At the Secular Student Alliance conference a couple weeks ago, Greta Christina gave the keynote address on the topic “What Atheists Can Learn from the LGBT Movement.” (An earlier, briefer version of her talk can be found here.) You often hear analogies about how coming out as an atheist has parallels to coming out as gay or lesbian, but Greta pointed out that there’s waaaaaaay more to the analogy than just that. It was one of my favorite talks all… Read more
Seriously, if Christopher Hitchens wrote a book about facing death as an atheist, wouldn’t you pick that up immediately? He spoke with CNN’s Anderson Cooper about his esophageal cancer. It’s a point of view you rarely hear on television — an atheist with a potentially life-threatening disease responding to Christians who are praying for him (or praying against him). I love this exchange regarding deathbed conversions: Cooper: In a moment of doubt, isn’t there… I just find it fascinating that… Read more
I mentioned last week that I was stepping down from my position as chair of the Secular Student Alliance board of directors. I’ll remain on the board, but with a lot of other things happening in my life, something had to give. The new chair is Joe Foley, a doctoral candidate in genetics at Stanford University and someone who has plenty of experience working with campus atheist groups. He a close friend and someone who’ll be a fantastic leader for… Read more
I received an email from a father on behalf of his wife and 14-month-old daughter. They never baptized their baby and the grandparents are not too happy: … I find the idea of something as innocent as a baby needing to be cleansed and purified of the sins of her (non-existent) ancient ancestors through an indoctrination process of which she has no say in the matter repugnant and insulting. It was only after a series of heated dialogues that my… Read more
In Florida, the Lakeland City Council members can’t get enough prayer. They invite predominantly Christian people to deliver invocations and they see nothing wrong with this. The Atheists of Florida filed a lawsuit (PDF) telling them to stop. They even suggested a compromise: Don’t pray, but we’ll accept a moment of silence. What did the council do? They refused to compromise. Instead, they adopted a resolution (PDF) that would let them continue to have the prayers… but it’d be before… Read more
Jessica Hagy combines Adult Attention with Danger for Kids and the result is…: I know most people who served mass did so without incident, but it’s still amazing to me how anyone could defend the actions of the Catholic Church. This issue hasn’t been in the news lately, their pedophile coverup shouldn’t be forgotten anytime soon. It brings to mind this wonderful cartoon by Nick Anderson of the Houston Chronicle: (Thanks to Amanda for the link!) Read more
When young people consider coming out as an atheist to their parents, they usually face two main challenges. One is the financial and physical dependence on their parents they may still have, and the other is their unfinished process of differentiation from their parents, where they still feel an obligation to please them and an overpowering aversion to disappointing or upsetting them. Some have mainly one or the other issue, but more have a mixture of both in varying proportions…. Read more
I watched this clip again last night and it was just as powerful then as it was when I first saw it a couple years ago. Keith Olbermann said this shortly after Prop 8 was passed in November, 2008: … With so much hate in the world, with so much meaningless division, and people pitted against people for no good reason, this is what your religion tells you to do? With your experience of life and this world and all… Read more
Last month, Aaron Gouveia took his wife (MJ) to a clinic to have a surgical abortion. There were personal reasons for that decision, but that didn’t matter to the protesters outside the clinic. Aaron and MJ made their way inside, but not completely unscathed. … when I looked at MJ she was in tears. Those self-righteous assholes had gotten to her. Without knowing one solitary thing about her or why we were there, they inserted themselves directly into our nightmare… Read more
