding of them, their origins and histories;
to encourage the development and public acceptance of a human ethical system, stressing-the mutual
sympathy, understanding and interdependence of all people and the corresponding responsibility of each
individual in relation to society;
to develop and propagate a culture in which man is the central figure who alone must be the source of
strength, progress and ideals for the well-being and happiness of humanity;
to promote the study of the arts and sciences and of all problems affecting the maintenance,
perpetuation and enrichment of human (and other) life;
to engage in such social, educational, legal and cultural activity as will be useful and beneficial to
members of American Atheists and to society as a whole.
Atheism may be defined as the mental attitude which unreservedly accepts the supremacy of reason and
aims at establishing a lifestyle and ethical outlook verifiable by experience and the scientific method,
independent of all arbitrary assumptions of authority and creeds.
Materialism declares that the cosmos is devoid of immanent conscious purpose; that it is governed by its own
inherent, immutable and impersonal laws; that there is no supernatural interference in human life;that man finding his resources within himself - can and must create his own destiny. Materialism restores to man his,
dignity and his intellectual integrity. It teaches that we must prize our lifeon earth and strive always to improve
it. It holds that man is capable of creating'a social system based on reason and justice. Materialism's "faith" is in
man and man's ability to transform the world culture' by his own efforts. This is a commitment which is in very
essence lifeasserting. It considers the struggle for progress as a moral obligation and impossible without noble
ideas that inspire man to bold creative works. Materialism holds that humankind's potential for good and for an
outreach to more fulfillingcultural development is, for all practical purposes, unlimited.

**************~*********************************~***~******~**~*****
AMERICAN

ATHEISTS

P.O.BOX 2117

AUSTIN,

TX 78768-2117

Send $40 for one year's membership. You will receive our "Insider's'Newsletter"
monthly,
your membership certificate and card, and a one year subscription to this magazine.

(Vol. 25, No.1) January, 1983

REGULAR FEATURES
Editorial: "1963-1983" ...................
American Atheist Radio Series: "Rituals Examined" .....
Poems .....................

2
35
39

FEATURED COLUMNISTS

ON THE COVER

U_S. & Christ: The Illicit Connection

-,- Dr. Madalyn Murray O'Hair

"

...
Woodworth

Notes on the Phenomenon of Publishing - Fred

Bits and Pieces - Jeff Frankel ...
Betting on a Hereafter - Merrill Holste.

23
37
40

ARTICLES
Speech by Sen. Lowell Weicker ................
The Lord and the Intellectuals - Christopher Hitchens
Where Happiness Denies Children Happiness
-

Margaret

Bhatty . . . 30

Louis Mountbatten on Nuclear War .........

Flaws in the Lazarus Story - Hiram Elfenbein
Proposition 1 in Utah: A Trojan Horse - David Chris Allen

Editor-in-Chief
Madalyn Murray O'Hair

Managing Editor
Jon G. Murray

Poetry
Robin Murray O'Hair
Angeline Bennett
Gerald Tholen

Production Staff
Art Brenner
Bill Kight
Richard Smith
Gerald Tholen
Gloria Tholen

Non-Resident Staff
G. Stanley Brown
Jeff Frankel
Merrill Holste
Ignatz Sahula-Dycke
Fred Woodworth
Clayton Powers

Austin, Texas

20
26

..

. .
..

33
42
46

The American Atheist magazine is published monthly at the Gustav Broukal American Atheist Press, 2210 Hancock Dr., Austin, TX 78756, and 1982 by Society of
Separationists,
Inc., a non-profit, non-political, educational organization
dedicated to
the complete and absolute separation
of
state and church. Mailing address: P.O. Box
2117/Austin,
TX 78768-2117. A free subscription is provided as an incident of membership in the American Atheists organization. Subscriptions
are available at $25. for
one year terms only. Manuscripts submitted
must be typed, double-spaced
and accompanied by a stamped, self-addressed
envelope. The editors assume no responsibility
for unsolicited manuscripts.

The American Atheist magazine

is indexed in

Monthly Periodical Index

ISSN: 0332-4310

January,

1983

Giving proper consideration to

our gluttonous military budget of
1983, it would seem that reliable
old "John O. Nobody" is again, as
always, low man on the totem pole
of national priority.
Perhaps it is time that we realized that Uncle Sam has "ultimately more far reaching problems" than those that concern the
average American citizen. Besides
installing bristling forests of nuclear missiles around the globe (at a
cost of hundreds of billions) to
"protect" that which is now unprotectable, he must also continue to
bilk the public (to the tune of more
billions) in the form of religious tax
exemptions. In this way, ongoing
religious mythology can remain
intact in order to keep soaping the
minds of nitwits so that they will,
in turn, keep pouring those billions
down the bottomless pit we call
the American economy.
In our continuing tradeoff of human integrity (for pre-election
promises) it would seem that we
would slowly become wiser with
the years. Apparently this is only a
misconception on the part of idle
dreamers. We should therefore begin to take a more realistic view of
circumstances and at least give
proper titles to those more serious
items of importance, i.e. instead of
"income tax" let's say "outgo tax"
and how about the even more
proper title "Social Insecurity. " At
any rate the once proud label of
"U.S. Citizen" or "John O. Public"
now seems more fittingly defined
as (excuse the expression)
"Turds Are Us."
By the way, happy 20th anniversary to all American Atheists and
happy New Year to everyone who
is still able to find happiness at all.
G. Tholen

Page 1

1963-1983
This is the normal time of year for Happy New Year
greetings from most journals, and the staff of The American
Atheist Center which produces this one offers you that
sentiment as well. We do, however, have an additional
event about which to be happy for 1983 is the 20th
anniversary year of the existence of the American Atheist
organization.

o
o

".

Amreican Atheists was founded by Dr. Madalyn Murray

O'Hair in Baltimore, Maryland, on July 1, 1963, following
the eight to one decision by the United States Supreme
Court in the case of Murray v. Curlett which removed
religious ceremonies from public schools. Since that founding, American Atheists has enjoyed a slow, but steady,
growth despite many setbacks that would surely have
caused the permanent closure of many other groups. Those
setbacks came as a result of the fascistic stance, of

Page 2

January, 1983

religionists, organized and unorganized, in all walks of life,

as they did battle against the idea, as they saw it, of
organized "ungodliness."
For many years the American Atheist organization was
sustained monetarily, psychologically and physically, by Dr.:
O'Hair and her immediate family - with Atheists, by and
large, being too frightened to join in any way. One of the
most immediate stumbling blocks to the success of the
organization was to convince the rank and file of Atheists
that it was O.K. to have their name on a "mailing list"
without fear of loss of citizenship for the exercise. It is not
hard to realize why that attitude prevailed when you take
into consideration that America, in the early 1960's was just
shaking loose of the McCarthy hysteria of looking for
communists under every bed.
I think that one of the greatest services American
Atheists has performed in these twenty years is to let
Atheism stand alone outside of association with any political
ideal. As the name of the organization states we are
AMERICAN Atheists. That accomplishment alone was a
long hard fight, one which the new radical right religious
movements of today are attempting to turn around - to
bring us back to the "good old days" of the 1950's with their
McCarthy terrorists tactics.
The organization has had great success in increasing the
self worth of individual American Atheists by making them
proud of their Atheist heritage and aware of the great men
and women with whom they share their reasoned stance.
My personal goal as director of the national office, The
American Atheist Center, is to see the day in this country
that all individual citizens can openly and proudly flaunt
their Atheism without fear of reprisal, discrimination or
abuse of any kind. In many ways that is a similar ultimate
goal of almost every minority "cause" group in the United
States today. They all want equality and true "liberty and
justice for all." We are all approaching that goal.
I feel that the day of recognition of Atheism as a viable
and, in fact, superior life style is in our (almost immediate)
future. The purpose of an American Atheist organization is
to bring that future to fruition as quickly as possible. The
way to do that is by forming a growing, well informed,
educated American Atheist constituency nationwide which,
working together, can reinforce each other against the
continued and now heightened onslaught of public criticism
orchestrated by the radical religious right forces while
reaching out to educate that public a little at a time. Toward
this end The American Atheist magazine, now beginning its
25th year of publication has endeavored to bring information on every conceivable aspect of Atheist news and

The American Atheist

thought to its readers.

Perhaps the highlight of this journal's recent history were
those issues produced from February, 1977, through October of 1980, with four-color process covers by a commercial
printing house in Austin, Texas. Aesthetically those were
the apex years of this journal's publication, but in terms of
content The American Atheist continues to improve issue
after issue providing a wide range of information to you in a
number of subject areas of concern to you as an Atheist.
More important, perhaps, is the fact that this journal willnot
compromise in "telling it like it is." This is one of the reasons
why, throughout its publication history, it has had no or
very little advertising. With advertising comes a dependency on advertising dollars and with that, in turn, comes
the ability of the large advertiser to dictate the content of the
journal. The ability of this journal to speak openly and
directly to issues of concern to Atheists will never be
compromised by the advertising dollar for that is where you,
the reader, are the safeguard of the purity of the publication.
It is with your continued generous support of American
Atheists that the publication of the journal continues.
Unfortunately The American Atheist is no longer produced in four color, due perhaps to our uncompromising
editorial position in the face of the stark economic times in
which our nation finds itself today. We do feel, however,
that this journal has been and will remain the outstanding
real source of information and education (and not from the
fact that it is the only one), on a monthly basis, for Atheists
in the United States.

winter holidays in the United States. Time magazine would

not have seen The Center as a source in beginning years in fact, there was no "Center." Now, we chuckle to note
that we are quoted as "officials at The Atheist Center say"
when our research is quoted by the news media over and
over again throughout the nation.
At that First National Annual Convention in 1970, when
the media showed up with portable TV cameras, the
handful of members in attendance dove under the tables in
the room, covering themselves up with the table cloths for
fear of being recognized on the evening news that night by
employers, relatives or friends. At the Twelfth National
Annual Convention, held in April of 1982, in Washington,
D.C., over 350 members in attendance picketed the White
House with red, white and blue signs, happily outnumbering, as they did, a religious counter demonstration
across the street.
So, as a common cigarette commercial says, "You've
come a long way - baby!". Now, 1983 has the potential of
being not alone a banner year for Atheism, but a doorway to
the future. The radical right religious groups in the country
are losing ground rapidly as evidenced by their failure to
unseat targeted candidates in the November elections, as
they had done in the previous election. The American
Atheist Center is now well into its third years of production
of the American Atheist Television Forum series for cable
outlets across the country. The American Atheist Press has
embarked on publishing paperback books which will now
make it possible to bring you the best of over 150 years of

"... the American Atheist movement ... has nowhere to go but up, nowhere to reach
but out, and nothing to conquer but the world."
The American Atheist organization continues to gain
strength and recognition. When it first started back in 1963,
it was not possible to complete a chore so small as to mail
this journal into many cities in the United States due to the
level of hatred against us - and the determination of the
postal services as they were then constituted to "lose or
destroy" our mail. Currently, we now mail not only to our
own fifty states but to Canada, Australia, Mexico, Europe
and the Far East. The journal can now be found on news
stands in several major cities. In the beginning Atheists were
not allowed to advertise in any media - radio, television,
magazines or newpapers. We are now able to do that in
every area of the country. The journal is now in some 400+
libraries across the nation, with the major proportion paying
for the subscriptions. We have come a long way indeed.
When the First National Annual American Atheist Convention was held in Austin, Texas, in April, 1970, not one
hotel or motel facility in the city would host the meeting at
any price and the convention was held in a city facilitywhere
discrimination was prohibited (after a good fight!) by law.
Now, not a week goes by at The American Atheist Center
that another solicitation does not pass over my desk, as
Director, from another major hotel asking for our convention and meeting business.
Just a day or two ago Time magazine called The Atheist
Center asking for our input on an article being prepared on
separation of state and church issues surrounding the

Austin, Texas

Atheism in America.
Plans are being drawn now for a new American Atheist
Center complex to be constructed on acreage outside of
Austin, Texas, during this new year. With that new complex
will come even greater outreach. We have, indeed, even a
new motto for our organization as we begin the third
decade: "Unity Today - Power Tomorrow."
With your continued support and the new and more
efficient means of information distribution today, this
journal and the American Atheist movement, in general,
has nowhere to go but up,nowhere to reach but out, and
nothing to conquer but the world. And, we're ready for it.

January, 1983

Page 3

UNCLE SAM
AND CHRIST
THE ILLICIT CONNECTION
For a number of years, American Atheists have published
as a theme, the "Nine Demands" for separation of state and
church which were set out as a goal, on January 1, 1874, by
an early pre-Atheist, Francis Ellingwood Abbot, on the front
page of his weekly free thought paper, The Index. These
were:
1. We demand that churches and other ecclesiastical property shall no longer be exempt from just
taxation.
2. We demand that the employment of chaplains in
Congress, in state legislatures, in the navy and militia,
and in prisons, asylums, and all other institutions
supported by public money be discontinued.
3. We demand that all public appropriations for
sectarian educational and charitable institutions shall
cease.
4. We demand that all religious services now
sustained by the government shall be abolished; and
especially that the use of the bible in the public schools
whether ostensibly as a textbook or avowedly as a
book of religious worship, shall be prohibited.
5. We demand that the appointment by the president of the United States or by the governors of the
various states of all religious festivals and fasts shall
wholely cease.
6. We demand that the judicial oath in the courts
and in all other departments of the government shall
be abolished, and that simple affirmation under the
pains and penalties of perjury shall be established in its
stead.
7. We demand that all laws directly or indirectly
enforcing the observance of Sunday as the sabbath
shall be repealed.
8. We demand that all laws looking to the enforcement of "christian" morality shall be abrogated, and
that all laws shall be conformed to the requirements of
natural morality, equal rights, and impartial liberty.
9. We demand that, not only in the constitutions of
the United States and of the several states but also in
the practical administration of the same, no privilege
or advantage shall be conceded to christianity or any
other special religion; that our entire political system
shall be founded and administered on a purely secular
basis; and that whatever changes shall prove neces-

Page 4

January, 1983

sary to this end shall be consistently, unflinchingly,

and promptly made.
Had the Atheists of our nation supported Francis Ellingwood Abbot one hundred years ago, the situation would not
be as bad in the United States as it is today. Almost one
hundred years before, in 1784, James Madison had warned
everyone of the dangers. When fighting the religious forces
in Virginia, he had stated in his Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments, "... it is proper to
take alarm at the first experiment on our liberties .... We
hold this to be the first duty of citizens, and one of (the)
noblest characteristics of the late Revolution. The freemen
of America did not wait tillusurped power had strengthened
itself by exercise, and entangled the question in precedents.
They sawall the consequences in the principle, and they
avoided the consequences by denying the principle. We
revere this lesson too much, soon to forget it." But Madison
was wrong - we did forget it and our nation now is in a
position where power usurped by religion has strengthened
itself by exercise and entangled the question in precedents
which are almost impossible -to combat. Now, at the
beginning of 1983 we review with dismay the abuses of
religion throughout the land. In all nine areas of concern to
Francis Ellingwood Abbot, Atheists are mindful of the
threat. There is an awakening felt now across the nation as
egalitarian idealists move to timidly embrace the concept of
freedom from religion, first recognized in our time era by
Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas in the case of
McGowan v. Maryland (1960).
One hundred and nine years have brought one partial
victory only, wrested from government in a bitter and
protracted legal battle which culminated in the US Supreme
Court decision of June, 1963, when reverential bible reading
and unison recitation of the so-called lord's prayer were
banished from the public schools of our nation by the case
of Murray v. Cur/ett, through the efforts of the MurrayO'Hair family, founders of American Atheists.
This year is the 20th anniversary of that case, the 109th
anniversary of the Nine Demands and the 199th anniversary of the warning given by Madison. A review of the
current status follows:
******

The American Atheist

ITEM: LOBBYING AND THE CHURCHES.

Under Federal Regulation of Lobbying Act, groups
whose "principle purpose" is to solicit and spend money to
influence Congress and communicate directly with lawmakers are required to register and file quarterly reports
with the House and the Senate. In addition to detailed
spending records, the reports are required to include the
names and addresses of all persons contributing more than
$500. Although, in the fiscal year ending August 31, 1981,
the moral majority spent $4.4 million for "lobbying and
publications," the federal government has not brought that
organization into compliance with the law. Falwell insists
that his is not a true lobbying group but his publications
reveal the active role his organization is taking, for example, ~~,-"",~".iI~!II~iH~
in the criminal code bill.We quote the November 23rd issue ~ ~~
(1981) of moral majority's publication: "The Senate Judici--------------,
ary Committee staff has agreed to negotiate with moral
majority over its concerns. But unless the negotiations
produce much more than expected, we believe that the best
course of action willbe killthe bill."Much of the information
that could be interpreted as showing preference for any
on legislation which is printed in Falwell's publications are
supplied, says his second-in-command, Ronald Godwin, by political candidate on issues of interest to the church, (an
IRS ruling of June, 1978 prohibited such endorsement), he
the conservative Republican Steering Committee in the
defiantly wrote an editorial in his June, 1981 issue titled "To
Senate, the US Chamber of Commerce, the Nationai
Association of Manufacturers and the National RifleAssoci- the IRS - NUTS." In that issue he characterized the
presidential candidates with John B. Anderson being "the
ation.
most abrasive pro-abortionist;" Edward Kennedy as having
Our nation is in good hands!
"regrettably consistently sided with pro-abortion forces;"
The third largest public interest group membership in the
nation, with a budget of $6.6 million and a membership of and Jimmy Carter as being "politically expedient" on the
200,000, directed by Richard A. Viguerie, spews out over
issue. He concluded with an endorsement of Ronald
100 million pieces of direct mail per year to aid the goals of Reagan as "the only Presidential candidate who is clearly
opposed to abortion and is willingto use the political power
the radical religious right.
of the Presidency to support his position." In making this
In October, 1980, the Abortion Rights Mobilization,
endorsement the priest-editor defied guidelines which had
headed up by Lawrence Lader, filed a suit in the Federal
been issued, in February, 1981, by the Catholic Press
District Court in the Southern District of New York seeking
to force the IRS to collect taxes retroactively from Jan. 1, Association, headquartered in Rockville Center, New
York, which were a tacit acceptance of the IRS's regulation.
1978 from any roman catholic group found to have violated
By and large the scattered roman catholic presses did not
the tax exempt provisions of the IRS code in respect to
like knuckling under and a large number ignored the IRS
lobbying. In January 1981, an amended suit added the US
Catholic Conference and the National Conference of ruling. By May of 1981 the Catholic Press Association was
forced to issue a "clarification," to the effect that its position
Catholic Bishops to the case.
The original catalyst of the suit was a pastoral letter sent
stated in its issued guidelines did "not constitute approval of
by a Boston, Massachusetts cardinal to 410 parishes in
the IRS ruling." Also at issue in the case is the tax exempt
Massachusetts just a few days before a state congressional
status of the roman catholic journals which operate on a
primary, saying it would be "a sin" to vote for two prononprofit mailing permit. Denial of that status, with a
abortion congressional candidates.
subsequent higher postage rate, could "kill the papers
financially," the churches claim.
.
By July, 1982, a federal judge ruled in this case that the
groups and the individuals had standing to sue. At the same
American Atheists participated in the Abortion Rights
time he dismissed all complaints against the church itself
Mobilization case to the extent of obtaining copies of the
saying that the government must be the object of the action
San Antonio diocesan newspaper directly from the diocese
and not the roman catholic church. This is thought to be the
headquarters for use in the legal action.
first case in which third parties have argued the right to seek
A total of 10 church publications had violated the rule
injunctive relief from a grievance arising from the tax
before it became a national issue with the San Antonio
exemption of organized religion.
editorial stance.
Evidence of similar intrusions into political campaigns in
Meanwhile, Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia
Long Island, New York; South Dakota; Pittsburgh, Pennsylremanded a significant case to the federal District Court of
vania; St. Cloud, Minn.: Livonia, Michigan; Ames, Iowa; and
D.C., when an en baric hearing resulted in a 7 to 3 decision
San Antonio, Texas were cited. When the editor of the
in the case of Taxation with Representation of Washington
Today's Catholic, the official weekly newspaper of the
v. Regan. This case deals with an IRS regulation that
archdiocese of San Antonio, was warned by the IRS that he
prohibits groups exempt under 501(C)(3) from devoting a
could lose the paper's tax exemption if he printed anything
"substantial part" of their activities to "carrying on propa-

Austin, Texas

January, 1983

be tbejudge ...

PageS

ganda, or otherwise attempting to influence legislation."

Since all churches and religious institutions are exempt
under this section of the IRS law, the religious community
nervously watched the case. The appellate court held that
Taxation's rights were abridged under the 5th Amendment
guarantee to equal protection, but not under the 1st
Amendment. The equal protection provision ruling came
because veterans' organizations, exempt under 501(C)(19)
can lobby. The federal District Court now has the job of
devising some "equal protection" theory which will continue to favor the veterans' organizations without seeming to
do so. It willbe a neat trick.

Pressing everywhere for government funds and sponsorship, religious forces had proposed two state constitutional
amendments this year for public aid to religious schools.
However. Proposition 9 was turned down by California
residents by a 61%-39%vote and Question 1 was defeated in
Massachusetts by a 62%-38% vote, as again, depressed
economic conditions were helpful in the defense of state/
church separation. Both states were trying to give publicly
financed textbook aid to religious schools. In California that
state's roman catholic dioceses "lent" money to the committee pushing Proposition 9. American Atheistscan safely bet
that no law enforcement agency willlook at any violation of
IRS regulations forbidding political activity since California
is a strong roman catholic state. And, this despite the fact
that National Catholic Reporter freely disclosed that diocesan spending included: $100,000 from L.A.; $45,410 from
San Francisco; $38,110 from Oakland, $29,405 from San
Jose; $28,000 from Sacramento; $25,000 from San Diego;
$20,000 from San Bernardino; $12,670 from Stockton;
$10,500 from Santa Rosa, and $10,000 from Monterrey. The
total was $319,095 spent for the proposition while the
opponents spent less than $10,000. The Reporter opined
that the loans would be repaid "to some extent." The
campaign included sophisticated television appeals with

Page 6

January, 1983

Helen Hayes giving a heart-rendering appeal for votes "for

books for children" and the archdiocese of L.A. paying for a
fullpage ad in the L.A. Times urging a yes vote. Again it will
be up to an individual citizen or organization to sue the
government and force it to take action in this instance.
There are difficulties for government brewing in the "tax
exemption" area. Several theories conflict. The "tax expenditure" theory holds that exemption from taxation is an
affirmative benefit extended by the legislature to organizations that benefit the public, being a subsidy or grant for
performing certain services. Since churches do not perform
a service which the government can supply or should
encourage (because of the First Amendment), there are a
number of questions about the tax expenditure theory. The
"tax base" theory holds that certain institutions are not
taxed because they are not in the tax base to begin. The
Revenue Act of 1913 was structured to tax "net income."
Therefore any non-profit organization, having no "net
income," would not be subject to taxation. Naturally, the
religious community prefers the second theory and strives
for it.
But during it all the Christian Broadcasting Network, in
Virginia Beach, Virginia, has been advised by the State of
Virginia that it does not use its 390 acre property for
"exclusively religious" work and therefore is subject to
taxation on its land. The opinion was based on nonreligious
use of the CBN facilities, specifically its secular programs,
its paid advertising and its leasing of studios and production
facilities to commercial interests for a fee. It is expected that
Pat Robertson will appeal before the assessment becomes
final in June, 1983.
*'* * * * *
ITEM: RELIGION AND THE DEATH OF
CHILDREN.
The year 1982 was again characterized by stories surfacing in the media across the United States of children
dying because parents had relied on the healing powers of
jesus christ and refused medical aid to their children. Again
this year, in most instances local prosecutors found some
excuse for winking their eyes at the deaths. But, in several
states the parents were actually arraigned on "involuntary
manslaughter charges" in relation to the deaths. The state,
condoning any action termed religion, continues to permit
the wilful religious murder of children in our nation.

