What's so Important About Blasphemy Day?

"I blaspheme everyday", said an atheist friend in response to my explanation of what blasphemy day is. Which got me to thinking, why do we have blasphemy day? For my answer, I need to start off by making a comparison to faith.

Many devout theists worship everyday, yet they go out of their way on a few special occasions to truly displace their faith. Think Easter or Ramadan, just to name two commonly known events.

Now many may cringe at the use of faith to illustrate a day that is viewed as inherently anti-faith. However, like a certain "religious" holiday in the West that need not be named, blasphemy day can have a secular edge to it. In this case, secular can include the involvement of theists willing to stand up for what, I feel, is blasphemy day's true purpose, free speech. While blasphemy day is, for the most part, a day in which non-believers take time to mock the more absurd aspects of faith. It can also be viewed as a day to stand up for free speech in general. An idea that you should stand up for regardless of whether or not you believe that you are drinking the blood of the son who is actually his father sent down to Earth to become a zombie that oddly does not eat brains. Or that a cartoon of some man who wrote a book that reads like it was written by a schizophrenic in a cave is a reason to kill.

Did you find those last two sentences offensive? If yes, good. I've achieved my goal in writing them. This is what free speech (blasphemy day) is all about. You can disagree with what I have said, you can even be offended. You cannot, however, under any circumstance work to deny me or others the right to say such things. In turn, we shall allow you to do the same.

Happy Blasphemy Day 2010.

Beyond New Atheism? | Caspar Melville | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

Beyond New Atheism? | Caspar Melville | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

Caspar Melville
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 21 September 2010 15.38 BST

Today I have been defending New Atheism in the morning, and will be attacking it in the evening. At 9am, I debated the Christian theologian Alister McGrath, author of the wittily titled Dawkins Delusion and critic of New Atheism, on Christian Premier Radio. You can bet I swotted up on my Dawkins and Hitchens for that. But at 6pm at the Royal Society of the Arts the magazine I edit, New Humanist, will be hosting a debate called "After New Atheism: where next for the God debate" where the panellists – award-winning novelist Marilynne Robinson, conservative philosopher Roger Scruton, historian Jonathan Rée, the whole thing chaired by Laurie Taylor – will be invited to consider how we can move beyond the crude and simplistic perspective on religion popularised by New Atheism.

Does this make me a hypocrite? I'm going to say "no", though I would wouldn't I? The fact that I can both defend and attack it represents my ambivalence about the phenomenon of New Atheism, or more precisely my certainty that New Atheism is very good at some things and bad at others. For the purposes of what follows I use New Atheism as a somewhat baggy but, I think, useful shorthand for the trenchant anti-religion polemics of Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennett (though he is more scientific and more polite) and AC Grayling, plus a few others.

One thing it's certainly good at is generating interest: speaking as a professional godless editor, New Atheism has been very good for business. Hundreds of column inches have been generated by New Atheism and responses to it – not least in my magazine – and, if at times the debate has all the subtlety of It's A Knockout, it has also been educative, instructive and popular, in the important sense that it has been conducted in a language that most people can understand. It's sold a lot of books, too.

New Atheism is also good at answering back to particular kinds of arguments. The origins of the New Atheists' impulse, according to philosopher Richard Norman, lie in 9/11 and the reappearance of a particularly aggressive strain of Christian religious fundamentalism. If, as Norman also argues, New Atheism can be over-generalising and crude in its response to religion, this is because it is a response to crude and nonspecific articulations of religiosity – what could be less specific than bombing a skyscraper, or cruder than Biblical creationism?

In the light of this, irascible, rhetorically florid, sweeping, intellectually arrogant New Atheism certainly has its place – some arguments are just asking for it. Perhaps the classic New Atheist quote is Dawkins's response to those who accuse him of dismissing theology from a position of ignorance: "Look," he told Laurie Taylor, "somebody who thinks the way I do doesn't think theology is a subject at all. So to me it is like someone saying they don't believe in fairies and then being asked how they know if they haven't studied fairy-ology."

There is a crisp logic here. I agree with Dawkins. But in another interview, this time with a fierce critic of New Atheism, Terry Eagleton says: "Imagine someone holding forth on biology whose only knowledge of the subject is the Book of British Birds and you have a rough idea of what it feels like to read Richard Dawkins on theology." Put this way, Eagleton seems right. I agree with him, too.

Because entertainment value aside it is surely false, as well as politically unwise and, well, pretty impolite, to say that "all theology" is irrelevant (some of it is moral reasoning, isn't it?), still worse to say that "religion poisons everything", or that without religion there would be no war, or that bringing a child up within a faith is tantamount to child abuse, or that moderate religious believers are worse than fundamentalists because they prepare the ground for extremism, or that "all" religion is this, or that, or "all" faith is misguided, or to suggest that those who believe in God are basically stupid, or that science, and only science, can answer our questions.

The picture of religion that emerges from New Atheism is a caricature and both misrepresents and underestimates its real character. "Religion," Richard Norman writes "is a human creation … a mirror which humanity holds up to itself and in which it sees itself reflected. Human beings attribute to their gods all their own human qualities – cruelty revenge and hatred, but also love and compassion and mercy. That's why you can find a justification for anything, good or bad, in religion."

This may be less fun than denouncing the pope and all his works, but it's closer to reality. For Norman, as a humanist, the requirement is to be less strident so as to create alliances with moderate religionists on specific topics – faith schools, fundamentalism, terrorism – of concern to all. I second that, but I have a more base reason for wanting to move beyond New Atheism. I'm bored, and I fear my readers are becoming so too.

So the purpose of this evening's event is to see if we can find a mode of inquiry into religion, faith, belief and non-belief, more consistent with William than with Jesse James.

It might be that we will map out a new, specific, patient and subtle future for the God debate. But let's be clear, no matter where we decide to go we wouldn't be where we are now if we hadn't had five good years of irascible, impatient, blunt, godless discourse – New Atheism – to leave behind.

Showbiz - News - Maher: 'Emmys will never honour atheists' - Digital Spy

Showbiz - News - Maher: 'Emmys will never honour atheists' - Digital Spy

Comedian Bill Maher has said that he has never won an Emmy award because he is an "outspoken atheist".

The Real Time With Bill Maher host asserted that awards committees will never acknowledge him because he made the documentary Religulous that openly challenged organised religion, according to Reuters.

"A panel of, like, ten people watches one tape. If half of those people are religious, that probably eliminates me right there," he said. "A lot of people wouldn't vote for such an outspoken atheist, someone who made Religulous."

Maher also stated that he plans to continue to criticise religion on his talkshow, but he will not release a new documentary on the subject.

He explained: "I have no desire to make another [documentary]. I had one subject that I wanted to paint on a bigger canvas than I could in television and in a place that would live in a more permanent way.

"It took me ten years to finally get a studio crazy enough to make the movie and the right director, and having made it I feel I have harpooned my Moby Dick."

