Columnist Compares Atheists to ISIS for Challenging Illegal Christian Displays

[NeoGreen]

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2018/01/05/columnist-compares-atheists-to-isis-for-challenging-illegal-christian-displays/

Columnist Compares Atheists to ISIS for Challenging Illegal Christian Displays
January 5, 2018 by Hemant Mehta

The East Tennessee chapter of the Freedom From Religion Foundation has noticed a number of constitutional violations taking place by government officials in Knoxville (including placing a Nativity scene in a government building, seen in the picture below), and they’ve followed up by sending warning letters to the appropriate officials.

That, to one local columnist, makes them just like ISIS.

It began over the summer when FFRF sent a letter to the Knoxville Police Department about a plaque quoting Romans 8:31 in the building. Mayor Madeline Rogero agreed to remove the plaque, but not before Knox County Mayor Tim Burchett weighed in with an ignorant response.

“Mayor Rogero is my friend, but I would fight this one. I wouldn’t yield to extortionists,” he said. “Ultimately, I have to answer to God not some outfit from out of town who make their living just suing people …

“What I don’t understand is with atheists if they don’t believe in God, what do they care? It just doesn’t make much sense to me,” he said.

That’s… a lot of stupidity for one man. It wasn’t extortion (the atheists weren’t demanding a pile of cash). It wasn’t a complaint from people living “out of town” (it turns out East Tennessee is, in fact, in Tennessee). And the atheists spoke up because, apparently unlike the mayor, they know how to read the First Amendment.

(snip)

Then, Johnson started in on the comparisons to terrorists.

This attempt to eradicate the Christ is no new thing. Last week, a Muslim gunman killed nine in a Coptic Church in Cairo. Yet Christians persist. In Wenzou, China, Reuters reports, communist authorities outlawed Sunday school. Yet Christians persist.

So when the folks at the Freedom from Religion Foundation seek to remove Christ from the scene, they are taking the same position on Jesus as ISIS and the godless communists in China. They also are of like mind with a genocidal king.

Mass shooter. Dogmatic government that represses freedom of thought. And atheists who point out how government officials have crossed the line, then politely ask them to fix the problem by at least moving the religious displays to a private part of the office (like at someone’s desk instead of in the lobby).

Totally the same thing.