Ken Ham Slams Atheist's Answer to Why Godless Life Is Positive for Children
Young Earth Creationist Ken Ham slammed the response he received from one atheist who took him on his challenge to explain how atheism is positive for children.
"This atheist's 'positive' message for kids is nothing but a tirade against Christianity (which is the best he can do). He mocks those who believe in Adam and Eve, the fall, sin, and Jesus. Then, he borrows from a Christian worldview to make moral claims," Ham, CEO and president of Answers in Genesis, said on Facebook Wednesday.
Ham's comments were a response to Luciano Gonzalez of the Sin God Patheos blog, who on Saturday responded to an earlier Ham tweet that challenged atheists to explain what positive message they have for children.
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"A world without deities has a significant impact on our role in the world and in the universe," Gonzalez wrote as part of his answer.
"It means that every single person isn't cursed to walk along a predetermined path where they at most make minor but already accounted for choices that do not alter the future but to decide their own fate and to make choices that will ultimately alter humanity's future in ways they might not understand or ever even see themselves," he added.
"It means that it isn't wrong for boys to like boys or for girls to like girls, or for children to like both or neither."
He went on to argue that it is positive to believe that there is no plan by God that allows for children to suffer, and to believe that the world doesn't elevate humanity.
It is positive for children to understand "that humans are animals like gorillas, dogs, cats, elephants, and many other kinds of animals," he continued.
"My positive message for kids is this: you have value and can change the world in ways that no one has ever predicted. You aren't cursed because of who you find attractive, you aren't sinful for being human.
"You are your own person and the most important decision you'll ever make is not something as simple as whether or not you should believe in a deity. Your actions have power and you are responsible for your choices, the world isn't fallen and you aren't some horrible sinner."
In his criticism, Ham argued that ultimately atheism is "meaningless."
"Of course, the 'positive' message this atheist didn't tell kids is that it's positively true that you will all die. From an atheist's perspective, you die, then know nothing, and will not even know you existed, so the article is meaningless — like atheism," Ham said.
"This atheist's 'positive' message to kids is they can act like animals --- and he forgot to say, 'some animals even eat or abandon their young and others eat their mates.'"
Bill Nye "The Science Guy" made a similar argument that all persons are simply animals, during a visit to the Ark Encounter in Kentucky back in July 2016. In one encounter with a young girl during the tour, Nye told her that she is a "wonderful, beautiful animal."
"Young woman, I will say to you that there is a process that humans have developed over millennia by which we know nature. We call that science. And the big thing in science is questioning things," Nye also told the girl about her origins.
Ham insisted that the girl was created by God, however, as He has created all things. He added that it would be wrong to portray a child as "just an animal."
