This list inckudes websites and other online resources which offer a skeptical view of traditional organized religions and their belief systems. Some of the owners of these sites have received hate mail and even threats.
Bible Blunders - Many people have turned away from Christianity because the bible is so full of inconsistencies and contradictions, even on very important matters. This site lists numerous passages in which the bible itself contradicts basic Christian beliefs.
Christianity Revealed - This website explores the sordid side of Christianity. Subjects include the tortures of the Inquisition, the witch burnings, the invasions and conquests of the lands of primitive peoples, repeated persecutions of Jews and other non-Christians, and forced conversions. There is also information about the altering of the gospels and other books of the bible in order to hide the true origin of Christianity. The site also reports news about recent events.
Partial History of Christian Missionary Atrocities - This site describes some of the brutal methods that Christians have used to try to impose their beliefs on other people. It recounts the savage atrocities that occurred in places such as Tahiti, Hawaii, the Caribbean, Burma, Thailand, the Philippines, Vietnam, China, India, and Rwanda. It also chronicles the plundering of cities by the Crusaders, the repeated persecutions of the Jews, and the horrors of the witch burnings.
Evil Bible Website - According to the various articles on this site, the Christian God condones murder, rape, torture, and slavery. Specific topics include the Christianity of Hitler and the German soldiers of World War 2, the false messiahship of Jesus, two thousand years of mass murders and other atrocities commited by Christians, and the lies that Christians tell. Another section contains a sample of the hate mail which the site receives. There are also forums for discussions of the various issues raised on the site.
Ex-Christian - This website provides an internet-gathering place for former Christians. It includes a "testamonies" section in which people explain why they can no longer accept the fundamental beliefs of Christianity. Individuals can also discuss their personal views and other matters in an active forum. The site also includes videos, articles, and a gallery of images.
New Atheism - Wikipedia Article - This article describes a recent movement, sometimes called "the new atheism", which entered the public consciousness after several well-known atheists wrote best-selling books that take a sharply critical view of traditional religious beliefs and practices. These books include The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason by Sam Harris, The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins, and God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything by Christopher Hitchens. The New Atheism movement has also taken root on the internet, which makes it possible for individuals and small groups to reach large audiences at little expense, and many of the websites, articles, and other online resources listed on this page are representative of the views and opinions associated with the movement.
Victims of the Christian Faith - This list is limited to atrocities that occurred solely on command of church authorities or were committed in the name of Christianity. Despite this limitation, it is a very long list, and describes numerous cases in which Christians murdered thousands of people in one operation. Because many of the atrocities were commited against particular groups of people, the list contains sections with headings such as Heretics, Witches, Jews, Pagans, and Native Peoples. There are also sections for the categories of Religious Wars, Crusades, U.S. History, and 20th Century Church Atrocities.
Horrors of the Inquisition - During the Inquisitions of the Middle Ages church officials tortured and murdered thousands of suspected heretics. This article contains many contemporary eyewitness accounts of the methods and devices that were used. It also includes accounts of how some inquisitors became very rich from the bribes they received and the property they confiscated.
Freedom From Religion Foundation - This organization works for the separation of church and state. It also opposes attempts by religious groups to use taxpayer money to pursue their own agendas in schools and public properties. It monitors attacks on public schools and resists attempts to limit the rights of non-theists.
Of God and Greed - This Time Magazine article describes the wealth and opulent lifestyles of some modern Christian televangelists. It also mentions various controversies that have erupted around certain televangelists due to reports of bribery, adultery, drug use, homosexuality, and visits to prostitutes.
List of Christian Evangelist Scandals - This is a list of more than 25 modern Christian evangelists who have been involved in scandals, with brief descriptions of the accusations against them. The list doesn't include Roman catholic clergy.
Not A Christian - This website contains a long list of atrocoties committed by Christians from ancient times up to the present day. Among the hundreds of entries in the list are many instances in which Christians mass-murdered tens of thousands of people at one time.
Wikipedia Article on Skepticism - This article discusses various aspects of skepticism, including its history and its application in areas such as science, religion, and philodophy.
