Sylvia Browne just died, as Hemant noted. I hope she went in peace, without any of the pain and anguish that she habitually caused in the hearts of bereaved parents whom she fed unadulterated bullshit about their disappeared, dead, sometimes murdered children. Here are Browne’s 14 final predictions. Are they any good? You be the judge. (via Illuminutti) Read more
What happens when real actors read statements written on Christian forums? Hilarity, that’s what: Read more
Frederick Sanger, the two-time Nobel Prize winner, died on Tuesday at the age of 95: It was remarkable what he accomplished in his career: Dr. Sanger won his first Nobel Prize, in chemistry, in 1958 for showing how amino acids link together to form insulin. The discovery gave scientists the tools to analyze any protein in the body. In 1980 he received his second Nobel, also in chemistry, for inventing a method of “reading” the molecular letters that make up the genetic code. This discovery was crucial to the development of biotechnology drugs and provided the basic tool kit for decoding the entire human genome two decades later. The reason I bring this up is because the New York Times included an interesting tidbit in his obituary: Read more
(via @SecularStudents and the University of Texas at Austin’s Texas Secular Humanists group) Read more
My kids are 8 and 11 years old. You’d better believe that neither of them would be allowed to scream at me like the boy in this video (whose name, interestingly enough, is Christian) does when he confronts his atheist mom. Then again, being a parent is sailing in largely uncharted waters. I certainly don’t have all the answers, either. Read more
Up to 22,000 survivors of Typhoon Haiyan/Yolanda are finally receiving some international assistance: Donations of more than 12,000 rosaries and 10,000 scapulars. (Quick, someone notify Joe Klein!) A CBCP [Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines] News report said the religious articles came from Jocelyn Bernina, a staff member of John Aboitiz Carcovich through God the Father Foundation, Inc. and a friend of CBCP Media Office director Msgr. Pedro Quitorio III. But there’s even more good news: Last week, the pro-life prayer support group ‘Rosary for Life’ donated to CBCP an initial 3,000 rosaries followed by another 10,000. Very generous. I’ve made a little infographic to help you understand what’s going on here. Read more
A United Methodist minister has been suspended from his position for presiding over a same-sex marriage back in 2007 — his son’s. Rev. Frank Schaefer, the pastor at the Zion United Methodist Church of Iona in Pennsylvania, officiated his son Tim Schaefer’s wedding to another man in Massachusetts in 2007. Marriage equality had already been legalized in the state, but Methodist doctrine does not permit same-sex marriage (though it does allow LGBT people to worship in churches — gee, thanks). Read more
There’s so much wrong with Jennifer LeClaire’s latest piece for Charisma, I’m not even sure where to begin. It’s all about the radical atheist agenda… I guess we should start with the headline: Atheist Agenda Wants You to Turn Your Back on Christ Well, yeah… that’s kind of the point. (Spoiler alert: The writers at Charisma want you to find Jesus, too!) Moving on to the actual article: Read more
Good stuff: Bad stuff: The team behind the above video works for a startup called Stated Clearly. You can find out more about the members and their goals here. In a nutshell, their objective is to overcome the tendency of most people to “shut off” any learning and thinking about evolution. Stated Clearly identifies the three key factors in that popular rejection as a general lack of interest in science, the fact that evolution can be difficult to understand, and the perception that evolution is “offensive” (after all, some people get upset about being told we’re all related to monkeys, and many see evolution as a middle finger to religious beliefs). Read more
Daniel is back with another montage of some of the awful things done in the name of God over the past month: (via ConversationWithA) Read more
