What is Freedom?

Many in our culture stand today behind the banner upon which is written: FREEDOM!

What, however, is freedom? What is "freedom" that people advocate for it?

One of the major assumptions today is that freedom, to be free, means that one has unrestrained access to the fulfillment of desire. In other words, it is freedom to do whatever one wants, whenever one wants to, however one wants to do it, and with whomsoever one wants to do it with. In short, freedom is the unrestricted access to express or act upon some feeling or desire.

There is a basic problem with this, however, for desire is actually a form of enslavement. Desires actually arise in the mind in an impersonal manner. One sees "object x," for example, and one finds oneself desiring it almost automatically. One sees "behavior y," and one finds oneself desiring it almost choicelessly. Did the person "choose" to desire these? Not likely. Desire is just a movement of the psyche in response to some sensory stimulus, either present or absent, real or imagined.

Now, since the act or experience of desiring just kind of "happens," when one defines freedom as the ability to act on desire, one is actually defining a form of slavery. How? Because they did not "freely" choose the desire. The desire was pre-loaded, in a manner of speaking, and so the person is seeking not to be free, but to obey! The person wants to OBEY the desire. The freedom most people seek is the freedom to obey irrational impulse, and yet they use a catchword, a slogan word, "freedom," in order to make the slavery to desire sound enlightened.

Paul, in Romans chapter 6, puts it this way: "Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one's slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death, or of obedience leading to righteousness?"

In other words, when one seeks to "freely" obey desire, they become desire's slave. Desire, however, has within it the seeds of misery and death. Since desire is by nature fleeting and capricious, it contains within itself its own frustration, which in turn leads to more desire, and so more enslavement, and finally spiritual death.

True freedom, however, is freedom from the tyranny of the passions, freedom from desire.

Paul continues: "For just as you presented your members as slaves of uncleanness, and of lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves of righteousness for holiness."

This might shock some people, if they are paying close attention, for Paul is not advocating for "freedom" here at all, but for slavery, for servitude. In truth, one is either a slave of sin unto death or a slave of righteousness unto holiness and everlasting life. There is no enlightened "freedom" standing in the middle.

The Scriptures teach that true freedom is freedom from sin, not freedom to sin. True freedom is obedience to righteousness, which is unto holiness and life everlasting. Read Romans chapter 6 closely.

To close, as people cry out for "freedom," please understand that their understanding of freedom is false and depraved. It is freedom to be enslaved to sin, and to be free of righteousness, not free in any positive or life-giving sense of the word. Quite the opposite, really.

Atheism is Pantheistic Nature Worship

Atheism is pantheistic nature worship.

One inexorable thing about religion is that human beings cannot escape it. Whether we change the words or deny them outright, religion describes (accurately) the way by which we relate to that which we find most true, compelling, and valuable.

A Christian, for example, finds Christ most true, most compelling, and most valuable.

Supposedly, an atheist finds science most true, most compelling, and most valuable.

Science, however, is not a thing or a content, but a methodology, one by which one filters varying types of empirical observations about nature. It is actually totally nature-focused, and as such gives nature pride of place as that which must be submitted to. In fact, this is what is indicated by saying atheism is nature worship.

Now, because atheism does not recognize an authority higher than nature, nature therefore stands in for its highest truth and authority, that which cannot be overcome, countermanded, or escaped. Practically speaking, whether something is true or not, whatever is one's highest truth or principle is one's god. As such, atheists treat nature as god, and so, since there is nothing beyond nature according to such naturalism, they are in this sense quite pantheistic.

Pantheism is the idea that god is Thing, and is All the Things. It fails to recognize a transcendental reality, but collapses on an extreme focus on material reality, infusing ultimate meaning therein and admitting nothing beyond it. This is precisely the position of atheism.

Atheism is thus just a modern form of an old saw: pantheistic nature worship. Do not let its reductive materialism, scientism, and advanced technology fool you, for these are merely a thin veneer masking one of the most primitive types of mentality.

Moral Arguments claiming "It's Natural" are False and Dangerous

It is not only false and irrational but actually dangerous to assert that because something is "natural" it is therefore also moral.

Simply because something happens in nature, or simply because animals are observed to perform some behavior in their natural setting, that it is somehow therefore morally acceptable for a human to perform the same behavior, is patently absurd and morally depraved thinking.