Thoughts? As the Emmys are an American thing this wouldn't surprise me. Then again maybe Maher is just looking for an excuse as to why he didn't win.

The Associated Press: Atheist billboard provokes Oklahoman Christians

The Associated Press: Atheist billboard provokes Oklahoman Christians

By SEAN MURPHY (AP) – 4 days ago
OKLAHOMA CITY — Atheists in Oklahoma City have erected a billboard seeking fellow non-believers, and Satanists have scheduled a conference in a city-owned building, drawing criticism from ministers in a state where more than eight out of 10 people say they are Christians.
"It's not a question of 'Can you?' It's a question of 'Should you?'" said Dan Fisher, pastor of the Trinity Baptist Church in Yukon. "It's kind of like they're poking a finger in your eye."
Nick Singer, the coordinator of a local atheists' group called "Coalition of Reason," recently received $5,250 from its national counterpart to erect the billboard along Interstate 44 near the Oklahoma State Fair, which opens Wednesday. Its message reads, "Don't believe in God? Join the club."
Similar billboards were recently put up in Arizona, Arkansas, California, Florida, Iowa, Louisiana, Michigan, Texas and Washington.
"The billboard was designed to get a little bit of a response, but it's not meant to be directly insulting," Singer said. "It's just a sign to like-minded people that we are here."
Oklahoma wears its religion on its sleeves.
Around the holidays, owners of downtown skyscrapers leave on nighttime lights in the pattern of a cross, which across the flat landscape can be seen for miles. The Ten Commandments were on display at a courthouse lawn in northeast Oklahoma until a federal judge ordered it removed, and a move is afoot to erect a similar monument at the state Capitol.
Legislators pray in their chambers, led by a "minister of the day," usually Christian. The Oklahoma City Thunder is one of the few NBA teams to begin each contest after a non-denominational prayer delivered by a minister on the public address system.
One state lawmaker wants to change the state's motto from "Labor omnia vincit" — Latin for "Labor conquers all" — to "In God we trust."
Oklahoma also has various "God" billboards that purport to pose questions and observations from the Almighty, like: "You think it's hot here?" and "What part of 'Thou shalt not ...' didn't you understand?" and "Life is short. Eternity isn't."
That campaign was funded by an anonymous donor in 1998 and later expanded as part of a public service campaign of the Outdoor Advertising Association of America, an industry trade group.
No one has questioned the constitutional right of atheists to erect a billboard or Satanists to rent a public hall, but there are questions about how much of a crowd they'll draw.
"People here, the vast majority, still hold a regard for scripture and traditional biblical values," said Paul Blair, pastor of the Fairview Baptist Church in Edmond. "If liberalism, if the Devil himself, can make inroads in Oklahoma, that would be a great victory (for them) to be trumpeted across the land."
Oklahoma ranks eighth in the nation for percentage of residents who self-identify themselves as Christians (85 percent), according to an analysis of the 2008 U.S. Religious Landscape Survey conducted by the Pew Research Center's Forum on Religion and Public Life. Mississippi ranked first, at 92 percent, according to the Association of Religion Data Archives, which analyzed the Pew Center's data.
Ryan Dragg, 35, of Norman said he wasn't offended by the billboard.
"I just blew it off," Dragg said. "That's what's great about this country. You've got an idea, you can express it."
Some religious leaders had other issues on their minds.
"It's not the people who don't believe in God that worry me," said Robin Meyers, senior minister at Mayflower Congregational Church in Oklahoma City and a professor of rhetoric at Oklahoma City University. "It's some of the people who do.
"Fundamentalism is the enemy worldwide, no matter what the strain."
The Satanists, calling themselves the Church of the IV Majesties, have reserved a room at the Oklahoma City Civic Center for a "blasphemy ritual," said James Hale, a founding member.
"I guess you could say we're poking a dog with a stick. That's the point of Satanism — to question all things," Hale said.
Singer, from the atheists' group, said his group has no connection to the Satanists.
"As far as Satan goes, we don't believe in him either," he said.
Copyright © 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

Creationists seek to insert their own brand of 'truth' into education | Paul Sims | Science | guardian.co.uk

Creationists seek to insert their own brand of 'truth' into education | Paul Sims | Science | guardian.co.uk

Thirty reasons why man is not descended from apes may seem an unlikely thing for children to learn on an educational school trip. But that's just one of the treats in store at Noah's Ark Zoo Farm, a creationist establishment near Bristol which was recently awarded a "quality badge" by the Council for Learning Outside the Classroom.

The council's deputy chief executive, Elaine Skates, defended the decision by saying she believed that "an important aim of learning outside the classroom is allowing children and young people access to education that challenges assumptions and allows them to experience a range of viewpoints."

What Skates is endorsing here, though probably unwittingly, is a notion known as "teach the controversy". The term was coined by the Discovery Institute, America's most notorious creationist organisation, as a means of arguing for the teaching of Biblical creation alongside evolution in US schools.

Operating ostensibly from the principle of free speech, its proponents argue that the purpose of education is to allow children to reach their own conclusions, as though there are no facts, and all knowledge is subjective.

Perhaps it sounds reasonable to be open-minded. But those arguing for "teach the controversy" in this area do so disingenuously – it's a convenient way of inserting their own brand of "truth" into education.

There are controversies in all disciplines, including science. But the scientific "controversies" covered by the teach-the-controversy brigade tend to highlight problems that don't actually exist. Just look at the examples provided by Answers in Genesis, a website run by Ken Ham who is also founder of Kentucky's Creation Museum. Here you can learn why the Earth is 6,000 years old, or why "dinosaurs make perfect sense in light of the biblical history of creation and the Flood".

Away from creationism and intelligent design, the main area in which "teach the controversy" has been invoked is climate change, with conservatives in some US states campaigning for children to be taught alternative explanations to anthropogenic global warming. There is even evidence of creationists adding climate change to their list of controversies, in order to create the impression that their concern is not with religion, but with the balanced teaching of science in general.

We're used to hearing about these things happening across the Atlantic, but "teach the controversy" appears to be making inroads in the UK. The decision to award Noah's Ark Zoo the "quality badge" was welcomed by no less a figure than Ann Widdecombe, who used her weekly Daily Express column to accuse critics of the zoo, particularly the British Humanist Association, of stifling free speech. "The British Humanist Association does not believe that children should be allowed even to discuss creation or to be exposed to any evidence that might support it," she said.

But what "evidence" for Biblical creation might children observe at Noah's Ark? Having spent a delightful summer's day there last year, I can confirm it's a lovely zoo – there are tigers and giraffes, a petting zoo for the really little ones and lots of fun slides in the picnic area. But try and learn anything about natural history, and things become less straightforward. Ever wondered why birds sing? To "praise their maker", of course. How about why rhinos are practically bald? "It is likely that God's earliest design for the rhino had both nose horns and hair, but these were lost in some species later." Stroll over to the "Noah's Ark Exhibition", which contains a "scale model" of the ark, and things take a turn for the sinister – "All the people in the world come from Noah's sons Shem, Ham and Japheth. Caucasian from Japheth, Semitic from Shem, and Negroid/Mongoloid/Redskin from Ham." It's everything you need for a school trip – fluffy animals, slides and creationist racial theory.

