For Christians this is a no brainer and maybe even so for atheists.

You have one hour to talk to a convicted rapist that is being released from jail. Within that hour, you must inform him of either Christianity or atheism before he goes. You have no knowledge of his current beliefs or lack thereof.

Which do you choose?

Atheism isn't really a belief....its a lack of belief(like anyone buys that but thats what atheists claim). They really don't have anything to inform the convicted rapist.

I said "you must inform him of either Christianity or atheism". It doesn't matter if atheism is a belief or not you still must tell him what the position/concept of atheism is.

I think most atheist on this forum would choose to not inform the rapist of christianity and leave it at that.

Rizeagainst would be one of the exceptions.

Why are we informing him of anything? What are we trying to accomplish here, exactly?

And what does him being a rapist have to do with anything at all?

Currently I would be one of those exceptions as well.

Because we must as stated in the OP

That's wide open for debate.

Atheists and Christians can agree that a rapist has done something horribly wrong.

Tell him about Christianity.

Tell him if he's wants to participate in God's forgiveness we can get him a priest and have him baptized (if he hasn't already) forgiving him of all of his sins.

Yes, this means he would most likely get to heaven if he asked and was baptized. The Lord's forgiveness is truly endless.

If the intention is to make him rape less, I'll inform him of some form of mainstream liberal Christianity.

Atheism and related issues...like lack of belief in Santa Claus or not believing Superman is real, are fairly useless in that regard.

Ofcourse my answer shouldn't be constructed as to say that I believe released rapists should be taught Christianity as a reform method (which I think would be an absolutely horrible practice)...the OP is after all a dichotomy.

You're assuming the justice system is perfect and all convicted rapists actually raped. The assumed extreme immorality is also dubious with the ever-expanding definitions of rape in our culture.

I know these are fine points, but I am being completely serious here: when I hear someone referred to as a convicted rapist I am thinking more along the lines of "Well, what did he ACTUALLY do?" rather than "Oh, how evil!"

Oh & I would "inform" our "rapist" of Atheism, because (1) I happen to be Atheist and as such I am generally ignorant about Christianity, ergo I am not in a position to explain it to anyone, and (2) I don't believe the Christian mythology needs my assistance in perpetuating itself.

If I thought there was any chance of him re-offending I would definitely try to teach him about Christianity. Especially if the rapist has psychopathic/non-empathetic traits - if they can be convinced that their immortal soul is in danger of being cast to the fiery coals, they might not re-offend, even if they don't actually give a crap about treating other people properly.
I don't any point of telling them about atheism. I don't really care what they believe. Besides, if they become an atheist and then commit another rape, it would be another example theists could fallaciously use to say 'atheists have no morals'.

So? That doesn't answer the question of why it's relevant to the discussion.

Christianity.

If there's a good chance that he's a psychopath or has sexual compulsions, then ordinary empathy is unlikely to have a significant impact on his recidivism. Religion still seems unlikely to have an impact, but I could see it happening in some cases.

I inform him of atheism since Buddhists tend to be pretty mellow ime.

Also... I wouldn't be too quick to confuse religious beliefs and nonreligious beliefs with complying with laws and moral rights.

Rape is (IMO) one of the top 3 worst things on Earth anyone could do.

http://www.holysmoke.org/icr-pri.htm

Before answering you need to clarify: Will the rapist be returned to his old parish or transferred to a new one?

I'd choose Christianity, out of the hope that maybe he'd fear the threat of hell/Yahweh and live a better life.

This is not the most optimal choice, but it's the best of the two that you've made us stick to. I have no problem with explaining atheism to him, it's just that it telling him god isn't real won't have any effect. It's effectively pointless.

If I could, I'd talk to him about rape and how it's a harmful way for humans to live together. Perhaps try to get him to realise it's best for humans to have a choice of who they have sex with.

It'd probably be futile too, but certainly better than saying "hey, listen to this old dumb book that you almost certainly already know about and disregard".

So if he is in jail for rape he is probably already aware of christianity.

nice...

I disagree.

Unit 731ing someone would be worse, mass genocide would be worse, and simple murder would be worse. There's 3 :P

(Sorry, I'm a nit).

If I want to be even more nitty, gang rape is worse than normal rape.

Really, as bad as rape is, it's probably not in the top 20 list of worst things someone could do to me.

Was going to say that. I could name like 100 things one person could do to one other person that would be far worse than rape, but I won't mention any.

I understand. If we had knowledge of how this person was charged with rape, then we could better choose on whether or not to go the atheism or Christian route.

I bet your mom or sister or daughter would see it different.

Atheism for me says nothing except idk if there is a God so it would only take about a minute to get that across. I fully admit its not likely to stop him in future crimes unless he has some guilt for what he did and not removing that guilt would stop him.

Which Christianity am i informing here.

Is it the easy believing once saved always saved. Because to me that might be the most permissive belief system on earth.

Is it the kind he can just wash away his guilt with a little remorse and a prayer. Because that doesn't seem to work in keeping priest form raping again.

Cant i just chose something were works is important like Judaism or Buddhism with reincarnation. That way i can make him thing he is going to come back as a dung beetle or something.