I predicted a backlash against the New Atheism, but I had no idea that the Pope would get involved. Interestingly, he cuts right to the heart of the materialist matter:
Pope Benedict XVI strongly criticized modern-day atheism in a major document released today, saying it had led to some of the “greatest forms of cruelty and violations of justice” ever known to mankind….
“We must do all we can to overcome suffering, but to banish it from the world is not in our power,” Benedict wrote. “Only God is able to do this.”
It is interesting how every significant atheist idea for making the world better and reducing human suffering almost invariably ends up with a recommendation to impose murderous dictatorship on mankind. From Meslier to Marx, from de Rouvroy, to Russell, from Heinlein to Harris, the atheist solution is inevitably simplistic, brutal and devoid of positive result.
And yet they consider themselves freethinkers, apparently without any sense of irony.