The whole 13-episode run of Cosmos is freely available to watch on Hulu! Just in case you had a desire to watch quality programming tonight… What’s your favorite scene in the series? Name an episode and time-marker so we can watch it, too! Read more
Last month, I mentioned that I participated in a non-debate with a Christian pastor. Jay Gamelin and I took questions from the audience (via moderators) and talked about faith and atheism and politics and stereotypes and all things entertaining. The entire video isn’t available at once, but several clips are finally up. The first clip is below. The others are linked to after that: Part 1. Part 2. Part 3. Part 4. Part 5. Part 6. Part 7. Part 8…. Read more
Well, this is disturbing, even for me. Christian missionary organization Youth with a Mission filmed a documentary movie called Hakani aimed at shedding light on the practice of infanticide in Brazil. They say tribal communities are burying alive infants who have some sort of handicap. You can watch a clip of the movie here. (Warning: It’s disturbing. And there’s nudity.) There’s just one problem with all this. It’s faked. London-based Survival International said in a statement the film is “faked,… Read more
Ashley Paramore, president of the Students For Freethought at The Ohio State University (“The best damned group on campus”), is going on a special trip during her Spring Break next week with several of her atheist group members. And their Christian friends: How wonderful is that — they’ll be rebuilding homes in New Orleans with other atheists and Christians. Can’t get more cooperative than that. I mentioned last year that the Atheists, Agnostics, & Freethinkers from the University of Illinois… Read more
There’s one good thing about the Pope’s absurd comments lately. People are leaving the Catholic Church. Well, at least blogger Jim Gardner is… but surely he’s not alone. He needs to go through a “formal act of defection” first: Roman Catholic canon law allows a process known as a “formal act of defection” from the faith. This means that a note will be made on a person’s baptismal record stating that they have left the church. Here’s a bit of… Read more
Before I talk about Kevin Roose’s excellent new book, The Unlikely Disciple, let me remind you of this clip from Real Time with Bill Maher: Remember that sense of anger you felt every time Jerry Falwell made any sort of public statement? Maybe, like Maher, you weren’t all that sad when he passed away. Kevin Roose felt pretty much the same way about Falwell a few years ago — basing his view of Falwell off the man he’d seen on… Read more
Atheist buses? Those are *so* 2008. We’ve moved on to buildings now. The sign says (in Spanish): “Probablemente Dios no existe. Deja de preocuparte y disfruta la vida” which basically translates to the classical version of the atheist buses in London: “There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.” Here’s the basic story behind this picture. The Union of Atheists and Freethinkers (UAL) in Spain wanted to put up atheist bus ads of their own, so they… Read more
Because Rush Limbaugh says you do. Here’s a partial transcript from March 20th (emphasis mine): Something else that I want some of you to think about, and I know that many in this audience — not all — but I know that some of you in this audience are part of the mob. Some of you in this audience — because this audience spans all boundaries. We appeal to all political persuasions, all ideologies, all three sexes, all religions, all… Read more
Well, reader Paul certainly has a dilemma…: My wife is agnostic and I am an atheist and we are trying to raise our two children to think for themselves. My mother-in-law, every time she has the kids, takes them to church and tells them all kinds of stuff about Jesus. When they get back, they start in with “Mimi said this and that” and they believe her because she is Mimi. I don’t know what to do without causing a… Read more