******
ITEM: STATE LOAN OF BOOKS TO RELIGIOUS
SCHOOLS.
The California Supreme Court, the only state court in the
nation with courage enough to do so, ruled in April, 1982
that it was unconstitutional for the state to lend public
school books to religious schools.

******
ITEM: COLLEGE CAMPUSES GIVEN TO
RELIGIOUS RIGHT.
On December 8, 1981, the US Supreme Court placed

The American Atheist

state supported colleges and universities in jeopardy across

the nation with an 8-to-1 majority decision in Widmar v_
Vincent, that those institutions must provide facilities for
religious organizations
to engage in religious worship on
campus. The effects of the decision were immediately felt in
1982. The year was characterized
by a massive assault on
state colleges and universities by every religion as they
moved en masse. Nationally, the campus crusade for christ,
maranatha,
christian athletic fellowship and others increased their activities while locally, whatever religious
zanies that could moved in. The demands were most felt at
University of Virginia, University of Illinois, University of
South Carolina, University of California at Berkeley, University of Texas and Florida State. Many of the national
organizations
have grandiose plans. And, immediately
parents in a high school in west Texas started litigation to
have the Widmar v. Vincent decision applied at that level.
Since the attorney, Leon Jaworski died of a heart attack
during mid-December, activity on the case is not currently
available.

'could be excused from sex education

programs if the
parents requested it and if the participation conflicted with
conscientiously held religious beliefs.
Sometimes some difficulties can develop, as in Colorado
when a state representative
demanded all school districts
send him a list of their sex education materials so that he
could submit the books to fundamentalists
who have
terrorized the state of Texas Board of Education for the last
five years. Nine school districts had courage enough to
refuse.
Meanwhile, Planned Parenthood,
which also is a sex
educational agency, was under attack from Ronald Reagan
who set the General Accounting Office and a federal health
inspector on it to see if any federal dollars were going to
abortion. Planned Parenthood operates 36 clinics, nationwide and it was almost universally understood that this was
a mere harassment
movement against it because of the
hostility of the roman catholic church directed to this group
and the need of the administration
to woo roman catholic
votes.

******

******
ITEM: SEXUAL INNOCENCE
THE RELIGIOUS.

ITEM: MAIL ORDER MINISTRIES_

FOR

Sex education was under attack in 1982 as the religious

continued to push for its elimination in public schools,
aiming attacks at school boards. However, the public
educational system is becoming more adept at handling the
problem and in Kentucky and New Jersey agreed with the
religious parents that their children be given studies in
general health while other students were taught sex education. This ploy apparently may be an acceptable solution
while still retaining general sex education for the average
public school student, especially since the US Supreme
Court could find no "substantial federal question" in the
case of Smith v. Brand which was appealed from the New
Jersey Supreme Court. That Court, reversing the trick
constantly played with Atheist parents, this time told the
religious parents that their rights were protected by a local
New Jersey board of education's regulation that children

.i \
"But doctor, she can't be pregnant I didn't
let her take any sex education classes!"

Austin, Texas

The universal life church, granddaddy of all the mail order

ministry systems in the country, was sued for $1.25 million
because one of its ministers in North Carolina married a
couple without legal authorization from the state to perform
such marriage. The woman charged "unlawful cohabitation
unsanctioned by law" had caused her emotional distress.
In 1982, also, the US Supreme Court refused to review
the New York case of Town of Hardenburgh v. State of
New York. There, 88% of the property owners of the city
claimed exemptions from property taxes as ministers of the
universal life church. The highest court of New York state
concluded
that if all the property
was owned by the
ministers of u.l.c., they should not object to turning it all
over to a trust fund, run exclusively for the benefit of that
church. It was a massive loss for u.l.c. arid the decision will
probably be followed in other states. American Atheists,
although friendly with the u.l.c. and personal "priests" of
Kerby Hensley, never involved itself in this tax exemption
scheme since it was felt that the states and federal
government were sooner or later going to come down hard
on the idea.
The IRS and the tax courts have repeatedly denied tax
exemption to assorted "mail order ministries," charging
that they are simply tax dodges. The legal argument used
against them is that they do not pass an "operational test" of
being for "public" rather than "private" interests. Kirby
Hensley in Universal Life Church v. US won a victory in
1974 because the IRS sought to show that his church was
not, in fact, religious, the trial judge holding, "Neither this
court, nor any branch of government,
will consider the
merits or fallacies of a religion." This only showed the IRS
how to proceed and the definitional arguments have now
been abandoned in favor of the "operational"
test so that
tax exemption may not be used to foster a private purpose.
From 1977 to 1980 the IRS detected 1,657 Hensley-type
operations.
In 1980 it found 382 such schemes involving
4,296 tax returns claiming $7,073.400 in refunds. An IRS

January, 1983

Page 7

spokesman believes "Many are apparently using the

scheme merely to evade property, state, and local taxes.
They're not taking on the IRS." Perhaps with good reason
for the IRS has won 39 consecutive cases against mail-order
ministers for tax exemption.
The basic bible church, organized on the same principle
as the universal life church, has been under constant fire by
the IRS. After failing to put the founder in jail in 1981, he and
eight of his "ministers" in Texas were reindicted in April on
charges of federal income tax evasion.
The life science church, also organized on the universal
life church plan, was enjoined from selling ordination
certificates in New York state in 1982. Already under
preliminary injunction from a 1981 case, this case against life
science was built under the" consumer fraud" statutes. The
head of this church, in February, 1982, was given five years
in prison in California on 26 counts of violating federal
income tax laws. His son received two years and a couple
from Indiana were placed on probation. Church charters
and ministerial certificates, the court held, were "false,
fraudulent and misleading representations, pretenses and
promises" which could not be fulfilled by tax exemption.

******
ITEM: THE BIAS OF THE IRS IN FAVOR
RELIGION.

OF

During 1982 several Atheists attempted to challenge the

religious preference of the IRS. In Austin, Texas, Gerald
and Gloria Tholen, and Jon Murray, officials of The
American Atheist Center, joined a suit which attacked the
practice of permitting the religious to take a tax deduction
on their individual 1040 tax returns for contributing to
religious organizations. The IRS code of 1954 had made
such a deduction possible. In order to channel such tax
deductible contributions to government approved eleemosynary institutions the IRS issued a large book containing a
list of them. This book, titled Cumulative Index is the size of
an ordinary telephone book. Charging that the US government had simply set up a reward system to encourage the
practice of citizen funding of state approved units of the
judeo/ christian religion with money which would otherwise
be submitted to the government for taxes, the MurrayTholen team outlined how the state had set up an administrative and taxation procedure calculated to advance
religion. However, in the fall of '82 the suit was not
maintained when a federal district court in S. Antonio held
that they lacked "standing" to sue.
On the west coast an individual member of GALA,
Jeffrey D. Vowles, filed a suit in US District Court,
Southern District of California challenging the use of
religion as a basis for income tax exemption eligibilitywhich
gave a preference to belief in religion over nonbelief and
promoted an entanglement between state and church. The
court held that it lacked subject matter jurisdiction. It is
imperative that other "tries" on these issues be had and
American Atheist Center continues with legal research.
Among IRS's other helpful assistance to religion is
Section 107 of the IRS code which exempts "a minister of
the gospel" from income taxes on a home provided as part
of compensation and on any rental allowance paid in lieu of

Page 8

January, 1983

a house. Seeing the abuse itself, however, the IRS in a case

in the tax court in North Texas fought for and won a
decision in 1982 that 20 ordained professors of a christian
university in Texas were not entitled to this free exemption
since they had no sacerdotal functions. The case, however,
pointed out the abuses which religious institutions institute
as they continue to construe these already favorable laws in
such a way as to wring out every last cent of benefit to their
institutions. The case, which the university has decided not
to appeal, narrows exemptions to ordained ministers with
sacerdotal functions.

~83

Internal Revenue Service

Instructions for Form 990

bturn of Organization
Exempt from Income Tax
Under section SOl(c) (except black lung benefit trust
or private foundation) of the Internal Revenue Code
or section 4947(a)(l) trust
(Section ,.f.,ences

are to the Inte,nal Revenue Code, unless otherwise Ind.cated)

General Instructions
font'l!lo~.-.

rnc-e part,e

. O. niutiona Not Required to

F. SM.-FOI' State fiting purposes. lee
inanlction
D. The following types of org.oiutionl:axempt
from
under section 501 (a)
do not have to tile Fonn 990 with IRS:

t..

1 . A churdt. an interchurch
organization
of tocaI units of church convention or
aaeoa.tion
of c:t..dtes or an integrated
auxiliary of c ..
c:tt (auch a men', or
women'.
organization. raligioua school. mi.
ooc:iety . youth groupl.

-.

2. A achool

below coAege

lever affiliated

churc:h or operated by a religious

3. A minion
~
ored by or
affiliated witt. 01' IlION churches
or
dlurch_
-.if_than
.
h.1f
of the 1IOCiety'. ectiwitiea are conducted
in,
Of diNcted
penons in. foreign countriea.

........

-.

4. An ucluliwty

NIigiouI ectivity

of eny

Oil"!

"
, '04
I( II tr .~1!

e."e' ior yea'

be. )1. 1980 .,)'1
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1,l<nll.eq "emer
Ihe

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hat

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met e!"~c" boo r
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rNmq~

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.~
...

However, in White v. US the Federal District Court of

Central Utah did rule that mormon parents may not claim
an income tax deduction for money given directly to their
children in the missionary service. That case is on appeal to
the Circuit Court and a decision should be forthcoming in
1983.
This was overshadowed by Ronald Reagan's administration resulting in a change 'of IRS individual deduction rules
generally so that even those persons using short forms may
take, on a graduated yearly scale, greater allowances for
religious contributions, effective January 1,1983. This must
be challenged.

The American Atheist

******

ITEM: FREE SOCIAL SECURITY, A GIFT

FROM UNCLE SAM TO FOLLOWERS OF CHRIST
At a time when the beneficiaries of Social Security are
even denied the extra pennies computed to be theirs for
contributions into the system (The US is now rounding
each check down to the next dollar. If a beneficiary should
have received $350.76, the government now keeps the 76

cents.) Approximately.3 million pe~ple receiving $122 per

month Social Security checks were dropped from the rolls
early in Ronald Reagan's presidency. But Congress in late
December, 1981 was forced to return them. Although no
new persons were to be permitted to qualify after January,
1982, we now find that Congress has modified that so that
only members of religious orders may now get on the rolls in
the next ten years. Any nunnery with a score or more "over
63 year old" nuns, can peacefully collect each one's $122 a
month now. And what did the nuns, priests, and brothers
put into Social Security? Nothing. Their privilege is to milk
the fund.

******

ITEM: CRECHES AND NATIVITY SCENES;

CHRIST IN GOVERNMENT.
A series of hard fought suits have been in city, county and
state courts, as well as federal district and federal appellate
courts, beginning in the early 1970's, many'involving either
the American Atheist organization or its members. In "ill
disguised hostile decisions, the courts have universally held
that the depiction of the birth of jesus christ is a bauble
christmas tree decoration, a device to attract shoppers, an
enhancement of the commercial exploitation of the holiday,
an accommodation to the majoritarian culture, innocuous
or even nonreligious. However, finally on November 4,
1982, the 1st Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston, Massachusetts held that a Pawtucket Rhode Island nativity scene
"had a primary effect of advancing religion and therefore
was unconstitutional." The court ruled that the city was
unable to "advance any legitimate secular purpose" for

Austin, Texas

depicting the birth of j.c. In characteristic petty political

style, the mayor of the city ordered the case to be appealed
to the US Supreme Court.
The governor of South Dakota insisted on installing 'a
nativity scene in the rotunda of the state Capitol, claiming
that the creche is "a part of the American scene," equivalent
to "Barbie dolls."
In a see-saw court battle over an enormous life size
nativity scene on the steps of the city-county building in
Denver, Colorado, which has been going on since November, 1978, litigation continued throughout 1982. At first
ordered removed by one federal judge, having climbed the
appellate ladder and returned again for a new hearing with
another federal district court, in a decision calculated to
insult but maintain religion in christmas, the judge of the
latter noted, "The nativity scene is both a religious symbol
of the birth of christ and a sign of the holiday season on a par
with santa and mistletoe." Atheists, while happy to have a
federal judge say that the nativity of j.c. is the same kind of
. myth as is santa claus, nonetheless willcontinue in this fight
which now goes to the Colorado State Supreme Court for
yet another hearing.
And in early December a judge in Milwaukee, Wisconsin
proclaimed that the City Hall marquee sign, "Keep Christ in
Christmas," was unconstitutional unless it also displayed
the name of the organization which suggested it: the
Milwaukee archdiocesan confraternity of christian mothers. The judge, who told all and sundry that he was a
methodist minister's son, held that ifthe "attribution" of the
roman catholic source was added to the sign, it would
distinguish that it was a religious message and not a
government message, therefore being permissible. But,
who pays for the bill for the sign? Taxpayers.
What it all meant was evidenced by the governor of
Wisconsin who designated November 22-28 as "Prayer Vigil
Week" and urged all citizens to get to their knees.
But in ACLU v. Rabun County Chamber of Commerce
the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in June held that the
erection of a large, illuminated cross at Black Mountain
State Park in Rabun County, Georgia, was not a tourist
attraction but a religious symbol and that public authorities
had violated the First Amendment by erecting the cross on
public property.
And in Illinois in May the House of Representatives
approved a bill to crack down on abuses of the state's
bargain-price license plates for cars and buses owned by
churches. The bright orange, $4-a-year plates have been
spotted too often on luxury cars, so the new measure would
require proof of qualification (easy enough for a church!)
and the name of the vehicle owner to be displayed on the
sides of the bus or automobile.

******

ITEM: BOOK BURNING AND CENSORSHIP.

It was a good year for the bigots, with children's books
such as Cinderella and Little Red Riding Hood going up in
flames in church parking lots across the nation. One 7-year
old agreed to burn his "Star War" figures "because they are
not of god." Texas and South Carolina were prime leading
states in the battle.

January, 1983

Page 9

However, the US Supreme Court did order that a Long

Island School Board return books removed from the
libraries of the school district. The number of books
challenged nationwide has grown to 1,200 and includes Kurt
Vonnegut Jr.'s Slaughterhouse Five, Desmond Morris's
The Naked Ape, Eldridge Cleaver's Soul On Ice, Mark
Twain's The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, The Adventures
of Huckleberry Finn, John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men, In
Dubious Battle, and works of Hemingway, Conrad, Homer,
Poe, Hawthorne and Bernard Malamud's The Fixer. The
American Bookseller Association made available a list of
the most banned books and some of the shockers in the list
included: L. Frank Baum's The Wizard of Oz, Sir Arthur
Conan Doyle's Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, Henry
Fielding's Tom Jones, F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great
Gatsoy, Homer's The Odyssey, James Joyce's The Dubliners and Ulysses, Harper Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird,
Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman, John Milton's Paradise Lost, Boris Pasternak's Doctor Zhivago, J.D. Salinger's Catcher in the Rye, Shakespeare's King Lear, The
Merchant of Venice, Richard II, Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's
Travels, and P.L. Travers's Mary Poppins.
The National Coalition Against Censorship in May, '82
issued a summary of current cases involving litigation on the
issue of censorship. They include: California where a policy
of restricted access to material has been put into effect
rather than an outright ban. The suit McKamey v. Mt.
Diable Unified School District was filed when Ms. magazine
was restricted in its availability only to students with
parental permission. In Wexner v. Anderson Union High
School District five of Richard Brautigan's books having
been banned, the challenge is on. In Idaho Ken Kesey's One
Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest was banned but a suit is likely
to be dismissed since the school board involved agreed to
provide for a district book review committee which would
include English teachers. In Maine, in early 1982 a federal
district court judge in Sheck v. Baileyville School Committee ordered Dr. Ronald Glasser's book 365 days (experiences of American combat soldiers in Vietnam) to be
returned to a high school library shelf. In New York in Pico
v. Board of Education, Island Trees the issue was at first
standing, and then of course, with the US Supreme Court
review of the case, the nine books banned were ordered
returned to the shelves of the school library and for
classroom work. These particular books were characterized as "anti-American, anti-Christian, anti-Semetic (sic)
and just plain filthy." Fortunately, 34 organizations filed
friend-of-the-court briefs in this suit. In Oregon, "standing"
again was an issue as an attempt was made to throw
Johnson v. Stuart out of court. There a state law prescribes'
that no American history or government text may "speak
slightingly of the founders of the republic or of those who
preserved the union or which belittles or undervalues their
work." The outcome of the case is awaited. In Washington
in Grove v. Mead School District No. 354 a moral majority
parent group is worried about "swearing, explicit sexual
descriptions and blasphemies against jesus christ" in the
Gordon Parks' book The Learning Tree. The suit states
that the book" ... tends to inculcate the anti-god religion of
humanism which is antithetical to plaintiff's beliefs.... " This
suit is also pending.

Page 10

January, 1983

Meanwhile, a late year survey of high school libraries

indicated that Go Ask Alice is the book most frequently
censored at that level. This is the diary of a teenage girl who
fell into drug use and committed suicide. Her parents
published the book after her death in the hope that her story
would deter others from using drugs. Whereas there was
fewer than 1%of local critics carping to libraries in 1977, that
has now increased to 17%.The research revealed that when
a book is challenged, on 54% of the occasions some form of
censorship resulted, the book often being removed.
In addition to those listed above, the books which are
being targeted for censoring especially in high schools are
Boston Women's Health Collective's Our Bodies, Ourselves; Judy Blume's Forever; John Steinbeck's Grapes of
Wrath; Alice Chidress's A Hero Ain't Nothing But a
Sandwich; Paul Zindel's My Darling, My Hamburger; from
a recommended list, from classroom use.
To emphasize it all, the Office of Intellectual Freedom of
the American Library Association put 60 banned books into
a travelling exhibition which is currently booked for display
up through '84. The AL.A put the display together for its
own convention in 1981, but it proved to be so popular, with
requests for its exhibition that it since has "hit the road." By
March, '82, it had already been displayed in ten cities. The
AL.A notes that the number of challenges to books had
held steady at about 300 a year for several years, but that in
'81 this had increased to 900. But, since only about 15% of
the challenges on books are reported by the local news
media, the true situation is difficult to know. Most challenges, however, do come from parents. Only occasionally is
there a student complaint or - once in a while - that of a
librarian.

Ta the already existing list reported here the AL.A

added the American Heritage Dictionary of the English
Language banned in Alaska, Missouri and Indiana; George
Eliot's Silas Marner; Margaret Mitchell's Gone With The
Wind; Ira Levin's Rosemary's Baby; Alexander Solzhenitsyn's One Day in The Life of Ivan Denisovich - which
contained the word "bastard;" and
children's book
entitled Father Christmas.
There was some little light in the late fall when the New
York City Board of Education rejected three high school
biology textbooks for having an inadequate treatment of the
Darwinian theory of evolution, thus becoming one of the
first large districts to put publishers on notice that it willnot
accept uncritical endorsements of the creationist theories
in biology class books.

The American Atheist

.-

_011I
11I""

...;,

",,--~....
<::-
'"

..~ =..... ;;:;,

.. iiii........

-'

",.

(~ / jthe rulinginMeltzerv. Board of Education, 577 F2d311; 5th

/' Cir. banco 1978; cert. den; 439 US 1089; 99 SCt. 872; 59
L.Ed. 2 56 (1979) that sectarian literature, such as the
gideon bible may not be distributed to students on public
school grounds, even if students wish to receive the
Rock and roll music got it too, as the Led Zeppelins', the
Beatles' and Pink Floyd's records went up in flames in material.
An attempt at such gideon bible distribution was made in
church parking lots in Missouri and Texas. A 12 year old
Arkansas in early 1982 but when American Atheist member
boy whamming away with a sledge hammer at a large box
housing his priceless collection while he both shook with N.C. Danke filed suit in Federal District Court, a consent
decree stopping distribution was obtained in April, 1982. In.
agony from the loss and reveled in joy for the glory was a
strange sight to behold on television. It was worse in Iowa, gideon society international finally came to an agreement to no longer distribute the bibles to fifth graders in that
Topeka, Kansas where a frenzy of destruction descended.
state when a threat of a legal suit solidified. And, the official
There the objectionable objects were "rock and roll," which
some pastors could not even describe. Of course, Kiss was
distribution of such gideon bibles was stopped in Oklahoma
a prime target, as was the Ramones ("Beat on the Brat"),
by similar threats.
Meanwhile on August 9th, Americans United and six.
Pat Benatar ("Hell is for Children"), AC/DC ("Hells Bells")
and Kiss ("Gotta Thunder, Gotta Rock 'n' Roll"), Rolling local taxpayers won a suit in Grand Rapids, Michigan when
Stones ("Sympathy for the Devil"), Black Sabbath ("Heava federal judge there agreed that public school funds used to
en and Hell"), Alice Cooper ("Alice Cooper Goes to Hell"),
lease space in parochial schools and to hire instructors to
teach classes there was a violation of the Establishment
Ozzy Osbourne, Queen {"Another One Bites the Dust"},
Clause of the First Amendment. The school system had
K.C. and the Sunshine Band ("Shake Your Bootie") and
Olivia Newton-John ("Let's Get Physical").
placed 470 full time and part time teachers in catholic,
lutheran, and christian-reformed religious schools, many
You are NOT paranoid. They are really out there!
being current or former employees of the religious schools
******
in which they were teaching. The $3 million so-called
"shared time" program was characterized by the court as
"When courses are offered within the abdomen of a
ITEM: RELIGION IN SCHOOLS.
sectarian institution to students who are brought together
Religious instruction in school is back with school boards
for a religious mission, there is a distinctly impermissible
and local communities defying prior US Supreme Court
rulings such as McCollum V. Board of Education and simply constitutional effect."
installingministers in classrooms. The situation was particu******
larly bad in Virginia, the home of Falwell where two entire
counties continue bible study classes in elementary schools
ITEM: A RELIGIOUS BIG BROTHER SAVES
despite protests from many parents. The school administraA CITY FROM ITSELF
tors' attitude is summed up by those in the Shenandoah
district, "We realize we are wrong. But the majority of the
In the state of Washington, a local evangelist elected to
parents support it."
the town council decided that he would ban all cable TV.
Bibles have been distributed in public schools in twelve . So, out it went - no all-news channel, no children's show
channel, no educational channel, no sport channel. And, he
counties in Virginia, despite threats of law suits and despite

;:33

Austin, Texas

January, 1983

Page 11

calmly reflected about the entire town "I am concerned for

the mental and spiritual well being" of the citizens. "Our
fo~ding fathers were christians ... and
they were not
excluded from making right decisions
I am not saying
they (the townspeople) are not capable of making a good
decision. This is not so much for the good of the majority
but for the good of everyone."
And the town of South Prairie took it, lying down.
******

ITEM: REAGAN'S SUPPORT

OF RACIST SCHOOLS.
As we all know, when separated education for the Blacks
of our nation was found to be inferior and a deprivation of
their civilrights, the United States set itself upon a course to
integrate the Blacks into the larger, better, public school
system. Busing was mandated by the federal courts as one
solution, but this series of court orders brought a burst of
outrage from white parents dead set against having their
children attend public school with Blacks. A rash of allwhite, private, often fundamentalist, religious schools
sprang up throughout the nation, numbering in the tens of
thousands. These, most often, were called "communitybased academies." Because they were put together in
defiance of the national civil rights statutes, the IRS denied
tax exemption.
In April, the US Supreme Court agreed to review the
joined Bob Jones University v. United States (from South
Carolina) and Goldsboro Christian Schools Inc. v. United
States (from North Carolina) cases, which are on appeal
from the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals which (December 30,
1980) upheld the IRS's right to terminate or deny the
exempt status of religious institutions with racially discriminatory policies.
But early in '82 the IRS ended its l l-year policy of denying
tax-exempt status to schools which discriminate in admission and other policies because of race. President Reagan,
on the side of the lily-white schools, had stepped into a
continuing argument between the IRS and the schools, by
saying that Congress had not given the IRS power to deny
the tax breaks. On January 8, Reagan had penciled on a
letter received from a member of Congress (Rep. Trent
Lott, R-MS), asking the US to intervene in the cases of Bob
Jones University in S. Carolina and Goldsboro Christian
Schools in N. Carolina, "I think we should." His word was
law to the IRS. About III schools had been denied tax
exemption because of racial discrimination. Actually, Reagan was trying to save Bob Jones University, the fundamentalist blot on our nation, $750,000 a year in taxes it must pay
if racial segregation is impermissible in religious schools.
When Reagan showed his racist colors, such an uproar
ensued that he had to back away from his order to the IRS
that it had exceeded its authority. Reagan then retreated
and passed the buck to Congress. The IRS Code of 1954
(another good year for McCarthy) had approved a plan by
which taxpayers could take a deduction on their individual
1040tax returns for contributions to religious organizations
and the schools depended on the money which this IRS tax
break to donors gave the schools. But meantime, the case
of IRS v. Bob Jones University had been accepted by the

Page 12

January, 1983

US Supreme Court. That school, founded in 1927, is

dedicated to the indoctrination of its students in a literal
reading of the bible and an unwavering obedience to biblical
commandments. Attorneys for Bob Jones University point
out that the bible ordains that races not mix and therefore
that the school must be free to practice that belief no matter
what the laws of the land. The case was argued in October,
1982 before the US Supreme Court in a what-the-Britishcall "bit of the sticky wicket." For although the IRS was
contra the Bob Jones University, Reagan had ordered that
the US government argue that the schools should be given
the tax exemption -an opposite reason for which the case
had been brought. With both the attorneys for the religious
schools and the government on the same side, the US
Supreme Court was put into a position that it had to appoint
someone to argue for the constitution, civil rights and the
people. Black attorney, WilliamColeman, did that, principally pointing out that the tax breaks would be a subsidy of civil
'rights violations. The decision should come in early '83.
That issue remains the same at the US Supreme Court
level despite Reagan's effort to moot the litigation. The
Blacks won their civil liberties fight to be coequal citizens of
the United States in the mid-'60's. By the early '70's
nondiscrimination as a test for federal tax exemption of
private schools had been firmly established. Then in 1971 a
ruling came in Green v. Connally which broadened the
prohibition to include religious schools in one state, Mississippi. The policy was gradually extended until by 1975 it was
applied to all religious schools. The schools in the current
US Supreme Court case simply maintained that the IRS
never had authority under its enabling legislation to establish a public policy test for exemption. This is the argument
Reagan bought, causing a short flurry of excitement for the
cases. They have, however, as indicated had briefing and
oral argument and a decision is expected in early '83. Only
the american jewish committee is supporting the IRS
decision, all other amicus curiae briefs supported the right
of racial discrimination with tax exemption and included the
american baptist churches, the united presbyterian church,
the national association of evangelicals, the church of jesus
christ of latter-day saints (the morrnons), and several small
mennonite and amish groups.

