religion
gregladen | August 21, 2009CALLING ALL ALLIES:
Hemant Mehta is the Friendly Atheist (that's a blog) and a math teacher. There are people who want him fired. This is not the first time he's been through this. Please visit his site and give him some support.
Click Here.
If you are a blogger please point to the above referenced post. It would be nice if there were several hundred supportive comments there.
gregladen | August 20, 2009BioLogos was a foundatoin Collins started in an effort to reconcile science and religion. He just resigned from the foundation, saying "I want to reassure everyone I am here to lead the NIH as best I can, as a scientist. The NIH director needs to focus on science. I have no religious agenda for the NIH."
That's good. Details here.
oracknows | August 20, 2009One of the advantages of hanging out around home on the proverbial staycation is that, instead of actually paying more attention to the news, I've paid less attention to the news. That's why I didn't notice some stories from earlier this week about what the new director of the NIH, Francis Collins, plans to do.
Regular readers probably know that, other than the occasional snarky comment on other people's blogs, I haven't (much) engaged in the blogospheric kerfuffle over Collins' religion and the (in my opinion) vastly overblown fear in some quarters that he would inject his religion into his…
pharyngula | August 20, 2009We had summer thunderstorms and a tornado touchdown in Minneapolis yesterday, and the convention center was slightly damaged. At the same time, the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America was having their national convention there. You know what this means?
God hates Christians. Repent!
No, wait, that can never be what an omen means. We already have prophets stirring the tea leaves and interpreting the event. It seems, if you look at the conference schedule, that the liberal Lutherans were contemplating making some friendly statements about their gay congregants, so obviously this was an…
razib | August 19, 2009It was a pleasure to hear Tom Rees, one of my favorite religion & data bloggers, on Thinking Allowed, one of my regular podcasts. Epiphenom is of particular interest because Tom Rees offers up original data and analysis, instead of anecdote laced speculation. As they say, if you enjoy Thinking Allowed, you might also be interested in In Our Time....
gregladen | August 19, 2009A Des Moines bus driver has been suspended for refusing to drive a bus with a pro atheist ad on the outside. The story is here. There is also a poll at that location that you may want to answer. Hat tip Pharyngula.
Angela Shiel was suspended on Monday after she refused to drive a bus with an Iowa Atheists & Freethinkers ad on its side. The ad reads "Don't believe in God? You are not alone."
Shiel says the message is against her Christian faith.
The transit authority removed the ads earlier this month after complaints from riders, then reversed course after meeting with the atheist…
emjohnson | August 19, 2009
Mark Dery, guest blogger for Boing Boing, has a piece up on the "philosophical investigation into the paradox of horrible beauty and the politics of 'just looking.'" In it he highlights the 17th century crypt where the Capuchin's (the religious order, not the monkey) buried their deceased brethren. I visited the crypt when I was in Rome a few years ago and, I can assure you, it's every bit as creepy as he describes.
From 1631 until 1870, the monks buried their dead here---some four thousand of them, reportedly. The musty, mineral smell of the hard-packed dirt floor mingles with the sweaty…
pharyngula | August 19, 2009There is a bill pending in the Bahamas which would outlaw marital rape, and it is facing a lot of opposition. There is a common theme in the arguments against it: see if you can figure out what it is.
"It is ridiculous for them to try to make that a law, because I don't think a man can rape his own wife. After two people get married, the Bible says that they become one - one flesh. How is it possible to rape what is yours?" asked Mr. Sutherland.
"Even if a woman says no to her husband it still can't be considered rape because she is his wife. He already paid his dues at the church and she…
razib | August 18, 2009Rod Dreher is aghast at the fact that Americans don't assent to the views of "orthodox" Christianity. The problem that many secular and religious people on the extremes don't get (the anti-devout and the devout) is the cognitive complexity, and, frankly, the fundamental incoherency of the religious beliefs of most humans. In The Future of Religion: Secularization, Revival and Cult Formation the authors report survey data from the early 1980s which shows that most American Christians would not definitely deny that Hindus could achieve salvation:
Missouri Lutheran
South. Baptist…
grrlscientist | August 18, 2009tags: Gay Christians, religion, humor, funny, streaming video
This video is a very silly Not The Nine O'Clock News Sketch about gay christians [1:33]
jrosenhouse | August 17, 2009The fall semester begins one week from today. Much work, both physical and psychological, must be done to prepare. Cuts into the blogging time. Sorry about that.
But since it hardly seems fair that my problems should cut into your bloggy pleasures, have a look at the latest column from the always excellent A. C. Grayling, writing in The Guardian.
In the aftermath of the Reformation in the 16th century, Ignatius of Loyola founded the Jesuit Order as an army of defence against the attack on the One True Church. The Jesuits saw that the reformers had learning and intelligence on their side;…
grrlscientist | August 16, 2009tags: Faith Is Retarded, religion, faith, delusion, streaming video
Clearly Christianity, as with all religions, has been a necessary cog in the machinery of human social evolution. But it is a crutch that we no longer need. It is time for us to move past this primitive mindset and into a world based on reason and logic. [5:50]
grrlscientist | August 16, 2009tags: The Most Amazing Bible Passages Ever, humor, funny, Edward Current, streaming video
In this video, Edward Current shares his favorite Bible verses to recite for nonbelievers who just don't get it -- especially when the going gets tough. [5:03]
razib | August 15, 2009I hear that a Muslim Bollywood star was detained at an American airport, Shah Rukh Khan (there is some confusion here, and a possibility that this is a publicity stunt related to a film about profiling which he is promoting). Out of curiosity I checked out Khan's bio on Wikipedia, and found out this interesting datum:
Shah Rukh Khan, born into a Muslim family, is married to a Hindu and his children follow both religions.
At home, next to idols of Hindu gods he has the Koran. The most important thing is that "the children should know about the value of God".
In this YouTube video Khan asserts…
razib | August 14, 2009Over at Why Evolution Is True Greg Mayer wonders:
I also recalled that the percentage of religiously unaffiliated had gone up noticeably from 1990 to 2008, and that another survey found the percentage was higher among young people. What could have happened so that younger people, growing up in the 90s and 00s, would be less religious? And then it occurred to me: 9/11. Something finally happened which gave religion a bad name. This was forcefully expressed at the time (here, here, and here) by Richard Dawkins.
The the fact that the % of Americans who aver "No Religion" has increased…
gregladen | August 14, 2009A new study making its rounds in Christian media reports that people who attend churches with large congregations have more intense, more conservative, and more fundamentalist-literalist beliefs than Christians who attend small churches
I fear this is a bit like the popularity of the grease pushing fast food places vs. the mom and pop diners, often sharing parking lots along America's byways. Or am I reading too little into this?
Teapot Atheist has deeper thoughts on this.
pharyngula | August 13, 2009It's not just Oklahoma — New Zealand apparently has no sick people. They have a brand new faith-healing clinic that fixes everything right up!
Rea said patients with problems as diverse as stroke paralysis, cancer or dyslexia were cured, usually within one 20-minute session.
Wow. Complete cures, in just 20 painless minutes. Doctors' offices must be closing all over the place, and the hospitals must be empty.
Sorry, Tulsa, I was going to pack up my bags and move to your shining flawless city, but I think now I'm going to have to move to Christchurch. They've probably got more squid.
pharyngula | August 12, 2009Watch this video: 50 rabbis are circling Israel, chanting and singing and blowing horns to ward off the swine flu. The scene is one of pure madness.