It’s hard to characterize Dinesh D’Souza in just one way: He’s a conservative Christian, anti-gay marriage activist, guy who had an affair while still technically married, president of The King’s College until his resignation in 2012, and Mr. Bean doppelganger: And now, D’Souza is the subject of a federal investigation for giving $20,000 to an unnamed Senate candidate when the legal limit is $5,000. Read more
Craig Lamar Davis worked in a Georgia church, but he was far from a saint. In fact, even though Davis knew he was HIV-positive, prosecutors say he had sex with others without disclosing his medical status, knowingly putting their lives in dangers for his own selfish pleasure. On Tuesday, Davis was found guilty in what was only his first trial. He faces another one, with a different victim. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports: Read more
Sharon L. Shepherd, a Jehovah’s Witness from Erie, Pennsylvania, is suing her former employer for the most unbelievable reason I’ve ever heard. Gannondale is a residential home for young women who have committed a crime or suffered abuse and need help and mentorship, and Shepherd was their bookkeeper until last summer, when she was fired because she refused to violate her religious beliefs. What did they make her do? Check it out: Read more
Christian missiologist and Patheos blogger Benjamin Corey spent years of his life slandering gay people. That’s what he says, anyway. I’m not sure I believe him. I met Corey in 2007 or 2008 and we struck up a solid friendship, even though he was a social conservative back then and I was, well, anything but. I once asked him about his opposition to same-sex marriage — a cause I had been actively campaigning in favor of — and I didn’t hear slander from him, or hatred. Back then, Corey supported the notion of civil unions for gays, but not full marriage. He felt that marriage rights were the province of straight people only, because there was a sanctity to marriage that would somehow be tarnished if same-sex couples could wed. I don’t remember asking how he squared the sanctity bit with having broken his vows before God when he got divorced himself. Read more
You may think that all those craters on the moon and other planets that were caused by meteoroid impacts and volcanoes were created hundreds of millions of years ago. But Creationists are having none of that. Don’t worry, though: they’ve come up with an alternative theory: They all came into being on Day 4 of Creation! Read more
Russell Romano, a longtime Illinois clergyman who left the active priesthood in 1991, is thought to have sexually abused more than a dozen boys in his heyday. As recently released records show (with the Catholic Church, there are always recently released records that astonish, despite everything we’ve already learned), church officials were perfectly clear about what Romano did. The Chicago Sun-Times recounts how at Quigley Preparatory Seminary, where Romano worked, Rector Rev. John Klein stated in writing in 1985 that he knew his employee “liked the boys.” When he confronted Romano about his habit of kissing and hugging boys, serving them alcohol and showing them pornography, “Russ immediately and without hesitation admitted that these (actions) showed poor judgement and they would stop immediately — that sincerely I should never worry about him doing any of this again.” Read more
Back in the 80’s, when he was still a teenager, Barry Minkow became famous after he founded a carpet-cleaning company called ZZZZ Best (pronounced Zee Best), an enterprise that made made him wealthy. His luck didn’t last. According to Wikipedia, ZZZZ Best was actually … a front to attract investment for a massive Ponzi scheme. It collapsed in 1987, costing investors and lenders $100 million — one of the largest investment frauds ever perpetrated by a single person, as well as one of the largest accounting frauds in history. The scheme is often used as a case study of accounting fraud. The judge who sentenced Minkow to 25 years in jail in 1989 described him as “a man without a conscience.” Guess what happened behind bars? Minkow found God! And his conscience! Hallelujah! Read more
Last week, I posted about how the Pinellas Park City Council (in Florida) keeps a copy of the Bible next to the Mayor’s seat atop the dais in City Hall: City officials argue there’s a historical purpose for the Bible being there, but there’s nothing historical about it. It’s a Bible that was gifted to them by the local Kiwanis Club several years ago, certainly not a good enough reason to give it such a prominent position at meetings. Tonight, the Pinellas Park City Council will have its monthly meeting, and they’re in for a media treat: Terry Jones, the pastor who caused worldwide controversy with his “International Burn A Koran Day” on September 11, 2010, will be at the meeting tonight: Read more
You all remember the student-led revolution that began at Eastside Catholic High School in Seattle, Washington last month after Assistant Principal Mark Zmuda was forced to resign after school officials confronted him about his sexual orientation and summer wedding: That forced firing resulted in a massive student protest last month and an even bigger one next week. The New York Times is covering the controversy in a front-page story today, and I was surprised by a couple of the updates. Read more
In an interview with Patheos’ Jonathan Ryan, Answers in Genesis’ Ken Ham explains what we’ve known all along: This debate against Bill Nye is just a way to push the false notion that there’s actually a scientific debate taking place over Creationism: Read more