The-American Atheist

Of course, American Atheists feel that the IRS should

deny tax exemption for these schools on another basis: the
fundamentalist bible based christian ideology saturation of
the school is so insane that no state support (such as tax
exemption) should be permitted on the basis of such aid
being forbidden under the Establishment Clause of the First
Amendment to our Constitution.
******

ITEM: RELIGIONS PROTECT THEIR OWN.

Although the media made much of the income tax
evasion troubles of Korean evangelist Sun Myung Moon,
little publicity was given to his "win" during May of the case
of Holy Spirit Association v. the Tax Commission, whereby
he gained state property tax exemption in New York. A
lower court had ruled that his organization was "political
and economic" and therefore did not qualify for the
. exemption, but on May 6th seven judges of the Court of
Appeals of New York, in a unanimous decision held that his
organization was "primarily religious." It added that no
court or other civil authority may "inquire into or classify
the content of the doctrine, dogmas and teachings held by
that body to be integral to its religion, ... but must accept
that body's characterizations of its own beliefs and activities
and those of its adherents, so long as that characterization
is made in good faith and is not a sham." Despite all the flak
that the staid and established religions have directed
towards Moon's cult, he was joined in his case with amicus
curiae briefs filed on his behalf by the national c.ouncil of
churches, the new york state council of churches, the
american jewish congress, the national association of
evangelicals, the catholic league for religious and civilrights,
and christian legal society and the American Civil Liberties
Union.
Perhaps the churches were all fearful of activity on the
part of the legislatures of Pennsylvania and Maine both of
which introduced bills in 1982 to levy service charges on
some religious properties. Seeking money for police and fire
protection, the hard pressed municipal and county tax
entities finally have turned to the churches which own, in
most states, approximately 20% of all privately owned land,
all tax free; all constricting the base for ad valorem (real
estate) taxes thereby increasing those taxes for every home
owner (and consequently every renter) in the state. And, in
Grand Rapids, Michigan the City sought to tax a building
housing the administrative offices and publishing offices of
the christian reformed church, but lost its case in the .
Michigan Tax Tribunal and the State Court of Appeals ..

******
ITEM: NON-ACCREDITED
RELIGIOUS SCHOOLS.
The religious radical right in its full-speed retreat from the
twentieth century continues to open more and more small
fundamentalist schools wherein children, the victims of the
parents' fanaticism, may be brainwashed. As government at
all levels steps in to save the minds of the children,
demanding accredited teachers, accredited courses, nourishing foods, more and more of the fundamentalist preach-

Austin, Texas

ers are playing the martyrs' role of bulldog guardian of the

doors of ignorance. In Nebraska one minister went to jailfor
contempt of court for operating his school with noncertified teachers. In Iowa that state is demanding the
names and addresses of students and teachers and copies
of textbooks from the fundamentalist schools. In Iowa as
elsewhere there are compulsory school attendance laws
and certification requirements for teachers other than the
teacher's faith in god. In Maine the state is demanding a
curriculum equivalent to the public school curriculum. The
religious schools are being told that attendance records are
required, as well as a "basic' approval" for the church
schools' operation. The US Supreme Court refused to
:review a decision by the Massachusetts Supreme Court in
Bailey v. Bellotti which upheld a state law requiring church
schools to report names and addresses of its students. In
Hawaii the Supreme Court of that state upheld the state's
authority to license all religious schools, and to have those
schools submit information on teacher certification, curriculum and faculty. In Michigan a circuit judge found a minister
in contempt of court for refusal to comply with fire code
inspections and reporting of student immunizations. Two
fundamentalist schools are also suing the state's requirement of teachers' certifications. Meanwhile in nine other
states, the fight heats up for in each the state requires
certification of private school teachers, religious schools or
not. Those are: Alabama, Idaho, Maine, Nevada, North
Dakota, Ohio, South Carolina, Washington, and West
Virginia....~

And in Faith Baptist Church v. Douglas the US Supreme

Court ruled that Nebraska's compulsory education law
requiring teachers to have baccalaureat degrees does not
violate the constitutional rights of a religious school. It is in
Nebraska that an especially ugly situation has developed
with faith christian school where a minister has dramatically
forced his own arrest (4 times) on contempt of court
charges as he tries to maintain an uncertified school in the
basement of a small one story church. Christian children
may have "love" but they willnot have adequate education
to cope with the world when these zanies win.

January, 1983

Page 13

In mid-summer, 1982, the US Supreme Court ruled that

religious schools do not need to pay unemployment compensation taxes on their employees. The case St. Martin's
Evangelical Lutheran Church v, South Dakota held that
since the schools have "no separate legal existence" from
the churches which own them and thus are wholely
religious. The court used the term, "legally organic," which
leaves up in the air the status of religious.schools which are
separate corporations, apart from the churches which own
them, such as hebrew day.schools, The burgeoning christian school movement, now has 10,000 new religious
schools, many of them with baptist congregations. The
association of christian schools international, anxious for
the tax exemption, has declared that 78% of their schools
are integral parts of congregations, 2% are separately
incorporated but accountable to their congregations and
that the other 20% belong to independent religious institutions.
But, nonetheless the US Supreme Court has accepted
for review the case of US v. Grace Brethren Church from
attempts by the State of California to collect state and
federal unemployment insurance taxes from several religious schools. In this case some of the schools are
separately incorporated, some are not separately incorporated and the question of what is a "legally organic" school
may be clarified. The argument is also concerned with
whether the payment of unemployment tax is based on
"employment relationship" or on "individual religious acts,"
which the churches claim. Actually, what is at issue here is
that the churches desire to give "love and understanding" to
employees but do not care to protect them against the
hazards of unemployment by providing them with coverage
by coming into compliance with state unemployment
insurance acts.
But, in Arkansas, the Supreme Court of that state has
ruled Arkansas Employment Security Division v. National
Baptist Convention U.S.A., Inc. that since the religious
organization owns outright the National baptist Hotel and
Bath House that its employees are not covered by unemployment benefits and the church need not pay. A similar
.. decision came in the case of Hickey v. Dist.of Columbia
Dept. of Employment Services when the US Court of
Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled that the roman
catholic archdiocese need not pay unemployment tax on
lay teachers employed in their schools since parochial
school employees performed "strictly church duties." It has
escaped the courts completely that when the roman
catholic church, or the baptists desire to have federal
monetary grants - they can prove employees are not
responsive to the church; but when it comes to paying taxes.
on the same employees, they suddenly become an integrated part of the church. And, Uncle Sam permits them to
play the game.
However, in the case of US v. Lee, in late February, the
US Supreme Court held that religious beliefs do not give a
taxpayer constitutional grounds for resisting a tax of
general applicability. In this case an old-order amish farmer
said he had religious objections to the payment of eitherSocial Security or unemployment taxes on his amish
employees. The decision was based on "overriding governmental interest" in protecting a nationwide comprehensive

Page 14

January, 1983

insurance plan for the old, the sick and the unemployed. A
religious interest of one employer would unduly interfere
with that government interest and the court said, amish or
not, he had to pay.

******

ITEM: SPARE THE ROD AND SPOIL THE CHILD.

Apparently the fundamentalists really accept the dictum
of jesus christ of "Suffer the little children" for that they
must do if they go to religious schools. During 1982, more
and more fundamentalist schools were fighting any requirements which would bring their schools within minimum
requirement regulations promulgated by states in order to
assure not alone adequate education for but physical safety
of the children - to protect them from child abuse. In
Texas two heavily fought battles went on and on with
ministers using corporal punishment on anything from
toddlers to to teenagers. In one day-care center a 13 month
old child was "spanked" hard enough to leave bruises. A
court case in Texas revealed that in one such school a 2-feet
by 3/8ths of an inch dowel is used to whip younger children
and a plywood panel is used to wail away at a teenager.

******

ITEM: "INTEGRATED AUXILIARIES."

The Federal Tax Reform Act of 1969 sought to curtail the
abuse of religious ownership of businesses. When it passed,
it gave the churches a grace period of 7 years to divest
themselves of non-church activities such as bowling alleys,
steel rolling mills, girdle factories, shopping centers, pumping oil fields, banks, etc. All these, called "unrelated
businesses" of churches had been tax exempt on income.
The IRS, after the 7 years grace, was to tax the income from
these "businesses." That grace period ended in 1977 and
the churches have been giving the IRS a hard time since
claiming that certain of the businesses, especially hospitals
and schools are "integrated auxiliaries" of the churches, a
phrase which unfortunately appeared in the tax law,
without a congressional definition. The churches were
required to file Form 990 informational returns concerned
with income on everything outside of the "integrated
auxiliaries" classification. The missouri synod of the lutheran church decided to do battle immediately and since 1979
has been in an administrative struggle with the IRS over the
lutheran Social Service of Minnesota. That religious institution, simply, at first refused to file the Form 990. After
several years jockeying, as of late 1982, all administrative
appeals have been exhausted. Court action is the necessary
next step. Now, joined by the tennessee baptist children's
homes, the churches are all watching to see if IRS,can be
backed down. Meanwhile, the annuity board of the southern baptist convention is still in administrative appeal
seeking to establish itself as an "integrated auxiliary," and
the pension agency of the disciples of christ christian
church has just been notified by IRS that it is not exempt
from reporting.
1983 should be an interesting year.
In mid-1982, a coalition of religious organizations (lutheran church in america, seventh-day adventist church, united

The American Atheist

methodist church, united presbyterian church, church of

jesus christ of latter-day saints "morrnons," national council
of churches,
southern baptist convention,
baptist joint
committee on legislative affairs, lutheran council in the
U.S.A., national association of evangelicals and christian
legal society) approached vice president George Bush for
help to have the phrase "integrated auxiliary" altered so
that more units of churches could come under the exempt
umbrella. The Treasury Dept. (and IRS) is still sticking to its
original definition that an integrated auxiliary must be dne
"whose principal activity is exclusively religious." The
coalition is attempting to persuade George Bush (who will
do anything to be president) that the IRS is "defining certain
institutions out of the churches," since it excludes men's
and women's organizations,
religious schools, seminaries,
mission schools, youth groups, hospitals, orphanages,
homes for the elderly and universities or colleges. Of
course, the religious groups could have any of these
institutions qualify as non-profit under educational, health,
or welfare provisions.
But in all of those cases, the
institutions would need to prove they are non-profit by filing
informational tax forms. The churches will do anything to
avoid that disclosure. And, a religious exemption alone
hides the churches' finances from any inquiring eyes.

******
ITEM: THE US POST OFFICE BOWS
TO RELIGION.
The US Post Office is notorious for its aid to religion. For
decades the crudely religious slogan of "(You) Pray For
Peace" was used as a cancellation. Still, there are postal
stations throughout the states which continue to use this
offensive religious slogan.
In January, the US Post Office raised postal rates for
non-profit organizations
from 3.8 cents per item, to 5.9
cents, causing consternation
with most periodical publishers, especially those at colleges and universities. However, the religious lobby in the US Congress
was so
powerful that by June the postal rate had to be returned to
its prior 3.8 cents rate. You, of course, stili pay your 20 per
letter.
Now the post office casually violates separation of state
and church each year as it issues both "secular" and
"religious" stamps (end of year "christmas stamps"). In
1982 the secular block of four depicted only winter scenes of
sledding, skating, building a snow man and decorating a live
christmas tree, as again the south was forgotten as was
Hawaii. The religious stamp reproduces a roman catholic
madonna, by an 18th century Spanish master.
.
Although the post office has a rule that it may not issue
stamps for sectarian figures or religious events, it is planning
on honoring the SOOth anniversary of the birth of Martin
Luther. This announcement
followed on the heels of that
announcing a stamp to commemorate
the 800th anniversary of the birth of st. Francis. Postal officials denied that the
Francis stamp was religious. This only brings the clamor on
as the methodist church seeks a "circuit rider" stamp to
commemorate
the bicentennial of American methodism.
So, why shouldn't the swedenborgians
be seeking a 1988
tercentenary commemorative
of their theologian Emmanu-

Austin, Texas

el Swedenborg? American Atheists fought religious stamps

and religious cancellations twenty years ago, and having no
help, failed to prevent them. Now, the flood gates open.

******
ITEM: STATE AND FEDERAL
TUITION TAX SCHEMES_
The tuition tax credit scheme of the Reagan administration moved forward in 1982, despite almost uniform predictions that it could devastate public education. In October,
the US Supreme Court agreed to hear the case of Mueller v.
Allen on the matter, coming from the 8th Circuit Court of
Appeals, St. Louis, Missouri, which had upheld on May 1st a
Minnesota law giving state income tax write-oils of $500 per
year, per child in religious elementary schools and $700 per
year, per child in religious secondary school to the parents,
A similar law in Rhode Island, had been struck down by the
First Circuit Court of Appeals in Massachusetts
in Rhode

Is/and Federation 01 Teachers

u,

Norberg.

Meanwhile, Ronald Reagan called upon the moral majority to help him draft a bill for national income tax write-off
credits, of 50% of the cost of tuition for each child in a
religious school. In July he sent two Cabinet Secretaries,
Donald T. Regan of the Treasury
and Terrel Bell of
Education, to the Hill to testify for tuition tax credits before
the Senate Finance Committee.
Reagan's bill as now constituted
would give a federal
income tax credit of $100 to families for each child in private
schools in '83, increasing to $500 by '85 - a two year period.

January, 1983

Right To Rob Demanded

One of a series of cartoons issuedin "the 1880's.

Page 15

Families with incomes up to $50,000 would be eligible for the - On an appellate level the US Supreme Court declined to
full credit. A single difficulty is that an estimated 70% of review Brandon v. Board of Education, a New York case
wherein a school board refused to permit high school
roman catholic children attend public schools nationwide.
It did not become generally known until after the students to conduct prayer meetings before school. There
November elections, but in a pre-election letter to roman the lower court had ruled that the refusal did not violate the
catholic school administrators Reagan wrote, "I pledge that students' First Amendment rights to freedom of religion,
I willcontinue to do everything I can to get this bill enacted speech and association.
Whereupon the governor and attorney general of Ala(the billfor tuition tax credits for parents who have children
in religious schools). If we are not successful in the lame- bama simply defied the September federal court injunction
duck session, we will press all the more vigorously in the and told the schools to keep on praying, while makin9:pl~
first session of the 98th Congress" in 1983. The administra- to appeal that case. Why should they worry? It is not their
tion bill has the approval of the Senate Finance Committee money they are spending to pursue the imposition of their
(117) and is ready for the full Senate vote. Reagan, religious beliefs on the citizens of the state. Indeed, a total of
however, is displeased with the roman catholic bishops who 13 states now act in direct defiance of the US Constitution
issued a pastoral letter attacking his arms race program just and the US Supreme Court. The case of Louisiana is
before the November elections. Again, state/church separa- illustrative. There one school district continues "piped-in"
tion may be a peripheral issue in a largerfight and the First intercom prayer. In that state, the legislative bodies had
Amendment saved by accident and not by the rallying of passed a law permitting prayer in schools on a voluntary
citizens in agreement with the state/church separation prayer. Challenged, the law was declared to be unconstituprinciple.
tional by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, and sustained by
the US Supreme Court in January, '82. School officials
******
adamantly held that " ... piped-in prayer. is not praying. It's
listening to someone pray."

ITEM: PRAYER REARED ITS UGLY HEAD

THROUGHOUT THE YEAR OF 1982.
A quick drama was played out in Tennessee as that state
was used as a prototype for the return of prayer to public
schools in what was seen as a national turning to fundamentalist religion. On March 11th the bill to reestablish prayer
was introduced into the Tennessee Congress. By April 6th
it had passed both houses. By May 24th it was signed by the
governor and prayer in schools began the next day. A US
District Court struck down the law on October 9th finding it
to have a "legislative purpose of advancement of religious
exercises in the classroom." The state planned an appeal to
the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati, but nothing
further was heard. Similar laws were immediately passed in
. both Alabama and in New Mexico.
In Alabama a bizarre drama developed. There the
governor himself pushed through the legislation and his
son, the attorney general of the state, composed a prayer
which he felt to be suitable for both the students and god.
Trying to jump routine legai channels and declaring that god
could not be made subjected to the legal process the
governor and his son provided comic relief for the world
through the summer. Of course, the federal District Court
ruled that the prayer was unconstitutional. In the middle of
it all, Ishmael Jaffree of Mobile, Alabama, became angry
when his child was required to recite a prayer over her food
in an elementary school of that city. Claiming that his three'
children were emotionally harmed, he filed a suit in the US
District Court to stop prayer over food, also.
No sooner had the Alabama prayer statute been batted
down, in September, than New Jersey's legislative bodies
passed a law requiring two minutes of silence in public
schools for either prayer or meditation. New Jersey had
tried this twice before, once in 1978 and again in 1982, but
on each occasion the governor had vetoed the bill as
unconstitutional. This time the new governor of the state
had until December 3rd to sign the bill- and it was at this
point that it dropped out of the news.

Page 16

January, 1983

At a national level Jesse Helms attempted to attach to an

unrelated bill an amendment to prohibit the federal courts
from reviewing any prayer legislation. The move was seen
for what it was - an attack on the federal judiciary - and it
was successfully defeated in Congress in mid-September,
mainly through the efforts of Senator Weicker, (R-CT). At
the same time Ronald Reagan after 18 months of uneasy
avoidance of the issue, finally decided to court the religious
community for the congressional elections and had introduced into Congress on May 18th a hoped for Amendment
to the Constitution of the United States which would permit
prayer in the public schools. The final version of the
projected amendment read: "Nothing in this Constitution
shall be construed to prohibit individual or group prayer in

The American Atheist

public schools or other public institutions. No person shall

be required by the United States or by any state to
participate in prayer." Reagan used this Amendment as an
appeal for votes in the November elections, promising to
pick up the issue again in '83.
In 1980, state senator Ernest Chambers filed suit to stop
chaplain led prayers in Nebraska's unicameral legislature.
In the suit Chambers v. Marsh in a federal District Court,
the court held that the First Amendment's ban on an
establishment of religion was not violated by having the
chaplain open each day's session with prayer, but it was
abridged by paying him and by printing this prayer from
public funds. In an appeal to the 8th Circuit Court of
Appeals, that court ruled that the retention and compensation of a single chaplain for an extended tenure violated the
establishment clause. However, the appellate court permitted the practice to continue pending final disposition of the
case by the US Supreme Court which agreed to hear the
case in 1983.
And, in Murray v. Morton which was filed in June, 1980, a
case which seeks to stop payment of over $120,000 a year to
the chaplains of the US Congress, a decision was given by
the US Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Division on
March 9, '82 that Jon Murray, Director of the American
Atheist Center had "standing" to sue. The US Congress
immediately asked for a review by the full 14 judge banque
of the appeals court. This was agreed upon on May 25th and
the appellate court at that time vacated the lower court
decision. Oral arguments were heard on October 28th and
American Atheists now await a decision on "standing"
alone from the US Court of Appeals.

vatican to secure papal help in "blunting the attack of the

roman catholic church's American bishops on the US
nuclear deterrent." Columnists Evans and Novak, however, got a scent of the deal and published it in their
newspaper column along with the comment that "high US
officials" fear the bishops' statement "unwittingly or not fits
Soviet propaganda and strategy while undermining the US
government's moral stature in its own country."
Since the Reagan administration - as before it the Ford,
Nixon and Eisenhower administration - had the habit of
blaming all nuclear escalation on the "atheistic communists," it delights American Atheists to see Reagan squirm
since he can hardly call the roman catholic bishops of the
United States "atheistic."

******

ITEM: UNITED WAY BECOMES

A RELIGIOUS FUND-RAISER.

******

ITEM: REAGAN RED BAITS THE FREEZE.

