Orson Scott Card secular sermon

:
Brothers and sisters, can you hear my voice? Am I talking loud enough? Brothers and sisters, I come to preach a religion that doesn't exist. It has no members. It has no clergy. It has no doctrine. It has no collection plate. I figure that makes it about the most peculiar religion I ever heard of. I've heard of churches with no members and churches with no clergy and churches with no doctrine, but secular humanism is the only religion I know of that has no collection plate. 

Now some folks might wonder, might wonder if a church without members, clergy, doctrines, or money can really be said to exist. Now the fact is nobody even knew about secular humanism until some fundamentalist preachers discovered it. And they found it everywhere. A secular humanism supported vile pornography like Penthouse Hustler and Huckleberry Finn. The fundamentalists found its pernicious influence in the schools. You know the vile things that go on there? Teaching evil-lution and forbidden little children to pray in unison. 

Now that last one just makes me sick. Everybody knows that little children just love to stand up and pray in unison. They do it on their own whenever they get the chance. That's half what goes on during recess. The slides and swings are just for little atheist children. The fundamentalist preachers were horrified when they found out that children were being whipped and beaten to keep them from leaping out of their chairs a hundred times a day in spontaneous outbursts of hallelujahs and hymns singing. Now only secular humanism could have caused such cruel repression of children's natural religious impulses. 

And not just here and there. It was happening in every school system in America. In fact, the fundamentalists discovered secular humanism is the established church of the United States. Why? The devil is pretty near to getting the whole country damned. Now unless the... Now don't you speak in favor of damnation, man. You've never been damned. You don't want to try it, I believe me. Unless the fundamentalists can throw out secular humanism and get it replaced with their own religion Wow, that's just the most logical thing in the world. 

Any fool can see that their religion is far superior to secular humanism. After all, their churches have members. Their churches have clergy. Their religion has more commandments than a whole troop of sinners can violate in a year. And it has a collection plate. It's a real religion! 

But you know, you know, I got to thinking. I got to thinking about what they said about secular humanism. I mean, it's gone from nothing to be in the established church of the United States of America and all that in just the last few years. It includes rock music and pornography, science and literature, Satan and the US Supreme Court. And I thought, that is one hell of a successful religion, particularly considering it don't exist. And then I thought, and all this thinking is why no self-respecting fundamentalist church would have me as a member. 

I thought... The surest way to kill a church is to have a clergy. I mean the minute you got a clergy, then folks can see how foolish you are, and how hypocritical you are, and how rich you are, and how political you are, and seeing how the clergy behaves, it's near impossible to hold that church together. And doctrine. Oh, the minute you get doctrine, you get arguments. And arguments lead to feuds, and feuds lead to schisms, and schisms lead to crusades, and crusades lead to whole bunches of dead people till their religion gets plain worn out. 

After all this thinking, I came to the conclusion that the best way to destroy secular humanism was to get at a preacher and some doctrine and be in a civic-minded, generous-hearted person and seeing how there wasn't much competition for the job and nobody in charge to turn me down, I volunteered. So here I am, the only secular humanist preacher in the world. I just hope you know how lucky you are. Having me here in person is like... having the Pope of Rome, the Patriarch of Constantinople, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and Jim and Tammy Baker all at the same time. 

So now brothers and sisters, let me ask you, do you believe? Yes! How dare you answer that question? How dare you answer yes or no to that question? If I asked you, will you sign here? Wouldn't you ask me, now what am I signing? And if I asked you, will you buy? Wouldn't you ask me, what am I buying and what does it cost? Well, if you're that careful about what you sign and what you spend, then why are you so free? and easy with what you think. And when I ask you, do you believe? Why don't you answer with a question? Ian, what? Because if somebody asks you, do you believe? Without saying what it is you should believe, Ian, if somebody asks you, do you believe? And you answer, I believe. Then you're saying yes to things you don't even know. You're signing a blank check. and letting him fill it in later. You are signing a blank check against the belief account in the bank of your brain. And brothers and sisters, I can promise you that it will bounce. I tell you, I tell you that check will come back stamped insufficient mental funds and intellectual account closed. 

If you say, I believe without knowing the particulars, then you are mistaken. You are deceiving yourself because you don't believe. You merely agree. You agree to anything. You agree to everything. Now, there are those, there are those who would say, yes, that's right, Brother Orson. I agree to everything. Everything in the good book. Because the good book has all the answers. But I tell you, I tell you as one who knows and loves the good book better than my best friend, I tell you that the good book doesn't have any answers at all until you ask the questions. Now some people, some people use the good book like a phone book. They just look up what they already know is there. For them, the good book is just a long list of names and numbers, but at least they use the book. 

There's an awful lot of folks who are so lazy, so lazy, that they call directory assistants for everything. They flip a switch, they turn a dial, the screen lights up, and those old operators at directory assistants, they don't ever say, you could have looked it up in the Good Book. Now they don't want you looking up stuff for yourself. You might find out what's actually in here. You might start to think. Well, I don't mind if you think. Right here in front of God and everybody, I declare the first doctrine of secular humanism. 

Now... Now I don't want to frighten any of you, don't want to scare you. You don't have to think all the time, not just when you're starting out I don't think the air conditioning in here could handle it if you all thought it once. Now in one minute, folks, can't just go from dumb and ignorant to wise and well-informed. You might strip your gears with a Jackrabbit start like that. Now right now, all I ask is that you get your brain all lubricated and loosened up. Just hang some of your ideas out to dry. 

And in the meantime, I have decided that one of the rituals of secular humanism is that when somebody asks you, do you believe, you wait to hear in what before you answer. Do you believe? Yes, what? Just testing. Do you believe the earth is old? Yes. Older than 7,000 years? Yes. Older than 20 million years? Yes. Billions of years old? Then you are a secular humanist and they say you will burn in hell. 