In short, it is false in at least two ways:

The first is that animals commit cannibalism, slavery, murder, war, even genocide. As such, if someone argues that "natural behavior" is okay because it occurs in nature, then one must also include by implication that cannibalism, slavery, murder, war, and even genocide are also okay, because they occur in nature and are equally "only natural."

The second way one gets oneself in trouble is because humans are also part of nature, and because they are equally a part of nature one implies that everything a human does can therefore be considered natural, and therefore moral. With this reasoning one again justifies rape, cannibalism, abuse, slavery, pedophilia, murder, torture, war, and genocide.

The first example is irrational because one has no criteria by which to deny any evil, and so there is likewise no criteria for determining any good either. One cannot proclaim something good in a system which cannot discern what a good even is, only what is natural - thereby not only letting in all the cruelty of nature, but actually justifying cannibalism, slavery, murder, war, and genocide. The second example suffers the same fate as the first, but is particularly grievous because it ends by making all human behavior self-justifying in its "naturalness."

In sum, one cannot rationally argue that because it is "natural" it is therefore okay, because then it is okay to do anything that animals do, or okay to simply do whatever terrible deed because it is simply a part of human "nature." This is irrational and completely undermines the entire moral force of an argument "from nature," actually disallowing any sense of morality, and dangerously justifying great evil.

Nature is no basis for determining right and wrong, and without right and wrong one cannot argue that ANY behavior is morally defensible.

Secularism: The History of an Insidious Term

Secularism is a technical term that was coined by mid-19th Century atheists. It was specifically designed to operate as an ideological substitute for religion. In fact, secularism is precisely the political application of atheism. In this article we will first look closely at a statement by Holyoake, who has been called “the brain of the Secularist Party,” the man who is credited with having coined the term secularism (English Secularism: A Confession of Belief, Publisher’s Preface: Chicago: Open Court Publishing, 1896; pg v). Thus peering into the heart of secularism, we will find, as the preface to Holyoake's book states, that "Secularism espouses the cause of the world versus theology… [and] claims that religion ought never to be anything but a private affair.” We will also find that there is something yet more sinister lurking in secularism than may be readily apparent.

Holyoake says that "Secularism is not an argument against Christianity, it is one independent of it. It does not question the pretensions of Christianity; it advances others. Secularism does not say there is no light or guidance elsewhere, but maintains that there is light and guidance in secular truth, whose conditions and sanctions exist independently, and act forever. Secular knowledge is manifestly that kind of knowledge which is founded in this life, which relates to the conduct of this life, conduces to the welfare of this life, and is capable of being tested by the experience of this life" (Charles Bradlaugh: a Record of His Life and Work, Volume I, pg 336).

Looking more closely at this, notice that in stating that he is not attacking the "pretensions" of Christianity, he adds, "it [secularism] advances others," i.e. other pretensions.

Now, on the face of it this could look innocent, but notice how it subtly changes the secular state from being a neutral place where no single religion holds dominance, a place of separation, to one where secularism actually "advances" other pretensions. But which ones?

He goes on to say that secularism "maintains that there is light and guidance in secular truth." In other words, secularism is a stand alone truth. Secularism, not generically advancing simply other "pretensions" so as to protect, say, some minority religion its right to a voice, it is actually advancing its own pretensions. Secularism's "truth," whatever that is, functions to provide its own light and guidance to people. It promotes itself as an alternative to religion, which is to say it can function in the same place religion does.

The statement goes further to hold that secularism's "conditions and sanctions exist independently, and act forever." In other words, secularism is explicitly claiming for itself the status of eternal truth, acting “forever”! It also has its own "conditions" and its own "sanctions" that "exist independently," and therefore like religion it is its own independent system of truth and governance. It is thus not functioning to merely protect the rights of other religions, or the state from ideological takeover, but is itself taking over the state with its own eternal truth, with its own internal demands, conditions, and sanctions which function to replace the eternal truth of religion with its own eternal truth. Hardly a neutral ideology.

The paragraph concludes by saying that, "Secular knowledge is manifestly that kind of knowledge which is founded in this life, which relates to the conduct of this life, conduces to the welfare of this life, and is capable of being tested by the experience of this life."