President Reagan wound up the year by charging the
"Freeze''- movement as being tainted with communism,
relying on the Reader's Digest magazine as a source of
information. When challenged with his remarks, pointed at
Betty Bumpers, leader of Peace Links and the wife of
Senator Dale Bumpers, (D-Ark.) Reagan gave his source as
an article in Reader's Digest magazine. A month later
sulking petulantly, he pointed out that "the first man who
proposed the nuclear freeze was in Feb. 21, '81, in Moscow,
Leonid Brezhnev." Meanwhile, another mental giant, Sen.
Jeremiah Denton (R-Ala.) contended that the Peace Links
organization had on its 14-organization advisory board 4
persons who "are either Soviet-controlled or openly sympathetic with and advocates for, Communist foreign policy
objectives. "
We have yet to see how Reagan is going to handle the
roman catholic bishops whose pastoral letter issued during
the '82 November elections on the Freeze affirmed that "the
deliberate initiation of nuclear warfare, on however restricted a scale," can never be "morally justified." They added,
"We have judged immoral even the threat to use such
weapons." The bishops coupled this with a call for "immediate, bilateral verifiable agreements to halt the testing,
production and deployment of new strategic systems."
Covertly, one way the President was fighting the bishops
was to send roman catholic General Vernon Walters to the

Austin, Texas

The United Way Campaign for assistance with local

charities has now turned into almost a full-fledged religious
drive, as recipients of the obligatory drive largess include
such organizations (using the example of Pittsburgh, PA)
as: Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts (both of which organizations
require a belief in god for membership), catholic Social
Services, holy family institute, jewish Community Center,
jewish Family and Children's Service, jewish Home and
Hospital, methodist Union of Social Agencies, rankin
christian center, salvation army, Social and Community
Services of the diocese of Pittsburgh, united jewish federation, young women's christian association, young men's
christian association, and catholic charities. Atheists everywhere should bow out of the United Way campaign.

******

ITEM: ABORTION.
After the '80 election of Ronald Reagan the right of

January, 1983

Page 17

women which seemed most threatened was the right to

choose an abortion. The zealots of Reagan's allies made the
outlawing of abortion a religious crusade. The object was
first to overturn or make ineffective the US Supreme Court
decision of 1973, Roe v. Wade, which permitted a woman in
the first trimester of pregnancy "entirely too much" latitude
for decision making. Senators Orrin Hatch, (R-Utah) and
Jesse Helms (R-N.C.), who really wanted a "Right-to-Life
Amendment" to the US Constitution maneuvered a compromise billout of the Judiciary Committee in May on a 10-7
vote. But by September, '82 that first anti-abortion measure
to reach the Senate floor was tabled by a vote of 47 to 46.
And, that was the beginning of the end of Reagan's religious
"social programs." The rejected bill, tacked onto national
debt legislation as a rider sought to establish the fetus as a
human being from conception, and to permanently bar all
federal funding of any medical procedure, facilities or
research in any way associated with abortion.
Reagan left no doubt about his allegiance to the antiabortion crusade when in July, '82 he intervened in the
Akron ordinance case before the US Supreme Court. That
ordinance, passed in 1978, is a model anti-abortion statute
the provisions of which have been adopted by other
communities in the US. It mandates a waiting period, inhospital requirements, and forces doctors under the guise
of "informed consent" to. provide biased and unsound
"medical information" concerned with the alleged bad
psychological effects of abortion. Clearly showing his intent
to undercut the federal court's right to interpret the
constitutionality of legislative actions in respect to the Billof
Rights, Reagan's Dept. of Justice submitted an amicus brief
in the case admonishing the Supreme Court to be mindful of
the prerogatives of legislatures in matters of social policy
and suggesting that legislatures, not the courts, should'
decide constitutional rights.
Meanwhile, the case of McKee v. Ramsey County, waits
a US Supreme Court decision on its review. This is a
taxpayer challenge to state funding of elective abortion,
contraception and sterilization.
With Ronald Reagan declaring that "this country is
hungry. for .a spiritu:al revival" h~ also I;>ublicly.
res~ated his
determination to fight for antt-abortton legislation, and
vowed to use the "presidency as a pulpit" for the religious
radical right. In late fallHelms, vowed to resume the prayer j
and abortion battle in the '83 Congress beginning January /1
and after the November elections. Reagan affirmed that.

ITEM: CHILDREN AND RELIGION.

In the case of Wilder v. Bernstein, the ACLU is challenging the entire structure of New York City's child welfare
system. It alleges that the city's reliance on religion-based
child care agencies and the practice of religious matching
results in racial and religious discrimination and denial of
equal access to appropriate services for Black protestant
children. A federal district court has granted "class action"
status and the case is now in discovery. In this same city,
abandoned children are rotated between roman catholic,
protestant and jewish adoption agencies to become the
religion of the agency to which New York City assigns the
child. There are no secular non-religious homes or adoptive
agencies for these children. Every foundling is given to
religion.

In the October 1981 term, which ended June, 1982, the

US Supreme Court ruled on 50 religious cases which had
reached it during this session and3 of these went specifically to cases of American Atheists:
Marsa v. Wernick: Commencement of city council
meetings (Metuchen, NJ) with prayer does not violate the
Establishment Clause.
OHair v. Cooke: Invocations at city council (Austin, TX)
and prayer at federal court of appeals (New Orleans, LA) do
not violate the Establishment Clause.
OHair v. Clement: Display of nativity scenes/menorah at
state capitol (Austin, TX) and prayer at federal court of
appeals (New Orleans, LA) do not violate the Establishment
Clause.
In addition:
Valley Forge Christian College v. Americans United
citizens/taxpayers do not have standing to challenge government transfer of surplus property to a sectarian religious
college.
Larson v. Valente A Minnesota statute exempting from
registration, and from reporting requirements, religious
organizations receiving more than half their contributions
from members - but not such organizations receiving less
than half from members - violates the Establishment
Clause
. ~~.
- ~.~
~"c~;;;;;;;;~_P;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;~~;;J%~~~~
A.V'

-.'~e~
C3'C 11 a

******
ITEM: AND, OF COURSE, THE GAYS.
Anti-gay legislation has already passed in Oklahoma and
is contemplated in other states. The Oklahoma statute
provides that teachers or teachers' aides may be fined for L~~~~~~,"---_--.iJ.
"public homosexual activity," which is defined as "advoLarkin v. Grendel's Den, Inc. The 1st Circuit Court of
cating, soliciting, imposing, encouraging or promoting pubAppeals in Boston, Massachusetts in this case struck down
licor private homosexual activity in a manner that creates a a state law permitting schools, churches and synagogues, in
substantial risk that such conduct willcome to the attention
effect, to veto licenses for liquor sales within 500 feet of a
of school children or school employees. A district court
religious institution. The court quickly disposed of this by
judge ruled the law constitutional in June, 1982 and the
mid-December. The lower appellate court was affirmed.
ACLU is appealing the decision.
This presumably willlay to rest all of those many ordinances
and laws which the churches everywhere are having passed
******
Page 18

January, 1983

The American Atheist

at a local level as they seek to keep the area around the

church "free from sin."
Court cases abounded this year, and the appellate
process is still not concluded in Limmer v. Fernandes in
respect to control of religious solicitations at an airport; and
in Catholic Bishop of Chicago v. F.E.L. Publications, Inc. in
respect to copyrights on hymns.
******
ITEM: OUR CONGRESS AND GOD'S WORD.
And, on September 21st the US House of Representatives approved a resolution which authorized it to request
that president Reagan declare 1983 to be "The Year of the
Bible." Cosponsored by 218 representatives, the resolution
was approved and together with S.J. Res. 165passed earlier
this year for the same purpose. Our nation is put to shame
by this religious nonsense which rivals anything put out by
the legislative body under ayatollah Khomeini. Insofar as
American Atheists are concerned, if Congress wants a
"Year of the Bible," we should make them eat the damn
thing, ~ord for word. Stand by for our activity in that area.
******
ITEM: POLICE SQUADS.
As religious fundamentalism spread, the Tulsa police
force was found to have a "god squad" of police officers who
pray over shooting victims, try to bind demons of arrested
men, tote prisoners off to church before taking them to the
slammer, or pray over the arrested subjects in the squad
cars. The police chief sees nothing wrong with reading the
bible while cruising in the squad car, or praying for a
distressed fellow human being who has just been arrested.
Naturally an investigation found no officer guilty of having
allowed his christian faith to interfere with his duties. But
meanwhile, the normal police officers could only resort to
exposing and laughing at the "god squad." It would be funny
if it were not happening in New York, North Carolina, and
California as well.

stores every Sunday until christmas. What god hath done

can be undone in a depression when retail sales are
desperately needed by merchants.
******
ITEM: 'SCIENTIC' CREATIONISM
V. EVOLUTION.
The continuing efforts of the radical right religious
fundamentalists to push "scientific creationism" into our
public schools suffered a major setback this year when a
federal district court judge in Little Rock, Arkansas in
January, 1982, ruled that an Arkansas law requiring the
bible position be taught in science classes was an unconstitutional violation of the doctrine of separation of state and
church. The much publicized case was a stunning victory
for ACLU. "Scientific creationism" teaches the "relatively
recent creation of all things by a supernatural force." That
means, god did it - in 4004 b.c. - according to the genesis
chapter of the so-called holy bible. Not at all intimidated by
the Arkansas debacle the radical religious right pushed
through another scientific creationism law in Louisiana. By
late November the ACLU had obtained a federal court
ruling that the similar Louisiana law violated that state's
constitution which forbids the legislative bodies from mandating the teaching of a course.
The ACLU was also active in Georgia where it succeeded
in blocking creationist legislation.
And in October, in Iowa, the Attorney General's office
advised the public school system that although it may buy
library books advocating "creationism," the use of such
books in teaching science is unconstitutional.

******
ITEM: PROTECT THE MIGHTY OF RELIGION.
Now that cardinal Cody is safely tucked into his bier, a
former deputy attorney general of the US discloses that
Jimmy Carter, when president, had limited a federal
investigation into the financial dealings of roman catholic
John Cody of Chicago. The Carter administration claimed
to be concerned with "problems of separation of state and
church." The former official said, "I didn't think it terribly
important where the money went, if he had discretion. It
was something between the church and him." Now, in your
job, you funnel off several million bucks for your girl friend
and see what the government says to you.
******
ITEM: SUNDAY CLOSING LAWS.
In Maine the powerful Main Merchants Association
switched its stance and endorsed a move to open retail

Austin, Texas

Allof this but indicates that the struggle is on. Religion has
gained so much in the past 30 years, as the government has
used it for an instrument to fight" godless" communism that
even those segments of our population who also abhor
Atheists are being overwhlerned by it and starting to fight
back. American Atheists, comparatively speaking still a
young organization, just entering now its 20th year, has
been a catalyst in the media to draw attention to the
problems of religion inherent in our system. As American
Atheists continue to strengthen its base, it still is called upon
to remain in the litigation efforts. We have hardly begun to
fight the monster that overwhelms our culture, saps from it
and stultifies it. But, as we look back on those original "Nine
Demands" made 109 years ago, we take pride in that we
were the first to attain one partial victory from the list, as we
move now to try to accomplish the remainder.

January, 1983

The Editor
Page 19

SPEECH BY
SENATOR LOWELL WEICKER, JR.
BEFORE THE UNITED CHURCH

ON THE GREEN
NEW HAVEN, CONNECTICUT
September 19, '82

_E

I .I,

In a prior issue of American Atheist we requested our readers to write and thank Senator Lowell Weicker Jr. for his
attention this year to the problems of state/church separation and the radical religious right's effort to subvert that
constitutional principle.
Often as not, our readers do not report back their experiences, but this time we were lucky in that a corporate
executive from New Jersey sent a copy of his reply from Weicker, along with a copy, provided by Weicker, of a speech
given by him to a church in mid-September.
American Atheists recognize the need for any U.S. Senator to massage the churches in our nation and we "forgive" him
his "trespasses" as Weicker does the same. But, even while massaging them, Weicker made clear a position which we
applaud and encourage: his dedication to one of the founding principles of our nation - state/church separation. We feel
that Senator Weicker is motivated to keep the wall high and we encourage all of our readers, in a continuing way, to
support him in that effort.
We reproduce here, below, his reply to our New Jersey executive, a member of American Atheists, along with his
speech to the United Church on The Green. "Gracias," Senator Weicker.
"Dear (Atheist):
Many thanks for your recent letter.
THE SPEECH
I appreciate your kind words of support for my service as
It is a great honor for me to join you in worship this
a United States Senator. The interest and encouragement
of citizens from across the country makes my work here in morning. Reverend Hay has reminded me that it is an old
congregational tradition for government leaders to speak
Washington all the more worthwhile.
from the pulpit. Forgive me if today I avail myself of this
On August 16, '82, Senator Helms offered an amendment
tradition to speak out against what used to be another old
to the Debt Ceiling bill which would strip the Supreme
congregational practice: theocracy, the fusion of church
Court and lower federal courts of jurisdiction over controand state into one authority. Until its disestablishment in
versies involving school prayer.
1818, nearly two hundred years after the pilgrims came in
I strongly opposed the Helms school prayer amendment
search of religious liberty, congregationalism was Connectifor two principal reasons. First, I do not believe that the
cut's official creed.
Congress can constitutionally deny the Supreme Court or
I don't mean to cast stones but simply to cite facts. On
federal court jurisdiction over such fundamental matters.
this issue, my ancestors took much the same path. A great
Furthermore, I am unalterably opposed to this, or any other
uncle of mine was archbishop of canterbury. Nevertheless, I
measure, which would provide for governmental intrusion
have come to believe with Mark Twain that established
into the realm of religion.' The words of the First Amendment to the Constitution make it clear that "Congress shall religion "means death to human liberty and paralysis to
make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or human thought." No greater mischief can be created than
prohibiting the free exercise thereof." Prayers sanctioned
to combine the power of religion with the power of
by public schools violate this Constitutional mandate of government. History has shown us that time and time again.
separation of church and state.
The union of the two is as bad for religion as it is for
On September 23, after four votes to invoke cloture on government. It gives rise to tyrants and inquisitions. It is
the school prayer amendment had failed, Majority Leader . what drove many of our ancestors to these shores. That is
Baker prevailed on a procedural motion to drop the
why clergy, lay people and public office holders alike must
amendment from the Debt Limit bill. The filibuster which I fight radical rewrites of the First Amendment which are
led along with Senator Baucus against the Helms amendmasquerading as good old-fashioned morality.
ment thus succeeded in stopping this dangerous measure,
I want to speak in particular today about prayer in our
at least for this session of Congress.
public schools. The idea is very appealing on its surface.
You can count on my continued efforts to protect the
Indeed, it summons up reassuring images of freckle-faced
Constitution from the political whims of the moment.
Norman Rockwell children with their heads bowed and
Enclosed for your information is a copy of a recent speech I hands clasped in prayer. But as inspiring as it sounds,
gave, which further expresses my views on this issue.
prayer in school has the potential for doing real damage With kindest regards
Lowell Weicker, Jr. to children and their families, to the cause of true religion,
and to the ideal of separation of church and state our
United States Senator"
Page 20

January, 1983

The American Atheist

founders embraced.
Today's gospel lesson goes to the heart of the issue,
which is that prayer is - or should be - a personal act of
devotion, not an official function. I would like to reread a
part of that passage from the sermon on the mount, this
time from the phillips translation: "And when you pray don't
be like the play actors. They love to stand and pray in the
synagogues and street corners so that people may see them
at it. Believe me, they have had all the reward they are going
to get. But when you pray, go into your room, shut the door
and pray to your father privately. Your father who sees all
private things willreward you."

people of differing beliefs and disbeliefs. They were never

intended to indoctrinate them or inculcate a certain set of
beliefs. That is the work of parents and sunday school
teachers and hebrew school teachers.
There is an old Spanish proverb which says "an ounce of
mother is worth a pound of clergy." I would add that both
are worth a ton of politicians where prayer is concerned.
These days we talk a lot about strengthening families. But
we will not do so by imposing some doctrine from without,
particularly ifthat doctrine is alien to the family's own beliefs
or traditions.
President Kennedy's comment on the 1%2 Supreme

"... I have come to believe with Mark Twain that established religion 'means death to
human liberty and paralysis to human thought.' "
It seems to me that the kind of prayer jesus is recommending here is not the sort the school prayer supporters
have in mind. He advocates a one-on-one personal dialogue
with god, not some kind of officially-sanctioned formula
blared through a public address system. Now, to be sure,
people are concerned about falling church attendance and
the fewer andfewer applicants to seminaries and well they
might be. But making prayer a government program won't
help matters. Government itself is still in the midst of a crisis
of confidence. Look at how few people exercise their right
to vote and participate in government. I have never seen a
merger between two weak companies that ever worked,
and that is what is being attempted here. In this country,
government and religion, each must stand on its own two
feet. If they cannot, then we must shake them up. We must
not yoke them together. When the blind lead the blind, they
both fall in the ditch.

Court decision barring prayer in the New York public

school system was right on the button. "We have in this
case a very easy remedy," he said. "And that is to pray
ourselves. And I think that it would be a welcome reminder
to every American family that we can pray a good deal more
at home, we can attend our churches with a good deal more
fidelity, and we can make the true meaning of prayer more
important in the lives of all our children."
School prayer supporters contend that the prayer they
want could be voluntary and vaguely enough worded to
embrace all beliefs. But there is nothing voluntary about
school attendance; that is compulsory. And what six-year
old is going to stand up and insist on his or her constitutional
right to be excused when the prayer is recited? At that age
and older, peer pressure is intense. When everybody
stands, you stand. When everyone bows their head, you
bow your head. When everyone mumbles words, you

"... prayer in school has the potential for doing real damage - to children and their
families . . . and to the ideal of separation of church and state our founders
embraced."
If getting the American people closer to god is their goal',
why make government the go-between? It reminds me of
the old testament story of the tower of babel. There you had
civil leaders commissioning a public works project to bring
people closer to god. In the end, of course, the tower not
only failed at that but it so insulted god that he made sure
such a thing could not happen again by causing the people
to speak different languages and scattering them to the
winds.
Do I encourage my fellow citizens to pray? Certainly. And
I hope that when they do, they will keep those of us in the
US Senate in mind. But I do not believe it is up to a
Representative or a Senator or even the President to
espouse or encourage anyone religion or even religion in
general. It is not my job to do the convincing, to take up on
Monday on the floor of the Senate where the rabbi left off on
Saturday or the priest or minister left off on Sunday.
Myjob is simply this: to make certain that every individual
is free to practice the articles of his or her faith, whatever
they may be, without fear of reprisal.
Similarly, I believe that our public schools are meant to
educate our children, teaching them a healthy respect for
Austin, Texas

mumble words. So, in a very real sense, neither is the

exercise of the prayer voluntary to a young child.
As E.B. White wrote to Senator Margaret Chase Smith
when this issue came up in 1966, "In an atmosphere of
'voluntary' prayer, pupils coming from homes where other
faiths prevail will feel an embarrassment by their nonparticipation; in the eyes of their schoolmates they will be
'queer' or 'different' or 'irreligious.' Such a stigma for a child
can be emotionally disturbing, and although we no longer
hang and burn our infidels and our witches, a schoolchild
who is left out in the cold during a prayer session suffers
scars that are very real."
The reverend Jerry Falwell, founder of the moral majority, recently made a very telling remark. He told reporters
that because moral majority members represented a variety
of denominations "if (they) ever opened a moral majority
meeting with prayer, silent or otherwise, (they) would
disintegrate." Well, just what does he expect to happen to
our school systems, many of which are equally pluralistic in
makeup?
.
What sort of prayer do they plan to recite: protestant?
catholic? jewish? buddhist? mormon? depending on the

January, 1983

Page 21

community in question each of these religions could be in

the majority. Is the prayer to be addressed to god, jehovah,
buddha, or the virgin mary? Or is it to be a meaningless
mishmash of every religion known to man?
M. William Howard, the former president of the national
council of churches, put it well recently when he said that
religious people do not want "a least common denominator
prayer addressed to whom it may concern." That is part of
the reason why sixty major religious leaders have come out
against school prayer.
These leaders are also motivated by a strong sense of our
history and our destiny as a free people. In his book, The
Making of The President 1960, Theodore White wrote:
"America as a civilization began with religion. The first and
earliest migrants from Europe, who shaped America's
culture, law, tradition and ethics, were those who came
from England - and they came when English civilization
was in torment over the manner in which Englishmen might
worship christ. ... It was with remembered bitterness they
distilled, though not without struggle, that first great
landmark in America's unique civilization, that first of the
creative American compromises that was to set America
apart from the old world: freedom of worship."
Ifyou go to Plymouth, Massachusetts, today, you willfind
it teeming with tourists. They crowd around the rock with
cameras. They clamber on board the Mayflower Two. They
patiently file through the first pilgrim house. How many of
them, I wonder, relate what happened at Plymouth to their
lives today? On the hill overlooking the sea, there is a
monument bearing the names of those 102 English calvinists who were persecuted because they denied the ecclesiastical authority of the king. There is also this dedication: "to
the forefathers in recognition of their labors, sacrifices, and
sufferings for the cause of civil and religious liberty."

the Danbury baptists no doubt.