Do you believe that there is an orderly system of change by which some species become extinct, others remain unchanged for millions of years while others develop into something that their ancestors were not, all through the process of natural law? Do you believe that? Then you are a secular humanist and they say you will burn in hell. Do you believe the study of animals? can be illuminating in the study of man because man and animal follow the same physical and biological principles? Yes! Well then you are a secular humanist and they say you will burn in hell! Do you believe that human beings are capable of reading and seeing depictions of evil without becoming corrupted themselves? Yes! That human beings should be free to say what they believe to any audience that's willing to listen as long as they do not endanger the right of others to do likewise? Yes! Do you believe people are smart enough to vote to decide public issues without anybody else telling them what to do? Then you are a secular humanist and they say you will burn in hell! 

And above all, brothers, do you believe that every single one of these ideas will eventually be improved, enhanced, explained, modified, modulated, calibrated, spelled out, specifies, revised or reinforced by the things that human beings learn tomorrow? And when those changes come, will you gladly give up your old understanding in favor of the new? Will you? I was wondering if you would. Let's have a little more certainty here, folks. And when those changes come, will you go after truth every time, even if it leads you into places that scare the holy Shinola out of you? Then you are a secular humanist, and they say you will burn in hell forever! 

But no, they say, no! Secular humanism is something else. Secular humanism is a secret group of atheists who deny the existence of God. Secular humanism, I know it's shocking, try to control yourself. Secular humanism is the church of the antichrist scientist, which has become the established church of our government, which will turn us into a nation of atheists. But I say to you that is a fraud. That is a lie, it is a deception practiced by those who wish to rule your mind and heart. 

They say that they attack secular humanism because it is godless. But when they set out to pass a law or defeat one, when they set out to defame a person or destroy one, it is not atheism that is under attack. Never! Not once! What they call secular humanism is anything that disagrees with their particular doctrine. Even if it is believed in by millions upon millions of God-fearing, church-going, Bible-reading, Christian-living citizens. Even if it happens to be true. 

Now if all they threatened was the fires of hell, I'd gladly take my chances. I would not bother to answer them. I have my own view of hell and who is likely to populate it. I might even list some candidates before this day is over. I might mention some people who, in the name of God, are doing things that will guarantee their room reservation in Hotel Hell as surely as American Express. Say Amen. Now here is the fairy tale. They want you to believe. Once upon a time, a group of agnostics got together and published a humanist manifesto. They pretty much said, now we don't hold much truck with churches. We think the world is what science has discovered it to be. And that's that. 

Now nobody paid much attention. Nobody ever does, except the fundamentalists. Now with the brilliant logic that has long been a hallmark of Christian fundamentalism, they came up with this syllogism. Secular humanists are godless. Secular humanists believe in science. Therefore, everything scientific is godless, evil, anti-Christ, and part of a conspiracy to steal the faith from the hearts of America's children. Now, if we could teach a chimpanzee to talk, and if we taught that chimpanzee to say, I believe in the gospel according to Falwell, would that make fundamentalism a monkey religion? Say amen. 

Now, they say that America was originally a Christian nation, and that is true. Most people were Christians. If they are not Christians now, it is not because the law forbids them to be Christians. It is because they do not believe. It is because they do not care. Now, Christians have seen apathy and unbelief before. Many times in our nation's past, they have found the solution. The solution is to preach, to persuade, to proselytize. 

Now, that's just what I'm doing now. Only I'm an American preaching to Americans. And I tell you that two precious principles of American life are under attack. America began as a Christian nation because most of its citizens were Christians by creed. But to preserve the freedom of all Americans, America was founded as a secular state. America was founded as a humanist state. Not to oppose Christianity, but to free all churches from the shackles of state control of the church. 

Now it is the nature of almost all religions to cry out for religious freedom when they are weak in the minority. But when they are in the majority, their cry changes. They don't want freedom of religion anymore. What they want is perfection. The Puritans in Massachusetts demanded freedom in England where the state religion was against them but they expelled, tortured, hanged or roasted heretics in America where they had a Puritan state. Now likewise my own people, the Mormons, were victims of murder, pillage and open genocide by local state and federal government in our effort to live our faith within the United States. But we did not keep our record clean when we controlled a state of our own in the Rocky Mountains. 

It is the nature of all men when they see the power of government within their grasp to try to use that power to make everybody else comply with their idea of virtue. But let me tell the fundamentalist in a language that they understand from the Bible, which they believe is the literal word of God. Let me read to you from Leviticus chapter 19, if they still have it in the same place. It does, comes right after 18, just like I hope. Chapter 19, verses 33 and 34. "And if a stranger sojourn with thee in your land, ye shall not vex him. But the stranger that dwelleth with you shall be unto you as one born among you, and thou shalt love him as thyself. For ye were strangers in the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God." In other words, remember your own suffering and be compassionate. Say amen. Amen. Hallelujah. 

The Pharisees, as portrayed in the New Testament, The Pharisees were the fundamentalists of their day. They found their people in idolatry and ignorance. And they labored long and hard to teach them the law and persuade them to obey. What did they teach? They said all Jews must follow literally every word of God in the law. According to the New Testament, they took the words of the prophets and made a prison. They took the scriptures and made a straitjacket. They took all the scraps of law and magnified them into hundreds of tiny laws until you couldn't take a step without the Pharisees correcting you. But I tell you, I tell you that as long as they were teachers and preachers, then there was no evil in it. They won their point by persuasion, but they were not content. 

According to the New Testament, which the fundamentalists claim is their great teacher, the Pharisees reached out as the fundamentalists of today wish to do. They reached out and took hold of the government. They used the power of the state. They used the power of the state to kill. They used the power of the state to kill Jesus. And why did they do it? Why did they say that they killed that good man? Because he was a blasphemer. And what was his blasphemy? What was the great crime that he committed? Here is the gist of his terrible crime. His interpretation of the Scriptures was not the same as theirs. 