In other words, its knowledge is now boasting to be an entire epistemological system! It has the quality of eternal truth, as noted above, and also provides true and comprehensive knowledge for its adherents. Furthermore, it is "manifestly" rooted in "this life," which is to say there is no actual room in secularism's functionally atheistic eternal truth for any spiritual truth, or room for consideration of that which transcends this world. It also "relates to the conduct of this life," which implies that secularism has its own moral program, an eternally acting light and guide of human morality, complete with its own conditions and sanctions.

Finally, he says it can be "tested," as if rounding out the entirely religious form that secularism assumes, and thereby asserts that it is somehow able to be confirmed in its complete self-sufficiency! Within its own logic, then, it must therefore function religiously, as a total worldview system and way of life, and so cannot serve to merely offer people a safe space from religious monopoly when it is operating and advertising itself as a substitute (for) religion.

Now, the separation of Church and State is nothing at all like secularism, and secularism cannot be the application of the separation of Church and State, but it is the political application of religious atheism. In case this is not clear, let’s go further and take a look at Holyoake’s contemporary and ally in the forging of secularism, Bradlaugh, a man also at the center of the development of Secularism and who thought Holyoake did not go far enough in spelling out the inherent logic of secularism.

As Bradlaugh’s biography states: “Secularism, [according to Mr Holyoake,] should assert its own principles, but not assail others, neither needing to assail nor condescending to assail theological systems. These ideas will doubtless commend themselves to many, especially to those who do not look under the surface of the words; but we know that before we can put nature ‘in the place of’ theology, we must depose theology” (Ibid, 334).

Note especially how the last sentence, after criticizing Holyoake for not being forthright enough, says: “we know that before we can put nature ‘in the place of’ theology, we must depose theology.” Looking “under the surface of the words” we see that secularism is therefore specifically designed and engineered with the deposition and replacement of theology in mind. Whether it is made explicit or not, it is and cannot be a freely open space for religion to be practiced freely as per the First Amendment, but stands as an antagonistic rival system to any and all theology, which is to say, it opposes religion, and even religious faith.

Bradlaugh maintained, quite explicitly, “The Secularist finds the kingdom of faith impossible, he finds belief in God impossible, he finds belief in religion impossible”(Ibid, pg 334).

Bradlaugh also said, “Although at present it may be perfectly true that all men who are Secularists are not Atheists, I put it that in my opinion the logical consequence of the acceptance of Secularism must be that the man gets to Atheism if he has brains enough to comprehend.” In other words, Secularism is either the cause or the consequence of Atheism, and they cannot be neatly disentangled from each other, if at all. Secularism is therefore the movement which seeks to lead all within it wittingly or unwittingly to atheism, if not in belief then in practice.

Finally, although Holyoake would veil the moral implications of his form of secularism, we noted above that even his form has clear moral implications, and as Bradlaugh states, “You cannot have a scheme of morality without Atheism. The Utilitarian scheme is a defiance of the doctrine of Providence and a protest against God"(Ibid, pg 334). Secularism and Atheism therefore go hand in hand, and so Secularism is not only intrinsically religious in that it claims to carry its own eternal truth and way of life, genetically it also must manifest Atheism’s religious principles in the moral and political spheres.

Now, since we have shown the intrinsic relationship between religious atheism and secularism, it should be clear that, destroying the rightful separation of Church and State, secularism is a problem for religious freedom, totally privatizing religion. At the moment it is unconsciously being absorbed by our country and its political institution because, being a form of scientism, it does not use obviously religious rhetoric to make its claims. To shine light on this, the relationship between Secularism and Atheism has been shown to be not at all accidental, but necessary, and is right there at the very inception of Secularism. They are a total package. The only real hope is to identify Secularism as rooted intrinsically in pseudo-religious Atheism so that it cannot wield untold power as it attempts to slip into the separation of Church and State, destroying it, and therein turn the State into an Atheist Church.

Secularism is a Religion

Secularism is a belief system which, by the demands of its own definition, systematically removes God from consideration in major areas of human life and community. As such, secularism is an assertion and application of atheism in the public sphere. Since atheism, and therefore secularism, makes claims about the nature and function of humanity and of reality, it is thus answering to basic religious questions, and so itself functions as a type of religion, and thus the fundamentally atheist secularism contradicts itself on its own grounds. This means that, since secularism does in fact function as a pseudo-religious ideology, it must therefore not only be identified as such legally, but must also be kept from asserting a monopoly in the public sphere, and its claim to be a type of neutral ground utterly rejected.

