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October 7th, 2013
12:31 PM ET
Scalia says atheism 'favors the devil's desires'By Daniel Burke, CNN Belief Blog Co-editor [twitter-follow screen_name='BurkeCNN'] (CNN) - As the Supreme Court begins its new term Monday, the devil is not on the docket - but the Evil One apparently is on the mind of Justice Antonin Scalia. New York magazine has published a fascinating new interview with Scalia in which the outspoken jurist tackled a number of topics. But none seemed to surprise Scalia's interviewer, Jennifer Senior, more than his views on Satan. The interview was conducted on September 26, the 27th anniversary of Scalia's swearing-in as a justice on the high court. He is one of a record six Catholic justices on the Supreme Court. After Scalia and Senior discussed heaven and hell (he believes in them; she doesn't), the justice said in a stage whisper, "I even believe in the devil." "You do?" Senior replied. "Of course! Yeah, he’s a real person. Hey, come on, that’s standard Catholic doctrine! Every Catholic believes that," Scalia said. Senior asked Scalia if he's seen evidence of Satan's work recently. "You know, it is curious," Scalia answered. "In the Gospels, the devil is doing all sorts of things. He’s making pigs run off cliffs, he’s possessing people and whatnot. And that doesn’t happen very much anymore. ... It’s because he’s smart." MORE FROM CNN: How to argue about religion online Senior asked if it's "frightening" to believe in the devil, which seemed to annoy Scalia. "You’re looking at me as though I’m weird," he answered. "My God! Are you so out of touch with most of America, most of which believes in the devil? I mean, Jesus Christ believed in the devil! It’s in the Gospels! You travel in circles that are so, so removed from mainstream America that you are appalled that anybody would believe in the devil! Most of mankind has believed in the devil, for all of history. Many more intelligent people than you or me have believed in the devil." Scalia, whose son, Paul, is a Catholic priest in Arlington, Virginia, also said Pope Francis is "absolutely" right about the church needing to concentrate more on mercy and outreach than on fighting the culture wars. MORE FROM CNN: American Catholics agree with Pope Francis on ending culture wars "But he hasn’t backed off the view of the church on those issues," Scalia said. "He’s just saying, 'Don’t spend all our time talking about that stuff. Talk about Jesus Christ and evangelize.' I think there’s no indication whatever that he’s changing doctrinally." Finally, Scalia said he has not "softened" his views on homosexuality. "I still think it’s Catholic teaching that it’s wrong. OK? But I don’t hate the people that engage in it. In my legal opinions, all I’ve said is that I don’t think the Constitution requires the people to adopt one view or the other," Scalia said. MORE FROM CNN: Church and state, executive power on Supreme Court docket soundoff (3,730 Responses)« Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 Next »
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The CNN Belief Blog covers the faith angles of the day's biggest stories, from breaking news to politics to entertainment, fostering a global conversation about the role of religion and belief in readers' lives. It's edited by CNN's Daniel Burke with contributions from Eric Marrapodi and CNN's worldwide news gathering team.  |
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Believing in the Devil, or God for that matter, doesn't make either one exist one more iota. You can believe in Santa to your heart's content, he'll forever remain a work of fiction and all your belief cannot change that, same goes for God and the Devil.
Well, duh, all Christians believe in the devil. This is shocking, why? This is not a newsflash: People non-Christians admire believe in the devil.
If this was Joe Blow, I'd just shake my head and laugh. But this is a man in a position of authority in the highest court in this deliberately secular land. The fact he is so ruled by religious delusions is quite frightening and offensive to me.
This man uses his unbiased mind to look at the rights and wrongs in society and passes judgement so they are the same right and wrong for all of America. Scary stuff going on in Washington. Where do you suppose they hide the garlic?
It is sad to hear that a Supreme Court judge actually believes that Satan is a real person. Satan according to the Bible was a cherubic angel turned bad and allowed to tempt Eve. God apparently created angels and one of them turned into Satan, not a person, but a bad supernatural being. It is a long time since established Christian religions have stopped preaching about Satan and damnation, preferring to preach about the God of love.
ouch!! theists are crazy. And the only way to get elected as President of the U.S. of A. is to believe this tripe. 2013 is still medieval. Come on LOGIC and KNOWLEDGE!!! (ditch the primitive Man thoughts)
Wake up people he is right.