In his recent documentary, Faith School Menace?, Richard Dawkins
witnessed the effects of "teach the controversy" first hand, meeting a class of 15-year-olds at a Muslim faith school who all believed evolution to be false. Writing on Comment is Free the day after the documentary was broadcast, Erfana Bora, a science teacher at an Islamic school in Leicester, suggested this isn't a problem – in faith schools like hers, students learn one perspective in science lessons and the other in religious studies, and then "literally make their own minds up as to what they believe". It makes for an inquisitive class too, with pupils approaching Bora with questions like "Do humans really share a common ancestor with apes?" She didn't say how she answers this question – does she tell them yes, or does she say that while scientists would say yes, Qur'anic scholars (who the pupils are used to seeing as authority figures) would say no?

Proponents of teach the controversy would have us believe that this is the purpose of education – to allow children to think for themselves, it is necessary to teach them things that aren't true alongside things that are. But if a child leaves school thinking that humans don't share a common ancestor with other apes, isn't the truth just that the education system failed them?

Paul Sims is the news editor of New Humanist magazine and blogs at
blog.newhumanist.org.uk

Science is not about using evidence to present different opinions. It's about presenting the evidence as it is. Nothing more.

The passion of Nate Phelps | Troy Media Corporation

The passion of Nate Phelps | Troy Media Corporation

From Chris Bowerman:

Nate Phelps balked at the opportunity to run the Calgary chapter of the pan-global, multidisciplinary Centre For Inquiry, a charity that posits itself as a “hub for rationality and critical inquiry worldwide.”
After all, he was a cab driver. He didn’t know how to run a professional institution on the provincial level, let alone direct its unorthodox coterie of secular humanists, atheists, naturalists, pagan dissenters and garden-variety infidels.
But since his own family had already condemned him, what did he have to lose?
Phelps took the executive director post this spring. Taking his newfound mission seriously, he said his job is to “interact with a diverse group of people, engage in debate over issues I’m passionate about, and try to understand ideas I would otherwise never encounter.”
Emancipated from hateful Phelps clan
Phelps was emancipated some 30 years ago from the notoriously hateful Phelps clan.
His father, “Pastor Fred,” leads the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kan., known for its varied slogans, such as “God Hates Fags” and “Thank God for 9/11.” Fred’s fanatic followers also picket and hector mourners at military repatriation ceremonies.
Nate escaped these foul clutches when he turned 18; two of his 12 siblings also made it out, but the others stayed.
Phelps moved to Canada
Free at last, Phelps traveled west, eventually winding up in Canada. Although distanced from the tyranny of his father’s hell-and-brimstone religiosity, he still suffers the psychological trauma of his brutal childhood indoctrination.
But he finds that talking about it allows him to gain new insight. “l’ve learned that by being more active and outspoken, I’m a tiny bit more in control of my life,” he explains. “Every day that I’m able to successfully combat the tapes in my head – to use my capacity to reason through an issue – I feel like I’ve succeeded at defying the hatefulness I was taught to embrace.”
Which securely places him on the CFI’s stated mission: “To foster a secular society based on science, reason, freedom of inquiry, and humanist values.”
The CFI challenges the kind of power-brokering imbued with mythology, largely supporting the separation of church and state; it’s opposed to the “principles that recognize the supremacy of God,” as the preamble goes in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms – the country’s moral bedrock, if it has one.
Somewhere between a modern-day Rosa Parks and a multinational buttinsky, the organization deserves a seat on the human-rights bus.
Science, reason and religious ideology
“A large percentage of Canadians still embrace some form of belief in God,” Phelps says. “By and large, science and reason are viewed as adversarial to religious ideology, and rightly so. The inability to separate the positive aspects of religion – such as charity and kindness toward fellow citizens – and the mythological components creates this constant tension between the secular perspective and religious groups.”
As Phelps sees it, “It’s a war of words between secularists and monotheists, both feeling disobliged and spiritually offended by the other.”
But words are OK, Phelps says. “Public discourse is important in all instances,” he adds, “because it shines light on human ideas and exposes them to consideration and, ultimately, acceptance or rejection by society.”
Secularism’s neutral position
Secularism, in theory, is a neutral position. The CFI can’t rightly say that it always maintains that ideal, but it does avidly promote civil discourse. Even in the most fixed dichotomies, human rights, controversy and debate often catalyze social progress. In the atheism-monotheism divide, says Phelps, both sides are heard, equanimous, and, perhaps more often than not, agreeable to disagreement.
Using dogma to justify hate
Theistic groups such as the Catholic Civil Rights League adhere to “Sacred Scripture,” allowing them free religious expression – but the parameters are vague.
Where does free speech cross the line into hate speech, Phelps wonders? “This is a very difficult area for me,” he goes on, “having grown up in America, where freedom of religion is sacrosanct. The overarching notion of hate speech speaks to the direct connection between the words and violence perpetrated on an individual or group. Of course, this extreme is rarely realized.”
In America, any notion of restraint in speaking one’s religious convictions is aggressively challenged, says Phelps. “A primary argument against restraining speech is the slippery slope. Too often, people use their dogma to justify hatred of another individual or group. This is abhorrent because it gives individuals the right to express hatred without taking personal responsibility for it.”
Could godless nonbelievers – infidels – become a prime new target for human-rights discrimination?
In The God Delusion, evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins writes: “The status of atheists in America today is on par with that of homosexuals fifty years ago.”
Phelps carefully considers these notions in the context of rural Wyoming, circa 1998, and a 21-year-old gay man named Matthew Shepherd. Shepherd was tortured and bludgeoned to death by two teenage homophobes.
The case ultimately galvanized lawmakers, after bringing state, federal, and international attention to the issue of hate crime. Shepherd’s funeral, sadly, was picketed by Phelps’ estranged father, Pastor Fred, with his vile placards.
“There is certainly a thread of conversation within the extreme religious groups that argues the idea that atheists are satanic and represent a threat to God and country,” says Phelps. “That perception is an uphill battle for mainstream nonbelievers – but I don’t see the fundamentalist fervor that is visited on gays translating over to the atheist community.”
As Phelps sees it, atheists struggle with social alienation and unfair characterizations of immorality, not loss of life. “I just don’t see the extremists beating an atheist and leaving him to die, hanging on a fence in rural Alberta,” he says.
“God willing,” he adds, borrowing a phrase from his past.

