r Summer 1990 Vol. 10, No. 3 $4.00 ¡-- Dying Wi o t Religion Why I Am Not a Methodist Don DeHart Bronkema Also: Interview with Paul Krassner Martin Gardner on Tammy Bakker Moral Repression, Entrapment, and Pornography SUMMER 1990, VOL. 10, NO. 3 Free ISSN 0272-0701 Contents 3 LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 47 ON THE BARRICADES 57 IN THE NAME OF GOD ARTICLES 4 Dying Without Religion: Introduction Paul Kurtz 5 A Eupraxophic Declaration on Death and Dying Verle Muhrer 7 Saying Farewell Honestly Daniel O'Hara 8 Let Thy Will Be Done Eugene J. Daly 9 Making the Best of the Worst John Buchanan 11 Theological Mythologies and Naturalistic Certitude . Delos B. McKown 13 0 Death, Where Is Thy Sting? Tim Madigan 14 Festivals and Transitions Vern Bullough 16 Defining—and Implementing—Eupraxophy Tom Flynn 19 A Eupraxopher's Agenda: Humanism and Religion R Joseph Hoffmann 22 Why I Am Not a Methodist Don DeHart Bronkema 25 Giving the Devil Much More Than His Due Shawn Carlson and Gerald A. Larue 28 The Dangerous Folklore of Satanism Phillips Stevens Jr. 38 Thomas Aquinas's Complete Guide to Heaven and Hell Ronald A. Lindsay 40 Skepticism and Happiness Marvin Kohl 48 Mysterious Cult Misuses Humanist Label Bob von Holdt 50 The Influence of Robert Ingersoll Gordon Stein 35 INTERVIEW An Impolite Interview with Paul Krassner Tim Madigan EDITORIALS 43 Moral Repression in the United States, Paul Kurtz I Entrapment, Possession, and Pornography, Vern Bullough 45 VIEWPOINTS Murder in the Name of Religion, James A. Haught / Some Fatherly Advice to Tammy Faye, Martin Gardner 53 BOOKS Evolution Reinterpreted, H. James Birx / The First Secular Jew, Paul Kurtz / Books in Brief 58 READERS' FORUM On the War on Drugs Editor: Paul Kurtz Senior Editors: Vern Bullough, Gerald Larue Executive Editor: Tim Madigan Managing Editor: Mary Beth Gehrman Special Projects Editor: Brent Bailey Contributing Editors: Robert S. Alley, professor of humanities, University of Richmond; H. James Birx, professor of anthropology, Canisius College; Jo-Ann Boydston, director, Dewey Center; Paul Edwards, professor of philosophy, Brooklyn College; Albert Ellis, director, Institute for Rational-Emotive Therapy; Roy P. Fairfield, social scientist, Union Graduate School; Joseph Fletcher, theologian, University of Virginia Medical School; Antony Flew, philosopher, Reading University, England; Levi Fragell, executive director Human-Etisk Forbund, Norway; Adolf Grünbaum, professor of philosophy, University of Pittsburgh; R. Joseph Hoffmann, professor of humanities, California State University at Sacramento; Marvin Kohl, philosopher, State University of New York College at Fredonia; Jean Kotkin, executive director, American Ethical Union; Ronald A. Lindsay, attorney, Washington, D.C.; Delos B. McKown, professor of philosophy, Auburn University; Howard Radest, director, Ethical Culture Schools; Robert Rimmer, author; Svetozar Stojanovic, professor of philosophy, University of Belgrade; Thomas Szasz, psychiatrist, Upstate Medical Center, Syracuse; V. M. Tarkunde, Supreme Court Judge, India; Richard Taylor, professor of philosophy, Union College; Rob Tielman, professor, University of Utrecht; Sherwin Wine, North American Committee for Humanism Associate Editors: Doris Doyle, Steven L. Mitchell, Lee Nisbet, Gordon Stein, Andrea Szalanski Editorial Associates: Robert Basil, Jim Christopher, Fred Condo Jr., Thomas Flynn, Thomas Franczyk, James Martin-Diaz, Philip Mass, Molleen Matsumura Executive Director, CODESH, Inc.: Jean Millholland Executive Director, African-Americans for Humanism: Norm Allen Jr. Chief Data Officer: Richard Seymour Typesetting: Paul E. Loynes Audio Technician: Vance Vigrass Staff: Kim Gallo, Steve Karr, Anthony Nigro, Alfreda Pidgeon, Ranjit Sandhu FREE INQuiRY (ISSN 0272-0701) is published quarterly by the Council for Democratic and Secular Humanism (CODESH, Inc.), a nonprofit corporation, 3159 Bailey Avenue, Buffalo, NY 14215. Phone (716) 834-2921. Copyright ©1990 by CODESH, Inc. Second-class postage paid at Buffalo, New York. and at additional mailing offices. National distribution by International Periodicals Distributors, San Diego, California. Subscription rates: $22 50 for one year, $39.00 for two years, $54.00 for three years, $4.00 for current issue; $5.00 for back issues. Address subscription orders, changes of address, and advertising to: FREE INQUIRY, Box 5, Buffalo, NY 14215-0005. Manuscripts, letters, and editorial inquiries should be addressed to: The Editor, FREE INQUIRY, Box 5, Buffalo, NY 14215-0005. All manuscripts must be double-spaced and should be accompanied by a stamped, self-addressed envelope. Opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of the editors or publisher. Postmaster: Send address changes to FREE INQUIRY, P.O. Box 5, Buffalo, NY 14215-0005. cerated in a concentration camp; they imprisoned Catholic priests and Protestant ministers who had a Jewish grandmother or Letters to the Editor grandfather. It is not