Jesus said, Woe unto you Pharisees, hypocrites! He said, They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. And I say, Woe unto you, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, Jimmy Swaggart, hypocrites! You pretend to be ministers of religion, but all your acts... declare that you want to lay your hands upon the power of the state. They do not want to establish America as a Christian nation. They want to establish America as a Christian state. And if they succeed, if they succeed, they will proceed to tell you what a true Christian is. 

Now, they've already started. They already tell you that Mormons like me are not true Christians. Not because Mormons do not believe in Jesus Christ. But because we do not believe their version of Jesus, they tell you that Seventh-day Adventists and Jehovah's Witnesses belong to cults, not Christian churches. They believe that Catholics are Christians, but only by a technicality. Even if you claim to be a good Protestant, if you have not been saved, you are not a Christian. And if you are not a Christian, they will not let you have a share of power in their American government. And even if you are a born-again saved member of the fundamentalist elect, if you oppose any part of their program, they say you are anti-Christ. 

But because, because they talk... of Christianity like one big happy family, many are deceived. Why? You aren't going to believe this, but it's true. A majority of Americans now agree that there should be prayers in school. But what prayers? What prayers will they say in school? Nice, safe, general purpose, absolutely meaningless prayers. to any person who actually believes that God is worth talking to. Prayers that teach little children that praying means exactly as much as the pledge of allegiance and the fight song. Now if you think you can write a single prayer that will please a Southern Baptist, a Catholic, a Mormon, and a Jew, then Ernest Ainsley had better perform a miracle of healing on your brain because it's broke. Sir, what we'll have is school children in Utah all saying Mormon prayers and school children in the Mexican border states all saying Catholic prayers and school children in North Carolina and Tennessee and Alabama all saying Baptist prayers and children in Manhattan spending all day praying to every God you ever heard of and every prayer they say will be a blasphemy.

If you don't believe it, you go back and read what happened to Aaron's two eldest sons in the book of Leviticus Now put God back in the schools, they say. Well, brothers and sisters, I always thought God could go anywhere he wanted. They say that God is always everywhere. Now we've got to make them play fair on this. If their doctrine is why their religion is superior to all others, now they better not go forgetting that doctrine the minute it gets inconvenient. 

Do you want to know how to raise religious children? I know a family that wants their children to believe in God. Now that family kneels down together and prays before the children go to school in the morning. That family attends church every Sunday and talks about religion, often at supper, at bedtime. The children don't just say prayers in that house. They think and they talk about what they're going to say and who they're saying to. And in that family, when the children have questions about religious matters, nobody calls directory assistance. They think and they study and they pray and they work it out. 

Now that father and mother know that a house filled with religion and love can keep faith alive in the hearts of their children no matter what they learn at school. But if you fill that house with hypocrisy or you fill that house with hate, then faith will die even if those children pray a hundred times a day at school. And the father and the mother of that family say to all the Jerry Falwells and Pat Robertsons and Jim Bakers and Jimmy Swaggots and Ronald Reagans of America, that father and mother say, don't you make religion seem trivial and meaningless to our children by reducing it to a minute of empty embarrassment at school. Don't you dare make religion exactly as important as recess! Amen! Prayer in school is to religion, as a spelling bee is to education. It's nothing but a stunt. Say amen. Amen! If it's strong enough to do any good, then it'll do harm. And if it's weak enough not to do harm, then it can't possibly do any good. Now let me hear you say amen! Amen! Say hallelujah! Hallelujah! Can you hear me? Am I talking loud enough? Yes! 

It isn't just prayer in school, brothers and sisters. They want more. They want to strip our textbooks, tear out of our schools the foundation of the science of biology. And if they can't do that, and thank God the Secular Supreme Court is still protecting the right of our educators to be intelligent, then they want equal time for... Now listen close. Listen close because the words I'm about to say are like a foreign tongue. Listen tight because this combination of words... is almost impossible for the human ear to hear because it makes just about as much sense as bicycle sex or vegetable athletics. In fact, it makes even less sense because I can imagine bicycle sex. I can even imagine vegetable athletics, but I cannot conceive of creation science. They want equal time for creation science. 

And they worry about drugs dissolving our children's brains. If we actually taught creation science in our schools, you could put our kids' brains through a strainer and there wouldn't be any lumps left behind. Now the last time I preached a sermon like this in Huntsville, Alabama, I ran across a book, a book you're all proud to look at. It's called Investigating God's World. I won't even list the names of the authors. I think they'd prefer to remain anonymous. This is the book that they want to use to teach creation science to your children. They want to give this book equal time. 

Now I'm going to do some dramatic readings from this book. I'm going to let you know what's going on in their minds. Mines, mines! I see we have an inquirin' mind among us. I'm going to read to you the section entitled, Is the amoeba related to me? Evolutionary scientists teach that at some time, millions and millions of years ago, an amoeba-like creature underwent binary fission, but by accident did not form two cells. Instead, the amoeba-like creature ended up with a two-celled body. They teach that this new process took place again and again over millions of years until all living forms of life eventually developed. This imaginary process is called organic evolution. 

Oh, I know, shocking, but try to control yourself. What is the scientific evidence for this process? There is none. In fact, if this process actually took place, all amoebas should be extinct. But they are still alive and doing well. Besides, no one has ever observed an amoeba divide into a two-celled creature. Evidence indicates that the amoeba, as well as man and all other living creatures, is the direct result of a creative act of God. There is no way for a human to be a relative of the amoeba. Now, doesn't that make you proud to be an American? I won't even bother answering. I think everybody here knows the nonsense that is. They don't need evidence. They just need to say that there's evidence. They don't have to... What? What about my marriage? Only by cohabitation, I'm afraid. 

