In true Christian fashion, Hope Christian School in Albuquerque, New Mexico just rejected a three-year-old from its preschool rosters because he has two fathers: Action 7 News got a copy of the letter that Hope Christian School sent to the family. It says in part: “Same gender couples are inconsistent with scriptural lifestyle and biblical teachings,” and “Home life doesn’t reflect the school’s belief of what a biblical family lifestyle is.” Ok, ok, we’re used to that kind of behavior… Read more
Now that Teresa MacBain is the Public Relations Director for American Atheists, the Clergy Project needs a new leader and they made an excellent choice in her replacement: Catherine Dunphy. Dunphy was a Roman Catholic Chaplain before she became an atheist and she was one of the first members of the Clergy Project when it began. A couple of months ago, she gave a wonderful speech about her de-conversion and you can watch it below (the transcript is here). Read more
Advocates for marriage equality in California now have another prominent religious official acting as an obstacle: Salvatore Cordileone, the Roman Catholic bishop of Oakland who was recently named archbishop-elect of San Francisco by Pope Benedict XVI, is an especially loud anti-equality voice in the Catholic community, too. Neal Broverman of The Advocate writes: Cordileone not only helped get the 2008 proposition that snatched marriage rights away from gay Californians on the ballot, he currently heads a subcommittee for the U.S. Conference of… Read more
Decades after James Dobson spoke out against the evil horrors of pornography, I think it’s safe to say he lost that battle. (Video is SFW. Audio descriptions of sex, maybe not.) Strangely enough, the audience members’ reactions to hearing James Dobson talk about pornography was the same reaction I had listening to James Dobson in the first place… Also, what’s up with the one smiling dude at the 1:29 mark? Winning comment on YouTube: Hello 1980’s audience. I’m from the… Read more
The Atheism subreddit will probably hit the 1,000,000 subscribers milestone sometime within the next week: Sounds impressive… I mean, it is by far the largest “organized” atheist community in the world by a longshot. But does it actually mean anything? Isn’t r/atheism mostly a collection of images and memes and ragefaces and commentary mocking other faiths? Does it really do any good? I asked jij, one of the moderators of the page, what he thought of the milestone and he… Read more
Vietnam, a country with a Communist government and where homosexuality was seen as a “social evil” only a few years ago, may consider legalizing same-sex marriage: “I think, as far as human rights are concerned, it’s time for us to look at the reality,” Justice Minister Ha Hung Cuong said Tuesday in an online chat broadcast on national TV and radio. “The number of homosexuals has mounted to hundreds of thousands. It’s not a small figure. They live together without… Read more
Most people live each day according to their own inner code even though, on the surface, they give credit to a supernatural designer. Even though Marcus Aurelius may never have said the following quotation, his book The Meditations implies much of the same philosophy and is worth a read. Take care of yourself and make some good memories. You don’t need to believe in a god to do that. Read more
Pennsylvania authorities just charged the Glad Tidings Assembly of God Church and youth pastor Andrew D. Jordan with counts of “false imprisonment, a felony, and simple assault.” What the hell did they do to deserve that? They conducted a mock terror raid on unsuspecting teenagers in the church… to show them what some Christian missionaries have to deal with: … four men — one carrying an unloaded but real gun — rushed into a room full of youth-group participants, put… Read more
Being a newly minted resident of the United Kingdom, I’ve learned that much can surprise you in this gloriously beautiful country with utterly filthy weather. One thing that might catch an American atheist off-guard is how the UK, a country far more secular than the US, maintains official ties with religion that are unthinkable in a country with the First Amendment. One of these ties is the existence of state-funded faith schools. Historically these were Christian schools that agreed to… Read more
Racism is still alive in Mississippi and a Baptist church is at the center of the controversy. Charles and Te’Andrea Wilson planned to get married at the First Baptist Church of Crystal Springs, a church they attend regularly (but aren’t members of), but at the last second, the church members said they couldn’t hold the ceremony in their building. Why not? They’re black. There’s no nuance to that. There’s no additional information we don’t know about. It’s just racism, pure… Read more
