It’s been a while since I’ve posted something by Pastor Steven Anderson, but the preacher just gave one of those sermons that you don’t really believe anyone would deliver until you hear it. Not only does he say women should remain silent in church, he adds that they shouldn’t even say “Amen” if they agree with him: Read more
When an Orthodox-Jewish marriage ends, under Judaic law, only the husband has the power to pronounce a divorce. That is, he is the one who has to provide his estranged wife with a get, a document that proves that she is newly unattached and allowed to move on with her life. Frequently, if the relationship is toxic enough, the husband flat-out refuses, often out of spite, and/or so that he can use the get as a bargaining chip in disputes over alimony or child custody. It happens often enough that it’s almost unremarkable, but a California man called Israel Meir Kin has just taken this kind of male privilege to new heights. After legally divorcing his wife, Lonna Kin, more than seven years ago, Mr. Kin has not given his wife a get. Read more
The Gospel of God Baptist Church in Asheville, North Carolina must be desperate for members. And I’m assuming they’ve just given up persuading local adults to give them a chance because now they’re just going after the children. In the creepiest way possible: Read more
In a fascinating story for the New Yorker — subtitled “How not to negotiate with believers” — Malcolm Gladwell takes us back to the tragedy in Waco more than two decades ago, when 76 members of the Branch Davidian sect were killed (many of them children), and suggests that the massacre could have been avoided if we just tried to learn more about their religious beliefs instead of simply dismissing them for being so ludicrous: Read more
According to Box Office Mojo, one of the highest-grossing movies this weekend was… God’s Not Dead: That would be the Christian movie starring Kevin “Hercules” Sorbo. He plays a godless college professor trying to indoctrinate his students into losing their faith… until he runs into one brave Christian. It’s one of those movies ripped right from the pages of Snopes. Read more
Christopher Hitchens is still publishing books years after his death. Simon & Schuster will be releasing Why Religion is Immoral: And Other Interventions this November. It’s not clear whether this is a compilation of material we’ve seen before or a never-published book that Hitchens was working on before his death, but it’s available for pre-order right now. Read more
SkeptiSketch’s latest video takes an awkwardly-worded, downright-weird question asked of Neil deGrasse Tyson at one of his talks, and the fabulous response given by Tyson, and puts it all together with a stunning visual: Read more
We’re back with another interview from The Amazing Meeting 2013. I had the pleasure of sitting down with Dan Ariely, a professor of psychology and behavioral economics currently teaching at Duke University. I had seen a few of his TED Talks before meeting him and found I was very interested in learning more about why people lie and cheat — how do they justify it to themselves, do they really think they’re doing something wrong, and so forth. In our interview, he went over the finer points of why people are dishonest, and perhaps how we can prevent it from happening. Read more
