Atheist Festival Promotes Anti-Christ Message
An atheist festival, scheduled to take place at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, has promoted their event with a music video that burns churches and insults Jesus Christ.
Rock Beyond Belief is set to take place in March 2012 and was organized by Justin Griffith. It is a response to Rock the Fort, a Christian evangelical event sponsored by the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association in 2010.
According to Fox News, Griffith said he was offended that a Christian evangelical event was held on the Fort Bragg base.
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"We felt it was entirely inappropriate for anyone to say your current religion is wrong," Griffith said. "We view all soldiers as already spiritually complete."
Griffith added that a soldier's religious preference had no bearing on how fit they are as a soldier or anything related to military business.
The Rock Beyond Belief festival will feature atheist speakers, a display of children walking on water and a number of band performances. One of the most famous bands, Aiden, uses images of burning churches and bloody crosses in one of their videos, Hysteria. Rock Beyond Belief is using this video on its website to promote the event, calling it the atheist anthem.
Aiden's lyrics in Hysteria contain very anti-Christian and anti-religious language, according to Christianfighterpilot.com.
"Love how they burn your synagogues, love how they torch your holy books...Faith whether Christian, Muslim, Jew. Still you all distort the truth. The death of fiction will save us all."
Aiden continues to curse Christ and curse the Christian faith, mocking clergyman and singing that there is no religion. The video shows images of churches on fire, dead animals, pandemonium and bloody crosses. An introduction of the video on Rockbeyondbelief.com said that Aiden is in the right place.
Regardless of the strong language in Aiden's lyrics, Griffith maintains that Rock Beyond Belief was not going to be "anti-anything." He originally said that it will not be an anti-religious event nor an anti-Christian event.
"We are simply putting on a day of secular entertainment...we are simply proud of who we are, and we are celebrating in a way that we wish that the Rock the Fort organizers had chosen to," Griffith said in a statement.
Benjamin Abel, spokesman for Fort Bragg, said that Fort Bragg will be reviewing the bands that are scheduled to perform, according to Fox News.
"This is a family-friendly event and we expect the entertainment will meet the standards of decency that would be typical on a top-40 music station," Abel said. "We owe it to our soldiers and families on posts to make sure it is."
Griffith defended Aiden's lyrics calling it a real story and saying it will not be front and center at the concert. He expressed that the group was not controversial, adding that their music could be found at Wal-Mart, a Christian-friendly store.
"If you have issues with bands that sometimes have swear words, or naughty words, or shocking imagery, that's a part of the First Amendment," Griffith said.