Rational Response - This content of this site is designed to encourage rational thinking in all matters, especially with regard to ethical and moral questions. Various articles consider some of the ethical and philosophical issues which arise in everyday life, and take a skeptical view of the answers provided by major religions. The site also opposes any attempts by organized religious groups to inject their agendas into official public and government policies.
How to Fake a Faith Healing - This article discusses various methods used by Christian televangelists to fake a faith healing. Of course the simplest method is to put a perfectly healthy man into a wheel chair and "plant" him in the audience, ready to get up and walk on cue.
Religious Tolerance.Org - This website tries to promote mutual understanding and tolerance among people of all beliefs. It argues that every individual should have total freedom to form his or her own beliefs, and it opposes attempts by any one group to impose its practices or beliefs on other groups. The site tries to present different viewpoints on major issues of our times, and to this end it contains more than three thousand articles and essays on a large variety of subjects, including the life and teachings of Jesus, inconsistencies in the gospels, why people do evil things, and whether hell really exists.
Skeptic Friends - The goal of this site is to promote logic, critical thinking, and science as the optimum way for a person to arrive at his or her personal beliefs and moral values. For this purpose Skeptic Friends invites inputs from people who have a variety of viewpoints and experiences. The site also conducts polls and permits anyone to submit articles for possible publication on the site. Various forums allow visitors to discuss current issues relating to the world's religions.
Bible Trash Website - This site points out the numerous biblical depictions of mass murders and other violent actions by the biblical God, and then connects this to the persecutions, enslavements, witch-burnings, tortures, and murders committed by Christians throughout the centuries. Other areas of the site describe the numerous discrepancies, inconsistencies, and errors that are found throughout the bible. One of the stated goals of this site is to set people free from the prison of Christian thought. There is also a long list of other skeptic and "new atheism" websites.
Torture Devices -- List Universe - This article contains descriptions and photographs of some of the most horrifying torture devices in history. The list includes the Heretic's Fork ... the Thumbscrew ... the Rack ... the Breast Ripper ... the Iron Maiden ... The Crocodile Shears ... The Brazen Bull ... and the Judas Chair. Needless to say, many of these devices have been used by Christians to torture heretics, witches, and other nonbelievers.
Torture Devices -- Occasional Hell - This website contains descriptions and images of even more torture devices, including the Chain Whip ... the Drunkard's Cloak ... the Iron Gag ... the Knee Splitter ... the Mute's Bridle ... the Pearl of Anguish ... and the Spanish Spider. There is also a list of books that were used as references for the material on the site.
Christian Witch Burnings - This article is taken from the book The Dark Side of Christian History by Helen Ellerbe. Here are several of its main points:
... The anti-female bias of Christianity was partly responsible for the witch hunts of the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries.
... During this period many thousands of people, mostly women, were tortured and then burned alive.
... Protestants persecuted suspected witches with just as much zeal as Catholics.
Here is a quote from the article:
"Witch hunts were neither small in scope nor implemented by a few aberrant individuals; the persecution of witches was the official policy of both the Catholic and Protestant Churches. The Church invented the crime of witchcraft, established the process by which to prosecute it, and then insisted that witches be prosecuted."
Christianity and Slavery - This site outlines the various arguments that Christians have used to justify the buying, selling, and owning of slaves.
Fundamentalist Christianity and the Religion of the Slave Owners - This article presents evidence which indicates that modern Christian fundamentalism evolved from the religion practiced by the slave owners of the American South prior to the Civil War, and argues that it still retains some of the same basic beliefs and attitudes.
Popular Delusions III: Faith Healing - Here is another good article about fake faith healings, and their potentially tragic results.
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests - This is the website of a support group for victims of clerical sexual molestation. Although most of the victims were abused by Catholic priests, the group also accepts people who were abused by Protestant clergy.
Note: According to a 2004 sexual abuse report by the National Review Board, since 1950 there have been more than 10,000 reported cases of sexual abuse of minors by priests. And it is likely that thousands of other cases were never reported due to the shame and fear experienced by the victims. More than 80 percent of the victims were male and over half were between ages 11 and 14 when they were assaulted. Many of these cases were initially covered up by church officials, and some clergy remained in their positions for decades after their abuses were reported.