In order for a person to be right, their statements must be supported by fact. There is no evidence that any devil (or any god or any heaven or any hell) exists, therefore all he stated was his opinion.
gods suck 🙁
why are we still stuck with twits that think mythology is real, and protect it and guise under this pathetic semantic veil called "religion" and then give it freedom?
FUGLY.
Christ followers remind me of that scene in the Mummy!! he's wearing all these talismans in hopes of one being correct...they have all their "eggs in one basket" and when viewed under the eye of scrutiny/truth/logic/reason/NOT FAITH/intelligence ... then it fails miraculously every time (just like Islam, Judaism, Jainism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Norse/Greek/Egyptian/Hawaiian/Fijiian/Thai gods etc)
Sharia law guy has the eyebrows of a mentat. Trim that ish bro.
If the devil does exist I would believe that Scalia is one of his top minions here on earth. I consider him the worst Supreme Court justice of my life time. The man seems to hardly even know what the word justice stands for. Hard to call someone like that a justice. Hard to understand how Reagan could appoint the finest justice to the court, Sandra Day O'Connor, and follow it up with the worst.
I don't like god very much.
But that's only because I know him real well 🙁
Outright scary stuff, this judge is on the highest court of the nation and believes in Satan, heaven, hell, fairy tales and you want to tell me that doesn’t influence his decision one way or another on cases to be decided by Supreme Court? And we all think that all judges in the Supreme Court are unbiased, wow, just enough to make you sick, wondering what do the other judges belief systems are, goblins, elves, trolls, dwarves, giants, unicorns…
"You’re looking at me as though I’m weird," yes you are for crying out loud
Insane!!!! Is this guy is a judge ? What wrong with this country!
Certifiably insane. There has to be a way to remove a Supreme Court judge who admits he us insane!
Unfortunately belief in unproven supernatural beings is not yet in the DSM.
Yes it is, look under "having and talking to imaginary friends".
But religion continues, hopefully not for very much longer, to enjoy a free pass.
And the world laughs.....
"Many more intelligent people than you or me have believed in the devil."-Scalia
I get the feeling he believes because someone he met who is smarter than him believes.
I'm pretty sure if you gathered the smartest people in the world the majority of them would be atheist.
I doubt he has even knowingly talked to an Athiest.
Ah, so he has been traveling in the southern red states has he.
Given the percentage of the population that claims atheism vs religious...i doubt it.
The huge number of people who just show up for special occassions at church show how many people officially claim they are beleivers, but don't really practice it.
They just do it to keep the peace with the in-laws at the family dinner afterward.
Right Satan is a real person and he currently runs the Tea Party.
I remember hearing Scalia being praised, about the time of his confirmation and installation, for his intellect. If this is what passes for intellect in this country its no wonder we are in serious decline.
The vacuum of naturalism, it's a nasty little thing.
Why?
Because naturalism threatens his supersti.tion.
Similar to the idea that many had at one time that the earth was flat.
Satan is a real person alright. Probably a campaign contributor too.
And the Tea Party are his horsemen.
Which one of them is the Antichrist we will soon find out. My moneys on Cruz.
Why is it news that a person that believes in a god also believes in a devil. Scalia is a highly analytical person and yet his faith is more powerful than his reason. Unsubstantiated belief in combination with reason must have had evolutionary advantage over pure reason because we still have it.
The ability to "compartmentalize". I'm sure there are some great studies published about it.
I think it's more about the fact that we face many situations where we need to act with little to no information. In those cases we act on intuition. Those that can't are disadvantaged. Other situations develop more slowly allowing data driven strategies to win. Having the combination gives you a better chance in the broad range of challenging situations.
We still have the wisdom tooth, too. What's the advantage of that?
Pseudo...
Point made, but science is evolving way to fast for us humans to keep up. If this trait truely is a product of evolutionary advantages, we couldn't hope to lose it fast enough to keep up with modern science.
That is a valid point, vestigial structure takes a long time to go away. I still think there is advantage to having reason and imperfect intuition, including belief. The analogy between belief in god and wisdom teeth is good, usually does no harm but occasionally gets impacted.
but most of us get our wisdom teeth pulled out when they come out, don't we? 😉