Mother Teresa attacked by Atheist/Anostic group -

by james_woods 205 Replies latest jw experiences

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  james_woods

  While I am no fan of Mother Teresa after reading some of the revealed facts about her life and work - I thought this was just a little out of the realm of polite conversation (but was interesting):

  Atheist group at Dartmouth plans anti Mother Teresa event.http://www.campusreform.org/blog/?ID=4503
  
  An atheist group at Dartmouth College is planning an event aimed at skewering the reputation of the late Mother Teresa.
  
  The Atheists Humanists Agnostics (AHA) club sent out a campus-wide e-mail announcing the program on Tuesday and promising a “full-out romp against why one of the most beloved people of the century, Mother Teresa, is as Hitchens put it… ‘a lying, thieving Albanian dwarf.’”
  
  The e-mail says the group plans to screen an anti-Mother Teresa film, discuss Hitchens’ book, Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice, and question how the public has been “conned into thinking this woman [Teresa] was good.”
  
  The e-mail states Teresa, who is on her way to sainthood in the Catholic church, “was not a friend of the poor,” but “was a friend of poverty.”
  The email links to a now infamous article by the late Christopher Hitchens which attempts to debunk much of the lore that surrounds Teresa.
  
  The event has ignited controversy on the Ivy League campus, with students telling Campus Reform they were upset AHA was hosting such an event.
  “It’s easy for a group of privileged Ivy League students who have never experienced poverty to meet in a ‘super secret room’ and think themselves as intellectuals by bashing Mother Teresa,” Melanie Wilcox, Executive Editor of the conservative Dartmouth Review, told Campus Reform.
  “I’d like to know what they have done, if anything, to help the needy,” she added.
  
  AHA President Adam Hann, however, defended the event, but admitted he had intentionally used “provocative” language in the e-mail to excite interest among students.
  “What I like to do is, when there are areas that people just get vitriol or angry even for bringing it up, I like to go and have that discussion,” said Hann.
  Hann added that he estimates about five to ten people will participate in the event slated for this Saturday.
  
  Mother Teresa is widely known for founding the Missionaries of Charities, a charity tasked with aiding the poor. She was beatified in 2003 by Pope John Paul II, a step toward possible sainthood.

  Perhaps it has relevance to the recurring topic here of what is decent and useful atheist criticism of religious issues.
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  Theocratic Sedition

  How can I show my support.................to the atheist group?
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  PSacramento

  Everyone is entitiled to their opinion.
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  james_woods

  I think we have pretty much settled the debate here - and concluded that while Mother Teresa may have meant well (at least in the beginning) - she evidenced a sad disregard for the people she was supposed to be helping. And very possibly, a good measure of hypocrisy at the end of it.

  I presented this latest protest as an example of how atheist protests can take on far to much shrill hate, and really work against whatever merit they might have had to say.
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  Band on the Run

  Several years ago I read a long article in The New Yorker about the reality of Mother Theresa. My objection is that the media made her a saint before the Roman Catholic Church did. Her objection to birth control had much further ranging devestation in India than it would here. She had a colonial attitude towards dark skinned Indians. These traits may have merely presented a complicated picture of a human. They raise concerns about any foreign missionary do gooder, not kowing the culture. She was never presented as human in the mass media.

  It reminds me of my Al Gore moment in the New York Times. He had me in tears speaking at the convention about his sister's death from nictoine. His brother in law and he decided to forgo profit from growing tobacco. It was very powerful. A few weeks later, The New York Times reported that the property stopped tobacco production years after his sister's death. It happened shortly before the campaign started. No respect for Al Gore.

  The culprit in Mother Theresa's case is not so much the Roman Catholic Church but the mass media creating some superhero. The Indian press reported her faults and strengths.
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  Sulla

  I suppose there exist people who think Theresa's Nobel Prize was awarded in error, while the President's was not.
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  Theocratic Sedition

  I guess this atheist group views this as a necessary battle in the scope of a larger war against organized religion's, particulary the Catholic Church's attempts at dictating history. There's plenty of uninformed people right now who upon hearing the name, Mother Teresa, think of some sweet little ol lady's incessant work in aiding the sickly and poor. They're completely ignorant of just how sick in the head Mother Teresa actually was. I get the feeling that some in the church would prefer people maintain the positive yet ignorant view of this woman. Kinda like how the WT keeps nonJWs in the dark about some of their more insidious doctrines.
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  james_woods

  My objection is that the media made her a saint before the Roman Catholic Church did.

  Actually, of course, the RCC has never officially made her a saint...and I for one doubt that they ever will, given the contraversy.
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  Band on the Run

  If they rush her through, she will be a saint. If the process is a normal one, I doubt it.

  She did do good works, in part. I believed she was almost Christ like until I read the article. She was such a notable world figure for so long. The larger picture should have been told.

  Perhaps her good outweighed the bad. I suppose no human is perfect.
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  cofty

  Turning a repugnant little busy-body into a bye-word for virtue was a triumph of the RCC Public Relations department.

  Perhaps it has relevance to the recurring topic here of what is decent and useful atheist criticism of religious issues. - JamesWoods

  Nothing should be off-limits.