Ray M. Davis Jr.: Why schools should teach creationism | Gainesville.com

Ray M. Davis Jr.: Why schools should teach creationism | Gainesville.com

Ray M. Davis Jr. is a rather clueless man. (That's me being kind). Here's why:

I was thinking about the controversy of whether or not the theory of intelligent creation should be taught in our schools, and realized that the main charge in our schools is to impart knowledge. Whether or not I believe in the theory of creationism, there are well over a billion people on this planets that do. Therefore this must be included with any other major theories.

Let's get the obvious out of the way. Intelligent creation is not a fucking theory. No credible scientist would ever call it that. You can't just call something a theory.

Second, his argument that a lot of people believe in creationism and therefore should be taught is a fallacy. It's known as argumentum ad populum. It's a childish argument. I don't mean that in an insulting manner (for the most part). Children will often claim "everyone has it, it's good, I must have it". I'm sure we can all see the error of this argument.

A majority in California didn't want to allow same-sex marriage but that does not make the decision to attempt to ban it right or acceptable.

I was thinking about the controversy of whether or not the theory of intelligent creation should be taught in our schools, and realized that the main charge in our schools is to impart knowledge. Whether or not I believe in the theory of creationism, there are well over a billion people on this planets that do. Therefore this must be included with any other major theories.

If a theory is wrong, it's wrong. If you can't handle that then stay out of the science debate. Opinions are nice, some are just more factually correct then others.

Evolution has not been clearly defined to the point that it is no longer theory but 100 percent fact. Scientist and others are still attempting conclusively prove the Big Bang Theory.

Evolution and the Big Bang Theory are two separate issues. Pro-intelligent designers need to get that fucking fact straight before they jump into this discussion.

Idaho logic | The Salt Lake Tribune

Idaho logic | The Salt Lake Tribune

From Robert Hoff:

Re “Idaho scraps science test requirement for students” (Tribune, Aug. 13):

It only took three years for Idaho’s State Board of Education to figure out how to get back at its science teachers. In 2007, the Idaho Science Teachers Association stood up for science education and church-state separation by declaring that “intelligent design,” the latest variant of creationism, has no place in science classes. This view mirrors that of the National Science Teachers Association.

Now the religious zealots who are Idaho’s education officials have decided to scrap the requirement that high school students must pass standardized tests in science before graduating, starting with the class of 2013.

Idaho Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Luna said the current system of too few tests is not an accurate measure of how students are performing in science, “not to the point that we would make it a graduation requirement.”

So, according to this logic, if something is broken, don’t fix it … throw it away! The problem with this solution is that it’s only logical in Idaho!

At times it really does feel as if the side of reason is losing.

There's a big illogical fly in former atheist's ointment - Winnipeg Free Press

There's a big illogical fly in former atheist's ointment - Winnipeg Free Press

From Ted St. Godard

BRITISH-BORN Christopher Hitchens is one of the cleverest thinkers now writing in English and also one of most outspoken atheists.
His recent memoir (ironically published prior to his having been diagnosed with esophageal cancer) describes the way in which writing and thinking can lead to a changing of one's mind, with the result that previously expressed opinions can come to no longer represent the author's position.
Now comes a second memoir, this one from Hitchens' younger sibling, Peter, wherein he relates his own fairly significant change of heart, a turning away from his Bible-burning atheist ways, to embrace Christianity.
A less prolific writer than his brother, and significantly less adept with language, Peter has written a book that is at once a confession and a profession of faith.
The fairly frequent references to his brother (whose name recently was conflated with that of fellow atheist Richard Dawkins as "Ditchens," by another unsophisticated thinker) lead one to wonder whether this outing is also Peter's attempt to clear the family name.
Hitchens goes to some length to demonstrate that in the 20th century, particularly in Britain, a country ravaged by two world wars (the first of which was to end all war), a "deep confusion of patriotism and faith" led to a watered-down Christianity, with the result that people left the flock, himself included.
He uses similar, if slightly tweaked (but not nuanced), arguments to suggest that the person he calls "homo Sovieticus," a man (yes) fairly designed to have faith in humanity and government rather than God and church, lived as a result in a "coarse and mannerless society."
"Compared with this desperate squalor," Hitchens writes, "the meanest British public house and the most sordid American bar are temples of civilization."
Few in the 21st century would dispute the almost complete failure of the Soviet enterprise, and Hitchens in fact notes that Christopher has written trenchant criticisms of totalitarianism in all its strains.
What Hitchens can't seem to appreciate is that, even if "Soviet Communism is organically linked to atheism," something his brother and others argue against (if somewhat feebly), and even if one accepts that Soviet tyranny was horrible, this says little about the existence of God, except inasmuch as it raises questions about how an all-loving and all-powerful deity can allow so much evil on this, his favourite planet (unless it's because he's so busy planning natural disasters).
Hitchens makes the easy point that under certain conditions humans behave badly. But under which conditions? When there is no God watching, but only "big brother" (one cannot escape noticing the relationship of the Hitchens brothers).
With unintended irony, Hitchens writes, "(t)hey (unbelievers) have a fundamental inability to concede that to be effectively absolute, a moral code needs to be beyond human power to alter," and elsewhere, "unless there is an absolute standard of good and evil," there is no way we fallen humans will behave.
For a man so bent on demonstrating that Lenin, Stalin and even their rebellious follower Trotsky, were evil due to atheism, this smacks of totalitarianism.
If we've learned nothing from generations of thinking and writing, it is that, as Hitchens quotes Trotsky jeeringly, "morality is a product of social development; that there is nothing invariable about it; that it serves social interests; that these interests are contradictory."
Although it is certain that both Christopher and Peter Hitchens will die, it may lamentably be the case that the former's remaining life on Earth will be short.
We can take comfort, and hope he does, from the fact that his books and other writing will long repay examination, and that he thereby will achieve a degree of immortality (insofar as he would tolerate the notion).
On the other hand, if this book is any indication, the writings of the prodigal Peter can and will with confidence be ignored, and he therefore had best continue to pray for pie in the sky hereafter.

Soldiers Punished for Not Attending Christian Concert on Base : Dispatches from the Culture Wars

Soldiers Punished for Not Attending Christian Concert on Base : Dispatches from the Culture Wars

The HuffPo Is a Joke

Pete Enns writing for the bastion of woo The Huffington Post:

Some atheists claim to have a sure and certain knowledge about spiritual things. "I know -- through reason, logic, and evidence -- that God does not exist." These atheists feel that their position is intellectually superior to a belief in God. God does not exist because what cannot be established through "reason, logic, or evidence" is not real.

This sounds rational and objective, but there is a lot of belief tucked away in this assertion. Atheists do not know God does not exist; they believe it.

Any atheist that says that they know God does not exist is a fool though I haven't met any such atheist and I'd like to see people like Enns actually give examples of says they know. Ok, so I don't believe God exists? What's wrong with that?

To say that God's existence is detectable with certainty through reason, logic, and evidence is a belief because it makes some crucial assumptions. For one thing, it assumes that our intellectual faculties are the best, or only, ways of accessing God. This is an assumption that privileges Western ways of knowing and excludes other wholly human qualities like emotion and intuition.

