In Ottawa, where taxpayers pay for Catholic education, the Catholic School Board decided to pull kids out of school today… so they could go march at an anti-abortion rally: High school students from Ottawa Catholic schools will have time off to join the anti-abortion protesters. Communications officer Mardi de Kemp said the board pays for buses to the event. [Click headline for more…] Read more
Father Anthony Musaala is called “the Dancing Priest” in the central and east African countries where he has earned a popular following as a gospel music performer. His music brims with joy, but he has deep concerns about the future of the Church he serves. Now that a letter he wrote about those concerns was leaked onto the Internet, Musaala faces censure from his higher-ups in the Church and indefinite suspension from his priestly work. [Click headline for more…] Read more
This is a guest post by Daniel Koster. Daniel is the President of the Wekiva Atheist and Secular Alliance at Wekiva High School in Florida. This post is in response to a recent distribution of atheist literature at several Orange County high schools. *** About three months ago, a Christian group distributed Bibles at eleven Orange County schools. They were given permission to do this under the condition that they leave the tables unattended and that their volunteers have no interaction with students. While they were at my school, Wekiva High, I documented them breaking both of these rules (see image below). The Freedom From Religion Foundation has been dealing with the School Board attorneys on this issue. But that’s in the past. Let’s get to the local secular movement’s inspiring response. [Click headline for more…] Read more
Sikivu Hutchinson may be best known in the atheist community for her 2011 book Moral Combat: Black Atheists, Gender Politics, and the Values Wars, a look at how religion has harmed the African-American community and how we can fix that. Now, she’s back with a collection of essays, Godless Americana: Race and Religious Rebels (Infidel Books, 2013), a book that challenges many of the ideas that constitute American culture: In the exclusive excerpt below, Hutchinson tackles the myth that people of color are somehow averse to fields of science: [Click headline for more…] Read more
The Barna Group has just released their version of data on Millennials’ and faith. We know the story — about 30% of people under 30 have no religious affiliation — but Barna tries to put a Christian spin on it by characterizing those who are no longer part of the church as “spiritually homeless.” [Click headline for more…] Read more
The Riverside School District in Arkansas has held Christian prayers at its elementary school graduation ceremonies for years and no one ever complained about it… until now. First, let me give you a summary of every conversation that takes place when we revisit this issue: Christians: But… Tradition! Everyone else: It doesn’t matter. That still doesn’t make it right. Christians: But… we’re in the majority! Everyone else: A graduation is supposed to be for all students, not just Christian students. Christians: But… we have rights, too! Everyone else: No one’s taking your rights aw–oh, forget it. You’re hopeless. Now, back to Riverside. Instead of simply removing the prayer from the ceremony and getting on with it, district officials decided to cancel the entire event altogether. Because we all know you can’t graduate from sixth grade without Jesus handing you a diploma: [Click headline for more…] Read more
Yesterday, I posted about Antietam Recreation, a field trip destination for public school students that secretly proselytized to the children during a lunchtime “show.” After an article came out in the Herald-Mail about how the Washington County schools (in Maryland) were no longer going to go there for that reason and how the owners refused to change their program, the two sides have already reached a compromise: [Click headline for more…] Read more
Yesterday, Canada’s National Household Survey (similar to the U.S. Census) released analysis of the demographics in 2011 [Insert joke about how long that took] and it turns out Nones are on the rise (PDF) up north, too: [Click headline for more…] Read more
In case you missed yesterday’s episode of the Jeopardy! College Championship, you missed a great Final Jeopardy clue: Read more
Peter Sagal, host of NPR’s “Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me!” is hosting a four-part series on PBS called Constitution USA and one of the segments he filmed involves our friend Jessica Ahlquist: [Click headline for more…] Read more
