During a conference call with evangelical Christians earlier this week, one-time Republican presidential hopeful Rick Perry told listeners that separation of church and state isn’t just a bad idea — it’s an idea that we can blame on Satan: This separation of church and state, which has been driven by the secularists to remove those people of faith from the public arena… there is nothing farther from the truth. When you think about our Founding Fathers, they created this country,… Read more
The other day, I posted about a public high school in Kountze, Texas, where cheerleaders held signs with Bible verses for the football players to run through as they came onto the field at the beginning of their games. After a letter from FFRF was sent to the district, the school temporarily halted the prayer banners, causing thousands of residents to freak out. As of this writing, the now-closed “Support Kountze Kids Faith” Facebook group has over 36,000 members. Now,… Read more
If you’ve ever heard the Freedom From Religion Foundation’s Dan Barker give a talk or if you’ve read his book Godless (a.k.a. Losing Faith in Faith), then you know that he met his future wife (and current FFRF co-president) Annie Laurie Gaylor on a taping of a morning talk show in Chicago hosted by a relatively-unknown-at-the-time Oprah Winfrey. It was 1984 and the topic was people who have left their faith. (A far cry from The Secret-promoting Oprah we saw… Read more
Dr. Lawrence Krauss filmed a segment for Chris Johnson’s multimedia book about atheists and what gives them joy and meaning in life. In the segment below, Krauss talks about why the universe is far more inspiring than any given holy book: (via The Atheist Book) Read more
American Atheists has announced that Jay Jay French, founding member of and guitarist for the heavy metal band Twisted Sister, will be speaking at the group’s 2013 National Convention in Austin, Texas: David Silverman, President of American Atheists stated, “We are thrilled to have Jay Jay French join us for our convention. Not only is Jay Jay a renowned guitarist but he is providing leadership as an atheist in the music industry and as a role model.” Here’s everything I… Read more
I write a lot of articles about a lot of un-fun topics: People doing physical harm to themselves or others, people crying foul because they don’t get their way all of the time, sundry injustices throughout the world, all sorts of awful things. I try to keep myself somewhat emotionally separated from the stories, because if I didn’t, I would just drive myself crazy. For some reason, this story, an opinion piece — on FoxNews.com of all places! — just got… Read more
There’s been a lot of talk about whether the University of Tennessee (in Knoxville) would be forced to end their pre-game prayers as a result of a letter sent (PDF) to the school by the Freedom From Religion Foundation. Yesterday, the school’s Chancellor, Jimmy Cheek, responded to the FFRF with a letter of his own (PDF) and he says he’s not budging: After conferring with the University’s legal counsel, my understanding is that the decision of the Sixth Circuit Court… Read more
A few days ago, the Bluegrass Coalition of Reason in Kentucky put up their first billboard: And, just like that, the Lafayette Church of the Nazarene has put up a weak message of their own in response: We believe in God. Join the right club! What?! A church that believes in God?! I’m shocked, I tell you… The purpose of the atheist billboard is to capture the attention of people who don’t know there are other atheists like them in… Read more
There’s controversy brewing in the Cranston Public Schools in Rhode Island. (And Jessica Ahlquist has nothing to do with it.) Back in May, the ACLU sent a letter (PDF) to the district informing them that a father-daughter dance sponsored by Stadium Partners in Education (a parent-teacher organization) could pose a problem. Federal law against gender discrimination says that you can’t hold an event like that unless you offer “reasonably comparable activities… for students of the other sex.” So what were… Read more
