It’s possible that once the township council of Galloway, NJ (my hometown) had unanimously voted to allow prayers at its council meetings, a tumultuous subject was now more or less closed. It was not to be. Some quick background: In February, I shared with you a thwarted-coming out of Michael Cluff, a secular activist with the South Jersey Humanists who had planned to out himself as an atheist at one such meeting with a short statement, but because of the way they had wound up running the meeting (holding the vote on prayer before anyone had a chance to talk about it), Michael never got to deliver his speech. He allowed me to reprint it later on Friendly Atheist, so it wasn’t a total waste. [Click headline for more…] Read more
Yogesh Master, an apparently prolific Indian author, has been arrested for what amounts to a blasphemy charge. In his new novel Dhundi, which is written in the Kannada language, the Hindu god Lord Ganesha is subject to “derogatory references” and is portrayed “in a highly objectionable manner,” according to complaints. I’ve not been able to unearth any actual text, English or otherwise, of the novel in question, but according to Daijiworld Media Network, the complaints are that Ganesha is portrayed as “cruel” and “rowdy,” having an “illicit relationship”: [Click headline for more…] Read more
This is just a brief note to let you all know I’m going to be gone for the next few days so I can focus on my wedding 🙂 (In atheist-speak, I’m getting Hitched.) While I’m gone, Paul Fidalgo will be running the show. Paul is the Communications Director for the Center for Inquiry, a blogger at Near-Earth Object, and the host of a new podcast (The Obcast) that features wonderful long-form conversations with people in the science/tech worlds. If you’re not already subscribed to his show, you should take care of that now. There are a few more posts in the queue, but I’ll be back early next week after taking care of all the chaos and stress and happy-fun-excitement that a wedding brings (and going on a hastily-planned mini-honeymoon in downtown Chicago). Be good to Paul while I’m away! Read more
The Humanists, Atheists and Agnostics of Manitoba are going all out this September. It starts with this ad which will appear on several city buses over the course of the month: [Click headline for more…] Read more
In 2012, Greg and JaLea Swezey were sentenced to five years of probation after they allowed their 17 year-old son Zachery to die of appendicitis… even though it was completely preventable: The Swezeys were not practitioners of Christian Science, but they were members of the Church of the First Born, a church that also endorses “faith-healing.” Why see a doctor when God will cure all?! (Except when He doesn’t.) Now, it’s happened again — to another family from the same church. [Click headline for more…] Read more
Recently, researchers from the Clergy Health Initiative at Duke Divinity School decided to look into the mental health of members of the clergy. Using phone surveys and written questionnaires, they interviewed over 1,700 United Methodist pastors, and found that depression is about 1.6 times higher in that group compared to the general population (8.7% versus 5.5%). Other estimates of the prevalence of poor mental health among clergy are wildly higher, with some sources claiming that 70% of U.S. pastors are depressed. The results of the Duke Divinity team were published in the Journal of Primary Prevention and summarized in the Huffington Post, which quoted Rae Jean Proeschold-Bell, the Clergy Health Initiative’s research director: [Click headline for more…] Read more
Earlier this week, the Kentucky Department of Education did something every state’s education department should do: They sent an email to every public school district superintendent in the state (173 of them in all) reminding them what the law says about church/state separation: [Click headline for more…] Read more
More than 80% of Indians identify as Hindus. Islam is the second largest group, and it’s six times the size of the third largest category, Christianity. There are a plethora of other religious identities in India, including Buddhists, Jains, and Sikhs. When it comes to the national census, though, the rest are all lumped into a single category: “Other.” That includes animists, Baha’is, Jews, Zoroastrians and… atheists. As it stands, there’s no category for “No religion.” For the 2001 Census, the “Other” category added up to 0.6 percent. Which sounds small, until you realize that it amounts to around 4,500,000 people in a nation the size of India. What’s the breakdown of that group? We have no idea. But we do know that the size of the “Other” category doubled between the 1991 and 2001 Census. If global trends are anything to go on, they may have doubled again between 2001 and 2011, which could mean we’re talking about 1.2 percent of the population or 9,000,000 people. [Click headline for more…] Read more
Remember Sigfried Gold, the atheist who found solace in prayer even though he didn’t believe in God? Now, he’s back to respond to his critics. And I don’t think he’s converting many people to his ways in the process… … My fellow atheists have suggested, not always politely, that I’m not an atheist, that I’m not really praying, and that praying is not acceptable behavior for atheists. As politely as I can manage, I would like to defend myself on all three counts. … Now, I can’t claim to speak for all non-reality-based people, but I don’t need imaginary friends, either. I lived for 45 years without them. I just happened to find that when I started talking to an imaginary friend, certain struggles began to evaporate. It became easier to act according to my conscience. [Click headline for more…] Read more
