‘Young Atheist’s Handbook’: Coming to a School Near You?
What do you think would happen if Christians sent every secondary school in America a copy of a book filled with testimonies of the power of God? I reckon it would wind up in a circular file, meet with lawsuits from secularists, humanists and atheists, and otherwise set off anti-Christ fireworks.
But it seems fine and good for the British Humanist Association to send their own handbook to every secondary school in England and Wales. Indeed, these handbooks of disbelief were distributed to students in the name of free thinking.
Can you spell double standard?
The Young Atheist’s Handbook, which is subtitled Lessons for Living a Good Life Without God, tells the story of Alom Shaha. Now a science teacher, Shaha was raised as a Muslim in London. When his mother died, he rejected Islam and accepted atheism wholeheartedly. Now he wants others to reconsider what they believe.
This is absolutely demonic. First, Shaha believed in the false religion of Islam. Like many Christians who lose loved ones, Shaha probably felt his god let him down by allowing his mother to die and got angry. Of course, his god could not comfort him in his time of grief, so he was at a marked disadvantage compared to Christians, who experience loss and the promise of being reunited with their loved one in heaven. So instead of working through the process in time, Shaha turned his back on his god.
He then converted from a false religion to no religion. I can’t find any specific numbers on this trend, but anecdotally there is evidence that more Muslims are converting to atheism. And atheists see Islam as a threat, though not as threatening as Christianity. Muslims who convert to atheism are themselves in danger, since it’s considered apostasy and can come with the death penalty.
In any case, the atheists seem to be committed to evangelizing for their god—which is themselves.
“[The handbook] made me realize how fortunate many of us are to be able to take for granted our own freedom to believe, or not, in the faith of our parents,” says Ian Horsewell, the atheist who spent his hard-earned dollars to make sure every secondary schoolchild was dissuaded from believing in God. “It seemed to me that the very students who needed to read Alom’s book would find it hard to buy for themselves, so instead I wondered if we could place a copy in every secondary school library.”
In America, atheists won’t even tolerate a college football coach expressing his faith. Atheists countered our National Day of Prayer with the “Day of Reason.” Atheists in a high school in Parkersburg, West Virginia, strong-armed the wrestling team over a Bible verse. The list of stories is longer than my arm, but I’ll leave you with this one: “Atheist Mistakes Roommate for Jesus, Attacks Him and Demands Godless Lawyer.”
Make no mistake, the atheists are as committed to their false gospel as Muslims and Christians are to evangelizing their beliefs in a world where tolerance seems applicable to all things but the cross of Christ.
We shouldn’t be surprised that atheists are offended by our beliefs and want to sway young minds toward godlessness. But we shouldn’t stand by and watch—or even sit by and complain—about initiatives like the distribution of The Young Atheist’s Handbook in England and Wales.
We need to first equip our own children with the Word of God so they can resist these false gospels. We need to be proactive about Bible-based initiatives in schools at every turn. And, of course, we need to stop doing so much standing by and sitting down and instead drop to our knees in intercession for the many who are leaving this tolerant world without embracing the saving grace of a God that religion—and anti-religion—has misrepresented.
Jennifer LeClaire is news editor at Charisma. She is also the author of several books, including The Making of a Prophet. You can email Jennifer at jennifer.leclaire@
