Here’s an encouraging story from the Las Vegas Emergent Cohort leader about one Christian high school student’s response to the atheist bus ads. It starts: I recently read an article in the New York Times that explained how Atheists in Britain, with the strong celebrity of Dr. Richard Dawkins at the helm, launched a campaign to preach a godless message across their country via bus advertisements. I shared the article with my Apologetics students (I’m a teacher at a private… Read more
Did you know that there exists an organization called Christian Anti-Defamation Commission? Well, it’s true. They have some gems on their site including Seven Reasons Barack Obama is not a Christian. My immediate thought on this title was, “do they mean to say ‘proofs?’” Because really, there is a huge difference between a reason and a proof. After looking through the list, I determined that, yes they did mean “proofs.” But, I digress. What led me to the Christian Anti-Defamatory… Read more
This is Part 2 of the ongoing Lee-Strobel-answers-your-questions series. Previous parts can be found here. You’ve essentially said before that you interviewed only Christian scholars/apologists in your books because you were asking questions in the shoes of a skeptic and you wanted to know the Christian explanation to certain questions. Weren’t there many questions you may not have thought of that other skeptics could have asked? In other words, wouldn’t it have been a wise move to take the Christian… Read more
Maybe I should watch the Food Network more often… The clip below is only good for the first 30 seconds (beginning at the 7:12 mark) before becoming disappointing. Still, I was hopeful. Mmm… Dutchelicious. (Thanks to Jacquie for the link!) Read more
Of the many stories about Pastor Rick Warren in the weeks before the inauguration, this one from The Daily Beast’s Max Blumenthal seems to have gone under-reported. But since the Warren inauguration controversy erupted, the nature of work against AIDS in Africa has gone unexamined. Warren has not been particularly forthcoming to those who have attempted to look into it. His website contains scant information about the results of his program. However, an investigation into Warren’s involvement in Africa reveals… Read more
The leaders of Christian Right groups and a US Congressperson have made their mark on Barack Obama’s inauguration ceremony: Congressman Paul Broun (pronounced BROWN) of Georgia joined the Reverends Rob Schenck (pronounced SHANK) of Faith and Action and Patrick J. Mahoney of the Christian Defense Coalition, both based in Washington, DC, in a prayer service inside the US Capitol today that included anointing the doorway President-Elect Barack Obama will pass through on his way to the platform to be sworn… Read more
If you saw the BCS Championship game tonight between the Florida Gators and the Oklahoma Sooners, no doubt you caught a glimpse of Florida quarterback Tim Tebow and the black strips under his eyes with the phrasing John 3:16. It’s not a surprise he would want to do that — Tebow’s never held back his Christian faith… and if you want to preach, why not go after a national viewing audience, right? Amazing how lenient the NCAA is about things… Read more
Believe it or not, in all my years of living in Chicago, I’ve never visited the Chicago Shakespeare Theater (CST). From what I hear, it’s amazing. They just began running a new production of Macbeth last week. Normally, that wouldn’t intrigue me… but now, I *really* want to see the show. Why? Because Laurie Higgins of the (Christian Right) Illinois Family Institute saw the show and can’t stop talking about it: In the early scene just after Lady Macbeth has… Read more
Your roving reporter, Richard Wade here. Several news services are reporting that the surprisingly successful bus advertisement campaign in the UK featuring banners saying “There probably is no god, now stop worrying and enjoy your life.” has been picked up in two other European countries. The British Humanist Association aimed to raise enough money to run the atheist campaign adverts on a CBS Outdoor central London bus route; instead, public donations to the value of £130,000 mean the advert will… Read more
Mike Clawson here… Newsweek had a really fascinating article this week about how hunting practices are leading to a kind of “evolution in reverse” as hunters kill off the “best” animals (whether elk, or elephants, or mountain goats, or whatever) and leave the weak and scrawny ones to propagate themselves. Of course, the article acknowledges that it’s not really “reverse” evolution, it’s just a shifting definition of “fittest”. When you add humans into the mix as a predator, suddenly large… Read more