Martin Wagner of the Atheist Experience reports on the Texas SBOE hearings on Science TKES (Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills). The news is disappointing. The citizens of Texas seem hell bent on ushering in the next Dark Ages.
I’m a big fan of The Atheist Experience. I listen to every show. I appreciate the work they do to promote positive atheism. Apparently in Texas, they have many difficult days ahead with this creationist packed SBOE. Let’s help however we can.
Apparently, secularists, humanists, atheists and agnostics will be celebrating HumanLight this holiday season. I'm not invited.
The very first HumanLight celebration was held in New Jersey on December 23, 2001 at a gala event attended by close to 100 people. It has grown in popularity around the country every year since. HumanLight is December 23rd, and should always be celebrated on or around this date. This date was chosen for several reasons.
So… what? We rebrand Christmas as HumanLight? I’m guessing this just won’t catch on. And what does one do at a HumanLight celebration?
I don’t get it.
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Kathleen Parker writes the unthinkable (only a few months ago). The GOP might just push the fundies out of the tent. Giving Up on God discusses what is needed to heal the Republican Party and position it for the future.
To be more specific, the evangelical, right-wing, oogedy-boogedy branch of the GOP is what ails the erstwhile conservative party and will continue to afflict and marginalize its constituents if reckoning doesn't soon cometh.
Simply put: Armband religion is killing the Republican Party. And, the truth -- as long as we're setting ourselves free -- is that if one were to eavesdrop on private conversations among the party intelligentsia, one would hear precisely that.
The point of her editorial is essentially to call for a secular grounding for the GOP. One where one’s religion is a private matter.
The pendulum is starting to swing back toward the center. It is about time.
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Labels:
Politics
Image via Wikipedia
The god business must be falling on hard times. Focus on the Family plans to layoff another 200 people has this onetime powerhouse of religions politics falls on hard times.
James Dobson and Focus on the Family were active supporters of Prop 8.
The cutbacks come after Focus, formerly headquartered in California until 1991, spent a reported half-million dollars to successfully support Proposition 8 in the Golden State, overturning a state court decision to allow same-sex marriages.
There are few things worse than losing your job heading into the holiday season. I feel for those who are about to take the hit. However, I feel only contempt for Dobson and is malignant hateful organization. I want to see it go out of business. Let the forces of economic justice wreak havoc on his misguided organization. I am sure a kinder, gentler, more socially responsibly organization will fill the gap. And something tells me he will not be missed.
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I was perusing Nice Marmot today when I saw his YouTube post of Sister Rosetta Tharpe singing Didn't it Rain from a 1964 performance in England. I love this style of gospel music. Tharpe makes her guitar scream.
Labels:
Music
Kenneth Craig has been on the run since 1999 when he jumped bail on a series of sex related exploitation of minors charges. The rat bastard has been caught.
"He was working in a movie theater but got most of his money from Eva," Feheely said. It was a hangout for kids from broken homes.
"He paid kids at the theater between $150 and $1,500 for sex acts," he said. "He would give them clothes and shoes and alcohol."
In November 1998, Craig was arrested in a hotel room with two teens and charged with multiple counts of indecent assault, lewd acts and promoting sexual performance of children younger than 16.
Source: Parents' visit led authorities to suspected pedophile hiding in Brazil -- South Florida Sun-Sentinel.com
Craig perfected his craft as a youth pastor in Louisiana. It is time he gets what he deserves.
And you can too!
Looking for an effective way to express your Christian faith this Christmas season to honor our Lord Jesus? Now you can.... with the "Original Christmas Cross" yard decoration.
What the hell were they thinking? Well... anything for a buck, right?
Labels:
Christianity
Life is full of morality lessons. I celebrate the stories that reinforce my values. Like this one about Barack Obama. He was generous before he needed to cultivate a public image and when $100 dollars was a lot of money to him.
In the early 80s, my wife and I were stuck in Tokyo without cash. We were near the central train station and totally confused. A young man from Texas stopped to help us. He paid a cab driver $60 to take us to our hotel. Unfortunately, it was not George Bush.
Labels:
Barack Obama,
morality
The poet Patrick Jones had his book launch canceled because of complaints by a Christian fundamentalist group. The Christian Voice (they speak for god so you don't have to) called the book "obscene and blasphemous". They pressured Waterstones in Cardiff to cancel the book launch. Waterstones did as it was told. The event was canceled on short notice.
What are the obscene objections? Here is what Fundie Stephen Green says.