So, the current disregard for the First Amendment and
the penchant for religious segregation is nothing new. Even
after the last state religion was disestablished, protestantism was still the unofficial national religion - to the
detriment of all other faiths. It was a touchy matter to be a
jew or a mormon. As recently as 1960 it was widely believed
that roman catholics should not hold high public office.
President Kennedy's election helped tear that barrier down.
But prejudices persist.
And I believe that school prayer only serves to reinforce
those prejudices. I attended a private school where not only
prayer but worship was mandatory, and believe me it was
protestant in form. My jewish friends either had to attend
these services or stand in the park. The same holds true for
my catholic friends. And we looked on them as something
different just as they must have looked on themselves.
Of my children, and there are eight of them, some go to
public schools, some to private. They have not had the
same experience. On the other hand, I think they probably
have a more profound understanding of the world around
them and a greater love and a greater beauty to their lives
than I. When I see them working with a group of retarded
children, giving of their free time, I can't help suspecting
that that really is a form of worship far more exhilarating
and far more meaningful than sitting in a pew with hands
folded. It is certainly different, far different, from what I did.
But according to the matters in which I believe, I think
maybe they are closer to heaven than I am.
The apostle paul wrote that "faith without works is dead."
And in the old testament text read this morning, isaiah
seems to be saying that prayer without actions to match is
not heard. It has always struck me how many biblical
passages the moral majority chooses to ignore when it sets

"... When I see them (my children) working with a group of retarded children, giving
of their free time, I can't help suspecting that that really is a form of worship far more
exhilarating and far more meaningful than sitting in a pew with hands folded."
Religious liberty. If you ask me, that was the real rock
upon which our country was built.
That was 1620. Unfortunately, not even a century passed
before the persecuted became the persecutors. In 1692, for
instance, entrenched puritan hostility to freedom of thought
and speech helped cause the deaths of 19 men and women
during the Salem witch trials.
In 1802,Thomas Jefferson wrote to the Danbury, Connecticut baptist association: "Believing with you that religion is
a matter which lies solely between man and his god ... I
contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole'
American people which declared that their legislature
should 'make no law respecting an establishment of religion,
or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.' thus building a wall
of separation between church and state."
Historians have since discovered that this letter was no
casual piece of correspondence. Jefferson had the then
Attorney General Levi Lincoln study it before mailing it.
Why, twenty years after the adoption of the Constitution
and the Bill of Rights, did Jefferson feel compelled to
address the establishment issue? Because in many parts of
the country people weren't taking the First Amendment
seriously. As I noted earlier, the congregationalists had
official backing in Connecticut, much to the annoyance of
Page 22

January, 1983

its legislative priorities. This 58th chapter of isaiah is one

such passage. Isaiah is explaining why the lord is ignoring
Israel's many prayers, fasts and solemn observances. As I
read it, the people's piousness is an abomination to god until
they first act on his social agenda. Isaiah writes: "Is not this
the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, to let the oppressed go
free? Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou
bring the poor that are cast out to thy house?"
This, I believe, should be the agenda for each of us as
individuals, and indeed for me as a Senator. It pains me to
see the Congress diverted onto these moral crusades when
there is so much real suffering in our land, when so many
people are losing their livelihoods and so many going
without the necessities of life. And when there are so many
people denied the justice which should be accorded them
bylaw.
Let us rededicate ourselves to taking up this agenda. Let
us get involved in our public and private lives to shape a
fairer society. Then, and only then, does god promise to
hear our prayers. "Then shalt thou call, and the lord shall
answer," writes isaiah. "Thou shalt cry and he shall say,
'Here I am.'''
The American Atheist

Fred Woodworth

NOTES ON THE PHENOMENON

OF PUBLISHING
Lightning struck the church across the street from my
apartment one afternoon in 1980, setting fire to the tops of
some trees and provoking a very interesting news story
about the Atheist in his bathtub who was entirely missed by
the bolt. But don't try to look it up in the papers of the time,
because this ironic item was distinguished in much the same
way as the dog that Sherlock Holmes mused had done
nothing in the night - that was what had made its behavior
remarkable. The thought-provoking coincidence of a billion
volts discharging against the steeple of a so-called house of
god, while a noted attacker of religion lounged in water up to
his neck a few yards away, SHOULD have made for several
lines of human-interest copy; but the odd fact was that not
even a bare reportage of the fire damage itself appeared in
the local dailies (this despite the pains I took to make sure
they got the story).
One can only speculate as to what story would have
resulted, and what section and page of the newspaper it
would have appeared on, had some building used by
Atheists been struck while some religious figure bathed
across the street. But it requires no great intuitive leap to
know all too well what gibes and sneers, thinly disguised as
"news," would delightedly have been published in that case.
Journalism, shielded by a cloak of impartiality, is one of a
great number of ways by which individuals and institutions
try to make others come around to their views. In fact, while
almost every expression of thought in published writing
bears strong suggestions of the attitudes of the writers, and
shows their wish to persuade readers, only in this single
area does a kind of expression so obstinately work to pass
itself off as entirely without opinion content. To Atheists this
pose is a continuing source of irritation because it is so
obviously false.

libertarian and even Atheistic kind, have found their way

into popular items such as books for boys, comic magazines, and even (increasingly rarely) television series. New
instances come to light all the time, and often these involve
the manipulation of material that the average observer is
least likely to suspect.
In publications of various kinds there appear letters-tothe-editor, which are seemingly pure statements of the
opinions of readers, published as a service by the magazine
or newspaper, to air opposite sides of issues. Here, the first
thing to realize is that no editor welcomes being called
wrong or foolish, or avidly wants to see ideas opposite to his
or her own appear as rebuttals to statements already made.
Nevertheless, appearances demand this fiction of openrnindedness, and so a spectrum of opinions does appear in
such letters. This leads to the second fact that needs to be
taken into account, which is that editing, pacing and
placement of opposition letters can degrade the impact of
the opinions expressed, or even now and then reverse their
effect altogether. In the city I live in, letters-to-the-editor
were recently used by the publishers of a local paper to
counteract an article previously printed on the subject of
the Dial-an-Atheist service originating here. The article, a
two-page piece in the human-interest tabloid distributed
with the rest of the newspaper on weekends, provoked the
usual flurry of responses from the religious, but the twist in
this case was that the paper kept printing these antagonistic
effusions at about two-day intervals for more than a month
- evidently a case of trying to make up for having
inadvertently printed anything about Atheism at all. Local
Atheists' own letters in support of the piece, and wondering
at the surprising persistence in the letters column of
rejoinders to something published so long before, were

"... A visit to (Tucson) several years ago by Dr. Madalyn Murray O'Hair which the
papers were compelled to report (in, of course, a snide and unfriendly manner), was
followed by over six weeks of rejoinders and hostile observations as the newspaper
utilized the unavoidable fact of a news story to manipulate second-hand editorials in
the letters column, all the while maintaining the customary pose of impartiality and
objectivity. "
The realization that almost everything is propaganda of
one sort or another is not, however, an awareness that one
can come to in some single blinding flash of insight, and it is
worthwhile to refine the critical attitude by constantly
adding new cases to the store of knowledge. I have
remarked elsewhere, for example, that ideas of wonderfully

Austin, Texas

simply not printed. A visit to the city several years ago by

Dr. Madalyn Murray O'Hair, which the papers were
compelled to report (in, of course, a snide and unfriendly
manner), was followed by over six weeks of rejoinders and
hostile observations as the newspaper utilized the unavoidable fact of a news story to manipulate second-hand

January, 1983

Page 23

editorials in the letters column, all the while maintaining the

customary pose of impartiality and objectivity.
Editing of writers' prose to weaken their statements in
letters-to-the-editor is a practice by no means limited to the
sleazy backwaters of publishing. No less a magazine than
the nationally distributed news-weekly, Time, resorted to
this practice when it felt compelled to present "all the
different sides" of disagreement provoked by an extremely
sycophantic article it had run on its religion page about a
book written to bolster faith among those whose personal
calamities makes them begin to question the existence of
god. This particular piece drew a response from the present
writer - a response that did appear in the magazine, but in
an edited form that not only shortened it ("space" is always
an unanswerable argument), but actually substituted some

the cast of a man using religious language. The final

sentence, containing as it does a restrained insult, was
predictably dropped, while my mention of religious beliefs
was altered for some reason to read "religious conviction."
True, the letter did appear, its tendency substantially
intact, but subordinate clauses containing the reasoning
behind the statement were excised. The heart of the matter,
namely that only cultural conditioning maintains religious
belief and that disasters prod people into considering their
beliefs at last, all vanished. Thus, Time was able to print "all
sides" of the question, even including some remark by an
actual Atheist, proving again to one and all how "objective"
the editors were, while at the same time gutting the views
with which they disagreed of any persuasive quality. Finally,
as so often happens, the affiliations expressed in the

"Plainly, a letter-to-the-editor is nothing more than an opportunity for manipulation

on the part of those in charge of publishing."
words for others, partially serving to give the response a
more benign cast. The letter, as written in response to the
article, follows, with the printed version below it:
As It Was Written:
"Editors: Harold Kushner's effort to restore religious faith to those whose personal calamities have
removed it ("Religion," July 19 issue of Time.) is
desperate and misguided. Disbelief in religion ought to
be seen as the valid conclusion reached by anyone
who can put aside cultural conditioning long enough
to seriously consider the question of the existence of a
deity.
It is remarkable that disasters of every sort can be
contorted by persons such as Kushner, into reasons
to continue, rather than abandon, religious beliefs. His
book will"inspire" only those on whom plain evidence
and logic have no effect."
(Signed) Fred Woodworth, Tucson, AZ.
(Staff member/columnist for
The American Atheist, Austin, TX)
As It Appeared In Time, Aug. 9, 1982:
"Rabbi Harold Kushner's effort to restore religious
faith to those whose personal calamities have caused
them to forsake it is desperate and misguided (July
19). Giving up belief ought to be seen as the valid
conclusion to a tragedy. It is remarkable that disasters of every sort can be contorted into reasons to
continue, rather than abandon, religious conviction."
(Signed) Fred Woodworth, The American
Atheist, Austin, TX
There are several points to notice about this editing job.
First, the honorific title "Rabbi" was added to Kushner's
name, apparently indicating that this writer felt a need to
honor the man with more than ordinary politeness, even
while attacking his ideas with words. More interesting still is
the fact that while the second sentence has been shortened
so far as to become cryptic, the latter part of the first
sentence has been reworked into a slightly longer version so
that the word "forsake," not in the original, could be added.
First, "Rabbi," then "forsake" - now the letter almost has

Page 24

January, 1983

signature were blown up so that the individual signing

appeared not so much as a person but as a media event or
commodity. Without this included affiliation, lending itself
so nicely to the practices of news-creators, very probably
the note would not have been published at all. Plainly, a
letter-to-the-editor is nothing more than an opportunity for
manipulation on the part of those in charge of publishing.
Local periodicals, however, are not usually so sophisticated, and operate instead on a level of pure censorship simple exclusion of statements to which they are opposed,
unless some innocuous communication will further the
illusion of openness while actually saying nothing. As an
example of this, the very dignified and persuasive letter
mailed to a local paper by three Tucson Atheists in
response to a news article on the denial of our lawsuit to
stop prayer in city council public meetings, never saw print.
The article itself, on the other hand, had been a jocularlyheadlined piece chuckling that "THREE ATHEISTS'
'PRAYERS' FAIL TO END PRAYER."
Such musings and considerations as these lead us around
to an ugly concept: Censorship. Or is this kind of falsification, exaggeration, excision, and distortion really censorship? The reply of most journalists and magazine or
newspaper executives would, of course, be "no." And the
question that such people would then immediately pose in
their turn would be: Do we want control of the press to be in
the hands of some external agency - some government
body - so that what we regard to be abuses will be
prevented? Then our answer too must be "No." But the
outraged counterattack should not obscure the fact that
censorship by the press does occur, and is really rather
common.
It has been said that freedom of the press belongs to
those who own one, a statement that in the latter part of the
twentieth century must be amended to something like
"Freedom of the press belongs to those who own one, if
they also own plenty of other property and a big distribution
system." What freedom of the press is, and what censorship
is, no one knows but the publishers and the censored.
There are simplistic formulations such as the one at the
conclusion of American Heritage Magazine's editorial in

The American Atheist

"It has been said that freedom of the press. belongs to those who own one, a
statement that in the latter part of the twentieth century must be amended to
something like 'Freedom of the press belongs to those who own one, if they also own
plenty of other property and a big distribution system.'"
.
the issue devoted to "The Press: Its Power and Enemies" "In our time any idea, any program, any scheme,
and any argument finds its miserable or glorious day in
the sun. And ifworst comes to worst, you can always
publish your message by Xerox and hand-deliver it
unhindered ... " (Which is like saying that certainly
everyone has the right to eat, and if you are starving
you can eat the bark off trees ... unhindered.)
But to Atheists, who are attempting to stop the authori-

tarian impositions of religious power in society, hostility of

persons in charge makes the phenomenon of publishing a
factor more inimical than helpful. How Atheists should
respond to this situation is indeed a puzzle - but if making
contact with large numbers of other dwellers in modern
society is the only road to a secular world, we must establish
means of our own for making such contact. And when or if
we do, let us hope, we willbe wise enough to hold in check
our own tendencies to behave as those we criticize do now.

"And now children, during the remaining two minutes of the school day, you may - if you wish indulge in silent secular thought."

Austin, Texas

January, 1983

Page 25

~~ TheLor~
and the Intellectuals

Copyright 1982 by Harper's Magazine. All rights reserved. Reprinted from the July 1982 issue by special permission

Since the Enlightenment, a healthy contempt for religion

and those who promote it has been widespread among
those who cherish the powers of reason. But lately, in what
is proclaimed as a secular age, Atheism and anticlericalism
have fallen very much out of fashion. Even - one might say
especially - among those with no time for religion in their
own personal lives there is a new respect for the prevailing
religious superstitions. Intellectuals have lost the courage of
their nonbelief.
Confirmed marxists plead the case of the rebels in EI
Salvador by quoting nuns and archbishops. Secular jews
make alliances with antisemitic evangelists who think that
god gave religious and other jews a textual break on the
West Bank. Conservatives who haven't been to church or
synagogue for years invoke the importance of "religious
values." Gibbon said of the many religions in the declining
Roman empire that they "were all considered by the people
as equally true; by the philosophers as equally false; and by
the magistrates as equally useful." Today's policy intellectuals, or philosopher-magistrates, hold the last two views
simultaneously.

people like herself, for people of gumption, it was a

social occasion providing the opportunity to sing; but
if she had ever given it much thought, she would have
considered the devil the head of it and god the
hanger-on."
Mrs. Shortley's views on religion are pretty much shared
by the urbane Mr. George Will. In his most recent collection
of columns (The Pursuit of Virtue and Other Tory Notions),
Willquotes from Chekhov's description of a character: "He
was a rationalist, but he had to confess that he liked the
ringing of church bells." Will adds, "Me too." But, as
demonstrated in other columns in the same collection, Will
also approves of churchgoing and true belief as valuable
constraints on minds less "rationalist" than his own.
Mr. William Barrett, philosopher of this parish and former
editor of Partisan Review, falls into the church-bell temptation in his recent memoir, The Truants. Mr. Barrett was an
intimate of Delmore Schwartz, Mary McCarthy, Lionel
Trilling, Philip Rahv - that lot. He was on easy terms with
secular liberalism, and in The Truants describes how a

"... Gibbon said of the many religions in the declining Roman empire that they 'were
all considered by the people as equally true; by the philosophers as equally false; and
by the magistrates as equally useful.' Today's policy intellectuals, or philosophermagistrates, hold the last two views simultaneously."
Flannery O'Connor once devised a character called Mrs.
Shortly, who was bucolic and superstitious but nobody's
fool:
"She had never given much thought to the devil for
she felt that religion was essentially for those people
who didn't have the brains to avoid evil without it. For

Page 26

January, 1983

combination of jewishness and skepticism kept the team at

arm's length from American religiosity. Yet here he is on
Lionel Trilling's obsequies, which took place in st. paul's
chapel at Columbia University, with a rabbi and a minister
officiating:
"Yet I remember being faintly troubled at the time;

The American Atheist

and as I reflect on those last rites I find myself more

and more troubled by the perplexing questions they
beget. Was the service religious or not? In some sense
it was not completely secular - there was the chapel
and there were the psalms. Suppose there had been a
completely secular service. Imagine it taking place in
one of those funeral parlors - they often dignify
themselves by the name of chapels - farther down on
Broadway .... Even the imagination of such a service
seems shocking and inappropriate for a man like
Trilling. It was fitting that there should be a chapel and
those psalms .... Hence the psalms."
Horror at the aesthetic defects of a secular departure soon
drives Barrett to question his very non belief. In a passage
that the great rationalist Trilling would have found extraordinary, he poses "the nagging question" raised by his
preference for psalms:
"Suppose we, as moderns, still feel the aesthetic need
for this archaic language at such times. How many
generations before its use as an aesthetic adornment
for a funeral service begins to lose its force, and
becomes a routine gesture? ... And if that archaic
language does become at last routine. what would be
required for its renewal?"
Of such are calls for religious "renewal" born. Anything but
burial "farther down on Broadway."

Doomsday may be unpolished, but it is unfalsifiable, just like

the opposing view that god does not want our extinction. It
is not for humanists to say which of these positions is
"blasphemous" (Schell's word).
This kind of selective indulgence shown toward religion
has some ironic and some farcical consequences. The
attitude of conservatives toward belief has always been a
fairly cynical one; it reinforces tradition and continuity and
(in some fortunate epochs) actual obedience. Among
liberals and radicals, therefore, there has traditionally been
a suspicion of political clergy and a feeling that the priests
should stick to minding their flocks. Hasn't there? Well, it
depends. When Ngo Dinh Diem took a well-timed vacation
from the exercise of despotism in his native (South)
Vietnam, his hosts in the United States were the maryknoll
order. At that time there was much liberal fulmination about
Francis cardinal Spellman and his "meddling," for all the
world as ifthe church had no business interfering in politics.
Now today, when the maryknoll order has its martyrs in El
Salvador and is quick off the mark with a burst of "liberation
theology" (an audacious oxymoron), all manner of moonfaced liberals can be found to argue for the healing and
creative role of catholicism. (And for the sake of symmetry,
Tom Bethell of the American Enterprise Institute denounced the raped and butchered maryknoll sisters as
"bull-dyke socialists.")
Piety on the left is a terrible thing to behold. A recent issue
of the Washington Monthly was consecrated to articles
about the right place of religion in American life. Ms.

"Once allow that 'religious convictions' are admirable in themselves, and where is
the limit? It's not denied that reverend Jim Jones gave some purpose and meaning to
the (abbreviated) lives of his unhappy followers ... Once aboard the religion train,
you have no reason to alight at any particular stop."
A final temptation to religious posturing among the
formerly enlightened is the sheer utility of pretended piety
as a rhetorical weapon. A recent example is Jonathan
Schell's The Fate of the Earth, which contains a detailed
rebuttal of "the suggestion, made by some christian fundamentalists, that the nuclear holocaust we threaten to
unleash is the armageddon threatened by god in the bible."
Schell insists "it is not god, picking and choosing among the
things of his creation, who threatens us, but we ourselves."
How does Schell know this? If he believes in god (which
internal evidence does not suggest, despite the devotional
uppercase Hs and GSl), why is he allowed to interpret his
plan? And, ifhe does not believe in god, why mention him at
all in this connection? The christian fundamentalist view of

Kathleen Kennedy Townsend called, in a striking contribution, for "A Rebirth of Virtue." She did not dwell on any
religious belief of her own, though the reasoning was clearly
of roman provenance. All she thought was that it would be
good if other people got religion. In a reference to her late
father she made the following point:

'Amencon Atheists note this comment. It is strange in that

the original article had capitalized all of Hitchen's references to god and "him," etc., a practice which Hitchens
here explicitly shows he disdains. Why would Hitchens
practice what he disdains? The only answer to be given is _
that the original manuscript of Hitchens did not capitalize
the "Gs" and the "Hs," showing that he understood the
nefarious psychological impact of such capitalizations.
Harper's, however, demonstrating the overwhelming pow-

er that religion still has on our culture, itself decided to keep

one foot in the religious camp (by devotionally capitalizing
god, etc.) even while printing an article that clearly shows
the folly of such behavior! Harper's, of course, must be
applauded for having the courage to print such a-bold and
incisive piece as The Lord and the Intellectuals. This
incident, however, reiterates the position of American
Atheists as the only organization in the United States
completely free from religion.

Austin, Texas

"In 1968, for instance, my father was able to earn the

trust of black and white women and men largely
because it was clear that he believed in them and in
their values. His religious conviction made him acceptable to many people who after his death could vote
only for George Wallace."
Yes. Religion helped Bobby Kennedy win votes. The

January,1983

Page 27

trouble is that George Wallace was also forever using his

flock. He also liked to give the impression that he "believed
in them and in their values." IfMs. Kennedy Townsend. gets
the religious revival that she seeks, how is she going to
confine its validity to what she calls "liberals"?
Once allow that "religious convictions" are admirable in
themselves, and where is the limit? It's not denied that the'
reverend Jim Jones gave some purpose and meaning to the
(abbreviated) lives of his unhappy followers. All agree that
the Black muslims rescue junkies and dropouts. Shiite islam
has cheered the lives of people in downtown Teheran.
Presumably - and reportedly - satanism creates a kind of
bond and obligation among its adherents (people who
otherwise "could vote only for George Wallace"?). Once
aboard the religion train, you have no reason to alight at any
particular stop.
The ultimate example of a nonbeliever using appeals of
pseudoreligious kind, to charm those who think that such
appeals make the speaker more impressive rather than less,
occurred in Vienna in June 1979. The SALT deal was being
signed, and in one of his speeches urging acceptance
Leonid Brezhnev said to Jimmy Carter: "God will not
forgive us if we fail." This unlikely exhortation was later
"clarified" by Soviet spokesmen. After Brezhnev's flack,
Zamyatin, had failed to strike the remark from the official
record, another spokesman said, perhaps more revealingly
than he knew: "It was simply because he (Brezhnev) wanted
to express his commitment to SALT in terms that Carter
would understand and identify with."
Precisely. If a guy believes he has been born again, it's
reasonable to assume that he will believe anything. At any
rate, it's worth a try.
Carter fellbecause, among other reasons, he was seen as
a gullibleand feebleminded person. Gullibility and credulity
are considered undesirable qualities in every department of

"The crime of inquiry is one which

religion has never forgiven"
PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY

"... Atheism, and the related conviction that we have just one life to live, is the only
sure way to regard all our fellow creatures as brothers and sisters. The alleged
'fatherhood' of god does not, as liberation theology has it, make this axiomatic. All it
has meant, throughout history, is afoul squabble for primacy in daddy's affections."
human life- except religion. Like William Barrett, who is a
"modern" until he reaches the cemetery gates, many people
willderide a man's tendency to wishful thinking until they
reach the "private matter" of his religion. Yet why should we
consider the inculcation of credulity into children and adults
to be desirable if performed by ministers of a (recognized)
church? Why are we praised by godly men for surrendering
our "godly gift" of reason when we cross their mental
thresholds?
Sometimes, among people of advanced views, a distinction is made between religious belief, held to be desirable,
and "organized religion," held in traditional contempt. You
would think such people had invented religious belief
themselves. But the desire for such a distinction is natural
and understandable. Pope innocent III told Simon de
Monfort to massacre all the heretics in cities held by the
Albigensians. When asked how the heretics could be
distinguished from the faithful (in order that they might be

Page 28

January, 1983

burned and broken in a fair-minded way), the pope replied,

"Kill them all. God will know his own." Whether the
liberated catholics of today, and noncatholic admirers of the
present pope, like it or not, there would have been no
papacy without that directive.
Many of the radical clergy of our own time seem almost
haggard in their effort to prove, by their own shiningly
political example, that Marx was being unfair in dismissing
religion as the opium of the people. Pity for them that their
understanding of Marx is as muddled as their understanding of the bible. What he said was this:
"Religious distress is at the same time the expression
of real distress and the protest against real distress.
Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the
heart of the heartless world, just as it is the spirit of a
spiritless situation. It is the opium of the people. The
demand to give up the illusions about its conditions is

The American Atheist

the demand to give up a condition that needs illusions.

Criticism has plucked the imaginary flowers from the
chain not so that men willwear the chain without any
fantasy or consolation but so that they willbreak the
chain and cull the living flower." (Critique of Hegel's
Philosophy of the Right)
What is being argued in this passage is not that religious
enthusiasts and prophets are dope peddlers. That is the
universal vulgarization of Marx's opinion. What Marx
meant is that there is a chord of credulity waiting to be
struck in all of us. It is most likely to be struck successfully if
the stroke comes concealed as an argument for moral and
humane behavior.

several centuries of the divine right of kings. It is the

religious mentality that has to be combated.
In pursuit of this goal, it's often necessary to be rudest to
the nicest people. P.G. Wodehouse's glutinous character
Madeleine Bassett believed that the stars were god's daisy
chain. Bertie Wooster was too well bred to contradict her to
her face, but added as an aside, "All rot, of course. They're
nothing of the sort." Madeleine Bassett was a sweet and
tender girl, and Mr. Charles Peters, editor of the Washington Monthly, is by all reports a fine fellow. In the same slushy
issue of his publication that I've already mentioned, he
shares with us his own deeper feelings. He tells how he used
to. worship president Roosevelt, and how he last turned to

"... the pope replied, 'Kill them all. God will know his own.' Whether the liberated
catholics of today, and noncatholic admirers of the present pope, like it or not, there
would have been no papacy without that directive."
But ifyou believe in religion as a reinforcement for other
people's morality, then why not mormonism? Or snakehandling? Or mithras or dagon or zeus, or any of the
thousands of defunct deities added up by H.L. Mencken?
True believers always balk at this point, murmuring feebly
on occasion that one has to believe in something. Satanism
does very well by this argument. The ontological proof of
satan's existence is just as good as that of god's, and the
reasons for propitiating him are, on one analysis, slightly
more compelling.
So Atheism strikes me as morally superior, as well as
intellectually superior, to religion. Since it is obviously
inconceivable that all religions can be right, the most
reasonable conclusion is that they are all wrong. Does this
leave us shorn of hope? Not a bit of it. Atheism, and the
related conviction that we have just one life to live, is the
only sure way to regard all our fellow creatures as brothers

the bible as a believer on that dark and dread day of April 12,
1945. Later, he surfaced from the bleak post-Roosevelt
years with a new scheme. As he tells us:
"Gradually, I began to build a new faith, one in which
the love and courage and indifference to wealth of
jesus and saint Francis were central but no more so
than the humor and delight in life I found in the
character of FOR and in the books that became most
important for me, Don Quixote and Huckleberry
Finn, and that is expressed in the great prayer '0 00
joyful in the lord, all ye lands: serve the lord with
gladness.' "
As William Barrett would say, "Hence the psalms." ("0 be
joyful is a psalm and not a prayer.)
Is it possible that Mr. Peters, or his magazine, both

". . . Stalinism, which was actually Stalin worship, could not have occurred in a
country that had not endured several centuries of the divine right of kings. It is the
religious mentality that has to be combated."
and sisters. The alleged "fatherhood" of god does not, as
liberation theology has it, make this axiomatic. All it has
meant, throughout history, is a foul squabble for primacy in
daddy's affections. In just the same way that any democracy
is better than any dictatorship, so even the compromise of
agnosticism is better than faith. It minimizes the totalitarian
temptation, the witless worship of the absolute and the
surrender of reason, that may have led some to saintliness
but can hardly repay for the harm it has done.
We need a general "deprogramming," of the sort that
even our churches endorse when the blank-eyed victim is
worshipping the reverend Moon. The desire to worship and
obey is the problem - the object of adoration is a
secondary issue. Professedly godless men have shown
themselves capable of great crimes. But they have not
invented any that they did not learn from the religious, and
so they find themselves heaping up new "infallible" icons
and idols. Stalinism, which was actually Stalin worship,
could not have occurred in a country that had not endured

Austin, Texas

devoted most of the time to exposing and combating cheap

illusions, would write in that tone on any other topic? That
they would permit themselves to many non sequiturs or so
much sentimentality? I take leave to doubt it. Mr. Peters
ends by calling for a religious revival. The awful thing is that
he may well get it. Then he will be compelled, both literally
and metaphorically, to say whether he believes in god or
merely believes in religion.

