At the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, the school newspaper The Vermilion recently gave a column to the priest of the school’s on-campus Catholic Church. Scott C. Broussard helps run the Secular Student Alliance group at the school and he requested — and received! — the chance to write his own column in the paper. Call it a reasonable counterweight to the priest’s drivel. His first column appeared this past week and focuses on the false notion that atheists are… Read more
I saw this at PostSecret yesterday: Well, duh. Of course he won’t be your friend. Would you remain his friend if you found out he secretly believed he was superior to you? Would you continue being BEST friends with a person who thought you were less than a person? If you don’t support gay rights “in any way” how can you possibly lie to your BEST friend every time you call him your Best Friend? BEST friends have each other’s… Read more
Back in June, 2011, Grief Beyond Belief was created in order to support those who experienced the death of a spouse, or child, or friend, but didn’t want to bring religion into the conversation. Rebecca Hensler’s group is now getting some major media attention, thanks to Kimberly Winston at the Religion News Service: For nonbelievers, John Lennon’s famous bid to “imagine there’s no heaven” isn’t just a lyric; it’s reality. And it’s not always easy. Last year, Hensler founded “Grief… Read more
A couple of weeks ago (and many times before that), I posted about Donna Hunter and the other parents in Morinville, Alberta (Canada) who have been trying to get just one secular school to open in the area. Right now, the only options for their children are religious schools. There have been many setbacks, but finally, there’s some good news to report! The Alberta Human Rights Commission has agreed to investigate complaints from four mothers from Morinville, who alleged that… Read more
When the Cranston School Committee had public meetings about whether or not to appeal the ruling to take down the prayer banner at Cranston High School West, local residents were allowed to speak (for 3 minutes), followed by non-residents. Locals filled up four pages’ worth of sign-ups to speak and after 2.5 hours of comments, they barely got through the first two pages. That meant Ellery Schempp, the atheist whose Supreme Court case helped stop mandatory Bible readings from public… Read more
Note: Letter writers’ names are changed to protect their privacy. Dear Richard, After rolling through many years without major crises, my family seems to have gotten our bad luck all at once in the form of some mutated cells. My grandfather and pet both have cancer, my boyfriend’s aunt just died of it, I’m scheduled to get a mysterious breast lump checked out, and my father just had a painful biopsy with less than promising conclusions. As I wait for… Read more
The Supreme Court of Canada is battening down the hatches on potential claims that laws or educational programs infringe on a person’s right to freedom of religion and conscience. In a key Charter of Rights decision on Friday, the court endorsed a religious instruction program that became mandatory in Quebec schools in 2008. The court said that anyone who challenges a program cannot simply assert that it offends their religious rights without furnishing tangible proof of harm. Hmm I wonder… Read more
A couple of months ago, we found out that the Supreme Court had refused to hear a case in which Highway Patrol Officers in Utah were putting up 12-foot-tall Christian Crosses in honor of fallen comrades. That meant the atheists were victorious since they had won their appeal. While the state paid only $1 to American Atheists to settle the case, the lawyer’s fees are a different story. And Utah’s Attorney General must be realizing that it was a bad… Read more
You might have said something like this to conservative Christians before: So what if you don’t like gay couples? Nobody is forcing you to approve of their relationships, support gay marriage, or pay any attention to them at all. But if you said that, they would whine and cry about how that’s ridiculous and how a gay couple’s love will (somehow) ruin all of society… they’re protecting the institution of marriage, dammit! So you have to laugh at how Bryan… Read more
She already speaks out against getting scientifically-sound vaccinations, but now she can start promoting Un-Oculate! It’ll get rid of vaccines you already have! (via the Cult Comedy Picture Show) Read more