'However, Waterstones are still selling Jones' book "Darkness is Where the Stars Are" which is full of anti-Christian rhetoric and profanity. The poems, some of which Patrick Jones sent me yesterday morning in an act of hubris, aren't actually much good, but they possibly have enough profanity and references to female genitalia to get the literati excited. One of them included the blasphemous if not terribly original line: 'just like mary magdelene (sic), i f****d jesus'
So... I little profanity and nothing more harmful than a Python skit? What the hell?
To fight the forces of evil, two Welsh Assembly members will host a reading.
Of course, the best way to fight back is to buy the book. I did.
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Labels:
Christianity
I read this horrifying tale of vindictiveness the other day and just could not let it go. Nicole Griffin of Roswell, Ga wanted to buy a house from her neighbor Lorenzo Jimenez. The deal fell through in part because Jimenez is an illegal alien. Roswell's disappointment leads her to a scorched earth approach to the problem which ultimately cost Jimenez his job, and will eventually cause his deportation. I thought about the story for a few days but kept coming back to something which was left unstated. Where did Griffin for her morality? In other words, which church taught her to be a human devoid of compassion and love for her fellow man?
Locked in a letter war with Meder, Griffin escalated her actions. She contacted the FBI, the Roswell Police Department, local media, the state attorney general's office and the governor's office, among others. She asked her congressman, U.S. Rep. Tom Price, for help, saying she felt Jimenez and Meder had deceived her. Price's office, in turn, contacted U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said Brendan Buck, a Price spokesman.
The FBI? The Police? The state attorney general's office? I mean, what could possibly motivate somebody to take action of this gravity? Griffin is attempting to destroy another living breathing human being over what? A few dollars and the loss of a house she possibly could not afford anyway? Her actions are evil.
I could not let it go. Sorry for the rant.
Well, not really.
May I confess that upon first seeing her, I liked her looks? With the sound off, she presents a not uncomely frontal appearance.
But now, as the Brits say, Ill be glad to see the back of her.
Cavett wrote this wonderful little snippet on his New York Times blog in a witty post titled, The Wild Wordsmith of Wasilla. Go ahead, give it a read. You know you want too.
Labels:
2008 Elections
It's like what I do here on Deep Thoughts with Hypocrisy Watch, only they seem more motivated. Check it out, Fetid Fruit.
The actual headline reads "Former church leader indicted on online sex charge". I don't know why they don't just say the guy was fired. I guess that's why I write a blog instead of a newspaper column.
Anyway...
Charles Andy Gartison, 24, of Monroe was arrested on Sept. 29 after allegedly arranging a meeting with Lt. Jeff Braley of the Hamilton Twp. Police Department, who posed as a 15-year-old male as part of an undercover investigation.
Gartison actually drove out for the meeting where he was arrested. How can Gartison not understand that he was about to step in shit? By now, after dozens of high profile arrests, only an idiot would fail to realize that 15-year-old boys have no interest in fugly old music directors.
For the record, Gartison was a Methodist. He's also a hypocrite, and will soon be a convicted Internet predator.
It's the best kind...
A former church secretary at Denver's Central Baptist Church has filed a civil lawsuit against the church and senior pastor Willie Simmons, accusing the prominent Denver-area clergyman of two incidents of sexual assault in the church office in 2007.
In a 2007 internal church memo obtained by CBS4, Simmons, a married, 58-year old father of two, acknowledged he engaged in a sexual encounter with the woman but claimed it was consensual.
"I wanted it to stop," the woman said in an interview with CBS4. "It wasn't consensual..."
I love it when dirty laundry is aired out in public. You learn so much about the character of the people involved. Take pastor Willie Simmons. He's not a bad man. All this upright pastor did was sleep with his secretary. What else would one expect of a married father of two who leads a church.
Move along folks, there is nothing to see here. Hypocrite!
My long time friend and fellow blogger, Brad Hightower, has started a new blog called The Post-Partisan. His first post answers the questions, What is Left Wing and Right Wing (and Center Left and Center Right)? I found his post concise, smart, and informative.
So here are what I believe are the criteria that constitute balanced definitions of the terms left, right, and center. In this discussion it is important to remember that these terms refer to actual historical realities. The extreme left wing is used to refer to communism, and the extreme right is used to describe fascism or military dictatorships. Therefore, the criteria we use to define these terms need to accurately reflect these forms of political economic societies.