Perhaps a few definitions, five really, from contemporary dictionaries may help in demonstrating this, giving a clearer picture of what is being all too briefly analyzed. (1) Merriam-Webster online states that secularism is “the belief that religion should not play a role in government, education, or other public parts of society,” and that secularism is “indifference to or rejection or exclusion of religion and religious considerations.” (2) Citing a Random House dictionary, Dictionary dot com says that secularism is a “secular spirit or tendency, especially a system of political or social philosophy that rejects all forms of religious faith and worship,” and that it is “the view that public education and other matters of civil policy should be conducted without the introduction of a religious element.” (3) The Free Dictionary online, citing The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, quotes that secularism is “religious skepticism or indifference,” and is “the view that religious considerations should be excluded from civil affairs or public education.” (4) Collins English Dictionary is cited on the same site as identifying secularism as a philosophy, a philosophy which is “a doctrine that rejects religion, esp in ethics,” and that it is “the attitude that religion should have no place in civil affairs,” and “the state of being secular.” (5) Finally, on the same site, Ologies and Isms is quoted as saying that secularism is “a view that religion and religious considerations should be ignored or excluded from social and political matters,” that it is “an ethical system asserting that moral judgments should be made without reference to religious doctrine, as reward or punishment in an afterlife.”

In case someone may object to using dictionaries as a source of information regarding the nature of contemporary secularism, one can only respond by saying that, unlike the major religions, there is no source of “orthodoxy” for secularism as practiced today, no source of ideological authority, and, in absence thereof, these definitions will be able to suffice as legitimate approximate descriptions of secularism. In this vein, then, we might also note the remarkable consistency and compatibility among them.

As such, let us look more thoroughly at the above definitions to see what sort of creature we are dealing with. First of all, taking the first source, that secularism is “the belief that religion should not play a role in government, education, or other public parts of society,” we might notice, perhaps with a sense of irony, that it begins by describing itself as a “belief.” In other words, it is not a science, nor is it a fact. It is a belief, and it functions methodologically by seeking to remove religion from “playing a role in government, education, or other public parts of society.” In other words, it is the systematic application of one belief over other beliefs.

Secularism is therefore not equivalent to “science” or “scientific thought,” it is also not equivalent to a “neutral ground” for the interaction of ideas. According to the given definition, it is a belief system whose basic assertion is that “religion should not play a role in government, education, or other public parts of society.” In short, it is ideological totalitarianism. It is the belief that no other belief systems, at least ones which include spiritual “considerations,” have any place in public or legal discourse. It is thus de facto atheist, which is also to say materialist and predisposed to materialism.

The second part of the first definition says that secularism is “indifference to or rejection or exclusion of religion and religious considerations.” So it is either indifferent, rejecting, or excluding of religion, even religious considerations. It is therefore a “belief” that dogmatically treats religion suspiciously and its considerations with hostility, ideologically rejecting and excluding them, leaving no room for any other ideology which includes a religious dimension. Again, though, it should be stressed that secularism is a philosophical position, one which rejects religious philosophy out of hand, but in and of itself pretends to be not religious.

The second definition states that secularism is “especially a system of political or social philosophy that rejects all forms of religious faith and worship.” So it is an entire philosophy, a way of governing people in such a way as to reject “all forms” of religion. It is by nature biased such that it is non-different on this level from atheism. As such it is the triumph, at a political level, of atheism against religion. It forcibly favors anti-religious views of man and society, and replaces religion with itself, and so stands in the vacant place as the last remaining way of life, the religion that wins by claiming to be non-religious.

The third definition states that secularism is “religious skepticism or indifference.” This is not just a whimsical doubt, of course, but an institutional doubt, a fundamental and systematic mistrust of religion, and therefore of religious people, requiring a hermeneutic of suspicion which helps to fuel hostility. Since secularism is not fundamentally scientific, but is a philosophy, it is the totalitarian philosophy which rejects all other religious institutions and their people’s considerations. It is a philosophical position, and as such it is making the claim that religion is systematically not desirable. It is also a metaphysical claim that religion can be dispensed with without detriment, and as such the adherents of secularism function as "believers" in anti-religion.