Here Enns is defining God in a way that puts God beyond of the realm of science. He may very well be. Again though I do not actually see how we can even attempt to detect God and I've never heard an atheist make a good case for it. Leave it to a writer for the HuffPo to attack "Western ways". There's nothing Western about excluding emotion and intuition. It's simply something science does not allow for. You may have emotions and feelings about God's existence but that is not proof for God anymore than someone saying they have emotions about the existence of aliens.

I know some real live atheists, and they do not claim to know as much as some others do. The reason that they are atheists is that "God is" is a less compelling proposition to explain their reality than "God is not."

They did not come to this sure and certain conclusion by a calm and logical assessment of the evidence (as opposed to the unreasonable and illogical faith of religious types). Rather, they came to their atheism for many different types of reasons, some of which are too subtle to quantify.

They do not claim to know that God does not exist; they believe it to be so because it makes most sense of their own lives and the world around them. This is not sure and certain knowledge; it is a belief.

Oddly, some Christian fundamentalists and some atheist fundamentalists suffer under the same delusion, that their view on ultimate reality is fully supported by reason, logic, and evidence.

Both are wrong.

We are in agreement that anyone who claims to know is wrong, however, I've never meant an atheist who claims to "know".

Futurama Tackles Creationism - And Wins

http://www.ugo.com/tv/futurama-tackles-creationism-and-wins

From Alex Zalben:

Fine, fine, I guess there’s something to be said for presenting both sides of an issue.

Last night on Futurama, we were treated to what might be the first hilarious honest debate about creationism versus evolution. And while as an episode the logic may not have made sense, and the B-plot was disposable, at best, the main thrust of the episode was smart, funny, and necessary.

Fed up with a creationist ape named Dr. Banjo, Farnsworth and crew head to an abandoned planet to start over. Once there, Farnsworth releases a gaggle of water-cleaning nanobots, who, interacting with the toxic sewage in the planet’s lakes, end up quickly evolving. Over the next few days, the crew gets to witness the whole of robot evolution, even ending up in a Scopes-like trial to prove that evolution and creation are sometimes one and the same thing.

I’m gonna make no bones about it (pun intended): creationism is pretty darn stupid. There’s a willful ignoring of facts for no good reason, and a blatant hatred of the other sides point of view that’s reprehensible at best, and downright dangerous at worst. And yes, I’m aware I’m trashing them as a way of making my point, but that’s where Futurama comes in.

Towards the end of the episode, Farnsworth agrees that it's possible some great big being in the sky could have created life, and Dr. Banjo agrees that it's possible evolution could exist as well, that this being could have jumpstarted things and then left. There’s an open-mindedness there that is almost never brought to the creationism debate, and that’s what leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Science states that anything is possible, you just have to prove it to be true – but creationists jump on that to say, “You can’t prove it’s not true, so it must be true!”

It’s the gotcha methods and tautologies that end up tanking their side of the non-issue, as brilliantly illustrated in a sequence where Dr. Banjo keeps pointing out more and more miniscule missing links that science has not discovered. I don’t know if there’s a great big guy in the sky – maybe there is, maybe there’s not. He doesn’t rule my life, and I don’t care if he rules yours. Just don’t tell me I’m wrong for saying I don’t care.

Which, in essence, is what Futurama was – and is always – saying.

This makes me want to go and watch Futurama again. It's been too long.

Creationism: Don’t Use the “C-Word”

From Lauri Lebo:

When I read Bruce Chapman’s American Spectator column yesterday, in which the president of the Discovery Institute back pedaled from a Louisiana creationism mishap he helped spawn, I thought of this: When Danger Reared its Ugly Head He Bravely Turned his Tail and Fled

Once again, after pushing for anti-evolution language that opens the door to teaching creationism, the good fellows at the Discovery Institute bravely turned around and ran away from the local creationist-talking school board members who want to champion their cause.

Because the DI’s first rule about creationism? Don’t talk about creationism.

In this case, the Livingston Parish School District, in a discussion regarding the 2008 Louisiana Science Education Act (LSEA), which Discovery Institute helped write, wanted to know when they could start teaching kids creationism in science class. Board members asked a staff committee to research the possibility for the 2011-2012 school year.

The discussion came up during a report on the pupil progression plan for the 2010-11 school year, delivered by Jan Benton, director of curriculum. Benton said that under provisions of the Science Education Act enacted last year by the Louisiana Legislature, schools can present what she termed “critical thinking and creationism” in science classes. Board Member David Tate quickly responded: “We let them teach evolution to our children, but I think all of us sitting up here on this School Board believe in creationism. Why can’t we get someone with religious beliefs to teach creationism?” (See my previous posts here and here.)

In lobbying for LSEA, the Discovery Institute had worked closely with the Louisiana Family Forum, a conservative Christian organization that directly championed the teaching of creationism as recently as 2004. (Read how Louisiana Coalition for Science’s Barbara Forrest connects the dots here.) However, because of that pesky First Amendment, which prohibits using public school biology class as a pulpit, creationism is never specifically mentioned in the LSEA. Instead, LSEA relies on code language to attack the teaching of evolution and other subjects that Christian fundamentalists hate because it contradicts their narrow religious worldview - reality be damned.

The language that was inserted into the LSEA, which the Livingston school district properly understood to mean it could teach creationism, says that the Louisiana State Board of Elementary and Secondary Education must “allow and assist” school boards “to create and foster an environment” in public schools that “promotes critical thinking skills, logical analysis, and open and objective discussion of scientific theories being studied including, but not limited to, evolution, the origins of life, global warming, and human cloning.” In addition to state-approved textbooks, teachers “may use supplemental textbooks and other instructional materials to help students understand, analyze, critique, and review scientific theories in an objective manner.”

In his column, Chapman disingenuously writes:

Tate’s fulminations are not characteristic of the educators and legislators who passed the new Louisiana law, but you can be sure that the Darwinist opponents of the law will try to make them sound representative. The same thing happened in Dover, Pennsylvania, in 2005 when school board members decided to grab onto the phrase (not the reality) of “intelligent design” to promote religious doctrine. The board members, as in Livingston, Louisiana, were as ignorant of the limits of the scientific case against strict Darwinism as they were of the content of intelligent design theory. The scientists and political scientists at Discovery Institute—colleagues of mine—who actually know something about intelligent design, tried to dissuade them, but to no avail. The Dover board members did not believe that a court could stop them. But a central Pennsylvania federal judge, John E. Jones, did stop them.
It’s interesting that Chapman brings up Dover. Discovery initially encouraged Dover board members. It provided them with videos touting intelligent design, which board members required science teachers to watch. But when board members wanted to pursue intelligent design, DI backed up, instead urging the watered-down “teach the controversy.” But just as in the case of Livingston, Dover board members correctly interpreted that code language like “intelligent design” and “teach the controversy” were merely other ways of saying “creationism.” And after the board members’ remarks about creationism became too widely reported to ignore, the Discovery Institute tried to distance itself from the case and ran away.

