You know lightning rods really made people turn to science seeing there is no god to protect them. Back in 1767, for instance, the people of the Italian city of Brescia stored a great deal of gunpowder in the cellar of a tall building which did not have a lightning rod in it. The people thought it was safe without a lightning rod because it was a church.
But the building was struck by lightning during a storm and all the gunpowder exploded. The explosion destroyed a great deal of the city and killed three thousand people.
But the building was struck by lightning during a storm and all the gunpowder exploded. The explosion destroyed a great deal of the city and killed three thousand people.
teachings of the Bible are so muddled and self-contradictory that it was possible for Christians to happily burn heretics alive for five long centuries. It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should be tortured (Augustine) or killed outright (Aquinas). Martin Luther and John Calvin advocated the wholesale murder of heretics, apostates, Jews, and witches. - Sam Harris, "Letter To A Christian Nation"
