Ray Comfort may be a bigger scumbag than previously imagined.

[Rev. Rye]

I was recently strolling through Ray Comfort's RationalWiki page, and I came upon this little gem: one of his early books, More than Just Comfort.

This was written sometime in the late 1970s, and is not only out of print, but is so rare that it doesn't even have its own page on Amazon.com. Even LaTawnya the Naughty Horse Learns to Say No to Drugs has that. So, in the interest of verifying that I'm not making this up, here's the front and back covers:





And there's a reason you've never heard of it, and the slogan on the back cover might give you some clues: "Cancer: The Modern Day Leprosy."

And here are some quotes from the book.

“There is absolutely no pointing being healed in our bodies, then dying in our sins and spending an eternity in hell. It would be better to die of cancer and go to heaven because of that cancer, then to live in perfect health and end up in hell”

“God slowly begins to wash the brain, removing all the filth and wrong attitudes it picked-up in the pre-Christian life. He begins healing wrong emotions, the scars of envy, jealousy, hate, bitterness etc, which can cause many common diseases”

“One of the first reactions to the news of cancer is fear. Through the healing of the soul God will teach the principals of faith. One way to rid your garden of the weeds is to cram them out with vegetables. In the same way God can cause you to rid yourself of fear by cultivating its opposite – faith in him”.

“The Bible tells us that the tongue has the power of life and death. Our words can bring either life or death”.

“Pain can be intensified by negative thought, which always destroys peace of mind. Often we have prayed for people who are in pain after being told they only have a short time to live, and the pain has gone”.

“Humanly speaking fear accompanies cancer, but through faith we can look at the situation supernaturally”.

“Satan has no right to afflict us, and when he does we can, by God’s grace, effectively resist him”.

“Therefore you should never take medicine to relieve pain. You should never consult a doctor or go to a hospital for treatment, because you would be interfering with the work of God in your life. If Cancer is the chastening tool of God, then doctors who are fighting cancer are fighting against the work of God. If a preacher or a Christian believes the sickness is a means of chastening, then he should never pray for relief from the sickness, but rather pray that the cancer will continue to grow until the chastening is completed”.

“If doctors were asked to diagnose that woman’s case, not one spine specialist in the world would say “Satan has bound her”. Doctors would call it arthritis of the spine, or vertebrae out of place, or some other medical term, and they would be right as far as medical terms are concerned. But if you get to the real source of the trouble you will discover that source is Satan”.

To Ray's slight credit, he does seem to have repudiated the book. In fact, when alerted to the book on Facebook, he had this to say:

"Here is my response: In the book, I am arguing for cancer patients to seek medical treatment, and not to mistakenly believe that God gave them cancer as some sort of punishment/lesson, because if God had done that, then they shouldn't seek treatment until He has finished teaching them their "lesson."

You and other atheists have numerous times attempted to make it look as though I'm saying the opposite, by taking it out of context. Any quote that begins with "Therefore" should be a clue that it is quote-mined."

He did not provide the material before and after any of the quotes to prove he was taken out of context. Then again, neither did my source, so, in the end, I don't have any way of verifying this, so, for the time being, I'll have to file this under "Important, if True."

Also, I was going to punctuate this with a clip from The Master, the scene where Philip Seymour Hoffman has to defend himself against someone who noted he claimed his Dianetics could potentially cure cancer, but I could only find it in a German dubbed version on Youtube, so, I'll just post that:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5GDN0ElWE1Q

Any thoughts?

[EgoRaptor]

I'm not surprised. Comfort is a fundamentalist crackpot.

[Tiberius]

Of course without an original copy we can't verify Ray's claims. I do find it terribly ironic that he is claiming someone quote-mined him; it's a dirty tactic he himself has used multiple times in the past (and being called out for it is probably the only reason he knows what quote-mining is).

[Minimalist]

Actually, I always regarded him as a major scumbag so this is covered.

[Kayenneh]

Wow. I read the title and thought to myself: "Is it even possible?!". Obviously it is..

[pineapplebunnybounce]

Evangelists regularly lie about diseases and Jesus having the cure.

Not news to me, I think they're all scumbags for lying about jesus and stealing money to begin with.

[Rev. Rye]

Of course without an original copy we can't verify Ray's claims.

And quite honestly, I'd be surprised if as many as a dozen copies ever made it outside New Zealand.

I do find it terribly ironic that he is claiming someone quote-mined him; it's a dirty tactic he himself has used multiple times in the past (and being called out for it is probably the only reason he knows what quote-mining is).

And, what's really remarkable is that, in the introduction to his book Evolution, a Fairy Tale For Grown-Ups, he's actually attempted to justify it:

"This book will no doubt be seen by some as “quote mining.” This is the practice of taking a quote (often out of its context), and using it in a way that was never intended by the author. However, every gold nugget is legitimately mined out of its context. No one seriously values the earth that encases the gold. So, when I uncover an evolutionary expert quietly admitting that he has no evidence to back up his theory, I don’t see any value in the soil of his surrounding words. I merely extract what I believe is of value for those who want to discover the truth about the theory of evolution."

It must suck when he's on the receiving end of the equation.

[xr34p3rx]

Evangelists regularly lie about diseases and Jesus having the cure.

Not news to me, I think they're all scumbags for lying about jesus and stealing money to begin with.

theyre not lying, they believe it to be true (most of the preachers).
they are just believing in a lie

[Ryantology]

The cover looks kind of cool.

And now I can safely assume I'll never praise Ray Cumfart in any way ever again.