Catholics have feast days. Ex-Catholics have a "blasphemy day".

Not all ex-Catholics, of course, just a few, some of them educated in "Catholic" schools. From a newly posted article on CNN.com:

 In his youth, Ronald Lindsey planned to enter the priesthood, so fervent was his devotion to God. But these days, Lindsay is devoted to protecting a person's right to ridicule, criticize -- even lambaste God.

You might say he is a blasphemer's savior.

The devout Catholic turned non-believer leads a movement that is all about protecting people's rights to speak irreverently about religion.

Pause button: Regarding the descriptive "devout Catholic", be sure to read this September 24, 2009, post on Get Religion by Terry Mattingly. Unpause.

Criticizing God is an act punishable by death in several nations. In America, blasphemy laws remain on the books in six states, though they are largely arcane and not enforced.

But everywhere, it seems to Lindsay, scoffing at God is not socially acceptable.

Apparently he's never been to Oregon. Or any of the other 49 states.

People are willing to tolerate the harshest statements about the president of the United States, he said. But talk about Jesus or Mohammed -- that's a whole different ball game.

"We think religious beliefs should be subject to examination and criticism just as political beliefs are," said Lindsay, 56, who heads the Center for Inquiry in Amherst, New York, an organization that claims about 100,000 followers worldwide. "But we have a taboo on religion."

Really? Do taboos even still exist? Well, to be fair, some examples are given:

Ellyn said she never means to harm anyone, so she finds it frightening that someone could be punished -- or lose their life -- over remarks or actions considered blasphemous. An Afghan student journalist was sentenced to death for distributing a paper that allegedly blasphemed Islam. A British schoolteacher spent time in a Sudanese jail after she allowed her students to name teddy bears after Mohammed.

Strange, then, that the article keeps mentioning "God." Shouldn't that be "Allah"? Here, however, is the saddest part of the piece:

All this did not come easy to Lindsay, the son of Catholic parents who bared his soul in a confession booth each week. Later, he studied religion and philosophy in at Georgetown University. The more he read, the more he questioned beliefs that had been ingrained from childhood.

Slowly, the would-be-priest turned into an atheist lawyer -- and a 21st-century defender of time-worn sacrilege.

That's right—he was brainwashed as a kid (ingrained beliefs!), but finally freed from superstition, confession, sin, guilt, God, and theocratic oppression at a "Catholic" school. Sad. And all too common. G. K. Chesterton, as usual, knocked such silliness out of the ballpark:

Atheism is the supreme example of a simple faith. ... The truth is that the atmosphere of excitement by which the atheist lives, is an atmosphere of thrilled and shuttering theism, and not of atheism at all; it is an atmosphere of defiance and not of denial. Irreverence is a very servile parasite of reverence; and has starved with its starving lord. After this first fuss about the merely aesthetic effect of blasphemy, the whole thing vanishes into its own void. If there were not God, there would be no atheists. ("Where All Roads Lead," Collected Works, vol. 3 [San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1990] 37-38).

Related IgnatiusInsight.com Articles and Excerpts:

• Professor Dawkins and the Origins of Religion | Fr. Thomas Crean, O.P. | From God Is No Delusion: A Refutation of Richard Dawkins
• Are Truth, Faith, and Tolerance Compatible? | Joseph Ratzinger
• Atheism and the Purely "Human" Ethic | Fr. James V. Schall, S.J.
• Is Religion Evil? Secularism's Pride and Irrational Prejudice | Carl E. Olson
• A Short Introduction to Atheism | Carl E. Olson
• C.S. Lewis’s Case for Christianity | An Interview with Richard Purtill
• Paganism and the Conversion of C.S. Lewis | Clotilde Morhan
• Designed Beauty and Evolutionary Theory | Fr. Thomas Dubay, S.M.
• The Universe is Meaning-full | An interview with Dr. Benjamin Wiker
• The Mythological Conflict Between Christianity and Science | An interview with Dr. Stephen Barr
• The Source of Certitude | Fr. Thomas Dubay, S.M.
• Deadly Architects | An Interview with Donald De Marco & Benjamin Wiker
• The Mystery of Human Origins | Mark Brumley
• Relativism 101: A Brief, Objective Guide | Carl E. Olson

Comments

[Kim Jordan]

It has ever been thus. Some of the Holy Mother Church's greatest enemies were formerly in Her bosom. Judas Iscariot comes to mind first, but there are many others who have followed his wretched course. We must pray for these lost sheep of our times to return to the Faith.

[Christine the Soccer Mom]

His parents probably sent him to Georgetown, thinking, "Oh, thank God! We have kept him in the Faith, and now he's off to a good Catholic school. We can relax a bit and let the school continue to develop his Faith and he can form it himself in that decent environment."

How sad that their trust was betrayed. I'll bet that they pray for him daily. We should, too.

And what does this mean for parents of young children (of which I am one)? It means that part of faith formation MUST be apologetics, because we must prepare our children not just with facts, but with the reasoning behind the Faith. And, sadly, they must also be prepared to encounter "Catholics" who question the Faith so much that they tear it down in the process and no longer hold to it.

[Kevin]

Lindsey is no fool. He cites Islamist intolerance to justify blaspheming... who? The Christian God of course! I'm sure the fact that Christians don't torture and murder those who offend us has nothing to do with it. If he wants to be "brave" as atheist polemicists like to fancy themselves, let him peddle his tripe in Afghanistan.

[LJ]

Took the Terry Mattingly detour. Right on. I have increasingly felt for a some time that if someone ever refers to me as a "devout" Catholic I should stop everything, conduct an immediate examination of conscience, and make tracks for the confessional, because I rarely ever hear that description without a completely un-Catholic qualifier or addendum. Various politicians in public, manifest and intransigent violation of the core Catholic values of life and its protection, routinely describe themselves as "devout" Catholics. I'm not sure what the word means anymore but when I hear it used my suspicions are raised immediately, before I hear another word.

[LJ]

I also love that Chesterton quote;

"If there were not God, there would be no atheists."