Italian atheists lobby against church bells

From Trust of India:

An Italian atheist group campaigning for a quiet life called for tighter restrictions on church bells ringing in the Tuscan town of Pisa, after complaints about the noise from locals. "The municipality is preparing new rules on noise pollution and we have sent our proposal, requesting that bells ring on bank holidays from 9:00 am to 1:00 pm and 4:00 pm to 8:00 pm (local time)," the Union of Rationalist Atheists and Agnostics said on Wednesday.

The URAA, which is also campaigning to ban crucifixes from display in Italian state schools, sent its proposal to the local council to be discussed in September, Giovanni Mainetto, the URAA's Pisa official, said.

"We have received complaints about the excessive noise produced by loud-speakers installed in Pisa's historical centre during religious processions that last well past 10:00 pm (local time)," the UAAR said in a letter.

The association argues that just as union demonstrations would be expected to take place in the daytime, the same should apply to religious processions.

On its website, the UAAR offers advice on how to combat the noise of church bells and refers to past cases of priests who have been fined for "seriously compromising" the peace and relaxation of residents living near bell towers.

This doesn't even seem like it needs to be a religious issue. Noise is noise and if it is disturbing the peace it needs to be stopped.

Former Atheist: Christianity Really Does Make Sense

Holly Ordway, an ex-atheist is now a Christian. She'd love to tell you that Christianity is true and that's not just faith, she has evidence.

"I was startled to find that Christian theism had significantly better explanatory power than atheistic naturalism, in terms of explaining why the world is the way it is, and in accounting for my own experiences within it," she recounted, according to Biola. "Learning more about the Incarnation and about God, the most holy Trinity, has further reinforced my confidence that Christianity really does make sense of the world in a way no other worldview does."

She found that "St. Paul's forthright declaration that Christianity is based on the historical, witnessed events of Christ’s death and resurrection," that "theology and philosophy offered real answers" to her questions and weren't an appeal to blind faith, and that "the history of the Church did not conform to [her] image of the Christian faith as a self-serving, politically useful fiction."

Her intellectual pride was broken and she was humbled by God's goodness as she began to see herself as a sinner.

"I don’t 'believe' because I like the idea and want it to be true. I don’t 'believe' because I think Christianity makes sense intellectually (although that was a necessary foundation to my faith). In fact, I wouldn’t say that I 'believe' in God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, or that I 'believe' I have a personal relationship with Him: I would say that I know these things to be true," the former atheist emphatically stated in a 2007 blog entry.

Not to anyone's surprise, she fails to actually state what this evidence is. For someone who is supposedly educated she displays massive amounts of ignorance in stating that we have a strong historical, and witnesses accounts for the death of Christ. None of the Gospels were written until well after Christs death, that's not a good eye witness account, especially when we consider the supposed miracles of the work of Christ.

Funny how these theists find it to be a good thing that her intellectual pride was broken and she viewed her self as a sinner, in other words, worthless. We need to be proud of holding intellectual views, as opposed to swimming in ignorance, which she seems content in doing.

Atheists can be ethical: Anglican archbishop | The Australian

Atheists can be ethical: Anglican archbishop | The Australian

What's this? A religious leader making perfect sense?

PERTH Anglican Archbishop Roger Herft has clashed with his Catholic counterpart over Julia Gillard's atheism.

He warned it was "unhelpful and untrue" to suggest the Christian faith had a monopoly on moral integrity.

The Anglican leader cautioned against making simplistic assessments of religious beliefs in an election context and said Ms Gillard had assured the electorate she would respect people with religious convictions.

"Any statement which portrays the Christian faith as having some type of exclusivity to be the sole arbiter on matters of moral integrity and just policy-making are unhelpful and untrue," Archbishop Herft told The Weekend Australian.

"Christians need to remind themselves that those who do not profess the Christian faith are still capable of adopting an ethical and moral framework which assists in public policy decision-making for the common good."

The comments follow controversial statements this week by Perth Catholic Archbishop Barry Hickey, who suggested Ms Gillard's atheism could cost her votes.

The Catholic Church leader said he was not telling people not to vote for Ms Gillard, but some would wonder what the future held under an atheist and it might influence their votes.

"Many Christians are concerned that someone who does not believe in God may not endorse the Christian traditions of respect for human life, for the sanctity of marriage and the independence of churches, church schools and church social welfare agencies," Archbishop Hickey said. But Archbishop Herft -- who believes election campaigns have become so vicious they may tarnish the nation's soul -- said believers and non-believers alike should be embraced by the church.

He said politicians were influenced by a range of factors, both religious and secular, when making cabinet and parliamentary decisions, but they were drawn to the job out of a desire to serve the common good.

"It is interesting that in the context of an election, those who profess a certain faith and, indeed, those who do not, have their beliefs assessed very simplistically as either a positive or negative influence based on the whim of the day or the policy area to which it is being applied," he said.

Herft is reminding is followers not to stereotype atheists as immoral. We atheists also need to avoid stereotypes, such as claiming that all religious people hold irrational views. Herft is one of those religious men that we should be willing to find common ground with, even if we don't hold the view on every issue. It's unwise to paint all theists with the same brush in order to create conflict where it does not exist.

The Press Association: Atheists could set up own schools

The Press Association: Atheists could set up own schools

From UKPA:

Atheists would be able to set up their own schools under the Government's education reforms, Michael Gove has said.
The Education Secretary said he would be "interested" to look at proposals from individuals such as outspoken atheist Professor Richard Dawkins.
Prof Dawkins, author of The God Delusion, said last month that he liked the idea of setting up a "free-thinking free school".
Speaking at a Commons education select committee, Mr Gove said: "One of the most striking things that I read recently was a thought from Richard Dawkins that he might want to take advantage of our education legislation to open a new school which was set up on an explicitly atheist basis.
"It wouldn't be my choice of school, but the whole point about our education reforms is that they are, in the broad sense of the word, small "l", liberal. That they exist to provide that greater degree of choice."
Mr Gove, whose two children attend primary faith schools, told the cross-party group of MPs that he "recognised that there are some people who explicitly do not want their children educated in a faith-based setting".
He said: "One of the principles behind our education reforms is to give people the maximum amount of choice so that those people, and they may not themselves necessarily have a very strong religious faith, but who believe that the ethos and values of faith-based education are right for their child, have that choice but others who want a different approach can take it as well."
Speaking afterwards, Mr Gove said he had seen a reference to Professor Dawkins expressing an interest in establishing a school, adding: "If Professor Dawkins wants to set up a school we would be very interested to look at an application."
Prof Dawkins, a former Charles Simonyi Professor of the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University, said in a conversation on the Mumsnet website last month: "I like the idea very much, although I would prefer to call it a free-thinking free school.
"I would never want to indoctrinate children in atheism, any more than in religion. Instead, children should be taught to ask for evidence, to be sceptical, critical, open-minded."

