Ironically, the oldest reference to atheism I can locate is contained amongst the oldest of the Holy Bible's books, in a scripture purported to be authored by histories wisest individual, King Solomon, under the influence of the holy Spirit; " A fool in his heart says there is no God."
From a secular humanist perspective. By this I'm meaning to address those atheists, such a s Joseph Stalin, who were responsible for the genocide of multiple tens of millions of human beings.
As has been oft repeated, and once avowed by a local university professor:" Why do I believe in God? Simple logic; if the atheist is right I have lost nothing in subscribing to a benevolent philosophy. However, if the atheist is wrong I have lost everything."
What does atheism have to offer? Truth? A truth that can nowhere be substantiated? But isn't that succinctly the atheist complaint against deity? Never once has the ghost of an atheist returned from the dead to proclaim in triumph "There is no God!"
Conversely, history ancient and modern is replete with chronicles of N.D.E.'s, with multitudes of individuals describing encountering an afterlife and the existence of God, and untold hundreds of millions have reportedly given witness to encounters with a divine creator as well as the angelic and demonic.
Atheism isn't "atheology," or a science, nor truly scientifically based in that there is no rational way to apply even the modest procedural requirements of The Scientific Method. Logic certainly cannot be applied to disproving God, as has been proven by quite a number of contemporary philosophers.
Atheism seems to derive itself in personal incorporation from either despondency, rebellion, or mere self-interest. If, self-interest, it is interesting to note the etymology of a particular word. Freud used the abbreviated word "Id" in characterizing part of his view of the psychological make-up of the human persona representing 'self,' derived from the Greek word 'Idios', from which we get our modern word "idiot." Thus, self-centeredness is idiocy.
It is also a mild curiosity to recognize that without theism, or God, 'theos',there can be no 'atheism.' To even deny God then is involving an acknowledgement of diety. In this sense atheism sort of self-destructs, contradicting its on purpose in the very label it must utilize to express itself. A funny little paradoxical joke of a kind.
It is interesting to note that within this very forum exists another semantical irony, the "non-religious sanctuary," considering that the word sanctuary is definitely and unequivocally religious terminology. I'll get into the history of that word later as well.
This thread was never described as an arena for "debate", nor was an invitation to debate extended.
Consider, one should possess a modicum of knowledge on a subject one intends to debate. If the source of Christianity is, for the sake of argument here, The Holy Bible, then the matrix of that religion by its own written definitions disavows the notion that Hitler was a Christian. What you are doing is precisely the same as insisting that a wolf seen prowling the perimeter of a sheep farm is a lamb.
The only way to deny Hitler's Christianity is to define "Christian" in a bigoted manner, ie- "to be Christian is to be moral", which is the refrain of those who would believe that you can determine someone's morality (or lack thereof) by simply asking what religious beliefs he holds. Those who would deny Hitler's Christianity on the basis of his immoral actions are guilty of not only religious bigotry but also circular logic: as they see it, Hitler is consistent with their belief that all Christians are moral because he was not a Christian, and they know he was not a Christian because all Christians are moral!
Finally, my words were not "ad hominem", but if that was your perspective, so be it.
AND,while respecting the cyber domicile of "the loyal opposition" in this forum, my purpose has been to provide a place apart from debate, where those of us who have faith could discuss issues brought up elsewhere, without engaging in a flame war, yet able to express ourselves freely.
It's interesting that when you compare the way this thread was initiated to the "Non-Religious Sanctuary", this is the one that decided to go into a long diatribe implying why non-religious people are immoral. If you wanted a sanctuary away from these people, why the attempt to incite them?