Video of the week -- post-Christian Ireland
American Catholic zealot Michael Voris interviews random people on the street in Dublin, Ireland, with alarming (to him) results. There are only a couple of self-described atheists, but almost no sign of any coherent or meaningful religious belief; those who still attend rituals are just going through the motions because of habit or to make older relatives happy. In another generation, religion will be extinct outside of small minorities. And this in a country which has been a bastion of Catholicism for most of its history! I think we can declare Ireland liberated territory now.
posted by Infidel753 at 4:04 AM
9 Comments:
I just read about this over at PZ Myers' blog.
It's great news. After centuries of repression by the RCC, Ireland is throwing off the yoke of superstition.
Up the Republic!
As a dedicated Agnostic I confess to an increasing alarm at the decline of Christianity in Great Britain....and apparently Ireland.
I understand the view of Shaw - and agree with it in so many ways but....
It's ok for me to doubt and disbelieve but not everyone else!!!
The decline will create a void and, given the number - and indeed increasing number - of muslims in Britain....well...
...it ain't rocket science.
Dublinistan....mmmmm....it couldn't happen could it?
Much as I abhore it...give me Catholic or Christian superstition anyday over Islamic.
Catholics and Christians won't cut your head off these days....as far as I know...;-)
SK: The endless revelations of child molestation, corruption, and so forth have obliterated the Catholic Church's credibility in what used to be one of its strongholds. Beyond that, this video suggests that many people have simply drifted away from religion due to lack of interest, as in the rest of the developed world. Either way, the Irish have awakened!
4D: I totally disagree. Christianity these days does less harm than Islam, but a lesser amount of harm is still harm.
People abandoning idiotic superstitions does not "create a void" that needs to be filled with other idiotic superstitions, any more than recovering from a cold creates a void that makes you more likely to get the flu. People who are disgusted or disinterested at the stupidity and bigotry of Catholicism are unlikely to find the even greater stupidity and bigotry of Islam at all appealing.
Empirical evidence supports this view. Islam has had a highly-visible presence in western Europe for decades now, and no significant number of native Europeans have converted to it. On the contrary, it has provoked a strongly-hostile reaction against itself. meanwhile, growing numbers of Muslims in Europe are becoming secularized or leaving Islam altogether.
Humanity totally liberated from religion is the only final victory, and we will achieve that.
It can't happen soon enough in Ireland or anywhere else. How this medieval religion has held fast there for this long is a puzzle to me.
RtS: I think it was mostly cultural inertia and political support (church and state were very much in cahoots). But it's on the way out, now.
The spectacle of idiots in neighboring Northern Ireland sporadically killing each other over religious differences probably didn't help religion's image.
rod blagojevich called. he wants his hair back.
Hah! They're probably both wearing the same species of mind-control alien (as does Romney). Trump must have a rival species..
Ireland has fallen on hard times. Hard times makes for religious revivals. Unless there is a strong social safety net, Ireland may go right back where it was 30 years ago in terms of religiosity.
PS: I see no sign of that, neither in Ireland nor in any of the other European countries, most of which are having tough economic times right now. The revelations about child molestation and other abuses by Catholic clergy in Ireland have had an effect which will be hard to reverse.
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