The pothole mosquito they tell us about, and other little animals that live in desert potholes that have a life cycle of just a few weeks while a pothole remains wet and then go dormant while it's dry. And here is what they say about it. If we had to explain the existence of pothole creatures from an evolutionary standpoint, we would be at a loss. I have no doubt that they would be at a loss. On the other hand, life in the potholes thrills creationists. We know how the creatures got there. We know how their accelerated life cycles and special structures were given them. It is no mystery that God performed these wonders. 

What a lie. Evolution easily deals with pothole adaptation. It was because of such isolated specialized forms that Darwin first conceived of the theory of evolution. I hope you're enjoying this as much as I am because I intend to read more from this book. There is no scientific evidence to indicate that the gecko evolved his wonderful suction cups. Geckos could not have known that their descendants would need suction cups. They must have been created with them from the very beginning. The suction cups of the gecko speak eloquently of God, the creator and master designer of all living creatures. You don't see their scientific method going on here. You just point to God and say, Remarkable curiosity. They know the answer before they ask the question. How marvelous is your body? Nothing about its work has been left to chance. Everything works just as planned by God. Only He had the wisdom to design the blood clotting mechanism. Never mind that all the creatures without it are dead. That's just a theory. 

Now here's something that's not really about evolution, but it shows just how careful they are. Columbus had probably heard theories of the earth's roundness. Far back in ancient times, some observers had thought that the earth might be a sphere. But most people in Columbus' time said that anyone could see that the land and the ocean were flat. Now that is a plain lie. We know the historical facts on that. We know that everybody knew the earth was round. They just thought it was bigger than Columbus thought it was. And you know what? They were right. If the world had... if he had sailed and America had not been in the way, he would have been dead and we would have forgotten Columbus a long time ago. It's only an accident that his ignorance allowed him to discover the land where we now live. 

But you see, they don't bother with the facts. It doesn't matter to them. Here's another one. No accidental combination of molecules formed our atmosphere. It was designed and created by God for our benefit and to meet the needs of Earth's living organisms. The atmosphere is a wonderful gift. from God. Now excuse me for living. But since all life evolved in our atmosphere, it's not much of a surprise that it's just right for all of us. All the creatures that it wasn't right for are dead. 

Creationists say, they, creationists interpret the fossil record quite differently. They say that various life forms appear suddenly in the rocks as if they had been created. And they say fossils do not show a transition from simple to complex because the record shows that complex animals are in every layer. Creationists state that fossil records do not contain any transitional forms because they never existed. If there were true transitional forms, evolution could be proved and there would be no argument. 

Now, that's just not true, folks. Because if you have animal A and animal C in the fossil record, and you finally find the transitional animal, animal B, who's right between them, you know what? The creationists will start saying, but wait a minute, there's no animal A minus or B plus. Between A and B, we need a transitional form. Animal B just suddenly appeared. You know what they really want. They want to have a 10 million year set of strata. where everybody lay down on top of his daddy to die so that we have a complete record and they want that never to have gotten eroded away they want to have it be on a plot of land that never got involved in any upheavals and even then they would just say that they were cousins Transitions used to bother evolutionists, but the punctuational model solves that problem. Creationism doesn't. 

This book, this book is full of lies. Now when a scientist answers a creationist, he doesn't have to lie about what creationists believe. He takes their real claims and responds to them, often politely. So why do creationists lie about what scientists believe? Because if they fairly represented evolutionary theory to their students, it would make sense to them. Their students would say, well, why couldn't God use evolution to create life? Amen. The creationists don't tell the truth about evolution. They claim that they are upholding the truth of the book of Genesis. But I tell you that the truth never needs to be upheld by a lie. Say amen. Amen. 

Now over in Huntsville where I got that book, they teach classes called God's World. They teach it outside of school time. And that is right and fair. Parents can teach their doctrines to their children as long as the public schools still teach science. then fundamentalist parents have a right to educate their children or miseducate them according to their faith and they'll have their strength because home is much stronger than school is. You will persuade your children for a time. But still my heart breaks for these well-meaning mamas and papas who send their children to the God's world classes. Now those who have stupid children are safe enough. Those children will laugh at evolution and be happy fools all the days of their lives. 

But to those who have bright, intelligent children, the day will come when those children will come home and say, now I've learned what evolution really is, and you lied to me. And if you lied about that, what else did you lie about? Did you lie about Jesus? About the redemption? About sin and repentance and forgiveness? About life after death and loving my neighbor? Was it all lies? Why should I ever believe you again? To all you fundamentalist parents who might want to use this book or others like it, I say it is full of lies. And if you can only defend your beliefs by lying about what others believe, then you give up right now. Your faith is doomed. The best of your children will not follow you. You are the last generation. Amen. 

Now the men who wrote that book, they are liars because they know better, or they should. But the parents don't know any better because they don't know what science is. They think that science is Carl Sagan saying billions and billions of years. They think science is the artificial heart. But the artificial heart isn't science, it's technology. And Carl Sagan isn't science, he's entertainment. They can't just put their boys in a white lab coat and suddenly they got science. Now Carl Sagan is a scientist. And a lot of the people who worked on the artificial heart were scientists. But when they talk on TV or they build neat machines, they aren't doing science. You want to know when they're doing science? When they watch things happen in the natural universe. They make guesses about the causes of those events. They tell other people about their guesses. And they all keep testing those guesses by comparing them to all the events that happen in the future.

Scientists aren't doing science when they talk to us. They're only doing science when they talk to each other, when they argue with each other, when they challenge and test each other, when they try to prove each other wrong. And what comes forth from that process is believed to be true because it works. Now, science may seem. That's right. Science may seem to fail at times because every hypothesis is eventually changed, amplified, or replaced. Yet, it is in those seeming failures that science succeeds. That's why religion based on dogma can never be science because you only learn by changing your mind. 

