U.S. District Judge Charles Siragusa has ruled that the Greece (New York) City Council can open its meetings with prayer: The judge signed an order Thursday tossing out a lawsuit filed by two residents of the town of Greece who had complained that prayers held at the start of town council meetings favored Christians and violated the separation of church and state. U.S. District Judge Charles Siragusa noted that government bodies throughout the country routinely invite religious leaders to make… Read more
Of all the wonderful talks at the recent Secular Student Alliance conference, arguably the funniest (and certainly one of the most inspiring) came from JT Eberhard, Captain of the Missouri State University Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. Watch it. Laugh. Go take action. Invite JT to speak to your group. Language is possibly NSFW. But it’s *so* worth it 🙂 JT is organizing Skepticon 3. If you haven’t registered for the free conference, you’re missing out! ***Update***: Sexy, sexy,… Read more
Hello, I have so much I would love to say and don’t know where to begin. I was raised by a single father who happens to be gay. He left my mother when I was very young due to her poor parenting skills. While growing up I went to a Roman Catholic church. I am NOT a Catholic though. I have tried many religions throughout my life, searching for something to believe in. I am HUGE into science and love… Read more
Andrea Crain devotes a lot of her free time to achieving full LGBTQ equality with Join The Impact Chicago. When she heard that the Americans for Truth About Homosexuality was holding a three-day “Truth Academy” in order to train the next generation of anti-gay-rights activists, she wanted to be a voice of dissent. So she joined a group protesting the event on Thursday night (the first day of the Academy) and wrote up her thoughts for this site. Her full… Read more
After posting the video of Aaron Gouveia responding to abortion protesters outside a clinic, I received an email from “Cindy.” She used to be one of those protesters but is now an atheist who hopes to eventually earn a Ph.D. Here’s her powerful story: My family is your quintessential evangelical, “Jesus Camp” family, except on steroids. I have at least four pastors in my not-so-distant extended family that I can think of off the top of my head, probably more… Read more
Friday night, Jen McCreight and I attended a “Celebrate Family Tour” at Wheaton College, hosted by Focus on the Family. Why? Because it was so close… and what better way to spend your Friday night than getting silently furious while listening to Christians talk about how they’re superior to atheists with regards to raising children, having morals, and caring for others? We were there for over two hours. You know what? There wasn’t a single mention of Prop 8 or… Read more
7-year-old Silas attending a Bible camp this summer and came home with a pillow that left his mother a bit… conflicted: Anyone care to offer an explanation? (Thanks to Hilary for the link!) Read more
Christianity Today recently published an article called “Woman as Folly” by Jana Chapman Gates in which she describes hearing a number of Bible verses that refer to women in a negative light: The speaker on the DVD said these verses showed that women should appreciate the desire of men to analyze and provide counsel. But I had a hard time moving beyond the underlying premise, at least as I heard it: Women are foolish. Granted, a verse or two appeared… Read more
As of a couple weeks ago, the 3rd annual Skepticon conference was going to take place in November at a 500-seat venue in Missouri. For the first two years, it was free of charge to anyone who registered, and the people running the show wanted to keep that going. But when your speakers include PZ Myers, Amanda Marcotte, DJ Grothe, James Randi, Rebecca Watson, and several others, that venue’s going to fill up fast. It did. Quickly, too. With three… Read more
The Creation Museum founder Ken Ham has a nasty habit of not linking to websites he trashes or offering citations when he makes his wacky claims. So when he mentioned that home-schoolers excel in college, and provided a link to the reference, I got very excited. The link goes to the Home School Legal Defense Association — a Christian group — and they have issued a press release about a new study! Therefore, it was with great interest that we… Read more
