Religious News/Quotes of the Day

[Dardedar]

Do what the catholics do, sue!

[Dardedar]

My friend Ralph writes good letters to the editor:

***
> From: Ralph Nielsen <nielsen@uidaho.edu>
> Date: October 26, 2007 12:33:56 PM PDT
> To: letters@lmtribune.com
> Subject: The Bible
>
>
> If people knew more about the origins and evolution of the Bible
> they wouldn't make such absurd claims about it. It isn't a magic
> book that was dictated by a God or his prophets. It is like any
> other book that has ever been written: a product of the human
> imagination.
>
> To this day no one can agree as to how many books belong in the
> collection called the Bible, so we have Jewish, Protestant,
> Catholic, Greek and Ethiopian Bibles, each with a different number
> of books in it. There are also other scriptures influenced by the
> Christian Bible: the Koran/Qur'an and the Book of Mormon. Is it any
> wonder humans can't agree about religion?
>
> Many don't even read their scriptures carefully. If they did, they
> would see that they contain many different ideas, including
> completely contradictory ideas. Some claim there is a hell for
> those who don't have the correct belief. Others claim you must do
> the right deeds to escape hell. Some say hell is forever, some say
> it is temporary. In the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament there is no life
> after death (except in the latest book in it: Daniel 12:2). God
> himself said humans will not live forever like him (Genesis
> 3:22-24). But New Testament writers claim we will. Paul claimed we
> will go up into the clouds with Jesus (1 Thessalonians 4:17) but
> the author of Revelation said we will live forever on a new earth
> that will come down from a new heaven (Rev. 21:1-3).
>
>
> Ralph Nielsen

[Dardedar]

"...the difference between applied science and applied
religion. Europeans use science to prevent unwanted pregnancies;
Americans use religion. That explains why Bible-believing,
"abstinent" Americans have a very much higher rate of illegitimate
pregnancies than Europeans who rely on scientific applications."
--Ralph Nielsen

[Dardedar]

From the petition at freehovind.com:

***


About the charges brought against Kent Hovind:

The alleged offences of Kent Hovind, for which pardon is sought, are as follows:
1. Willful failure to collect or pay tax. 26 U.S.C. § 7202. Twelve counts.
2. Structuring transactions to evade reporting requirement. 31 U.S.C. § 5324. Forty-five counts.
3. Attempting to interfere with administration of internal revenue laws. 26 U.S.C. § 7212. One count.

Based on these charges, Mr. Hovind was sentenced to ten (10) years in prison, three (3) years on probation, and six hundred thousand dollars ($600,000) in fines.

Although the mention of these alleged crimes may trigger thoughts of guilt, and though judgment has already been pronounced, we firmly believe with absolute certainty that Hovind is completely innocent of the charged offences. We think these sentences are extremely harsh and unjust, especially when considering the nature of the alleged offenses and the proofs of innocence heretofore shown.

LINK

***

A picture of two dino's from the above page. What are they doing? Looks like dino porn to me.

[Dardedar]

"Oh father, we acknowledge our wastefulness. But we're doing better."
--Gov. Sonny Perdue (R-GA), leading a prayer for rain

[winston]

"Rev. Coy Privette, the president of the Christian Action League, a North Carolina ultraconservative Christian political organization based in Raleigh, has been arrested for soliciting prostitution:"

Sitting in the heart of the "Bible Belt" in Springfield, MO, the "world headquarters" for two denominations of right-wing evangelicals, I must wonder why so many evangelical ministers fall to "sexual sins." I mean, there are so many good "sins" from which to choose.

[Dardedar]

SEATTLE (AP) — A few hours after a judge ruled that a 14-year-old Jehovah's Witness sick with leukemia had the right to refuse a blood transfusion that might have helped him, the boy died, a newspaper reported.

Dennis Lindberg died Wednesday night at Children's Hospital and Regional Medical Center, his biological father, Dennis Lindberg Sr., told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

LINK

[Dardedar]

"The Pope says in his recently released encyclical that being an
Atheist is ba-a-ad," he says. "We say, *being a Pope is worse*."

At a time when the Catholicism is losing adherents, when its churches are
closing all over the world (most recently, a well-known Greenwich Village
church was shut down), when Catholic schools are shutting their doors due to
lack of students, when the church has had to pay out millions of dollars to
victims of pedophile priests and is finding itself hard put to attract young
men to its the priesthood, Pope Benedict XVI says he has found the cause:
Atheism! Well, I'll be darned, says Bronstein. *Who knew*?

"The Pope is passing the buck, blaming us for the failures of the Catholic
church," says Kenneth Bronstein, president of New York City Atheists, an
organization dedicated to living by, and advancing, scientific principles
and reason.

*Who We Are*

Atheist organizations, in contrast, are growing, new ones are cropping up
every day; Atheist books are best sellers, celebrities are climbing on the
Atheist bandwagon and no pedophilic scandal has ever sullied our good name,
Bronstein points out.