The fourth definition states that secularism is “a doctrine that rejects religion, esp in ethics.” Thus we see another notable dimension to secular thought, aside from the use of the word “doctrine,” the rejection of morals derived from religion. In other words, secularism says as a matter of philosophical "doctrine" that religion has nothing of fundamental value to say on the subject of ethics. In its anti-religious fervor it can even perhaps go out of its way to seek to reject that which religion holds to be morally true. The definition continues to state secularism is “the attitude that religion should have no place in civil affairs.” It is an attitude, an approach, a way of viewing religion as needing to be privatized, alienated from the public sphere, and whether the religion is true or not is not allowed to be considered, only that it is silenced.

Finally, the last definition states that, in addition to the repeated assertions that religion should be excluded from the public sphere, secularism is “an ethical system asserting that moral judgments should be made without reference to religious doctrine, as reward or punishment in an afterlife.” In other words, for secularists morality is merely the mutable assertions of humans - which, however hard some may try, will ultimately remove all possibility of inalienable human rights. Furthermore, no consideration which accounts for that which is beyond this life is allowable. So, after excluding religion, this philosophical ideology also excludes any possibility of the afterlife as being seriously considered as relevant to making moral judgments. More basic, of course, and worth taking especial note, is the fact that secularism is being identified as an “ethical system” at all.

To collect some of the above data, we have seen that secularism has been described as (1) a belief, (2) having a doctrine, (3) an attitude, (4) an ethical system, all of which of course function together systematically to reject any and all religious considerations as a matter of principle. Can secularism therefore deserve to be called neutral in regards to religion? In a word: No. It is a philosophical antipathy towards all things religious, and therefore is inherently predisposed to be prejudiced against all religious ideas and people. Secularism, then, really functions to destroy religious freedom rather than protect it.

Also, in denying the metaphysical ground of ethics, it will also ultimately undo all ethics. Since secularism’s ethics are simply the assertion of people’s opinions and impressions, it will never be able to conjure a stable ethic. Freedom will become barbarism. Rights will become petty obstinance and petulant whining, the mere assertion of confusion. Love will become a blind eye. Justice will become systematic, efficient, and godless oppression and tyranny. The separation of Church and State will become the marginalizing of the Church by the State.

In attempting to further identify the properties of this ideology, we can also note that secularism functions to maintain a doctrine, just as religion does, an attitude, just as religion does, an ethical system, just as religion does, and holds an integrated network of beliefs, just as religion does. In other words, secularism functions as a complete “replacement religion” for religion. In other words, it is the religion of non-religion, and so it cannot be authentically called a non-religion, but a religion which is blind to its own religious nature.

Secularism thus functions as the false belief that man does not need religious belief, and self-contradictorily that he not only can but does get along in the important matters without it. It also says that man, if he be governed well, needs to be governed by godless principles. Through its ethics it further holds that considerations of the afterlife are irrelevant, and so anything considered of significance regarding the afterlife is rendered null. Denying all metaphysical depth, it therefore builds its entire ethical structure on worldliness and materialism, which center on comfort and pleasure, breed individualism and superficiality, and thrive on impressionistic and shallow thinking.

And so, rather than no particular religion being favored by secularism, the religion of non-religion is preferred by secularism, and is what secularism is. And as more and more of life gets incorporated into the public sphere, more and more will religion be privatized, marginalized, and ideologically alienated by this new religion, with its doctrines, beliefs, attitudes, and ethics, all bent at annihilating all competing religions and replacing them with itself.

The charge of atheism therefore sticks, which means that anyone who follows the logic of secularism will eventually be led towards the full scentless flower of atheism. Secularism is the arm of atheism, the self-contradictory application of its metaphysical denial of metaphysics. Atheism is a religious position, and as such it must be identified as such. Atheism is not equivalent to science, but is a faith claim that there is nothing of significant truth in theism - whether it be Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Sikhism, and, despite some claims of atheists otherwise, even Buddhism. Via its intrinsic atheism, secularism is and cannot be neutral towards religion, but is dead set against it, and so the religious nature and function of secularism needs to be widely published, and legally asserted, so that it can monopolize our public sphere no longer.