Stop Baptist Predators.Org - This organization is dedicated to exposing and stopping the sexual abuse of minors by Baptist clergy.
Dark Bible - This website focuses on some of the darker aspects of religion. It discusses the numerous acts of violence committed by the biblical Christian God, and by Christians themselves. It also takes a skeptical view of the Christian explanation for why Jesus had to die on the cross before God would forgive humankind's sins. It also questions why this same God has condemned millions of people to eternal torment in hell merely because they didn't accept the usual Christian explanation for the crucifixion.
20 Reasons to Abandon Christianity - This is an online copy of a short book of the same name. The book's stated purpose is "to list the most outstanding misery-producing and socially destructive qualities of Christianity in one place." The 20 reasons to leave Christianity include: its long history of torture and murder, its intolerance of other religions, its dishonesty, its arrogance, its cruelty, its past association with slavery, and its misogyny.
The article about misogyny discusses such matters as biblical verses requiring that women submit to their husbands, exclusion of women from the clergy, the traditional tolerance of wife-beating in Christian countries, and the era of the witch hunts. Here is a quote from the discussion of the witch hunts: "Christians all across Europe were engaging in a half-millennium-long orgy of torture and murder of "witches" at the direct behest and under the direction of the highest church authorities. The watchword of the time was Exodus 22:18, "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live," and at the very minimum hundreds of thousands of women were brutally murdered as a result of this divine injunction."
Women in the Bible - This article discusses the connection between biblical passages about women and the Christian misogyny of the past two thousand years. At the end of the article is a long list of some of the biblical passages that Christian men have used to justify their mistreatment of women.
Ancient Skepticism - This scholarly article details the history of skepticism in ancient times, and how the thinking of the skeptics of that period has affected subsequent developments in philosophy, science, government, and religion.
www.jesus21.com - The major purpose of this site is to challenge the views and policies of fundamentalist Christians. According to the site, there is a strong connection between the beliefs of conservative Christians and the exploitation of the earth's human and natural resources. The authors of the site believe that knocking down these beliefs will help fight such exploitation. The site also contains current reports of the moral depravities of modern priests and other church officials. In addition, there are regular book and movie reviews.
Christianity's Role in the Rise of the Nazis - According to this article, the vast majority of Hitler's German supporters were Christians, as were most members of the Nazi party and most of the soldiers in the German army. The article also gives numerous examples of how church officials, both Catholic and Protestant, cooperated with Hitler and the Nazis before, during, and after their rise to power.
Here is a quote from the article:
"Most German Christians supported the Reich; many continued to do so in the face of mounting evidence that the dictatorship was depraved and murderously cruel. Elsewhere in Europe the story was often the same. Only with Christians' forbearance and frequent cooperation could fascistic movements gain majority support in Christian nations. European fascism was the fruit of a Christian culture. Millions of Christians actively supported these notorious regimes. Thousands participated in their atrocities."
A Glossary of Weird Religious Beliefs - The entries in this glossary describe some of the strange beliefs that are found in many religions. These include demonic possession, incorruptible bodies, possibility of human descent from a god, stigmata, the Christian trinity, religious relics, original sin, divine interventions, the rapture, and transubstantiation. Skeptics and atheists sometimes use such beliefs as evidence to support their contention that traditional religions are nothing but superstitions.
False Christian Statements about Wiccans - Christians sometimes make false accusations against Wiccans. These include:
... Wiccans worship the Devil.
... They sacrifice babies on an alter.
... They have a Devil's Mark on their bodies where Satan licked their skin.
... They drink human blood.
... They have a hidden nipple with which they suckle the Devil.
... They cast spells on people.
... They have naked orgies and use a naked virgin for an alter.
... They have sex with the Devil.
In past centuries Christians have used such accusations to justify torturing suspected witches, then burning them alive. Fortunately those practices have stopped, but the same accusations are still being made against modern Wiccans. Some Christians also call Wiccans "Devil Worshippers", although in fact most Wiccans regard the Devil as a myth.