true, as Dvorkin be- lieves, that most Jews consider the Holocaust a divine punishment, or see an anti-Semite automatically in every gentile. Great numbers of "righteous gentiles" saved Jewish The secular priesthood anism for its own amendment. Thus there families and children from destruction in is no excuse for judicial alteration. countries overrun by the Nazis, risking their Richard Taylor hit the nail on the head ("The Franklin said we would have a republic own lives to do so. Those kind people, American Judiciary as a Secular Priest- if we could keep it. Evidently we are failing Catholics, Protestants, and secularists, have hood," Spring 1990). Like the Bible, the to do so. not been forgotten by the Jewish community. Constitution is worshiped and revered far Majorities may err, despots are some- Will Dvorkin, who is no longer a Jew, be more than it is read and understood. times benign. But the lesson of history, on able or willing to participate in Holocaust I agree with Taylor's conclusions that "the which the theory of democracy rests, is that, Remembrance Day memorials, to come to judiciary is, paradoxically, a despotic on balance, majority rule is safer. grips with this dark chapter in our history? bulwark of liberty," but it is important to note the other side of the coin, that the John H. Foard Jr. Heinz Hartmann, M.D. judiciary can and has acted to curtail the Kansas City, Mo. Syracuse, N.Y. democratic will in elitist ways as well. Taylor cites cases where the Court has created I write as an atheist and secular humanist freedoms and liberties that were denied by Why I am not a Jew who never believed in any supernaturalist the democratic majority. These cases, religion but who was born into a family however, were more the result of individual David Dvorkin ("Why I am Not a Jew," identified as Jewish. I think that David activist judges than of the legal system itself. Spring 1990) says the literature of disbelief Dvorkin is wrong, mainly by way of When Alexander Hamilton advocated bashes Christianity, but treats Judaism with exaggeration, on several points. judicial review in The Federalist, No. 78, he kid gloves. He attributes this to the writers' 1. In most countries, Jews tend to marry had in mind the need for an undemocratic wish not to seem anti-Semitic. While this more often with Jews than with non-Jews. institution to protect the property of the may be a factor, he overlooks a more likely This tends to make them, over several wealthy from the democratic masses. The cause of the kid-glove treatment of Judaism generations, slightly more like one another Court's record of protecting those rights has compared to its spin-off religions. Whereas than they are like their neighbors. It does been much more consistent than its protec- Christians and Muslims believe they have not make them a separate race but a tion of civil liberties. Before the Warren era, a duty to impose their strange ideas on distinctive group. the Court used its powers to strike down everyone, the Jews are less ambitious. They 2. I think that Dvorkin is somewhat off any democratic legislation it disapproved of, only have a duty to impose their strange ideas the mark when he chides Jews for taking including railroad rate regulation, populist on other Jews, and thus avoid antagonizing vicarious credit for the achievements of income tax, maximum hour law, anti-child- non-Jewish disbelievers. outstanding Jews: It is not a matter of labor law, and wage and hour laws. basking in reflected glory. It is a perfectly But, after the Warren era, it has gone Andrew Vicker proper ground for refuting those who hate to the other extreme, and through "judicial Scranton, Pa. Jews on racial grounds; we may say to them, restraint" has refused to overturn majority "See here, if you insist on judging us as a actions it approved of, even though they Bravo for the courageous article by David race, then you must deal with the fact that, infringed on civil rights. Dvorkin. in nearly every field, there are many more Which role is better for our secular church Why can't a person abandon his or her Jews of outstanding achievement and to take—to protect liberties from the ancient mythological loyalties and be a contribution to society than is accounted for majority, or to defer to the majority's every member of the human community without by our numbers in the society." act? I agree with Taylor that the former is any parochial commitment to ethnicity? 3. Dvorkin seems to contradict himself necessary. But, depending on the individual Why can't a person appreciate equally when, in one paragraph, he speaks of Jews priests at the top, this role leads to ending Hellenic, Jewish, Chinese, French, African, as having a ghetto mentality that makes them rights as easily as giving them. and other contributions to culture without think that they belong on the "bottom of chauvinism? the heap" and, in another paragraph, speaks James Hall of Jews as looking down upon "goyim" as Eugene, Ore.