Now, if those old religion salesmen changed their underwear no more often than they changed their minds, there's not a soul would stay 10 minutes in the same room with them. The public discourse of science is as close as we can come to combining the intelligence of many separate people into a single intellectual organism. It allows us to build a pyramid of ideas, each building on the one before, rising ever higher, going back and retrenching and widening the base to make a firmer foundation so the tower can rise higher yet. Not a tower of Babel trying to take God out of heaven, but a tower of intelligence. that can take us to the stars. 

See, Aiden? The only danger, the only danger is when one scientist gets so much prestige that he becomes an authority. Now his career is based on idea W and along comes Dr. Nobody with idea X which contradicts it and sometimes Dr. Famous hears the first glimmer of idea X and he says, poppycock. And because Dr. Famous is so famous, everybody else says, poppycock too. Everybody say, poppycock. Poppycock. That feels good, don't it? Yes. Now the fundamentalists don't realize it, but their religion works exactly the same way. The holy Bible was not written by the finger of the Lord. The word I hear from the fundamentalists is that Moses wrote down the Torah, which we call the Pentateuch, the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. Then a whole bunch of people. found situations that Torah just couldn't handle. So other people wrote down stories and dreams and poems and visions. And then Jesus came along and said, sweep away those old laws. Here is something deeper and truer. That's just what Einstein said to Newton.

Four different men wrote down the story of Jesus. In fact, dozens of men and women wrote Gospels. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are merely the four that by consensus became scripturer. The apostles wrote hundreds of letters to clarify and explain Christian doctrine. The few that are in the New Testament are the ones that by consensus were added to scripture. But the fundamentalists don't see that. They treat the Bible as if God dictated it to a stenographer, complete with chapters and verses. Consensus built the Bible, just as consensus builds science. If those holy boys weren't so busy using the Good Book like a phone book, they'd see that. They're like a stranger in town. All he's got is the phone book. Now, they can tell you every name, address, and phone number in the Bible, but they never have time to set a spell. They'll just get acquainted. They'll be strangers there forever. But boy have they got a mailing list. 

They are just religious name droppers. I know those names. I can drop those names too. All of you, you can say it too. St. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, Samuel, Kings, Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi. Now you can... Now don't start bringing in the pocket of a boy. I'm talking about Protestant Bibles now. Now can't you folks all say that? They can all say that! And they can tell you what it exactly literally means! Today at least. Tomorrow, it'll exactly literally mean something else. Dependent of course on whether Oral Roberts lives or dies. I tell you that man is tempting God. He is tempting the Lord. But I think the Lord will be generous enough to let him discover hellfire later. But I got to admit, I would dance a little dance if it was sooner. 

Something like the scientific method goes on in religion too, when people aren't killing each other. The difference is that whatever version a particular fundamentalist happens to favor on a given Sunday is presented as God's literal and eternal truth to be believed without question forever or until next Sunday. That's authority, folks. Not the authority of the Bible, but the authority of the individual preacher who dares to tell us what the Bible has to mean. And that kind of authority is the enemy of the scientific method. And the scientific method is the enemy of authority. And they know it. 

That's why they hate science. That's why they try to pin an ugly name like secular humanism on it. They know America will never let them kill science under its own name. We all enjoy our flush toilets too much. So they want to fool America. They want to fool America into killing science under an alias. But why should the scientific method make them afraid? If they had faith, they would not fear the process of public discourse. Because if their religious ideas are true, the scientific method cannot possibly contradict them. And if science seems to contradict religion, just wait a few years. They'll both change. 

It was awkward for Galileo, but nowadays there are hardly any Christians at all who think the sun goes around the earth. And I haven't heard a scientist seriously propose spontaneous generation in weeks and weeks. As long as we keep talking, we grow. But whenever we submit our minds to unquestioned authority, we grow rigid, we wither, we die. That's true for science and religion, both the same. Say amen. Amen. If they really believe their doctrine, they have nothing to fear from the secular science taught in their schools. No one forbids a scientist to publish because he's a Baptist or a Jew. They only forbid him to publish when he's shown to be a liar or a fool. 

The secular government makes secular laws that require all citizens to pay taxes, to support secular schools that teach the findings of secular disciplines, and putting any religion at all in the classroom opens the door for government to meddle in religion. Which... Which version of creationism will be given equal time? Which creation myths must be presented as alternatives to the time-tested findings of generations of scientists? The government would have to decide the answer to that question. And in the process, the government would indeed establish one religion over all others. The fundamentalists don't mind, because they think their religion would be the one that was established. 

If they thought for one minute... that the Catholic Church or the Mormon Church was going to be established they'd be screaming for the First Amendment just as loud as right now they're shouting to have it torn apart the secularity of American public life is the best protection of American religious life it is not the absence of religion in Soviet classrooms that makes Russia an atheistic state it is the presence of soldiers in the churches can you hear me? am I talking loud enough? America is and always has been a secular state. And from the day the Declaration of Independence was signed, America was established as a humanist state. 

Humanism has included many different ideas in its sprawling shadow. What matters to America is the fundamental humanist ideal that human beings are worth something. That if a human society... encourages individual life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness, then it is a good society. That it is good for the human mind to think and discover and strive to find truth. That human beings can find truth. That the things that human beings create can be good. Opposed to this is the Calvinist view of man as a worm born to be damned and destroyed. who can only be saved from his wormhood by the irresistible grace of God. That nothing you do yourself can save you. And if you are saved, you cannot even choose to unsave yourself. That no act of man in itself can be good and that human beings should be valued not for what they do, but for what God has done to them. 