Fair warning! Brad is a devout Christian and former pastor. However, after five years of daily conversations with the man, I can honestly say I wish Christians were more like him (as opposed to say... Ken Ham, or James Dobson).
Labels:
Christianity,
Politics
The statute of limitations expired on this case, so the victim went to the Presbyterian church instead.
Rev. Ronald Campbell resigned from Trinity International University, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and Trinity Graduate School in Deerfield this month, shortly after a church commission ruled that he sexually abused the woman in the 1980s.
I like justice, even if it only costs the bastard his job.
Campbell fit the profile of a sexually abuse authority figure.
The commission found Campbell guilty of the allegations of sexual abuse, as well as using "force, threat, coercion, intimidation, or misuse of office or position" against the girl.
"He showed me a gun," said Hokanson, who said she interpreted that as a threat. "I definitely felt like I wanted to stay in his good graces."
He also was dumb enough to have the girls initials tattooed on his ass. I mean... Oh, never mind. It is too bad he cannot go to prison over this. His ass might acquire a few more tattoos.
The Box Turtle Bulletin reports on an eleven year old internal LDS memo describing the Mormon strategy to defeat gay marriage.
The memo, dated March 4, 1997, provides insight into the late LDS President Gordon B. Hinckley’s strategy for opposing same-sex marriage. It describes a meeting in which Hinckley gives the go ahead, but urged caution. According to the memo, “he (President Hinckley) also said the (LDS) Church should be in a coalition and not out front by itself.”
Make no mistake about it, Prop 8 is theocracy. A church used its financial clout and organizational ability to push forward its moral agenda. Do you really want to live like a Mormon? I don't.
Hat tip: Stop the Mormons
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Labels:
Gay Rights,
morality,
Mormons,
Prop 8
We've had a couple of interesting Photos added to the Atheist Blogroll Flickr Pool this week. I've selected a few of the best for this post. Here we go...
Photo by HCVIII
Blog: (sorry - I don't know)
This photo is titled iFlickr, but I think that might be a reference to the device that took the picture. Let's just call it "An Atheist Coffee Cup". Anyway... I want one.
Photo by Jamon_sansgod
Blog: Sansgod
This photo is titled Stone Frozen Hope. I love old statutes. They feel creepy and warm at the same time. I once saw a statute in France. The tour guide said the artist worked on the sculpture for five years. Dedication like that blows my mind.
Photo by Toomanytribbles
Blog: toomanytribbles
I don't know if I love toomanytribbles or hate her. I look at her work feel and my own inadequacy. It's like when you play basketball for fun and show up at the courts to see the local university players occupying the court. You know that you are simply not in their league. I feel the same way about Tribb's photos. They are so good it hurts.
Photo by Psychodiva
Blog: Psychodiva's Mutterings
This photo is untitled. I included it because I too have may photos of various primate asses. In fact, I have 25 years worth. One must always have primate asses in their photography collections. Besides, it will be nice to use this photo in a post about Ted Haggard.
Photo by Toomanytribbles
Blog: toomaytribbles
Toomanytribbles makes it to the list a second time with this picture titled "Little orthodox church in marousi". She inspired me to buy a tripod today and start shooting HDR photos again. I posted my best at Flickr today.
After two weeks, we have 19 members and 118 photos. If you would like to participate, see this post.
The last 24 hours is something I will never forget. Yesterday, smoke from the Freeway Fires blocked out the noon sun. People walked from their cars to stores with hands covering their mouths. Breathing was difficult. Our eyes watered. We coughed like heavy smokers. I slept with every window in my house closed, yet I still felt like somebody was blowing cheap cigar smoke in my face all night long. It was a nasty day.
And then there was the ash... My house, yard, and cars are covered in a thick layer of the stuff. I have another picture here. It shows more detail.
I was outside this morning. The sun was shining. Since then, the winds have kicked up again. The smoke is covering our city once again. It looks like another nasty day.
I took this photo near sunset today. The sun and the sky around it were blood red. My city, or actually, the much more affluent Anaheim Hills, is burning. The whole of the LA basis is covered in thick choking smoke. It is hard to breath here. We are pretty muched trapped in our house. My best friend lives in the burn area. He's been told to evacuate. I'm waiting to hear that he is ok. In fact, I think it's time I call again.
Labels:
Photography
Try protesting Prop 8 and supporting our fellow citizens in their quest for equal rights. Visit JOIN THE IMPACT for more information.