Atheists are known for their scientific accomplishments (Darwin, Stephen
Hawking), their literacy (Mark Twain, Jack London), their public works and
philanthropy (Bill Gates, George Soros), their Nobel Prizes (Richard
Feynman, Physics), their compassionate aid to the impoverished (Margaret
Sanger), their legal acumen (Clarence Darrow), and their dedication to
democracy and justice, but the Pope would have you believe that Atheists are
responsible for nothing but 'the greatest forms of cruelty and violations of
justice.'"

"We say the Pope is wrong," says Bronstein. "He is seeing the world from the
perspective of an old man who has lived his life entirely within the
hierarchy of the Catholic church in a Vatican City remote from the everyday
life of real people.
Church's Time Is Up

"We say his church has had more than 2,000 years to heal the ills of the
world—and has failed abysmally. Now it is our turn," says Bronstein. "We do
not believe that the world will go to pot if people don't believe in Pope
Benedict's god. Nor do we believe that his god is the 'only hope of the
world,' as the Pope claims."

Religion—and in particular, the Vatican's hierarchy and its far-reaching
diaspora--have failed to solve the world problems of poverty, hunger, war,
illness, universal education and cooperation among nations--despite the huge
amount of money that is being poured into the Vatican's coffers by its
misled followers. Instead, that money has been squandered on sumptuous
vestments, gold overlay on ceilings, statuary, art and the support of a vast
Vatican population of sycophantic priests and cardinals whose entire
educations have been limited to the interpretation of the wishes of an
unseen, unheard spirit, whom they call their god.

"We think we can do better than a religion that relies on an illusory hope
of a paradise after death in an imaginary place called 'heaven,' and
admonishes its people that they must *suffer* to attain heaven after they
are dead," says the Atheist leader. "We believe the earth should be our
heaven, right now, right here."

nyc-atheists. org

[Dardedar]

[Dardedar]

Robert Ingersoll:

"Why should we pursue the truth? And why should we investigate and reason? And why should we be mentally honest
and hospitable? And why should we express our honest thoughts? To this, there is but one answer..for the benefit of mankind.

The brain must be developed. The world must think. Speech must be free. The world must learn credulity is not a virtue
and that no question is settled until reason is fully satisfied.

By these means man will overcome many of the obstructions of nature. He will cure or avoid many diseases. He will lessen
pain. He will lengthen, ennoble and enrich life. In every direction he will increase his power. He will satisfy his wants, gratify
his tastes. He will put roof and raiment, food and fuel, home and happiness within reach of all.

He will drive want and crime from the world. He will destroy the serpents of fear, the monsters of superstition. He will
become intelligent and free, honest and serene.

(skip)

Nothing but falsehood needs the assistance of fame and place, of robes and maitres, of tiaras and crowns. The wise, the
really honest and intelligent, are not swayed or governed by numbers--by majorities.

They accept what they really believe to be true. They care nothing for the opinions of ancestors, nothing for creeds,
assertions and theories, unless they satisfy the reason.

In all directions, they seek the truth, and even when found, accept it with joy--accept it in spite of preconceived
opinions--in spite prejudice and hatred.

This is the course pursued by wise and honest men, and no other course is possible for them."

[Dardedar]

Naturalism vs. Theism:
The Carrier-Wanchick Debate (2006)

Naturalism Is True, Theism is Not

"If we want all our beliefs to be more likely true than false, then we must proportion our beliefs to the evidence. So if our reasons to believe are few and unreliable, our confidence should be low, and if our reasons to believe are many and reliable, our confidence should be high, with an appropriate continuum between. That mean's if we have no reason to believe something, then we should not believe it, and if we have much better reasons to believe something than we have not to, then we should believe it.

Basic Argument for Naturalism (BAN)

The cause of lightning was once thought to be God's wrath, but turned out to be the unintelligent outcome of mindless natural forces. We once thought an intelligent being must have arranged and maintained the amazingly ordered motions of the solar system, but now we know it's all the inevitable outcome of mindless natural forces. Disease was once thought to be the mischief of supernatural demons, but now we know that tiny, unintelligent organisms are the cause, which reproduce and infect us according to mindless natural forces. In case after case, without exception, the trend has been to find that purely natural causes underlie any phenomena. Not once has the cause of anything turned out to really be God's wrath or intelligent meddling, or demonic mischief, or anything supernatural at all. The collective weight of these observations is enormous: supernaturalism has been tested at least a million times and has always lost; naturalism has been tested at least a million times and has always won. A horse that runs a million races and never loses is about to run yet another race with a horse that has lost every single one of the million races it has run. Which horse should we bet on? The answer is obvious."

--Richard Carrier

[Dardedar]

The nativity gospel stories of Matthew and Luke can't be made into one story.