And to the degree that fundamentalists believe this idea, to that degree, they are directly opposed to the American ideal of individual liberty, of individual responsibility, of individual worth, the foundation of this humanist republic. They are un-American. America trusts human beings to make their own decisions, to determine their own future. America trusts human beings to be free. Because of that humanist ideal, America is free to be a Christian nation if we want to or not if we want not. Amen. Now that freedom comes only because America is a secular state, a humanist state. There is no such thing as a secular humanist religion. I'm the only secular humanist preacher I ever heard of and I'm just an old fraud. If I was a real preacher I'd have a solid gold cufflinks and drive a Cadillac like them boys on TV. And if I was a real secular humanist I'd have control over most of the country. And believe me, it's not working the way I want it to I can't even get a parking ticket fixed. 

No folks, if I'm the whole clergy of secular humanism, then it's an embarrassment as a religion. Say amen. Amen. But there is such a thing as secularity. There is such a thing as humanism. And in 1787, Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Alexander Hamilton, and hundreds of other patriots did join them together in a grand conspiracy to build a nation upon those two principles. It was a conspiracy to give freedom to all the citizens of this country. A conspiracy to frustrate all those who would concentrate power in the hands of the few, to let them exploit the many for their own advantage. Now the result of that conspiracy was a constitution that has stood against kings, furores, and party secretaries, that has struck down city bosses and industrial barons, slaveholders and segregationists. genius generals and powerful presidents who tried to take power that the citizens of America had not given them.
 
And if we are to continue to be free, we must continue to conspire together, all 240 million of us, to maintain our freedom. We must tell the fundamentalists that we will stop them from taking power in the name of their religion. We will stop them just as we stop the slaveholders from perverting government in the name of property rights. just as we stopped the giants of capitalism from perverting government for the sake of profit just as we have stopped ambitious generals from perverting government for the sake of victory just as we have stopped power hungry politicians from perverting government for the sake of slogans and causes just as we have stopped segregationists from perverting government for the sake of white supremacy Am I talking loud enough? Can you hear me? Fool! hypocrites, Pharisees, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, Jim Baker, Jimmy Swaggart. 

Here are the words of Jesus in the Good Book. Search the scriptures, he said. Scornfully he said that. For in them you think you find eternal life. You think you're the chosen ones, the elect, the saved, the sons of Abraham. Don't you know that God can raise up sons of Abraham from the stones of the desert? The letter killeth. But the Spirit giveth life. Say Amen. Pharisees, fundamentalists, do what you can do by persuasion, but do not lay your hands upon the law. For the church that puts its hand upon the power of the state becomes the state, and in that moment loses all its holiness. All its holiness! 

Can you hear me? Hear. Never talking loud enough? Hear. Then I want you, I want you to reach down. I cannot sustain this cause alone. I want you to dig deep, not in your pockets. I want you to reach into your heart and mind. I want you to witness for wisdom, to testify for truth. Dig deep in your heart and then print, do not write, your name. Then print, do not write, the scientific theory you treasure most. The one scientific discovery or fact that you do not want to live without. Some people favor gravity. I myself lean toward evolution, even though its work is not yet done. Write it down and when you're finished, when you're finished I want you to raise it high. I want to see a sea of papers waving. The deacons will pick up those papers and bring them to me and I will read what you have testified so all can hear. But put your name there. I will not read something you have not courage to sign your name to. 

While you're writing, let us sing a hymn together. You all know the tune. The words may be a little unfamiliar. I'll tell you the words before each line. Rock of ages by the sea. In the hands of entropy. When the ocean and the flood. Carve the rock and move the mud. Rock of ages you will see. Rock of ages. you will see broken down by entropy and broken down by entropy. 

Brothers and sisters, let me tell you of the story of creation The way Moses would have written it if he had the language to express the vision that he saw if he had the scientific framework to comprehend the mighty works of God. In the beginning, entropy was king, and all the universe was void except a tiny ball of substance without form. Then bang! Bang! I say! The tiniest particles mate and cling. Protons and electrons begin their dance. Yes, electrons play their mad little shell game, moving faster than the eye can see. A great cloud of light and hydrogen swirls out into the night. The dark and cold are driven back, and entropy is cast out of heaven for a moment. The strong nuclear force holds tight. The weak nuclear force hangs on. The electromagnetic force shines so bright as if to say, it is good. And gravity, it just sets and sucks. Then the gas, the gas coalesces into stars. 

Some of them explode and from the heavier elements spewed out, a second generation of star systems is formed with small rocky planets, rich with carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, life. all swirling and whirling, rocks around stars, stars marching in great circles around the center of the galaxy. And the strong nuclear force holds tight. The weak nuclear force hangs on. The electromagnetic force shines so bright as if to say, it is good, while gravity, it just sets and sobs. And life, it changes. It adapts, it grows against the downward pull of entropy. And now we are at the peak of all the life we know because we alone have the power to consciously, deliberately build against entropy, to raise monuments that last for years, ideas that last forever. 

Yet entropy sneaks into the hearts of humankind. The dark and the cold burn a hole in the human heart. And because of the hole in our hearts, we have made a way to light the surface of our planet like a star, consuming and destroying all our works. Yet we have also made a way to journey world to world, and someday star to star, planting seeds throughout the universe. And the strong nuclear force holds tight, the weak nuclear force hangs on by its fingernails, gravity pulls us home! and the electromagnetic force shines bright and it is good. It is good. I say that it is good. Let me hear you say it. It is good. Amen. Hallelujah. Look in your heart and tell me, is it cold and dark in there? Do you look at all the business of life and want it to be still? Or do you love the magic of the blowing seed, the gravid beast, the spoken word? that stirs the mind. If you do, then I hope you have witnessed. I hope you have passed in your papers. 

Deacons, if one of you could go pick up, there are a few more papers out here that need to be picked up. Deacon Jade, would you please go pick up those papers? When I see them waving, I cannot leave souls in despair crying out to testify. The deacons are selecting from the words you've written, and I will read them from this pulpit. But let me warn you, maybe I should have warned you before, but I'm warning you now. Testifying for the truth is not without danger. Have you ever heard of the Mies Commission on Pornography? That was your tax money they spent, you better pay attention to what they did with it. The Mies Commission was named for that champion of liberty, our fearless attorney general. 

