A pastor trying to market his upcoming sermons on healthy marriages sent out 50,000 flyers that read “RED HOT SEX”… needless to say, many of the recipients weren’t amused. Joshua Cody at Church Marketing Sucks says this: The long and short of it left a community asking hard questions like, “Why didn’t the church spend this money on the community?” And it left the pastor saying he would do it all over again, but he wouldn’t do it again. If… Read more
Here’s a wonderful interactive tool to find out where the 2008 presidential candidates stand on faith and a number of issues influenced by one’s faith. (Use the “Comparison Mode” in the upper left!) Very cool. (Via toomanytribbles. Thanks to Robert for reminding me about newsinitiative.org.) [tags]atheist, atheism, politics, Democrats, Republicans, faith, values, religion[/tags] Read more
Now that Illinois has mandated a moment of silence in public school classrooms, you can hear the complaints loud and clear. Will Okun, a Chicago school teacher, has a great response in The New York Times: Boy, are our legislators busy. I teach in an overcrowded classroom with Xeroxed books, no computers and limited supplies in a city where the black male graduation rate hovers significantly below 50 percent. And they give us silence? … Instead of addressing the social… Read more
I’d watch this show. Dan Savage tells us his idea: Devout contestants representing all the major world religions will be left on a deserted island with a large group of religious people, agnostics, and atheists. The religion that wins the most converts in, say, six months’ time wins the coveted “World’s Fastest-Growing Religion” title. No forced conversions allowed—no point of the sword stuff, Islam! And no conversions of children—no baptizing babies, Catholics, and no manipulative “teen nights,” Evangelical Christians! Points… Read more
Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the ex-Muslim author of Infidel, may not have security for much longer. She constantly faces threats on her life and is in danger without the protection. There is an online petition for this matter, but those things are usually ineffective… Better yet, there are two ways you can directly help Ms. Ali through the American Enterprise Institute, where she serves as a fellow (via email): (1) The Ayaan Hirsi Ali Security Trust––a private trust fund that will… Read more
What do you do? An asteroid is on a collision course with the earth and you have one hour left to live. What would you do in your last 60 minutes? Most Britons (54%) said they’d talk to their loved ones. 13% said they “would sit back, accept the inevitable and reach for a glass of champagne.” 9% — Sex. 3% — Prayer. (Just 3%?!) 2% — Eat fatty foods. 2% — Loot. Jim Downey asks this: I wonder what… Read more
Greta Christina’s angry. For good reason. And not just one reason. There are (unfortunately) plenty of them: I’m angry that women are having septic abortions — or are being forced to have unwanted children who they resent and mistreat — because religious organizations have gotten laws passed making abortion illegal or inaccessible. … I’m angry about what happened to Galileo. Still. And I’m angry that it took the Catholic Church until 1992 to apologize for it. … I’m angry at… Read more
The Washington Post ran a story on Friday on how federal agencies and employees were using the guise of paid religious holidays to take their vacations. This allowed them to cash in on unused vacation days when they finally retired: When Mark Elengold retired as a top government drug regulator in 2005, he received $18,733 in his final paycheck, on top of his normal salary. The money was not a bonus, overtime pay or compensation for unused vacation hours. Rather,… Read more
I was destined to go to church, wasn’t I? (Thanks to Mriana for the link!) [tags]atheist, atheism, indian, desi, Christianity, Bible, God, Jesus[/tags] Read more
From the same mold of minds that said writing out 10262 “would [require] fill[ing] up the entire known universe with paper,” we get another piece of crazy mathematical manipulation. Chuck Colson wrote a piece for The Christian Post in which he said this: Even atheist Richard Dawkins admits that there is a one-in-seven chance that God might exist. He simply chooses to take, as he sees it, the six-in-seven chances that God does not exist. That’s a bad bet. Really?… Read more