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Labels:
Gay Rights,
Prop 8
I do not know what to say about the despicable status of our blogrolling service. Blogrolling.com has been down for a month. The most I can do is add new blogs and wait. The situation is frustrating.
Blogrolling.com has not posted an update since Nov 2. As users, we are given no idea as to when the application will return to service, or it it will return to service at all. I do not understand how blogroll.com can operate a business like this. At a minimum, they should be communicating status.
Blogroll.com, if you read this, you are ruining any credibility you have with your user community. If you are depending on us to help make version 2.0 a success, I have a feeling you will be disappointed.
The big new is that we are continuing to grow. I backed the Atheist Blogroll up this morning (manually) and then did a count. We stand at 857 member blogs. My guess is that 15 or so are inactive. I have not been able to perform maintenance since blogrolling.com went down, I am sure the number is somewhat inflated.
Larro, Db0 and I have pooled resources on a new project which will benefit the members of the atheist Blogroll and the atheist blogging community. I'll post more information on this when it's ready.
All of the Atheist Blogroll Logos are available on Flickr in the Atheist Blogroll Photo Pool. I would like to ask other bloggers who are interested to submit more versions of the logo, and to submit more graphics which can be used to illustrate posts.
Also, I have a special request. I've had several requests for a small logo like the one for the Flying Spaghetti Monster shown below. If somebody could produce something like this, I would be grateful.
I found a small article which illustrates how vulnerable young children are to Internet Predators. Men are pigs, especially those who get off on our children.
The story also profiles pedophile pastor Timothy Scott Richerson, who used Myspace to stalk a 14-year-old girl. Richerson was a Baptist, so it all makes sense.
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Former pastor and gay but in denial Ted Haggard, spoke in front of the Open Bible Fellowship Church (where do they come up with these names?). His sermon was titled "Jesus' Righteousness in Us". Haggard talked about the experience of being outed. He blamed what happened on being molested at age seven.
At 50, he said, whether it was because of a mid-life crisis, pressure or psychological determinism, “what happened to me as a child started to produce fruit.”
Haggard said he would walk around his church in the middle of the night, at war with himself, telling God to “do whatever it takes to deliver me. I’ll lay anything on the altar. I hate this thing. But, there were times when I love it.”
So... what really pisses me off is how easy it is for Haggard to stand up in front of sheeple and say, "The devil made me do it'. He takes no responsibility for his actions. He claims he was tempted because of prior sexual abuse and pressure on the job. He was pushed over the edge by a horrific battle with Satan.. Now he's back, forgiven, and ready to work for God's glory. Um... Bullshit.
An old Christian friend of mine had this saying, "If you want forgiveness after stepping on your dick in public, you should start by mowing the lawn for a couple of years". There are many ways to serve. But the option of leading a congregation should never be on this table to Ted haggard. What the hell are these people thinking?
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Pastor Ricardo Maffery is charged with lewd acts with a 14-year-old girl. He met the girl for "kissing". Maffery is the soon to be ex-pastor at Apostolic Christian Church. Maffery must not have read the lifestyle guidelines at the ACC.
Unedifying worldly entertainments are avoided, as believers are to be good stewards of all resources including their hearts and time
Maybe he mistook the Holy Kiss for the much more enjoyable French Kiss?
***Update***
A reader has informed me that Maffery and his Church are not associated with the ACC.
Title: Missing Person
By: Mojoey
Where: Buena Park, Ca.
When: October 8, 2008 at ~ 7:27 am PDT
Equipment: Nikon D300 - 1/160 @ f6.3
I see placards and flyers everyplace. Stuck to trees, poles, even stuck in bushes. It is particularly bad around election season. I will not call it a pet peeve. It's just ugly. These signs were on every tree in my neighborhood. I don't know if they found the poor bastard.
This photo is an entry in the Not So Buena photography project hosted here at Deep Thoughts. If you would like to participate with photo's from your own city, see the instructions for submitting photos on this post.
Seriously, how many Korean churches can you pack into about two square blocks? I counted 11 along a stretch of Orangethorpe in Buena Park. Most have started within the last two years. Most have taken over locations occupied by real businesses (and a damn good bar). I've watched the transformation of an industrial/business park into a religious zone in despair. Each new church robs my community of tax revenue while at the same time guarantying annoying visits by Korean missionaries.
On a drive over the weekend, I saw that an entire strip mall was vacated with the promise of yet another Korean church to come. I would rather see another Korean restaurant.