Most of the people on that committee were folks who devoted years of their lives to try to convince people that pornography was the worst danger facing the United States. So dangerous that if we didn't throw the Constitution aside and stop pornography, then God would surely burn us up like Sodom and Gomorrah. They studied, they heard testimony, and you won't guess what they discovered. You'll hardly believe your ears when I tell you. They discovered that pornography was the worst danger facing the United States. It's so dangerous that if we don't throw the Constitution aside and stop pornography, then God will surely burn us up like Sodom and Gomorrah. What is that stink? What is it that smells like rotten eggs? Is it the sulfurous brimstone that God has already heated up to smite us with? No! What you smell is the stink of hypocrisy and guile. What you smell is the odor of deception, because those godly people on the Meese Commission are not against pornography. 

If they were truly against pornography, if they were working to persuade people not to read or buy pornography, then I'd be right there with them, because I think pornography is even worse on your brain cells than an hour of PTL. But they aren't trying to convince people to freely turn away from pornography. They aren't telling people they should repent. They want the government to make laws saying what can or cannot be written, printed, sold, bought and read. And as long as those laws still don't exist, why, they'll just scare people. You know who they scared? All those fearful little boys at 7-Eleven. The Meese Commission just reared back and said, Hoogly, hoogly, boogly! And blew Playboy and Penthouse and Hustler right out of the stores. 

Now I'll tell you, I won't miss Hustler. A magazine that's always had about the same relation to good taste that the National Enquirer has to truth. But Hustler wasn't taken out of 7-Eleven because the customers had all repented of reading such filth and stopped buying it. And it wasn't taken out because the upper management of 7-Eleven are such fine, righteous, moral upstanding citizens that they wouldn't sell you something that might cause you harm. You know that ain't the reason, because they're still selling beer and cigarettes. And those things kill more people every week than have ever died in all of human history from an overdose of beaver shots. 

The Meese Commission ain't against pornography. They are for having the government set up the machinery that will decide which writers can write, which speakers can speak, what words they can say, what ideas they can express, what tales they can tell, what scenes they can show. So why do they say that they're against pornography? So that if you speak against them, they can accuse you of being for pornography. 

But don't you think for a minute, don't you go feeling smug, don't you think for a minute that conservatives are the only censors? The name of the group doesn't matter. Conservative or liberal, they all act the same. The conservatives begin by taking all the books with sex in them off the shelves. The liberals begin by removing sexist language from the textbooks. Keep that in mind, folks. That was how we first started playing politics with the classroom. Do you think they are content with that? No, sir. They come back. And this time they take all the books with impolite language. The conservatives take away the books by Hunter Thompson, so no one will ever hear those coarse old Saxon words for coitus and excretions. The liberals take away Huckleberry Finn, so no one will ever hear the word nigger, even though it appears in a profoundly anti-racist book. 

Are they finished? No ma'am! They come back and this time they take the books with obscene ideas. Books by Marx and Freud, Sartre and Swift, Darwin, Mao and Asimov. Not because they've read them. Not because they've understood them. But merely because they don't like what they've heard about them. Are they finished yet? Never! They will never be finished, because they will always be afraid of ideas they cannot understand. And the more books they remove from our collective memory, the less we will understand, the more we will fear until we understand nothing, until we fear everything. A nation of frightened peasants with stone axes in our hands, able only to scratch a living from the soil, and kill anything strange or different or new. 

Left or right? They are all pinheads and they know it. And they want to be sure, they want to be sure our kids are pinheads too. They are the force of entropy. They are the enemy of America. And I tell you, they are not Christian. Am I talking loud enough? Yes! Can y'all hear me? Yes! Well then, it's time for you to testify. 

Gayle Walker likes osmosis. Kind of sneaks in on you, doesn't it? Laughter And then, some illegible person, but at least it's a signature. I suppose that it's good enough on a check. I'll take it here. Likes the idea that all men are created equal, you sexist. I want you to know that you're not equal to me. Christine Seaman likes the conservation of matter and energy. Just hanging on to whatever you got, is that it? Some people, some people are just not willing to share. Barney Seaman wrote on the same card. Now talk about conservation. He says 186,000 miles per second, it's the law. I suppose... A law we can live with. Well, I'll tell you, I'm going 75 miles an hour all the way home. I'd like to go a little faster than that to the stars myself. Conservation of angular momentum by Dennis Smirl. Doesn't want me to throw him a curve here. David Dering, hey now, wait a minute. They can't all be jewels here. David Dering believes that everything is discoverable. I'm sorry, you are wrong. You can only discover what is true. Jeannie Schmitt says you can listen to both evolution and creation and decide for yourself. I'm sorry, too late. You are already created or evolved. Whatever you are, it's over. 

Carolyn Coogler likes heredity. Now that's nice and simple. I hope you got that from your folks. Carl Sackett! Paul Sackett likes interest equals principal times rate times time. Well, I don't. Laughter We find a perfectly normal congregation of people who love science and we get an accountant. David W. Fry likes the idea of further brain surgery for Reagan. Oh no. Don't mess with what you don't understand. Patrick Gibbs likes Occam's razor. It cuts through the foolishness, he says. I wish more people would save with it. That's all I can say. 

Why is Oral Roberts still alive? He asks. It's that God has a sense of humor? Mike Dillson says, if it weren't for Christianity, we'd still be numbering the years backward. Well, I say. Now he's found a real practical use for religion there. Now the first time, the first time that I preached a secular humanist revival, I got a message that said, I am a Christian and I think you are wrong to ridicule my faith. And I remember that. I remember that every time I give this sermon because I want you to know brothers and sisters that I don't ridicule anybody's faith. 

