The foreword to I Sold My Soul on eBay is written by a pastor named Rob Bell. If you’re an atheist, maybe you haven’t heard of him. I hadn’t until last summer. Same deal if you’re a Christian over 30. But in the past several months, I’ve run into a large number of younger Christians who love this guy. Their ears perk up at the sound of his name. You know that feeling of instant connection you get as an… Read more
The New York Times has an unprecedented five books with a secular viewpoint currently on the Hardcover Nonfiction bestsellers list (top 35 books in the country): #7: Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s Infidel #12: Richard Dawkins’ The God Delusion #13: Chris Hedges’ American Fascists #21: Victor Stenger’s God: The Failed Hypothesis #24: Sam Harris’ Letter to a Christian Nation And more secular books are coming to the list! I hope… Including Taner Edis’ An Illusion of Harmony (available now!) and Chris Hitchens’… Read more
On Tuesday, I was in Dallas taping a couple episodes of Life Today, a Christian talk show. I was with my friend Jim Henderson. You can read his thoughts here. My observations from the weekend: When going out for lunch with Jim and the book’s publicist Joel Kneedler, I saw a store called Mardel Christian and Educational Supply. It was like an Office Depot… but for Christians. Their vision is “to see the product [sic] we sell and donate provide… Read more
You may have heard about Rhonda Byrne’s The Secret, an Oprah-endorsed, even-Deepak-Chopra-looks-good-when-compared-to-this, self-help book. Elaine Friedman of Humanist Network News shares her take on this garbage here: The Secret claims you can manipulate the material world — the numbers in a lottery drawing, the actions of others, world events — through your thoughts and feelings. Did you get a promotion? You must have been thinking positive thoughts about your job prospects! Do you have cancer? You must have been thinking… Read more
Siamang brings to my attention that many of the 300,000,000 new George Washington dollar coins were incorrectly minted. Approximately 299,950,000 of them have “In God We Trust” written on the edge. (Ok, that’s not the story, but it would be a damn good headline, yes?) Yahoo says the 50,000 coins lacking the phrase have only been spotted in Philadelphia, but they are fetching close to $50 apiece on eBay. [tags]George Washington, dollar coins, atheist, atheism, In God We Trust, Yahoo,… Read more
Quick update on the story: Some people on this blog and others were wondering why the congressperson was coming out as a “nontheist” instead of an “atheist”… According to the Secular Coalition for America’s lobbyist, Lori Lipman Brown: His staffers say he does not identify as an “atheist” So we can lay that to rest. It doesn’t give us any clue as to what the congressperson does identify with, but it’s not atheism. [tags]atheist, atheism, nontheist, Secular Coalition for America,… Read more
Outside my door this afternoon was a box. I wasn’t expecting any packages, but I read the “from” address… it was from WaterBrook Press. And I got all excited. Grabbed some scissors. Opened it up. It was a box of books. 24 copies of I Sold My Soul on eBay. I hadn’t seen the manuscript since December. When I had it in my hands then, it was just pages printed off a computer. There were still some typos that needed… Read more
Next Monday, March 12, the Secular Coalition for America will be making history when they announce the first openly nontheistic member of Congress! Read more information here. Just to reiterate: Congress. Not a local mayor. Or dogcatcher. Someone’s also getting the $1,000 prize… [tags]atheist, atheism, congress, Secular Coalition for America, Congress[/tags] Read more
If you hadn’t seen the clip of the Freedom From Religion Foundation on ABC’s World News Sunday, here you go! [tags]atheist, atheism, Freedom From Religion Foundation, ABC, World News Sunday[/tags] Read more
Sam Harris is holding a contest where the prizes are autographed copies of his books and $100. He writes in Free Inquiry: While I heard many silly retorts to atheism at [a recent] conference, here is a list of those most in need of deflation by freethinkers: Even though I’m an atheist, my friends are atheists, and we all get along fine without pretending to know that one of our books was written by the Creator of the universe, other… Read more