January, 1983

Page 29

--

--

-----------------

WHERE RELIGION DENIES

CHILDREN HAPPINESS
There are close to twenty-five million orphans and
destitute children in India. This is the world's highest
average, surpassed only when certain countries are ravaged by war or civil strife.
But adoption is regarded with reservation by most
Indians and few families take orphans in. At the same time
they are very sensitive about any suggestions that Indian
children are being exported as cheap labour or for prostitution through adoption agencies.
Recently, the Daily Mail carried a story about trafficking
in babies by a Calcutta-based agency called the International Mission of Hope. The American director, Ms.
Cherie Volkavitch Clark, 36, hails from Denver. She finds
parents chiefly for disabled children and those abandoned
in jails. Twenty per cent of the 500 children sent to US
homes were disabled in some way. The fee Ms. Clark asks
prospective parents to pay for travel and legal formalities
was assumed to be the price of a child by the Daily Mail
correspondent.
This damaging report proved to be incorrect, but it did
the children's cause no good either. Other adoption agencies have also come under a cloud. This is because there is
an orthodox section in Indian society who oppose adoptions by foreigners for reasons of religion, and the Daily Mail
report justified their righteous indignation.
The Indian adoption law is almost a century old. Legally,
only those professing hinduism may adopt a child. Other
communities are only granted guardianship.
Since few hindu couples go for adoption, this means that
many orphan children are denied homes. Indian society is
rigidly set into caste and subcaste, each with a distinct
identity jealously protected by its members. Intercaste
marriages are seen as a kind of miscegenation. Adopting a
child whose antecedents are suspect also dilutes caste
purity.
Indians have a strong tradition of the biological concept of
parenthood whereby a woman is fulfilled and achieves
status through maternity, and aman's blood line is secured
through paternity.
According to hindu tradition, marriage is a social obligation, followed by the procreation of children. Children are
not born for themselves alone. Instead, they affirm sexual
potency so that too many daughters suggests attenuated
seed. Caste and community lines are carried on. In-laws are
satisfied that the girls they bring home for their sons are
fertile and unflawed. Inheritance and property rights are
guaranteed. Farmers see children as cheap labour. Pious
hind us are assured salvation if they have sons to carry out
the year-long funeral rites after they die, and pray for the
manes of the ancestors annually thereafter.
Indian children are also produced to strike a political

Page 30

January, 1983

by Margaret Bhatty

The American Atheist

balance in numbers between religious groups. Muslim and

catholic priests urge their followers not to practice birth
control because it is a "sin" against god. Besides, they
argue, producing more of the faithful willmake the cornmunity bigger and stronger. This has created a backlash
among the majority hindu community who see themselves
being swamped out. This is why India's population control
program has foundered.

against adoption. The koranic reference here is one of the

flimsiest of any, and derives from the dispute which arose
when the prophet wished to marry the divorced wife of
zayd. Since zayd happened to be his adopted son, the
prophet dissolved the adoption. This is now regarded as an
injunction against adopting children. Muslim Indians are
also afraid that any liberal legislation will be the first step
towards interference in their religion by the hindu majority.

"... Muslim and catholic priests urge their followers not to practice birth control
because it is a "sin" against god. Besides, they argue, producing more of the faithful
will make the community bigger and stronger. This has created a backlash among the
majority hindu community who see themselves being swamped out. This is why
India's population control program has foundered."
Despite the large number of orphans, few people go for
adoption purely for humanitarian reasons. Ifadoption does
take place in a hindu family, it is in order to fulfilla social
requirement. It is regarded as an extreme measure resorted
to only because childlessness has persisted. Care is usually
taken to ensure that caste and community rules are not
infringed.
The traditional attitude prevails that orphans without
proof of parentage are "bastard" and carry taint in their
blood. Since destitution is identified with crime, adopted
children are also likely to prove delinquent.
Allthese misconceptions lead to some interesting conclusions: Firstly, that the people of India to not share a
common humanity but consist of many distinct species,
some superior, some inferior, and described as hindu,
muslim, christian, parsi, etc. Secondly, religion somehow
establishes distinct genetic patterns, some superior, some
inferior, and" goodness" or "badness" is easily traced to this
genetic inheritance!
Middle class couples from orthodox religious backgrounds are so intimidated by these misconceptions that
few take pride in adopting a child. Social workers in
orphanages are often asked to go to ridiculous lengths to
keep the entire process secret. A prospective mother
usually goes away to her parents' home to return after a
reasonable absence with the adopted child. In the small and
exclusive parsi community no child is accepted unless born
of a parsi father, and an adopted child cannot even enter a
fire temple as a communicant.

Parsi, hindu and other bigots voted against the bill in the
interests of caste purity. Religious obscurantists thus
successfully deprived millions of orphans the chance of
happiness.
The legal position as it now stands is that all destitute
orphans, whether abandoned or rescued from garbage
cans, are hindu by religion. And unless hindu parents come
forward to adopt them, they must be maintained in staterun homes where their spiritual inheritance is safeguarded.
The hindu belief is that one comes into this world not to
shape one's destiny but to endure it. All suffering is
predestined according to sins committed in some former
existence. One's religious duty is to endure without complaint to ensure an accumulation of merit for a better deal in
the next existence.
Such a rationalization of suffering frees one from the
uncomfortable necessity of feeling overconcerned about
the lot of the less fortunate, since they have only themselves
to blame.
Orthodox hind us are opposed to children being adopted
by foreigners because they will then cease to be what has
been ordained by their karmic destiny - hindus, born in
India, for unverifiable reasons, in a cycle of existences.
Possibly, a short and brutai life in the grey walls of
institutions in subhuman conditions are also part of their
destiny.
Mother Theresa's work among the dying in Indian cities
has been strongly resented by hindus because of her
practice of baptising them before they breathe their last in

"Because of such religious prejudices Indian procedures for adoption are the most
complicated in the world .... In 1978 a bill was introduced in parliament to liberalize
adoption and make it available to everyone, regardless of religion. It was effectively
killed by vigorous lobbying on the part of the religious bigots."
Because of such religious prejudices Indian procedures
for adoption are the most complicated in the world. There
are less stringent laws against drinking, prostitution and
drug trafficking. In 1978 a bill was introduced in parliament
to liberalize adoption and make it available to everyone,
regardless of religion. It was effectively killed by vigorous
lobbying on the part of religious bigots.
Muslims claimed it infringed their personal law which is

Austin, Texas

the confident hope that they will attain heaven thereafter.

This is as bad as conversion. Her views on abortion, which
is legal in India, are of the catholic church. "Do not murder
your children," she says. "Bring them to me." The children
in her homes are raised to be catholics.
The average Indian attitude to deformity in a child is that
it is a kind of judgment. But children are also maimed and
blinded and put out to beg by unscrupulous operators.

January, 1983

Page 31

Indian officials were therefore surprised at the number of

appeals which came from America and Canada asking
specially for disabled children. They were convinced these
would be used for begging. Not until it was proved that
these applications were dictated by purely altruistic mo-

been some failures, but it is still safe to assume that this

could not be worse than the odium they would suffer here as
"bastard" stock without caste or community labels tied to
their ankles when tossed into drains or onto rubbish dumps.
But it will be a long while yet before religious bigotry

"Orthodox hindus are opposed to children being adopted by foreigners because

. they will then cease to be what has been ordained by their karmic destiny - hindus,
born in India, for unverifiable reasons, in a cycle of existences."
tives, did they allow them to be processed and filled.
Meticulous data on children sent abroad has proved that
most of them find happiness in their new homes. There have

allows adoption laws to be liberalized, and social attitudes

change sufficiently to make people see this problem from a
purely humanitarian view.

The 13th Annual National Convention

of
American Atheists
hosted by
The San Francisco Chapter of American Atheists

Minerva Massen, Director

Where:
The San Franciscan Hotel
1231 Market St. (Market and 8th, at The Civic Center)
San Francisco, CA 94103
in California, call (415) 626-8000;outside of California, dial: (800) 227-4747
When:
April 1st, 2nd and 3rd (easter weekend);
Price of Registration:
$20.00/person; $30/couple; $10.00 student/aged (with I.O.)
Special convention price on hotel rooms:
$55.00/day, whether single, double, triple, in a double room. For a 4th person in that room - rollaway
charge of $10.00; $75.00/day for family suite of 2 double rooms with 'connecting bath.
First night's deposit guarantees your room.
The cut off date for hotel reservations at these special rates is March 1st, 1983.
The cut off date for Convention registration is March 15th, 1983.

For additional convention and registration information contact:

Art Brenner, Convention Coordinator
American Atheist Center
P.O. Box 2117
Austin, TX 78768
Phone: (512) 458-1244
Page 32

January, 1983

The American Atheist

The Speech We Ignored

LORD LOUIS MOUNTBATTEN

ON NUCLEAR WAR
Speech by Admiral of the Fleet, the earl Mountbatten of Burma on the occasion of the
award of the Louise Weiss Foundation Prize to the Stockholm International Peace
Research Institute at Strasbourg on the 11th May, 1979.
Do the frightening facts about the arms race, which show
that we are rushing headlong towards a precipice, make any
of those responsible for this disastrous course pull themselves together and reach for the brakes?
The answer is 'no' and I only wish that I could be the
bearer of the glad tidings that there has been a change of
attitude and we are beginning to see a steady rate of
disarmament. Alas, that is not the case.

$2,600,000,000,000.00
That's how much the US has spent on the military since WW II.

15%
for
human
resources

15%
for all
other costs

THE BIGGEST TAX BITE

This year 64% (321.28 billion) of your Federal Income
Tax dollars are allotted for payment for the military and
past wars. For the average American family that's
$6,245.00 for fiscal year 1983. The same family will
spend only $602.00 for physical resources and only
$1,506.00 for human resources and an equal amount
for all other fiscal costs.

Austin, Texas

Iam deeply saddened when I reflect on how little has been

achieved in spite of all the talk there has been particularly
about nuclear disarmament. There have been- numerous
international conferences and negotiations on the subject
and we have all nursed dreams of a world at peace but to no
avail. Since the end of the second world war, 34 years ago,
we have had war after war. There is still armed conflict going
on in several parts of the world. We live in an age of extreme
peril because every war today carries the danger that it
could spread and involve the superpowers.
And here lies the greatest danger of all. A military
confrontation between the nuclear powers could entail the
horrifying risk of nuclear warfare. The western powers and
the USSR started by producing and stockpiling nuclear
weapons as a deterrent to general war. The idea seemed
simple enough. Because of the enormous amount of
destruction that could be wreaked by a single nuclear
explosion, the idea was that both sides in what we still see as
an east-west conflict would be deterred from taking any
aggressive action which might endanger the vital interests
of the other.
It was not long, however, before smaller nuclear weapons
of various designs were produced and deployed for use in
what was assumed to be a tactical or theatre war. The belief
was that were hostilities ever to break out in western
Europe, such weapons could be used in field warfare
without triggering an all-out nuclear exchange leading to the
final holocaust.
I have never found this idea credible. I have never been
able to accept the reasons for the belief that any class of
nuclear weapons can be categorised in terms of their
tactical or strategic purposes.
Next month I enter my eightieth year. I am one of the few
survivors of the first world war who rose to high command
in the second and I know how impossible it is to pursue
military operations in accordance with fixed plans and
agreements. In warfare the unexpected is the rule and no
one can anticipate what an opponent's reaction will be to
the unexpected.
As a sailor I saw enough death and destruction at sea but I
also had the opportunity of seeing the absolute destruction
of the war zone of the western front in the first world war,
where those who fought in the trenches had an average
expectation of life of only a few weeks.
Then in 1943 I became supreme allied commander in
Southeast Asia and saw death and destruction on an even
greater scale. But that was all conventional warfare and,
horrible as it was, we all felt we had a 'fighting' chance of
survival. In the event of a nuclear war there will be no
chances, there willbe no survivors - all willbe obliterated.

January, 1983

Page 33

I' am not asserting this without having deeply thought

about the matter. When I was chief of the British Defence
Staff I made my views known. I have heard the arguments
against this view but I have never found them convincing.
So I repeat in all sincerity as a military man I can see no use
for any nuclear weapons which would not end in escalation,
with consequences that no one can conceive.
And nuclear devastation is not science fiction - it is a
matter of fact. Thirty-four years ago there was the terrifying
experience of the two atomic bombs that effaced the cities
of Hiroshima and Nagasaki off the map. In describing the
nightmare a Japanese journalist wrote as follows:
"Suddenly a glaring whitish, pinkish light appeared
in the sky accompanied by an unnatural tremor which
was followed almost immediately by a wave of suffocating heat and a wind which swept away everything in
its path. Within a few seconds the thousands of people
in the streets in the centre of the town were scorched
by a wave of searing heat. Many were killed instantly,
others lay writhing on the ground screaming in agony
from the intolerable pain of their burns. Everything
standing upright in the way of the blast - walls,
houses, factories, and other buildings, was annihilated
... Hiroshima had ceased to exist."
But that is not the end of the story. We remember the
tens and thousands who were killed instantly or worse still
those who suffered a slow painful death from the effect of
the burns - we forget that many are still dying horribly from
the delayed effects of radiation. To this knowledge must be
added the fact that we now have missiles a thousand times
as dreadful; I repeat, a thousand times as horrible.
One or two nuclear strikes on this great city of Strasbourg with what today would be regarded as relatively low
yield weapons would utterly destroy all that we see around
us and immediately kill probably half of its population.
Imagine what the picture would be if larger nuclear strikes
were to be levelled against not just Strasbourg but ten other
cities in, say, a 200 mile radius. Or even worse, imagine what
the picture would be ifthere was an unrestrained exchange
of nuclear weapons - and this is the most appalling risk of
all since, as I have already said, I cannot imagine a situation
in which nuclear weapons would be used as battlefield
weapons without the conflagration spreading.
Could we not take steps to make sure that these things
never come about? A new world war can hardly fail to
involve the all-out use of nuclear weapons. Such a war
would not drag on for years. It could be allover in a matter of
days.
And when it is all over what willthe world be like? Our fine
great buildings, our homes, will exist no more. The thou-.
sands of years it took to develop our civilisation will have
been in vain. Our works of art willbe lost. Radio, television,
newspapers will disappear. There will be no means of
transport. There will be no hospitals. No help can be
expected for the few mutilated survivors in any town to be
sent from a neighbouring town - there will be no neighbouring towns left, no neighbours, there will be no help,
there willbe no hope.
How can we stand by and do nothing to prevent the
destruction of our world? Einstein, whose centenary we
celebrate this year, was asked to prophesy what weapons
would be used in the third world war. I am told he replied to
Page 34

January, 1983

the following effect:

"On the assumption that a third world war must
escalate to nuclear destruction, I can teil you what the
fourth world war will be fought with - bows and
arrows. "
The facts about the global nuclear arms race are well
known and as I have already said SIPRI (Stockholm
International Peace Research Institute) has played its part
in disseminating authoritative material on world armaments
and the need for international efforts to reduce them. But
how do we set about achieving practical measures of
nuclear arms control and disarmament?
To begin with we are most likely to preserve the peace if
there is a military balance of strength between east and
west. The real need is for both sides to replace the attempts
to maintain a balance through ever-increasing and even
more costly nuclear armaments by a balance based on
mutual restraint. Better still, by reduction of nuclear
armaments I believe it should be possible to achieve greater
security at a lower level of military confrontation.
I regret enormously the delays which the Americans and
Russians have experienced in reaching a SALT II agreement for the limitation of even one major class of nuclear
weapons with which it deals. I regret even more the fact that
opposition to reaching any agreement which will bring
about a restraint in the production and deployment of
nuclear weapons is becoming so powerful in the United
States. What can their motives be?
As a military man who has given half a century of active
service Isay in all sincerity that the nuclear arms race has no
military purpose. Wars cannot be fought with nuclear
weapons. Their existence only adds to our perils because of
the illusions which they have generated.
There are powerful voices around the world who still give
credence to the old Roman precept - if you desire peace,
prepare for war. This is absolute nuclear nonsense and I
repeat - it is a disastrous misconception to believe that by
increasing the total uncertainty one increases one's own
certainty.
This year we have already seen the beginnings of a
miracle. Through the courageous determination of presidents Carter and Sadat and prime minister Begin, we have
seen the first real move towards what we all hope will be a
lasting peace between Egypt and Israel. Their journey has
only just begun and the path they have chosen will be long
and fraught with disappointments and obstacles. But these
bold leaders have realised the alternative and have faced up
to their duty in a way which those of us who hunger for the
peace of the world applaud.
. Is it possible that this initiative will lead to the start of yet
another even more vital miracle and someone somewhere
willtake that first step along the long stony road which will
lead us to an effective form of nuclear arms limitation,
including the banning of "tactical" nuclear weapons?
After all, it is true that science offers us almost unlimited
opportunites, but it is up to us, the people, to make the
moral and philosophical choices and since the threat to
humanity is the work of human beings, it is up to man to
save himself from himself.
The world now stands on the brink of the final abyss. Let
us all resolve to take all possible practical steps to ensure
that we do not, through our own folly, go over the edge.
The American Atheist

Dr. Madalyn Murray O'Hair

RITUALS EXAMINED
Since the beginning of man, throughout all of human
history, and even in the modern and sophisticated culture of
today in America, we find that religion has relied on and
does rely on rituals.
Have you ever given any thought to some of those
religious rituals and wondered whence they came? These
are actions which people undertake without much thought
as to their meaning. There is little ifany emotion connected
with them. As a matter of fact, the earliest religionists of
whom we have any knowledge had got far from the state of
emotional expression, and seem to have believed that virtue
lay in the elaboration of ritual forms. Virtue today seems
also to be caught up in some of these ritual forms.
Ritual seems to go far beyond the regulation of those
natural feelings and attitudes in which religion is commonly
supposed to have had its origin. Ritual consists for the most
part, at any rate, not in the regulation, or perhaps overregulation, of conduct where at least some regulation is
necessary (such as criminal law, social etiquette, or military
drill) but ritual consists of the performance of acts which
serve no practical end, and are not even an exaggeration of
what once may have served some practical end. By a
practical end I mean one which contributes to the health,
comfort or happiness of mankind or of some part of it.
Let's look at some religious rituals, both historical and
modern, and just speculate on them for a few moments.
There are only thirteen types of rituals. The first and most
dramatic was human sacrifice. The second was torture and
mutilation. The third was ritual celibacy, such as nuns and
priests practice even today, and ritual prostitution which
was a part of the pagan religions. Fourth was burnt offerings
and the destruction of food and other things in certain ways.
Fifth was regarding certain days as holy or unholy, lucky or
unlucky, and performing or refraining from certain acts on
those days. You all recognize how quickly we have arrived
at customs which are today still going on. Sixth was
refraining from certain wholesome foods, either altogether,
or on certain days. Seventh was the adoration of images and
other inanimate objects. Eighth was the ritual visitation' of
sacred spots. Ninth was the performance of ceremonies to
cast out devils, exorcise ghosts, or thwart witches. Tenth
was turning profane into sacred persons by means of
baptism or initiation. Eleventh was turning living men into
gods by means of coronation or ordination. Twelfth was
turning dead men into gods by means of funerary rites and
thirteen was the unending repetition of certain formulae,
often in unintelligible language.
Now why do you suppose that intelligent creatures, like
all of you and me, too, would ever have engaged in anything
like this or why some of you still do it. Let's see what

Austin, Texas

features we can pull out of these, so that we can group them

and try to discover what we do and why we do it.
First, none of these rites attain any practical end. Think
about it. None of these rites serve any practical end.
Second, none of them has any obvious connection with
any of the primitive ideas from which religion came, such as
nature worship, primitive animism, the personification of
unseen forces, the sense of the numinous, the fear of the
unknown, or any of those vague ideas in which religion is
commonly supposed to have originated.
The third thing is that these rites make up religion, as we
can see it practiced. For the religious person, or the vast
majority of them, they are not merely a part of religion, but
religion itself. That is to say, that religion consists in the due
performance of the rites. Religious belief is commonly the

January, 1983

Page 35

belief in the value and efficacy of the rites, and theology

consists of giving reasons why the rites should be performed.
Let's look at the rites then. Not only do they not serve a
practical end, but it does not seem that any of them can be
explained, except in terms unfamiliar to modern thought
In all ages that had human sacrifice, which was an
important feature of religion for a long while, there is no
accepted theory as to the origin of this, or why it was
believed to be efficacious.
We can see that religious ritual torture and mutilation
were probably modifications of human sacrifice.
Ritual celibacy and ritual prostitution are probably alternative methods of reinforcing the procreative powers of the
gods, but this does not explain rationally how the process is
supposed to work For example, nuns are the brides of
christ, but I cannot find anywhere an explanation of why
christ, who is supposed to have been celibate on earth,
should have become so vastly polygamous in heaven.
The theory of burnt offering may be that the essence of
the meat ascends to the god with the smoke.
Food taboos are everywhere. Some are given a spurious
practical reason, but none have what seem to be adequate
religious reason.
Some lucky days or unlucky days are said to have had a
connection with the phases of the moon, but this does not
take us very far in explanation either.
We see pilgrims to Mecca, or Lourdes, or Benares, or
Rome, or to the big cathedrals in America, and presumably
we could suppose that the people think that they are nearer
to god or gods there than elsewhere, but such suppositions
are not consistent with any extant religious theory and
those must go back to the time, or a time, when gods lived,
or were believed to live, on earth.
I want to spend some time on the other rituals, so I willdo
that in another program, and tonight, I want to look at the
unending repetition of formulae, for this is the most striking,
and the most constant ritual, or feature of a ritual.
Sometimes prayer consists of this repetition. But, we can
set prayer apart just now. There are two fairly good religious
theories about prayer. One is that it is a means of intimate
communion with a deit\}and the other them\} hetd b\}most
oe\ie\lers tnat it is a means 0\ causing tneir o.esires to be
satisfied by making them known to the deity.
I have said before that I cannot pronounce some of these
words, since I have no pronunciation guide, and Iwilldo the
best that I can here; but what purpose is served by the
endless repetition of such formulae as "om mane padme
om" or "kyrie eleison" or "lord, have mercyupon us," or
"allahu akbar" - often in a language that the "worshipper"
does not understand? The practice seems to have come
down to us from a time when words were thought of as
being powerful tools which, like an axe or saw, increased
their effect with each repeated stroke. There is simply no
logical reason to believe that certain sounds or combinations of words uttered any number of times willproduce any
results at any level, anywhere. We can see some logic in the
"rebel yell" of the Confederate Army when it charged the
Yankees in the civil war for the noise presumably was to
strike fear into the Yankee heart In karate a sound is
emitted at the time a blow is struck presumably to throw the

Page 36

January, 1983

As man's prayers are a disease of the will, so

are their creeds a disease of the intellleet.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
opponent off guard, or to increase his fear. But, there is no
real rational reason for me, for instance, in a time of distress
to say, "Oh, Robert Ingersoll, deliver me. Oh, Robert
Ingersoll, deliver me." No benefit is derived from this at all.
Rites have been modified during the course of human
history. The old form has been preserved but there is a
difference. First, there was human sacrifice, which then
became symbolized or else animals were substituted for the
human. Jesus christ was a human sacrifice.
Celibate priests replaced castrated priests.
Fasts became less rigorous.
The number of holy or unholy days has been reduced.
Fewer activities on those days are tabooed. Why do you
suppose business everywhere is fighting the old concept of
"Sunday" as a day on which no one can do business. The
old "blue laws" are still in effect many places in America,
induding Texas. Rituats die hard.
\'i\grimages cease to oe a necess\t\}, ana oecome mere\':}
meritorious.
Images become merely incitements to devotion.
Divine kings become fewer and their functions are put
into commission.
Vast treasures are no longer buried with the dead.
There are striking resemblances to all rituals, no matter
what the origin, for the rituals of roman catholicism,
buddhism, and the ancient religions of Mexico, for example,
had much in common although their theologies were
different Similar rites are found among savages who as a
rule have no theology at all. The explanation of these
resemblances popular among christian theologians of former days was that the christian rites were instituted by god
and the pagan rites by the devil. This view seems to have
been abandoned, and it seems now to be held that there are
only a limited number of ways in which worship can be
performed and that these naturally suggest themselves to
the worshippers both of the true gods and the false gods.