I am also a Christian. I know, I know this book. I love this book and I believe this book is true. I believe it contains the words and the stories of men and women who were genuinely taught by God. I am a believing, practicing member of a church that demands more sacrifice and effort of its members than most fundamentalists would ever give, more than those TV preachers would ever dare to ask for. I spent two years as an unpaid missionary for the sake of my faith. Do not suppose for one moment that I think faith is ridiculous. Anyone who has thought deeply about religion and does his best to live according to his belief has my respect, even if we disagree on matters of doctrine. 

I have not spoken against faith, nor have I spoken against religion. But I have spoken and I will always speak in favor of a secular America, a humanist America in which all faiths... and all churches have equal freedom to teach their doctrine and bring together all those who believe it to meet and worship or not meet and not worship as they see fit. Brothers and sisters, can you hear me? Yes! Am I talking loud enough? Yes! 

No, no I am not. I cannot possibly talk loud enough. My voice cannot carry beyond the limits of this hall. They cannot hear me in the school boards and the legislatures, where the fundamentalists are shouting that the public schools must teach their private version of creation. They cannot hear me in the legislatures and the courts, where the know-nothings are demanding that only films and books that they approve of be allowed to find an audience. They cannot hear me in the courts and the Congress where the sanctimonious are scribbling the prayers they want to make our children say in school. 

They cannot hear me, but they can hear you. If you stand up and speak in the school board and the city council meeting, they will hear you. If you write to your congressman and legislator, they will hear you. And when the jackals gather to attack a teacher or a principal, a writer or a publisher, a bookstore owner or a theater manager for daring to present an idea or an attitude, a scene or a story, a wish or a word that they do not approve of, then let your voice be heard! Not just to defend people that you approve of, because they will try to strike down our freedom by attacking people and ideas that most of us when the power is in their hands, when the Bill of Rights lies in tatters around their feet, then it will be too late to speak against them because then it will be possible for them to use the force of law against you. 

Then if you work to throw out the fundamentalist state, the police can arrest you for being anti-Christ. They can seize your copy of Origin of Species and try you for possession of pornography. And if you speak for freedom of thought and speech, for a restoration of the Bill of Rights, You will go to jail as a secular humanist. Now me first, of course. Preachers first. Now maybe that's why I'm the only member of the secular humanist clergy. I like the term reactionary and coun in a Stalinist state. The name secular humanism will be applied to all the opponents of those in power. And under that name, they will disappear. No, says Robertson. No, says Falwell, we aren't the enemies of freedom. All we want to do is clean up a few areas where Americans have fallen into error. All we want is to make this a Christian nation again. We are freedom-loving fellows, and we would never use the law the way you say. 

And I believe them. I believe they mean no harm. But when they have struck down the Bill of Rights... and given vast new powers to the government, powers over faith and speech and publication, it will be but a matter of time until those powers pass into the hands of men who are not so mild and tolerant as Falwell and Robertson. Like Robespierre and Trotsky, the machine they set in motion will grind them to dust. If you think I am melodramatic, if you think my fears are groundless, then keep your silence. Let others fight this battle for you. 

But if you know something of human history and human nature, you will know that what I fear is not impossible. Humanist states are rare in history and they do not last for long. They are fragile, easily broken when their citizens come to value some other cause above freedom. When they place the responsibility for deciding their future in someone else's hands. Is freedom too heavy a burden for you to bear? No! Will you let them crush the Constitution? No! Are you so afraid of being called secular humanists that you will hide and let them have their way? No! Or will you speak out against them? Yes! Will you speak for freedom? Yes! Will you speak to support the secular state? Yes! Will you speak to support a humanist America? 

Let me hear your voices. Let me hear you shout amen to me in the school board. Say amen. Let me hear your voices in the city councils. Amen. Let me hear your voices in the legislatures and the Congress. Hallelujah. And when the jackals find some isolated individual that they think is easy prey, let that lonely, frightened individual see that he or she is not alone. You are beside him. America is beside her, because what you do is what America does. What you are is what America is. 

And if you go home and sit on your behind and say, boy, how did that revival meeting sure was fun, and you don't do one thing to stop the people who want to destroy freedom in the name of God, then you deserve to lose exactly what you'll lose. Here's a verse of a song you know. Oh beautiful for pilgrims feet, whose stern impassioned stress, a thoroughfare of freedom beat across the wilderness. The pilgrims made us a thoroughfare for freedom, but if we don't keep walking along that same road, the wilderness will grow right back and we'll lose the way. America, God mend thine every flaw. Confirm thy soul with self-control, thy liberty with law. You've sung that song a thousand times. Listen to what it means. Your soul is your own business. The business of the government is to preserve our freedom. 

It isn't just music, folks. Those are words to live by. And what about our national anthem? Do you know the words to that? Do you know those words? I don't ask for the later verse. It's just the first verse. Do you know the words? then tell me, where does that star-spangled banner yet wave? Tell me. That's right. That's right. Well, here's my last word to you. Here's the tail end of my sermon. It's all in that song. Listen tight, brothers and sisters. If that flag is going to keep waving over the land of the free, then you damn well better make sure it's waving over the home of the brave. Amen. 

The Secular Humanist Revival Meeting was created and performed by Orson Scott Card, author of many books and stories and winner of the Hugo and Nebula Awards for his 1985 novel, Ender's Game. The earliest version of this sermon was performed as part of a guest of honor speech at contraption in Pontiac, Michigan in 1985. At the 1985 North American Science Fiction Convention in Austin, Texas, the revival meeting was performed in full for the first time. With frequent revisions, revival meetings have been held in various states throughout the South. This tape was recorded at Chatticon in Chattanooga, Tennessee, on the 18th of January, 1987. It was produced by Burl Boykin and engineered by Howard Carrington. Copies of this tape are so cheap, it's hardly worth the effort to make illegal copies now, is it?