American Atheists’ president Dave Silverman was back on Fox News Channel yesterday — this time, alongside the Catholic League’s Bill Donohue — to talk about a study which claims that Christmas trees in the workplace make some people feel excluded. Somehow, Hitler gets worked into the argument at the end of the clip… Donohue’s suggests that anyone offended by the tree can 1) get over it, 2) move to another country, 3) convert to Catholicism, or 4) enter an asylum…. Read more
Do you need any more evidence to be convinced that hospitals should not be affiliated with the Catholic Church? In 2009, St. Joseph’s Hospital and Medical Center admitted a pregnant woman who was at nearly 100% risk of death. In order to save her life, the doctors chose to abort her baby, saving the mother’s life in the process. What did the church have to say about this? The Roman Catholic Diocese of Phoenix stripped a major hospital of its… Read more
There’s a brave Canadian mother in Edmonton right now trying to find a public school for her daughter. Donna Hunter can’t find a secular public school, though, because all the local schools are run by Catholics. The Greater St. Albert Catholic Regional Division, which also has schools in St. Albert and Legal, operates all four of the schools in Morinville — two elementary, one junior high and one high school — with a “Christ-centred learning” environment. It’s the public school… Read more
In the Philippines, new peso bills are being issued and they contain some mistakes (like the colors of the parrot on one particular bill). They will be corrected before the bills begin getting circulated. But one mistake is going unnoticed, say the Filipino Freethinkers: New bills will be containing this direct quotation from the Christian Bible: “Pinagpala ang bayan na ang Diyos ay ang Panginoon (Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord)”… which comes from Psalm 33:12. This… Read more
Last week, I mentioned that the Atheism sub-Reddit had taken up the cause to raise $42,000 for Doctors without Borders — the amount was an homage to Douglas Adams. This was a friendly competition with the members of the (admittedly less populated) Christianity sub-Reddit, who were donating to the World Vision Clean Water Fund. Well, our goal has been hit and surpassed! The goal was met in large part thanks to an incredible $5,000 donation from an anonymous user with… Read more
When Jon Acuff of Stuff Christians Like appeared on a radio show, a caller talked about her problem with Santa: One caller said something I have heard often from Christians when it comes to the man in red. She said, “We’re not telling our kids about Santa, because when they find out he’s not real, they won’t believe that God is real when we tell them about him.” I gotta say, there’s some truth to that. They’re both fictional characters,… Read more
If you go to the Cyanide & Happiness website, you can see an amusing punchline. Something only an atheist would say 🙂 I gotta find a way to use that line on someone… Read more
The Freedom From Religion Foundation issued an “Action Alert” yesterday asking members to complain to the religion writer at USA Weekend magazine because of a cover story she wrote about how people perceive god. Were they upset because she misunderstood the atheist position? Did she make an offensive statement about non-religious people? Did she treat the existence of god as a fact? No. They’re upset because… there was an article and cover dedicated to how people perceive god. The word… Read more
Remember a few months ago when I sent a couple people undercover into the Americans for Truth About Homosexuality Anti-Gay-Rights “Truth Academy”? (If not, you can read the reports here, here, and here.) Well, a couple months ago, I was contacted by my local Fox Chicago news affiliate. They were going to do a story on AFTAH (more newsworthy now that the Southern Poverty Law Center labeled them a Hate Group) and they wanted to get in touch with my… Read more
Earlier this year, students at Indiana’s Greenwood High School voted — VOTED — to have a graduation prayer. A judge told them they couldn’t vote on such things at a public school. School officials responded by saying they wouldn’t screen student speeches beforehand (*wink wink nudge nudge*). But one of the required speeches was from the school’s valedictorian, Eric Workman, a strong supporter of church/state separation. Here’s the transcript of his graduation speech. The Freedom From Religion Foundation awarded Eric… Read more