I like that idea. I agree, it shouldn't be an "atheist" school. However, Dawkin's definition of what his school would be should be the standard for all schools.

Reptile footprints in N.B. re-date evolution

Reptile footprints in N.B. re-date evolution

From Randy Boswell:

Dozens of fossilized reptile footprints left behind 318 million years ago in present-day New Brunswick will rewrite the history of animal evolution on land, says a team of Canadian and British researchers.

Their discovery along a Bay of Fundy sea-cliff is detailed today in the journal Paleogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology.

The ancient trackways are not only the world's earliest evidence of reptilian life, they are also the first known signs of vertebrates -- animals with a backbone -- living in a continental interior, far from any ocean.

Older fossils of amphibian species -- ancestors to the reptiles -- have been documented by scientists probing primordial coastal environments.

But the new reptile footprints are proof that these creatures -- the ancestors of all dinosaurs and mammals, including humans -- had adapted to dry, inland ecosystems at a time when the world's continents were fused in a single mass called Pangaea and the future Canada was in tropical climes near the Earth's equator.

The footprints were found in 2008 by University of London paleontologist Howard Falcon-Lang as he searched for fossils among piles of boulders along the steep Fundy seacoast, near the southern New Brunswick town of St. Martins. Now at the edge of the Atlantic Ocean, the sandstone strand was once an inland riverbed 500 kilometres from the ocean when several reptiles up to 20 centimetres in length -- and looking "a bit like a gecko," says Falcon-Lang -- made their mark more than 300 million years ago.

"The footprints were found as I tripped and fell while climbing," he told. "The boulder I grazed my knee on was covered in reptile tracks."

Falcon-Lang, who has made several important discoveries in Eastern Canada over the years, added: "While looking at the rocks, I could imagine the earliest reptiles scampering around a contracting water hole -- the first pioneers to invade the dry continental interiors."

At least three separate creatures, all from the era when certain amphibian species were morphing into reptiles, are believed to have left trackways at the site: Hylonomus lyelli, Dendrerpeton and Calligenethlon.

The world's earliest reptile-body fossils come from a 315-million-year-old coastal setting in Nova Scotia. And reptile tracks of a similar age were found by Falcon-Lang and other scientists in New Brunswick in 2007.

The new find pushes back the history of reptile life by a "trifling" few million years, Falcon-Lang says. But more importantly, he argues, it represents the moment when such advanced species began colonizing inland environments -- a key stage in the evolution of animals from marine to terrestrial habitats. Key to this transition was the reptile's development of eggs with hard shells that could be laid on land, giving the creatures the freedom "to explore the heart of the Pangaean supercontinent," Falcon-Lang says.

"At first, life was restricted to coastal swamps where lush rainforest existed, full of giant ferns and dragonflies," co-author Mike Benton, a University of Bristol paleontologist, states in a summary of the study. "However, when reptiles came on the scene they pushed back the frontiers, conquering the dry continental interiors."

While relatively small and simple compared to later reptiles, says Falcon-Lang, the creatures that left the footprints were part of an animal-invasion wave "that gave rise to both the dinosaurs and the mammals, the group to which we belong. So the story we report of reptiles invading the continental interiors actually laid the foundations for all diverse land ecosystems that followed, including humans."

He added: "It was one small step for a reptile, but one giant leap for life on land."

Young evangelical writer: 'Move on' from evolution-creationism debate - USATODAY.com

Young evangelical writer: 'Move on' from evolution-creationism debate - USATODAY.com

There are two problems here. See if you can find them.

Rachel Held Evans had a choice while growing up in Dayton, Tenn., site of the 1925 Scopes Monkey Trial. Believe the Bible or believe evolution.
"I was taught that if you don't interpret Genesis 1 and 2 literally, then you don't take the Bible seriously," said Evans, 29. "I held on tightly to that for a long time."

Evans says creationism — the belief that God created the earth around 6,000 years ago in six days — was commonplace in her town. Unable to reconcile science with her faith, Evans embraced evolution.

"I learned you don't have to choose between loving and following Jesus and believing in evolution," she said. She chronicled her personal journey in a new memoir Evolving in Monkey Town.

Evans is part of a movement of mostly Protestant writers and scientists trying to reconcile faith and science, 85 years after the trial ended. Instead of choosing sides, some prefer the middle ground of intelligent design, which claims God designed how life evolved. Tennessee gubernatorial candidates Ron Ramsey, Zach Wamp and Mike McWherter all advocate teaching intelligent design in schools.

But conservative evangelicals still reject any compromise.

Al Mohler, president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., says the two views — creationism and evolution — are incompatible for evangelicals.

"No one is going to read the Bible and be able to accommodate a natural reading of the biblical text with naturalistic evolution," said Mohler.

Unlike Catholics and Orthodox Christians who rely on church teaching and tradition along with the Bible, evangelicals rely on the Bible alone as the authority for their faith.

"The entrenched hostility to evolution in American evangelism is very deep," says Karl Giberson, a physics professor at Eastern Nazarene College in Quincy, Mass.

Giberson, the son of a Primitive Baptist pastor from Canada, grew up believing evolution was wrong, but his views changed once he studied physics in college. Now a member of the Church of the Nazarene and a teacher at a Christian college he's convinced evolution is true.

He is one of the co-founders of the BioLogos Forum which teaches faith can co-exist with science. He founded the organization in 2008 with Francis Collins, director of the National Institute of Health. Collins, 60, a one-time atheist converted to Christianity when he was 27.

The group runs a website, biologos.org, and sponsors seminars on how faith and science can work together.

"It's a place for people who understand that evolution is true to stand together," said Giberson.

For Giberson, evolution describes the mechanism of life — how it works. But faith addresses the meaning of life, something science can't do.

Recently, three candidates running for governor in Tennessee endorsed the idea of teaching intelligent design in public schools.

"We can blend science and religion in that regard and the two do not have to contradict each other," said Mike McWherter, a Democrat.

Wamp, a Republican, suggested teaching intelligent design as a balance to teaching evolution.

"If they are going to teaching evolution in schools, it better be counteracted by teaching a faith-based, God-centered education," he said.

The Republican Ramsey described himself as a creationist. "I know I was created by God," he said. "That's what I want my children to learn."

For Christian schools like Bryan College, evolution can be a tricky subject. Their biology professors teach it in class but without violating the school's statements of faith.

Brian Eisenach, assistant professor of biology at Bryan, says he teaches evolution straight from the textbook in his classes. Then he has a separate discussion about other views.

He does not endorse any particular belief. Instead, Eisenach says he wants his students to know all the options for understanding the origins of human life. It's better, he says, than confrontation.

"The argument has escalated into a lot of name-calling and stereotyping on all sides," he said.

Evans says Eisenach's approach is the correct one because her teachers handled it poorly.