"According to Matthew, Joseph and Mary were presumably already living
in a house in Bethlehem when Jesus was born. Some star-gazers in the
East saw a new star which indicated that a king of the Jews had been
born in Judea. So these wise men went to Jerusalem to look for him.
The chief priests and scribes said that the Hebrew scriptures
prophesied that he would be born in Bethlehem, the city of king David
of old. Matthew then misquoted Micah 5:2, which refers to a small
clan called Bethlehem, not a town of that name. He also made up a
story about a flight to Egypt in order to use another misquotation,
“Out of Egypt I called my son” (Hosea 11:1b) but this is God
speaking of Moses, in the past, not a future Jesus. This is how Matthew got Jesus born in Bethlehem.

In Luke’s story Mary and Joseph already lived in Nazareth. So he made
up a totally implausible story about everybody having to travel to
the husbands’ hometowns to be registered in a census. Luke then has
Joseph haul his nine-months pregnant wife 90 miles down to Bethlehem,
where Jesus was born in a stable, etc. Eight days later they had
Jesus circumcised. No massacre of infants. No flight to Egypt. Just
straight back to Nazareth. A few weeks later they went back again to
Jerusalem (where king Herod lived) to get Mary purified from having
given birth. This is how Luke got Jesus born in Bethlehem.

These stories are not history; they are pious fiction."

--Ralph Nielsen

[Savonarola]

A special Easter message:

[Dardedar]

"In modern times the first to speak out for prison reform, for humane treatment of the mentally ill, for abolition of capital punishment, for women's right to vote, for death with dignity for the terminally ill, and for the right to choose contraception, sterilization and abortion have been freethinkers, just as they were the first to call for an end to slavery."
FFRF

[Savonarola]

From freethoughpedia.com:

[Dardedar]

"Even the stricture “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth” was not a prescription of vengeance but a check on excessive punishment for any crime, serving to moderate violence."
--William Lame Craig, trying his hand at religious comedy.

[Dardedar]

DAR
Check out the incredible decline of Christianity in America here.

Excerpt:

"The proportion of the [American] population that can be classified as Christian has declined from 86% in 1990 to 77% in 2001." ARIS Study."

76.5% (159 million) of Americans identify themselves as Christian. This is a major slide from 86.2% in 1990. Identification with Christianity has suffered a loss of 9.7 percentage points in 11 years -- about 0.9 percentage points per year. This decline is identical to that observed in Canada between 1981 and 2001.

If this trend has continued, then:

-- at the present time (2007-MAY), only 71% of American adults consider themselves Christians

--The percentage will dip below 70% in 2008

--By about the year 2042, non-Christians will outnumber the Christians in the U.S.

[Dardedar]

Letter to Editor by my friend Ralph Nielsen:

***
We have an FLDS church/ranch a lot closer than the one in Texas. It
is in Bountiful BC, about 30-odd miles down the Kootenai River from
Bonners Ferry ID.

It is quite appropriate that these establishments are called ranches.
Human beings are treated like cattle. It's all very religious, of
course. Polygamy was common for big shots in Old Testament days. The
prophet Joseph Smith got a revelation from God that a man must have
more than one wife so he can have many children, both now and
hereafter. And according to the Bible a man's wives and children are
his property.

According to good cattle husbandry a young heifer is brought to a
bull when she reaches breeding age. The same on FLDS ranches. But a
heifer or cow should not be bred to her father. So a ranch keeps a
head bull and several auxiliary bulls. But what about the surplus
young bulls? They can't legally change them into steers so they
simply kick them off the ranch to fend for themselves. The head bull
in Bountiful currently owns about 30 cows, who have given him around
80 calves.

A man of property! And a man of God too!

Ralph Nielsen
Moscow ID

[Dardedar]

Penguin tale tops list of `challenged' books

By HILLEL ITALIE, AP National Writer Tue May 6

NEW YORK - A children's story about a family of penguins with two fathers once again tops the list of library books the public objects to the most.

"And Tango Makes Three," released in 2005 and co-written by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell, was the most "challenged" book in public schools and libraries for the second straight year, according to the American Library Association.

"The complaints are that young children will believe that homosexuality is a lifestyle that is acceptable. The people complaining, of course, don't agree with that," Judith Krug, director of the ALA's Office for Intellectual Freedom, told The Associated Press on Tuesday.

LINK

[Dardedar]

Speaking of wacky pastors. McCain proudly accepts the endorsement of John Hagee:

"I believe that New Orleans had a level of sin that was offensive to God, and they are, were recipients of the judgment of God for that. The newspaper carried the story, in our local area, that was not carried nationally, that there was to be a homosexual parade there on the Monday that the…Katrina came, and the promise of that parade was that it was going to reach a level of sexuality never demonstrated before in any of the other Gay Pride parades. So I believe that the judgment of God is a very real thing."

"Religious might consider how they feel about exhorting believers to follow a God so willing to callously end the lives of more than 4,000 Gulf Coast residents, most of whom, it’s safe to say, were not planning on attending the Gay Pride parade in New Orleans."

C and R