Th~ American Atheist

BUT, if these rites are natural, they should be explicable

in terms of human nature and this has never been attempted by any theologian.
All over the world we find rites the object of which is to
destroy enemies. Christians hope to do this, these days, by
prayer. Savages hope to do it by means of charms or spells.
Yet, common sense should tell a voodoo practitioner that
to burn a detached lock of hair hurts no one.
There is nothing natural in the performance of rites. They
are highly complex and completely stereotyped. They are
handed down from a prior generation and the slightest
deviation for the traditional form will usually make the
performer feel that the rites are ineffectual. The roman
catholic must make the cross in a certain manner: the up
and down stroke is first, and it comes from up to down and
then the second stroke is from left to right. None of the
roman catholics would dream of making the horizontal
stroke first from right to left and then the vertical stroke
from down to up. They would be aghast at the idea and
consider this to be sacrilege and mockery.
We find that religion often is a form to be observed, rather

than a manner of life.A rite is to go to a certain building each

Sunday morning, and to publicly go through other rites of
singing, kneeling, rising, rote reading, sacrificing (money at
this time in history), making signs, and yet curiously no
study has been done on the origin, the modification, the
meaning, of any of these rites except those studies done by
Atheists.
We are currently undertaking to do those studies. We
have established in Austin, Texas a beginning library of
freethought and Atheist books, manuscripts, documents
named after Charles E. Stevens, an Atheist of today. It is
called "The Charles E. Stevens Library for Education and
Information." I will be presenting to you many of the
theories of the papers and books and booklets in this library
as we continue.
There are many reasons that people do not accept
religion, and I have written a booklet about my reasons. It is
available to you for $3.00 by writing to P.O. Box 2117/
Austin, TX 78768 and asking for the booklet Why I Am An
Atheist by Madalyn Murray O'Hair.
~

Jeff Frankel

BITS AND PIECES

Shortly after I completed last month's column on the life
of John Lennon, Rolling Stone magazine came out with
. excerpts from a new book entitled The Ballad of John and
Yoko. In that book, Lennon is said to have gone along with
Yoko Ono on several superstitious rituals, such as fortune
telling and reading tarot cards. Also, a friend of the couple
was quoted as saying the lyrics to Lennon's song "God"
were quite ironic because he actually did believe in all of
those things which he claimed in the song that he didn't
Upon reading items of that nature, one could brand Lennon
as a hypocrite or simply dismiss it all as hearsay. My opinion
on the matter falls somewhere in the middle. Many dead
celebrities have been victimized by pseudo biographies
which were written by unscrupulous people out to make a
It has now been one year since "The Angry Young
quick
buck. But while researching the Lennon piece, I did
Atheist" first appeared in this magazine. Much has hapdiscover
that he was a very dissatisfied man, constantly
pened since then. We are all a year older. Perhaps some of
searching for something to hold on to. Perhaps he went'
us are a year wiser. The magazine has gone through
through a period of indecision where he gave beliefs he had
changes, such as the addition of my counterpart at the
other end of the age spectrum, Merrill Holste's "The Angry abandoned a second try. Perhaps he was, indeed, a
hypocrite. Whatever the case may be, it is insignificant now.
Old Atheist." It is my hope (for what hoping is worth) that
during the past twelve months several new Atheists have- The man is dead. What is important is that he made
joined the ranks, which appear to be stronger than ever, in statements against religion in his songs and interviews
which very few public figures have ever had the guts to do.
will if not in numbers.
One does not have to condone any superstitious beliefs
I don't have a lot to say about anyone thing this month,
but I do have a few things to say about several topics. I'm Lennon may have held to respect much of what he said and
sure you willfind some piece of information in the following did_
It should be remembered that Lennon was a deist, not an
paragraphs which willstimulate and/or entertain your mind.
Atheist Actually, Lennon's long time song writing partner,

*****

Austin, Texas

January, 1983

Page 37

Paul McCartney, is closer to being an Atheist than Lennon

ever was. In an interview for Julius Fast's book, The
Beatles, McCartney said that ifhe wasn't concerned with an
afterlife, he would call himself an Atheist. Fast believes that
McCartney is more concerned with his public image than an
afterlife. He bases that judgment on McCartney's statement
"I don't dare come on as an Atheist. Look what happened to
John when he put jesus down." McCartney probably has
more money than the entire readership of this magazine.
He's made a lasting mark on popular music, and that mark
willnot be removed simply because Paul might admit being
an Atheist. I failto see what he has to lose by being honest. If
enough celebrity Atheists would "come out of the closet,"
the stigma would be diminished and perhaps people in less
glamorous walks of life would find the courage to stand up
and be counted.
*****
Those of you who followed the 1982 baseball playoffs and
world series should be familiar with Cardinals outfielder
Willie McGee. He was one of the standouts on the team
which claimed victory in the prestigious fall classic. But
McGee's athletic career was threatened in his youth by his
overzealous father, a pentecostal minister. The elder
McGee refused to allow young Willie to play baseball on
Sunday, saying it was against the rules of the church. "They
said it was a sin," said Willie. "But I never heard in the bible
where it was a sin." In spite of threats of fire and brimstone,
Willie found a way to play. His father had a habit of falling
asleep while counting the money from the collection plate
after church. That's when Willie would take off for the
ballfield. Fortunately, this was one situation where religion
was unable to rob the world of a talented individual.
*****
The righteous reverend Ronnie Reagan has implied that
nonbelievers are not to be trusted. When it comes to trust,
few have earned as much from our nation's populace as
Walter Cronkite, the long time anchorman of the "CBS
Evening News." In fact, Cronkite has often been called "the
most trusted man in America." In the February 5, 1981 issue
of Rolling Stone, Cronkite was quoted as saying "I have
great questions about an almighty being." By uncle Ronnie's
ridiculous logic, a doubter like Walter just can't be trusted.
Idiotic reasoning to be sure, but "that's the way it is" where
our illustrious leader is concerned.
*****
When Tom Snyder's "Tomorrow" show was taken off the
air, a great forum for people with controversial viewpoints
was lost. Several Atheists, including Madalyn Murray
O'Hair, appeared on the program during its tenure on the
NBC television network. One frequent guest on the pro'
gram who you'll never see on the more conventional talk
shows was award-winning author Harlan Ellison. Ellison is a
classic freethinker who always speaks his mind, and he
really gave network officials headaches when he appeared
on the program shortly before the 1980 presidential election. Ellison's attacks sent everybody running for cover and
left poor Tom wondering what was going to happen next.
He labeled Reagan as having "some of the most brilliant
thinking of the eighteenth century" and read off instance
after instance of Ronnie's ineptitude as governor of California: Then came the ERA and its arch-foe Phyllis Schlafly.

Page 38

January, 1983

labeled

PRESIDENT

RONALD W. REAGAN

Harlan said a number of unkind things about Schlafly,

including that he would like to run her over with his car.
(Ellison's "tirade" prompted her to demand and receive
equal time on the program.) Then came religion. Harlan
related the story of a looney born-again female who, after
hearing him make some antireligious statements at a college
lecture, began calling him names and set her hair on fire.
That was followed by his mentioning some biblical inconsistencies and the beginning of an attack on the mormon
church. At that point, Snyder, fearing that he would have a
month's worth of programs devoted solely to giving equal
time to those who felt the sting of Ellison's sharp tongue,
quieted his close off-camera friend and got him to talk about
something a little less controversial.
In his column in Future Life magazine, Ellison has run
several scathing denunciations of the moral majority and
their ilk. Harlan was on a radio talk show in New York
several months ago with infamous conservative Richard
Viguerie and was quick to put Viguerie in his place. Viguerie
was ranting about "how these conservative activists are
something new, something fresh and original." Ellison cut in
on his self-aggrandizement by saying "I beg to differ. The
new right isn't original; we've had its like at least once
before. Except they called it the Spanish inquisition." I don't
know if Ellison is an Atheist, but I'd love to see him as a
spokesman for our organization. What a dynamic individual
he is. (Note to Paul McCartney: Ellison speaks his mind and
his books still sell.)
*****
I would like to thank all of you who have written to me
during the past year to comment on my column. Many of
you wrote concerning my first column, where I discussed
my turn away from religion and how I evolved into an
Atheist. Several individuals were able to identify with what
happened to me and related their own stories in their

The American Atheist

letters. It was my desire when writing the column that

others who had to go through the mental anguish which
goes along with de programming oneself would find solace in
the fact that they have company. That's what the American
Atheist organization is about; letting poor "confused"
Atheists know that they are not alone and that somebody
cares.
Knowing that my words are going out to an audience
which can identify with what I have to say is one reason why
I am an American Atheist columnist. I would like you all to
know that I receive nothing for writing this column other
than my own self satisfaction. I imagine they would have
paid me for this, but, fool that I am, I volunteered my
services. My reason for doing so is a simple one: I support
the American Atheist organization. I have a number of
things in mind which I would like to do to help the it, like

starting a local chapter in my area, and starting my own

Dial-an-Atheist. Unfortunately, my ambition is far more
abundant than my time and money. Perhaps in time Iwillbe
able to pursue both these goals. That doesn't mean I have to
sit on my duff and do nothing in the meantime. Fortunately,
I have a talent for writing which I can put to good use.
There's a lesson here for all of you; there's always something you can do. If you want to send $100 but can only
afford $1, send it. If you want to do something, but aren't
sure what, just write a letter to the editor of your local
newspaper stating the case for Atheism. Just admitting
your Atheism publicly is something which costs you no
money but ultimately helps us all. There's always something
you can do to help the cause. You don't have to be rich, or
be a writer. Just use your imagination. You may be
surprised at what you come up with. Every little bit helps.
~

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I can build a house but I and the house are not one and
the same.
Spinoza was a great philosopher, I only take issue with
his definition of the word god.
Perhaps this was a scheme by which he could write his
philosophy in a religious environment without disturbing the status quo.
He surely sprinkled it heavily with the word god, which
to him meant nature.

Hansel Harper

ON MONOTHEISM

THE PEACE MISSION

OF THE CHURCHES

Monotheism has the monster god

For whom the lives of millions
Have been sacrificed
Without its ever appeasing
Any of his intolerance
Or neurotic need to be
The only god in town

There'll always be a priest to bless the battleships

And praise the lord and pass the bombs along
So we can bomb the ones we feel a need to bomb.
But comes the time when peacefulness breaks out
And man - a bit ashamed by what he's done
And all the horrors he has wrought again
For reasons not as clear as once they were Now feels the need for pious sermons on
The wickedness of war in contrast to
The blessedness of brotherhood. Amen.
o praise the baby jesus
o hail the prince of peace.

What an infantile pathetic thing

To have conceived a jealous god
Who cannot abide competitors
And has his temper tantrums
Should he spot strange gods about.
For if there were a god
The first commandment
Would be blasphemy
And if there were a god
Then he would surely know
That monomanias are
The basic junk
And endless fix
To which mankind
Is hopelessly addiction-prone.

Yes, when it happens men are so debauched

By recent wars you cannot whip them up
For fresh assaults upon each other
Then - will rise the church to firmly stand
Opposed to any wars that aren't
Likely options at this time.
And so it goes when peace
Becomes the only game in town.
Frank J. Snider

Austin, Texas

January, 1983

Frank J. Snider
Page 39

,,~
.,'.:
..,.~

.
::.- -:

Merrill Holste

,1l

~~;F
~.

'/

BETTING ON A HEREAFTER
Christians often admit indirectly that their piety is
essentially a gamble. They say that by believing and
sacrificing their lives for the church they expect to win a
through ticket to heaven, while the unbeliever will win an
eternity in the christian hell Uohn 3:36}. They claim, on the
other hand, that if there really is no heaven or hell, they will
be no worse off than the unbeliever. So, why take the
chance?
We Atheists have examined all the available evidence on
the subject with a thoroughness that would surprise any
christian. We find all the evidence pointing to no life after
death, pointing to an extinction of our minds, personalities,
and consciousness as the inescapable result of the disintegration of our bodies and brains at death. A "soul" without a
brain to think with, and without sensory organs in working
order to feel and observe the supposed splendors of heaven
is unthinkable.

cause such complete mental blackout, loss of memory and

feeling, we Atheists bet that the total, irrevocable physical
disintegration produced by death will cause an equally
complete blackout of every nervous faculty constituting
human personality or "soul," thus eliminating every possibility of "life after death." Ifthe "soul" is so durable as to survive
an eternity after death, will some kind christian please
explain to us where it goes and what it does during the
temporary "death" accompanying a surgical operation?
The pious believer in a personal god, a heaven, one or
more hells, angels, devils, saints, etc. may think he isn't out
anything. He is only fooling himself there. He spends a lot of
money for church activities, and wastes a lot of time in futile
prayer, an activity that can result in nothing more perrnanent than a small local agitation of the atmosphere. The
church-goer is out all the money, time, and effort that he
might have used to make the only lifehe willever have more

"... Ifthe temporary stopping of the brain function due to anesthetics can cause such
complete mental blackout, loss of memory and feeling, we Atheists bet that the total
irrevocable physical disintegration produced by death will cause an equally complete
blackout of every nervous faculty constituting human personality or "soul," thus
eliminating every possibility of "life after death."
According to christian belief, the "soul" is able, as a
knowing, feeling, understanding entity to survive the disintegration at death of the physical body from which it is
supposed to originate. So durable is this soul supposed to
be that it is expected to survive an eternity of hell-fire or of
heavenly ennui. However, we have observed that slight
physical derangements of the brain, due to a blow on the
head, to lack of blood supply, or to damage f~om disease,
drugs, poisons or electric shock, can stop all mental,
processes. The temporary blocking of the nervous system

worthwhile.
Worst of all, the church-goer gets a thorough training in
illogical and unscientific thinking. He is taught that he, as a
true believer, can and should cure diseases by exorcism of
unclean spirits and devils. (luke 9:1-2,37-42, mark 16:17,
acts 5:16,8:5-7). He is led to believe in magic trees (gen. 2:9),
talking snakes (gen. 3:1-14),prenatal influences (gen. 30:2543), magic water (num. 5:11-31), john 9:1-11), magic brass
snakes (num. 21:8-9), magical cannibalism Uohn 6:53-56),
talking asses - the four-legged, not the pulpit, kind -'

"... The christian ... gambles on an improbable hereafter, bets against billion-to-one
odds, in the hope of gaining more - just like the silly pooch in Aesop's fable who lost a
bone trying to get a bigger one."
by anesthetics produces such a profound eclipse of all
mental activity that the mind is totally unaware of, and
remembers nothing of, the gravest surgical operation. Ifthe
temporary stopping of brain function due to anesthetics can

Page 40

January, 1983

(num. 22:22-33), the demonological theory of insanity (mark

5:1-20), that hatred of parents and family is good (luke
14:26-27), that poverty is desirable and that present comfort
is to be despised (luke 6:20-26), that improvidence is good

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(mark 6:8), and that mere belief in some mythical being will
atone for any crime one may commit (mark 16:16, john
3:16-18,36). Skepticism regarding anyone of these christian
beliefs means that the doubter is in imminent danger of
going to the christian hell. The christian who twists his mind
into believing the above irrational ideas seriously impairs his
effectiveness for rational living today, bets his future life to
gain a mythical, nonexistent future lifein a mythical heaven.
It may be pleasing to the vanity of the average person to
believe himself important enough to merit an eternal reward
of bliss in the gaudy, tinsel christian heaven, the heaven with
twelve gates of pearl and streets of gold, the heaven whose
length, breadth and height are equal - twelve thousand
furlongs. (revelations 21:1621)
We Atheists are realists. We avoid these unhealthy, pious
daydreams. We consider the infinite odds against the gaudy
christian hereafter. We bet everything on the present life
with its certain, though modest, rewards. The christian, on
the other hand, gambles on an improbable hereafter, bets
against billion-to-one odds, in the hope of gaining more just like the silly pooch in Aesop's fable who lost a bone
trying to get a bigger one. The Atheist guards what he has
and bets on the present without regard for vain delusions.

DIAL

AN
ATHEIST

CHAPTERS OF AMERICAN A THEISTS

Tucson, Arizona

(602) 623-3861

Phoenix, Arizona

(602) 267-0777

Sacramento, California

(916) 989-3170

S. Francisco, California

(415) 974-1750

Denver, Colorado

(303) 692-9395

Ft. Lauderdale, Florida

Tampa Bay, Florida

(305) 584-8923
(813) 577-7154

Atlanta, Georgia

(404) 577-7344

Chicago, Illinois

(312) 772-8822

Evansville, Indiana

(812) 425-1949

Lexington, Kentucky

(606) 278-8333

Boston, Massachusetts

(617) 969-2682

Detroit, Michigan

(313) 721-6630

Eastern Missouri

(314) 771-8894

Northern New Jersey

(201) 777-0766

Albuquerque, New Mexico

(505) 884-7630

Schenectady, New York

(518) 346-1479

Charlotte, North Carolina

(704) 568-5346

Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

Portland, Oregon

(405) 677-4141
(503) 287-6461

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

(412) 734-0509

Houston, Texas

(713) 664-7678

Salt Lake City, Utah

(801) 364-4939

Lynchburg, Virginia

(804) 993-2525

Northern Virginia

(703) 370-5255

Virginia Beach, Virginia

(804) 428-0979

DIAL- TH E-ATH EIST

Madalyn Murray O'Hair

Austin, Texas

January, 1983

Page 41

Excerpts from

THE CHRISTIAN CREDIBILITY GAPS

a new book by
Hiram Elfenbein

PART III:FLAWS IN THE LAZARUS STORY

(Excerpted by Frank Zindler)
(Editor's Note: Christian Credibility Gaps is as yet unpublished. We expect to make it auailable to you as soon as
possible.)

~-

: s, ~'- Jk...
JOHN XI:39

.~:J

Jesus said, take ye away the

stone. Martha, the sister of
him that was dead, saith unto
him, lord, by this time he
stinketh: for he hath been dead
four days.

The gospel of john, chapter XI, tells the long story of the
raising of lazar us from the dead. Lazarus is the alleged
brother of mary and martha, jesus's personal friends who
are from the town of Bethany. Jesus says (v. 14) "plainly,
lazarus is dead." In verse 17 we read, "he had lain in the
grave four days already." In verse 39, martha declares, "he
stinketh; for he hath been dead four days." Finally (v. 43),
jesus cries "with a loud voice, 'lazarus, come forth.' And he
that was dead came forth, bound hand and foot with
graveclothes: and his face was bound with a napkin ... Then
many of the jews ... believed on him."
We cannot pass by this lazarus anecdote without noticing
how poorly integrated it is in the surrounding context. It
appears to be inserted solely to set the scene for the jews
not to accept or recognize jesus as a miracle-worker and
messiah. This episode involves two distinct but overlapping
matters which are not mentioned at all in the other gospels:
1) Lazarus's return to human life, and
2) the jews' need of an acceptable alibi - or a
makeshift excuse - to explain why they
"denied" knowing of jesus and his "miracles."
If this gospel was written (as generally contended) some
20 or 30 years after matthew, mark, and luke were written,
the lazarus incident was meant to be an "improvement" or a

Page 42

January, 1983

new "argument" to fillthe gap in the three prior gospels but after half a century of discussions concerning the erratic
jesuit claims regarding what occurred in 30 a.d. or so in
Palestine.
The first three gospels do not specify the factual or
rational basis for the jews not "believing on jesus." Hence,
the passage in question supplies imagined jewish thoughts
and attempts to answer major objections which must haue
arisen between 30 a.d. (when jesus supposedly crusaded)
and 90 a. d. (when john's gospel was written). It is an attempt
to meet potent criticisms of a poorly reasoned christianity.
During those five or six decades (during which time Rome
destroyed Jerusalem's temple of the jews - in 70 a.d. and massacred or expelled the jews from Palestine),
intellectual gentile skeptics must have plausibly suspected
that if jesus had performed the miracles attributed to him,
the jews would have been forced by fact and logic to
endorse jesus: and their failure to do so was thus confirmation that the skimpy, unsubstantiated "miracles" were
fictitious.
To remedy this lack of credible miracles, the passages
about reviving lazarus from the dead were crudely fabricated and - what is more important - a carefully

The American Atheist

constructed pseudorationale
was concocted to account for
the jews' secret opposition to jesus as a messiah - also
explaining why jesus's death was imperatively needed by
the Hebrews. But neither the lazarus tale nor the plot to kill
jesus was cited - or even suggested - in the three prior
"lives" of jesus.

to life by jesus. Instead, they give us great detail about the

similar experience with the daughter of jairus.
THIRD. If caiaphas the high priest entered into the
quoted secret conspiracy "that jesus should die for that
nation," how did the author of john (who was also jesus's
close ally) discover the secret? Wouldn't that be a story

".. .intellectual gentile skeptics must have plausibly suspected that if jesus had
performed the miracles attributed to him, the jews would have been forced by fact
and logic to endorsejesus: and their failure to do so was thus confirmation that the
skimpy, unsubstantiated 'miracles' were fictitious."
In this connection, john XI: 19 tells us that "many of the
jews" were present at jesus's resuscitation of lazarus and
recites that the jewish leaders discussed jesus's "many
miracles," saying:
" 'If we let him thus alone [that is, if we let him do
more such miracles], all men will believe on him; and
the Romans [that is, theforeign imperial government]
shall come [shall send armies] and take away both our
place and nation [that is, take away our land and
remove our jewish nation from it].'
"And one of them, named caiaphas, being the high
priest that same year, said unto them, 'Ye know
nothing at all, Nor consider that it is expedient for us
that one man should die for the people, and that the
whole nation perish not [This is repeated
in
XVIII: 14.].'
"And this spake he not of himself; but being high
priest that year, he prophesied that jesus should die
for that nation ... (john XI:48-S1) [Material in square
brackets added]"
John XII:2 then tells us that later "they made him [jesus] a
supper; and martha served: but lazar us was one of them
that sat at the table with him" (with jesus); and verse 17
reports that the "miracle's" witnesses "bare record."
Several details call for closer examination.

worth telling?
FOURTH. Consider the following, irrational excerpt:
"But the chief priests consulted that they might put
lazarus to death; Because that by reason of him many
of the jews went away and believed on him." (John
XII:JO,ll)
We cannot reconcile this conspiracy to "put lazarus to
death" with the assigned reason for such a murder - that
the "miracle" of lazarus's revival caused many of the jews to
abandon judaism and believe on jesus! To begin with, even if
the jewish priests slew lazarus, it is not likely that thereby
the jews would cease to believe on jesus. There seems to be
no solid connection between the contemplated
murder of
lazarus and the stated need or reason for such murder.
Those jews who already saw the "miracle" of reviving
lazarus would not be disillusioned by a subsequent murder
of him. In addition, we have the absurd situation that
although john here reports the priests' precise intention to
kill lazarus, yet this plot is not spoken of in the rest of that
gospel! Nowhere does it mention a single step or effort by
the conspirators to execute their murderous plot!
It is as if the matter was completely
dropped and
forgotten - as if the plot had never been plotted. Apparently, lazarus is allowed to live out his second natural life
unmolested. This is another unfathomable - but conspicu-

"The whole lazarus story is not in any other prior gospel. If its addition by 'john'
was to 'supply the missing record,' ... the writer of john ... should have stated why
the new material was absent in the preceding accounts."
FIRST. The whole lazarus story is not in any other prior
gospel. If its addition by "john" was to "supply the missing
record," so to speak, by including a significant event which
was improperly missing in jesus's earlier "biographies," the
writer of john - as a conscientious
supplier of data
previously omitted or unknown for half a century - should
have stated why the new material was absent in the
preceding accounts. He should have explained how he
learned of the incident more than 20odd years after the first
three "histories" of jesus were written.
SECOND. John concentrated
our minds on the prominence and importance of lazar us and his two sisters, martha
and mary, all of whom jesus "loved." But we fail to learn why
or how other, more highly esteemed intimates and collaborators - such as the authors of matthew and mark neglected even to mention lazarus's name or to hint that
this close personal friend of jesus had died and was restored

Austin, Texas

ous - "unfinished story" of the new testament.

