Terry Firma, though born and Journalism-school-educated in Europe, has lived in the U.S. for the past 20-odd years. Stateside, his feature articles have been published in the New York Times, Reason, Rolling Stone, Playboy, and Wired. Terry was the founder and Main Mischief Maker of Moral Compass, a now-dormant site that pokes fun at the delusional claim by people of faith that a belief in God equips them with superior moral standards. He was the Editor-in-Chief of two Manhattan-based magazines until he decided to give up commercial publishing for professional photography... with a lot of blogging on the side. These days, he lives in an old seaside farmhouse in Maine with his wife, three kids, and two big dogs.
Jihad up North: A Quebecer shot dead by police after running down two Canadian soldiers told a 911 operator he was acting in the name of Allah… The Prime Minister’s Office says the dead suspect, identified as Martin Couture-Rouleau, had become “radicalized.” Two police sources [said] that the incident just after 11:30 a.m. was a possible terrorist attack against the unidentified soldiers, one of whom was in critical condition. Police gunned down Couture-Rouleau, 25, in his hometown of Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, 30 minutes south of Montreal on Monday morning. He charged at the officers wielding a big knife with a curved handle, witnesses claim. Police fired seven bullets to stop him. Read more
A sea of sexual-offender mug shots, is what. Surprised? Youth pastors diddling their young charges represent … a time-honored evangelical tradition which Christian culture is loath to speak of, yet everyone who grew up in Christian culture knows youth pastors (plural) who were deposed due to the dubiously defined Moral Failure. And those are just the ones who were caught. Read more
Three months ago, fighters of the Shaitat tribe in Syria had to throw in the towel when it became clear that their ISIS foes had superior firepower. The Washington Post reports what happened next: We wanted to save our people,” said Abu Abdullah … describing how they agreed to a truce with the militants in mid-July. The Islamic State was permitted to enter the town and establish a garrison, but local leaders were left in charge, he said. Relations quickly frayed. The crunch came, the tribesmen in Reyhanli said, when Islamic State fighters whipped a local man who was caught smoking a cigarette in the street, a crime under the Islamic State’s harsh interpretation of Islam. The man’s brother, incensed, shot at a passing Islamic State patrol, killing one of its fighters. Read more
I’m proud to keep donating to Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). This account by medical worker Natasha Lewer is one reason why: I’ve volunteered to go to west Africa because I heard that Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) was getting desperate for people. When I tell Mary in HR, she says she has three questions: “1) Do you know that you don’t have to go? 2) Do you know that if you get sick, we won’t bring you home? 3) Do you know that if you die, we won’t bring your body back and you’ll be buried there?” I know MSF is famous for being straight-talking, but I’m still a bit taken aback. I answer yes to all three and go home to look for my passport. The bravery and self-sacrifice of these men and women, and the value of their work, are worth a thousand times whatever we can give them. If you have the means, step up. Read more
The City of Melbourne enjoyed suffered experienced an invasion of some 70,000 Jehovah’s Witnesses this past weekend, all there for their international convention. Graeme Hammond used to be one of them — door-to-door haranguing and all — and explains what drives the Witnesses to keep going in the face of understandable exasperation, even hostility. [The] leaders require that all Witnesses, from children to the frail-aged, devote their lives to proselytizing in the hope of gathering millions more into their fold before the divine hammer blow of Armageddon. But the command is not only to “preach” (usually a forlorn offer of a magazine or leaflet); they must also hand in monthly reports detailing the hours they spent “in the field” and how many calls they made. The message at their meetings is relentless and laden with guilt and fear: keep on preaching or you, too, will die at Armageddon. Back then when my heart was in it, my Saturday mornings were often all about perfecting the soft knock, half-hoping no one would hear me. And I was not alone. For most of those I paired up with on Saturdays, an unopened door was a good door. When it did swing open, revealing a clearly irritated resident, I felt like saying, “Hey, I hate this as much as you do!” Read more