Christian Crime Line - This is an attempt to compile a chronological list of major crimes committed by Christians from ancient times to the present day. The crimes include forgeries, book burnings, alterations of the gospels, destructions of pagan temples, arsons, banning of other religions, destructions of ancient libraries, enslavements, forced conversions, persecutions of Jews, abuse of women, torture and murder of heretics and witches, plundering of conquered cities, murders of scientists, and invasions of other peoples' lands.
Atheist Bible Companion - Most bible companions written for Christains ignore and even cover up the many contradictions found in the scriptures. Not so with this bible companion. Here you can go through literally thousands of verses that are intentionally mis-interpreted by Christian writers, and learn their true meaning.
God Is Imaginary - This website presents 50 simple proofs that God doesn't exist. For example, in Proof #10, called "Watch the Offering Plate", the author asks why the church has to ask its members for money instead of getting it directly from God. Another example, Proof #30, called "Examine God's Sexism", points out the numerous cases of Christian bias against women. Altogether the author discusses 50 different problems with Christian beliefs. Some of these same problems are also examined on the sister site Why Won't God Heal Amputees?
Atheist Nexus - Atheist Nexus is a social networking site for non-Christians. Each person who joins is given his or her own profile page for displaying personal information and photos. Members may also express their skeptic views in forums, make blog posts, join special groups, announce events, and upload videos.
Jesus Police - The purpose of this site is to correct all the mis-information and misconceptions about the life of Jesus. Corrections discussed on the site include:
... His name wasn't Jesus Christ.
... He wasn't born on December 25.
... He wasn't born in Bethlehem.
... His mother wasn't a virgin.
... He wasn't an only child.
... He had more followers than is commonly believed.
... His family may not have been poor.
This site also includes a timeline of important events in the history of Judaism and Christianity.
American Atheists - This organization was founded in 1963 by Madalyn Murray O'Hair, the noted atheist activist, after her successful legal battle against mandatory prayer in public schools. Since that time the group has engaged in many other legal actions to support the separation of church and state, and to end discrimination against non-Christians. Its other activities include the publication of books, pickets and demonstrations, and providing college scholarships. It also preserves atheist literature and history in the nation's largest archive of its kind. The archive's holdings span more than three hundred years of atheist thought.
Forgeries in the Bible - This article describes some of the evidence that ancient manuscripts of the gospels were intentionally altered in order to make them conform to orthodox Christian beliefs. The article also discusses how some modern English translations of the bible contain intentional mis-translations of certain passages. There is also information about how ancient Christians made an organized effort to destroy all copies of some of the gospels that weren't included in the bible.
Burning Times (Auto-da-fe) - The article describes the Auto-da-fe, a Christian "ceremony" in which dozens of heretics or witches were simultaneously burned alive in front of a crowd of spectators. It served as a warning of the probable fate of non-believers, and raised income from the property that was confiscated from the victims and their families.
Here is a quote from the article:
"Attendance at an auto-da-fe was not merely a major social event and civic occasion: it was a religious act which even the king himself was obliged to attend. It was a collective act of sacrifice in which victims were roasted to appease the Christian godman ... Doomed prisoners were led in procession to the place of execution. The burning would be held on a Sunday or other holy day so that the maximum number of people could attend."
Alternative Encyclopedia of Religious Beliefs - This encyclopedia brings to light many interesting historical facts not mentioned in most religious encyclopedias. The thousands of entries cover such unusual topics as the Abbot of Misrule, Adam's Peak, Amarnath Cave, the Aryan Religion, the Ecuadorian Massacre, Agapetism, the Bible-based Church of Fire, Book of Shaddows, Cannabalism, Cat Worship, Naked Dancing Cult, the Church of the Most High Goddess, the Church of the Quivering Flesh, and Crucifixion Re-enactments. This is also an excellent resource for anyone looking for information about obscure religious cults.
The following glossary contains definitions of some of the terms used in the above descriptions.
The image at the top of this page is the painting The Uprising by Honore Daumier. This painting is a public domain work reproduced courtesy of WikiMedia Commons.
The Other Voices Directory of Dissent is a non-commercial website. Advertisements are not permitted and no products are offered for sale. In web directories, the site is normally listed in the categories of society, issues, activism, religion, skepticism, atheism, or dissent. Other pages on the site include religion dissent and home.