Furthermore,
since the destruction
of both the jewish
nation and their religious leaders actually occurred in the
year 70 a. d. (which was at least 20 years before this account
in john was written and about 40 years after the "plot" to
prevent it took place), the alleged murder plot against jesus
- said to have taken place in 30 a.d. - failed to save the
jews from the prophesied* annihilation which was to result if
jesus were allowed to live.
*Editor's Note: It is clear that this was intended to be an
"official prophesy," as can be seen from verse 51 (new

english bible): "He [caiaphas] DID NOT SA Y THIS OF HIS

OWN ACCORD, but as the high priest in office that year,
he was PROPHESYING that jesus would die for the nation
... " It is clear that caiaphas thought ("prophesied") that
jesus's death would save the nation. God apparently
misspoke!

January, 1983

Page 43

Thus, the entire story of lazarus and the conspiracies

were in reality pointless and superfluous even at the
moment when the gospel of john was issued - whether in
the year 90 a.d. or at some date long after that, as indicated
by our own analysis. In short, caiaphas's mad "conspiracies" and his "prophesy" of the death of jesus both
were built on false premises and resulted in false conclusions about the salvation of the jews.
FIFTH. Even ifwe deem the conspiracies to have actually
occurred, caiaphas's planned slaying of jesus and lazarus
could not have destroyed the other evidence of similar
"miracles" - already reported long before in the other
gospels and alleged to have been performed on other
individuals.
These other "miracles" of jesus's saving of lives bring up
the question of whether the other "biographers" of jesus
knew of caiaphas's plots to kill jesus and lazarus. If they
knew of the plots, those authors were derelict in not having
told of such important events. If they did not know of the
plots, how, when, where, why, and by whom were these
plots made known to the author of john's gospel about 30
years later?
But the other gospels show that their authors "knew" of
like "miracles" - not concerning lazarus himself, but
nevertheless involving similar events in the lives of other
persons (e.g., the daughter of jairus, the "ruler" of a
synagogue). Hence, john, by reciting and relying on
lazarus's "resurrection" alone, contradicts the earlier gospels as to the effect of the other "resurrections." Hence,
caiaphas's "prophesy" of how the Romans would react to
knowledge concerning the lazarus "miracle" was off base:
even if the Romans never heard of the lazarus "miracle,"
they supposedly knew of the other such "miracles." The
lazarus story gets more and more ridiculously and enigmatically complicated the further we pry into the matter!

caiaphas's plot. And the plot involving "betrayal" by judas

iscariot would not have been accomplished. In that situation, the entire structure of the four gospels would collapse
- that structure being erected on the foundation requiring
jesus to be betrayed by one of his own twelve disciples and
requiring him to be interred in the earth for three days and
three nights. Consequently, the lazarus story could not
possibly have been carried through to its completion.
SEVENTH. If lazarus's return to lifewere to remain as an
"authenticated" event in christian "history," so to speak,
then, according to caiaphas, the Romans would destroy the
jewish nation on learning about lazarus - because of their
resentment of jesus performing such miracles.
This alleged Roman antagonism to jesus is based on the
assumption that the jews - instead of being opponents of
jesus's ideas, as shown all through the gospels - were, to
the contrary, active supporters of jesus and would have
resented his death. John asserts, in effect, that the Romans
were opposed to the early cristian campaign - although
the Roman Pontius Pilate "found no fault" in jesus. This in
turn reveals that the gospels of matthew, mark and luke by being silent or evasive about any hostility by the Romans
- were written in a time when the Romans were hostile to
the christian campaign, when it was more prudent not to
mention the Roman hostility. But this passage in john, by
expressly mentioning the animosity of the Romans toward
jesus, indicates that it was written during a period when the
Romans were friendly to christianity and were not to be
feared by the christian leaders. This period, I believe, was
most likely at least a century later than 90 a.d. (whenjohn is
supposed to have been written).
EIGHTH. Nowhere else in the gospels are the Romans
mentioned by name. By this name john does not signify
Pontius Pilate or the few soldiers he commanded in
Jerusalem. Verse 48 says that the "Romans shall come and

"The alleged plot to kill lazarus was useless, since killing lazarus would not
remove the 'many jews' who allegedly knew of the lazarus miracle."
takeaway both our place and nation," meaning thereby not
SIXTH. If caiaphas's plotting happened, and if its major
only a new and large military force to "come" from Rome,
aim was "that jesus should die for that nation" (v. 51), then
but also that the nation of the jews would be removed from
this evil project conflicted in part with the general gospel
the place where it dwelt in Palestine.
goal that jesus was to be "betrayed" by judas iscariot and
It is queer that this unique "prophecy" of caiaphas (who
was to die as the outcome of that "betrayal" - as later told
was in theory a non-recognizer of jesus) should - in that
in john XVIII, and as told in the other three gospels.
year of 30 a.d. - so exactly foretell what later actually
Here we have a critical impasse in developing the
happened to the people and the institutions of the jews in
scenario in the gospel of "St. John the Divine" along a
the "holy land" in the year 70 a.d.!
course that was sound and sensible. The lazarlrs story can
NINTH. The inconsistency in the lazarus episode apbe sensible and significant only if we can see what it .
pears in the manner of the story's presentation in john. It is
demonstrates. If it shows that a plot was made to killjesus
told as if it were the only incident of jesus actually reviving a
and lazarus, what would the plot's execution accomplish?
specified person - although the other gospels tell of several
If lazarus were killed in pursuance of it, his murder could
not prevent news of jesus's other "miracles" from circuother such magical accomplishments. The emphatic, prolonged, and complicated tale of lazarus, emphasizing the
lating among the jews and thus winning over the jews to
importance which the jews were supposed to have given to
jesus's cause. This would be the effect whether or not
lazar us was slain. Thus, there was no sense in even making
its concealment and the supposed effect on the Romans if
the plot, in the first place, or mentioning it in the gospel, in the lazarus "miracle" were publicized, shows that a crucial
issue must have arisen only shortly before the gospel of john
the second place.
If the so-called plot to kill jesus had been followed
was composed and presented to its readers. This issue
most likely was a strong motive for issuing that gospel. It
through, jesus would then have been slain as a result of

Page 44

January, 1983

The American Atheist

must have been circulated to rebut the contention that had

developed that ifjesus had performed the miracles ascribed
to him, thejews would have flocked to his banner. But they
didn't. And so this crude forgery was designed to show why
the jews "conspired" to silence jesus.
Our verdict on the lazarus story is that the statements
can not be true as "told" injohn. Conspirators do not plot to
cover up glaring and well-known facts. Rather, they would
plot to use such real material. But here the jews are pictured
as trying to hide the alleged reality of jesus's "miracles" from
the Romans. Manifestly, the jews did not conspire to hide
jesus's "miracles." The necessary inference to be drawn is
that thejews did infact "know nothing at all" aboutjesus in
the year 30 a.d.!
In summary, then, the lazarus tale is defective because:
1. It is not mentioned in any of the gospels written as
much as 30 or 40 years previously.
2. It involved mary and martha, lazarus's sisters - who
accordingly would have been known to the writers of the
other gospels.
3. It mentions a secret conspiracy by the jewish high
priests which would, because of its secrecy, have been
unknown to the writer of john's gospel.
4. The alleged plot to killiazarus was useless, since killing

lazarus would not remove the "many jews" who allegedly

knew of the lazarus miracle.
5. The plots to kill both jesus and lazarus - ifcarried out
- would not destroy the knowledge of the many jews who
previously learned of the other miracles told in other
gospels.
6. The plot to kill jesus - if carried out - would have
destroyed the claim that judas iscariot caused jesus's death.
7. The lazarus story requires caiaphas to deal with the
existence of Roman hostility to jesus, while the gospel
accounts of jesus's trial and crucifixion show that Rome
was not hostile to jesus, because Pilate declared "he found
no fault" in jesus.
8. It is most unlikely that caiaphas, in 30 a.d. (while jesus
was supposed to be alive), would fear that by believing in
jesus the jews would evoke the Roman destruction of the
jewish people and government 40 years later, in 70 a.d.
9. John's gospel gave as the reason for the jewish
non belief in jesus the idea that the jews wanted to killjesus
in order to stop him from performing miracles - so that the
Romans would not destroy the jewish nation and expel the
jews from Palestine. Nevertheless, despite jewish non belief,
these disasters actually occurred, showing that the desired
non belief in jesus did not accomplish its "prophesied" aim
- the salvation of the jewish nation.
~

ITEM:
United States postal. authorities have
announced that the U. S. Post. Otfice is issuing a
stamp to commemorate the 800th anniversary of the
birth 'of st. Francis of Assissi.

Austin, Texas

January, 1983

Page 45

[lli~ ITJ [lli lJ ~ [lli ~ [ill lJ ill00

PROPOSITION 1

A TROJAN HORSE

BROADENING RELIGIOUS TAX EXEMPTIONS

compiled by David Chris Allen
Do you remember Proposition 2, the Tax Article Revision
Amendment that was defeated at the polls of Utah in 1980?
It has been repackaged and sent back to us again as
Proposition 1 on the ballot in the November 2 election.
Proposition 1, like its predecessor, is a trojan horse. Inside
this package of revisions to the state constitution is a
change that would broaden religious tax exemptions.
Although the governor and the legislature are promoting
Proposition 1 as tax relief, the amendment contains no tax
reduction. Proposition 1does not mandate a tax reduction,
because it does nothing to control tax rates, which are set
by local governments. It addresses only one side of the
property tax equation. In fact, by broadening religious tax
exemptions, it makes it even more difficult for government
to obtain the revenue it needs without a tax increase.
The originators in the state legislature of this proposed
amendment to the state's constitution have an ulterior
motive, and so far they have been successful at hiding it.
Nine years ago the state legislature did a favor for religious
and charitable organizations in Utah by passing laws that
made it possible for them to set many more tax exemptions
than they had previously been entitled to. Unfortunately for
the legislature, those laws were in violation of the state's
constitution. County tax assessors concerned about the
losses of revenue filed scores of law suits challenging the
new exemptions individually as unconstitutional. They won
many of the suits, but the laws are still on the books.
Another embarrassment for the legislature is that those
exemptions that were not successfully challenged are now
costing the state, the cities and the counties untold millions
in lost revenue, and those losses have been sorely felt.
Some of those losses have been made up in increased taxes,
so the taxpayers have been feeling them, too.
Now the state legislature is trying to do another favor for
those special interests and church groups, and in the
process spread the blame for the higher taxes they inflicted
on taxpayers and for the revenue problems that they
inflicted on local government in Utah. They are trying to
persuade the voters to ratify those currently illegaltax laws
by persuading them to amend the constitution. If they
succeed, many of those tax exemptions which had been
successfully challenged in court or are still in litigation will
now be allowed, and many more exemptions willfollow.
What is dishonest about Proposition 1 is that it is being
presented to the voters without any attempt to inform them
about how it broadens religious tax exemptions, without
any discussion of those 1973 tax exemption laws currently
in effect in violation of the constitution, and without any
effort to evaluate the impact that the additional tax exemptions obtained under those laws have had on tax rates and
on the revenues of state and local governments. In fact, it

Page 46

"And Stanley Wetherington Ashworth SPENDS!"

appears that every effort has been made to minimize
discussion of the religious exemption question, so that the
public won't examine it too closely. Consider these facts:
1. Omnibus Form of Proposition 1. The constitutional
change that broadens religious tax exemptions (revision of Article 13, Section 2a) and implicitly ratifies the
1973 tax exemption laws has been partially hidden by
putting it in an omnibus proposition with a complex
tangle of other changes, and some of those changes
are being touted as tax relief measures. It is claimed
that the changes are grouped together, because their
consequences are interrelated and they must be
passed together to avoid imbalances in revenue flow.
But State Senator Karl Snow, the principal sponsor of
Proposition 1, admitted in speeches to the legislature
last January that the change to section 2a is not so
interrelated. The only explanation that makes sense is
that the legislature put this change in with all the
others in hopes that the voters wouldn't give it much
attention and discover its real implications.
2. Issue of Broadening Non-Profit Exemptions. The
Voters Information Pamphlet printed by the Lt.
Governor's office does not even mention the issue of
the broadening of religious tax exemptions. It was in

January, 1983

American Atheist

the 1980 pamphlet in the section on Proposition 2. On

page 25 of that pamphlet, Sen. Snow argued that
Proposition 2 did not broaden exemptions to nonprofit entities because it "simply places in the constitution the same exemptions as those already granted by
statute since 1973." That statement ignored the issue
of the laws being illegal in the first place and the fact
that the voters were actually being asked to ratify
those laws without examining them and their consequences. This time, the whole issue of broadening
non-profit tax exemptions is being ignored. It is not in
the voters guide and it was not raised by any legislator
in all of the public debate of Proposition 1 in the
legislature.
3. Unconstitutional Tax Laws. There is no attempt to
either of the voter-information pamphlets to acquaint
the voters with the laws they are ratifying. There is no
suggestion that perhaps the voters should be looking
into what the effects of those laws have been and
deciding whether the laws should be repealed rather
than validated. The laws themselves are not even
identified. Those laws incidentally are 59-2-30,59-2-31
and 7-2.8 - all passed in 1973.
4. Suppression of Exemption Figures. Utah government does not tell the taxpayers how much property
is tax exempt. Ifyou want to find out what percentage
of total recorded property is tax exempt, or how that
percentage has changed in recent years, you cannot
go look those figures up in state, city or county reports
as you can in many other states, because Utah does
not require assessors to keep records of exempt
property. Once a property is declared tax exempt, it is
considered to be outside of the tax base and it simply
disappears from the tax rolls. In briefs prepared by
former Salt Lake County Tax Assessor Earl W. Baker
and his attorneys challenging unconstitutional tax
exemptions, it was repeatedly urged that the state
adopt the following recommendation of the Advisory
Commission on Intergovernmental Relations: "In order that the taxpayers be kept informed, each state
should require the regular asessment of all taxexempt property, compilation of the totals for each
type of exemption by taxing districts, computation of
the percentage of the assessed valuation thus exempt
in each taxing district and publication of the findings.
Such publication should also present summary information on the function, scope, and nature of exemp-ted activities." Bills to require that kind of record
keeping and reporting have been introduced into the
Utah State Legislature before and they have been
overwhelmingly defeated. The bottom line here is that
there are no firm figures that the public can examine
to find out how much those 1973 tax exemption laws
are costing them in terms of increased property taxes
and reduced government services. The State Legislature is not shy about asking the public to ratify the
unconstitutional tax exemption laws and broaden
religious tax exemptions.
To make an informed decision about Proposition 1,
voters need to know the ways in which Proposition 1
broadens religious tax exemptions. Section 2a of Article 13

Austin, Texas

of the state constitution currently reads as follows:

" ... lots with the buildings thereon used exclusively
for either religious worship or charitable purposes. _."
shall be exempt from property taxes.
Proposition 1 would substitute the following language:
"Property owned by a nonprofit entity which is used
exclusively for religious, charitable or educational
purposes ... " shall be exempt from property taxes.
This is basically the same change proposed in 1980's
Proposition 2, except that the word "exclusively" has been
added and three additional uses (welfare, hospitals and
employee representation) have been deleted. That is some
progress, but it does not resolve the most critical fault of the
amendment of Section 2a.
Proposition 1 broadens religious tax exemptions in Utah
in four ways:
1. It changes the basis of exemption from the "use"
of a property to the "ownership" of a property. This is
a major expansion and is the most critical fault.
2. It changes the qualifying object of religious
activity from "worship" to "purposes," which is vague
and much less restrictive. It is subject to interpretation. For example, a commercial property used exclusively as a benefit to a church or cult may be
construed as qualifying on the basis of purpose.
3. It redefines the type of property exempted from
"lots with buildings thereon" to "property" in general.
4. It is yet another way to provide tax benefits to
private church schools, akin to the Tuition Tax Credit
scheme proposed by President Reagan. In a recent
poll, Utahns were opposed by two to one to the idea of
tuition tax credits to families who send their children
to private and parochial schools. Proposition 1, by
broadening the categories of qualifying property to
include property used for educational purposes,
would make it legal to exempt from taxation all
property owned by nonprofit private and parochial
schools.
According to Senator Karl Snow, the principal sponsor of
Proposition 1, explaining the amendment to the State
Senate and House of Representatives last January, the one
concession made by the legislature in the interest of
separation of state and church, the insertion of the word
"exclusively," is not as significant as it might seem, because
recent court decisions have weakened the legal restrictive
power of the word "exclusively" in that it can now be
interpreted to mean simply "primarily."
The voters also need to know about the unconstitutional
1973 tax exemption laws, 59-2-30, 59-2-31 and 7-2.8. These
laws, claiming to be "clarifying" Article 13 Section 2 of the
state constitution, redefined the basis for religious tax
exemption to depend on the ownership of a given property
rather than its purpose. Under these laws tax exemptions
could be granted ifthe purpose of a hospital, private school,
gymnasium, office building, retail store, cannery, manufacturing plant or farm was to serve as a benefit for a church or
other qualifying charity. Many new property tax exemptions were granted and scores of law suits followed challenging the constitutionality of the exemptions.
The proponents of Proposition 1argue that Proposition 1
does not broaden religious tax exemptions because the

January, 1983

Page 47

1973 statutes have already broadened them. Yet, the very

fact that the legislature finds it necessary to amend the
constitution to agree with the laws is an acknowledgment
that the laws they refer to are illegal.What they are trying to
do is to get those laws legalized without having to justify the
laws to the voters. Furthermore, the state government of
Utah (the legislature, the attorney general and the governor) enacted and implemented laws that were in violation of
the state constitution, which is a clear violation of the very
idea of constitutional government, and now nine years later
they are trying to remedy the situation by quietly amending
the constitution rather than admitting that the laws they
enacted are without constitutional authority, i.e. illegal.
Another problem is that no one is looking at the question
of whether it wouldn't be better to repeal the unconstitutional1973laws. The tax exemptions granted by those laws
obligate Utah to provide government services and benefits
to entities owned by religious organizations free of charge.
The cost of providing these services and benefits is
redistributed onto the rest of the taxpayers. In effect, the
taxing powers of Utah are used to impose a tithe on all the
taxpayers to subsidize religious organizations by paying the
cost of the government services and benefits provided to
them. Some people, particularly some of our state legislators, may consider this to be a form of charity provided by
government. But even in a community where the majority of
people are religious, is it really charity when funds for
government services to churches are extracted from the
public at large under threat of criminal prosecution rather
than being contributed voluntarily by supporters of the
churches concerned?
It is possible to estimate the burden placed on taxpayers
by these tax exemptions. In 1976, three years after the
special tax exemption laws were passed, a study of property
tax exemptions in 14 American cities was published in a
book titled The Religious Empire by Dr. Martin Larson and
rev. C. Stanley Lowell. Salt Lake County was covered
separately in that report using figures provided by former
county tax assessor, Earl W. Baker, that he had compiled
independently. The report indicated that on average in the
14American cities 5%of total property tax base consisted of
religious exempt property. In Salt Lake County that figure
was three times as high. Fifteen percent of the total
property tax base was religious exempt. According to the
Salt Lake County assessor's office in 1980, if you owned a
home with a fair market value of $60,000, your taxes in 1980
would typically have been about $827. Fifteen percent of
that is $124. That is about how much it costs a typical
household in one year to pay for free 10cc!1government
services to tax exempt churches and church owned
properties in Salt Lake County.
These tax exemptions have impacted us in other ways as
well. Government may choose to compensate for lost
revenue by reducing services and cutting down on the
salaries paid to civilservants. In recent years, state and local
governments have been increasingly plagued by problems
caused by inadequate revenues. We've had protests from
policemen, firemen, and teachers over low wages. Our
schools, our zoo and our prison system are suffering from
inadequate funding. Just recently the governor announced
that he was cutting the budget of every state agency by 2%

Page 48

and increasing state withholding by 2%. Allconsidered, with

the current state of the economy and with president Reagan
shifting a greater burden of taxes onto the states, it would
seem to be a bad time to be broadening tax exemptions.
There is one more thing the public should understand
about tax exemptions before voting on Proposition 1. This
is not a dispute between charitable people and stingy
people. The limits on tax exemption imposed by the state
constitution were put there for a good reason. Every
exemption granted is granted at the expense of the
taxpayers, one way or the other. But if politicians try to get
favored tax status for a special interest, and are then
reluctant to discuss the matter or disclose details to the
public, you can be fairly sure that the politicians are
benefiting from the deal far more than that public. When the
government loses control of the exemption granting process, and gives away free services too liberally, the quality of
government suffers, the burden of taxpayers increases, the
free-market economy is compromised by unfair competitive advantages and the state's reputation suffers. Every
exemption is effectively a subsidy from public funds, so the
public has a right to insist that exemptions be held within
reasonable limits and that the government be held accountable for informing the public of the cost of those exemptions.
American Atheists first spoke out on Proposition 2 in a
Common Carrier article in the Salt Lake Tribune on
October 5,1980. On October 16,1980, we filed a lawsuit to
have Proposition 2 removed from the ballot citing the
omnibus form of the proposition as a violation of voters'
rights to select among changes to their constitution, and
citing the broadening of religious tax exemptions as a
violation of our First Amendment rights to protection from
the government aiding, subsidizing and establishing religion. The case was dismissed pending outcome of the
election. It was our intention, following the defeat of
Proposition 2, to follow up with a suit challenging the 1973
tax laws directly, but funding has been such that we only
recently finished paying the bills for the first suit. Proposition 1, if passed, would put the repeal of those laws and the
revocation of the tax exemptions granted under them even
further out of reach.

January, 1983

American Atheist

NORWAY

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Date: June 24,25,26 of 1983
Place: Lapinrinne Hotel
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For more information contact:
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The American Atheist Center/P.O. Box 2117/ Austin, TX 78768

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