Pastors and professors at Bryan College once told her if she questioned creationism she was no longer a true Christian.

"My generation of evangelicals is ready to call a truce on the culture wars. It seems like our parents, our pastors, and the media won't let us do that. We are ready to be done with the whole evolution-creation debate. We are ready to move on."

1) If your way of finding common ground between evolution and faith is to say "intelligent design", then you really do not understand evolution. You are not compromising so much as holding onto that aspect of your faith. 2) Referring to evolution as a "belief" is wrong. Evolution is something you accept, just like any other view of science, such as gravity.

Daily Herald | Don't be scared by creationism

Daily Herald | Don't be scared by creationism

Bill Hartman is an idiot. I'll let him speak for himself.

My hero Lindsey Stevens is correct. Creationism is real science. Disbelievers are those who have not studied the subject since they were in grade school. They have accepted the bazaar teachings that one day there was water, then tadpoles, then apes, and then - presto - man.

Wow, it has to take some really strong faith to believe anything so ridiculous. It is a "theory".

I don't know why evolutionists are so afraid to expose students to creationism along with evolution. Let me suggest one book for starters, "The Case for a Creator." The "science" of creationism is amazing and educational. Lindsey and I are not afraid of evolution - why are you afraid of creationism. All we say is, teach a little of both. Do some current research. Don't let it scare you!

It does scare. People actually buy into this sort of, "creationism is science" crap. It's not science, it's religion. A bad one at that.

EUobserver / EU to hold atheist and freemason summit

EUobserver / EU to hold atheist and freemason summit

LEIGH PHILLIPS

19.07.2010 @ 21:16 CET
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - Brussels is to hold an EU summit with atheists and freemasons in the autumn, inviting them to a political dialogue parallel to the annual summit the bloc holds with Europe's religious leaders.

While the EU is a secular body, the three European presidents, of the commission, parliament and EU Council, alongside two commissioners, on Monday met with 24 bishops, chief rabbis, and muftis as well as leaders from the Hindu and Sikh communities. The annual dialogue, which has taken place since 2005, is for the first time this year made legally obligatory under Article 17 of the Lisbon Treaty.

Under pressure from Belgium, which constitutionally protects and financially supports humanist organisations as well as churches, the EU has been forced to hold a mirror-image summit, but of atheists, scheduled for 15 October.

However, in a move that perplexed and annoyed humanist groups, the EU atheist summit will also welcome under the rubric of ‘non-religious groups', the Freemasons, the secretive fraternal organisation, according to commission spokeswoman Katharina von Schnurbein.

"I find it rather odd," David Pollock, president of the European Humanist Federation, told EUobserver. "Some of the Grand Lodges are secularist organisations, and strongly for separation of church and state, but they also retain all sorts of gobbledygook and myths such as the Great Architect of the Universe."

Emerging in the late 16th century in England and subsequently spread throughout the world, the Freemasons split in 1877 between the English-speaking lodges and their continental counterparts over the question of god. Anglophone Freemasons require that their members believe in a deity, while continental freemasons do not.

"Their public face is that they do charitable work and they do indeed engage in this, but there are also rituals involving blindfolded candidates with their trouser-legs rolled up during initiation," continued Mr Pollock.

"It's boys' games sort of a thing."

Mr Pollock told this website that humanists had opposed any inclusion of the ‘religion clause' in first the EU Constitutional Treaty and subsequently the Lisbon Treaty, arguing that "no one has any right to some special summit any more than any other type of organisation, and we should wait in line to speak to commissioners, to access at the highest level, like any other NGO, which is what churches are."

"Neither religious groups nor non-religious ones have any greater claim to taking up the time of commissioners."

"But sadly we lost that battle, and so with the atheist summit, at least we're being treated equally, although I'd rather if we were there along with the churches. Instead we're being bundled off with the Freemasons."

According to the commission's Ms von Schnurbein, Brussels views the Freemasons as a "community of conscience interconnected throughout Europe," and "a form of humanist organisation."

She dismissed concerns that while churches and atheist groups are free for anyone to join, membership in the Freemasons, a private organisation of men, with some separate Grand Lodges for women, is by invitation only and requires initiation fees and an annual subscription.

The EUobserver attempted to speak with the United Grand Lodge of England, the oldest Grand Lodge of masons in the world, regarding this development but without success.

Meanwhile, the Catholic Church has had its nose put out at the annual EU summit with religious leaders by the presence for the first time this year of Hindus and Sikhs.

According to La Croix, the French Roman Catholic daily, the church, happy to embrace an ecumenism of the great monotheistic faiths at the EU level, fears that the enlargement of the meeting to include such groups beyond those "more anchored across the whole of the continent," suggests the EU is being "religiously correct".

According to a spokesman for President Van Rompuy, next year the meeting could include a Buddhist.

Beyond the annual summit, religious leaders interpret Article 17, which commits the EU to holding "an open, transparent and regular dialogue with… churches and non-confessional and philosophical organisations", as meaning regular meetings with senior civil servants, not just on grand themes such as Monday's topic of the battle against poverty, but on more concrete legislative measures dealing with climate change, education, immigration, social services and labour laws.

In the future, they hope to have similar relations with EU agencies, notably the Fundamental Rights Agency, as well as with the bloc's new diplomatic corps, the External Action Service.

Are Atheists Fundamentalists? No. Why? Keep Reading

I'm writing this to address the claim made by Reza Aslan in this opinion peace for the Washington Times (http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/guestvoices/2010/07/harris_hitchens_dawkins_dennett_evangelical_atheists.html) in which he makes mention of the existence of an atheist fundamentalism. That is to say: it doesn't exist.

First, let's begin by defining fundamentalism.

1.

A movement in American Protestantism that arose in the early part of the 20th century in reaction to modernism and that stresses the infallibility of the Bible not only in matters of faith and morals but also as a literal historical record, holding as essential to Christian faith belief in such doctrines as the creation of the world, the virgin birth, physical resurrection, atonement by the sacrificial death of Christ, and the Second Coming.

2.

the beliefs held by those in this movement.

3.

strict adherence to any set of basic ideas or principles: the fundamentalism of the extreme conservatives.

Given that the first two definitions clearly apply to religion, we need not bother examining them. The 3rd definition applies best to the type of atheist fundamentalism you often hear people talking about but, they attempt to use this in the context that atheism is a religion, which it is not. If I hold the idea that the Toronto Maple Leafs are the greatest hockey team of all time and adhere to that idea despite their dismal record, you could call me a fundamentalist given this 3rd definition. However, in this way, it loses any negative connotation that those who argue in favour of the existence of atheist fundamentalism are trying to imply.

My Leafs analogy brings me to the next point I want to make. People appear to be confusing "atheist fundamentalism" with a passion for atheism. It is this passion that when strong can lead to statements that may not be wise to make. When you are speaking passionately about something, when you love the idea, your emotions flow and with that comes the good and the bad. For example, referring to believers as "stupid". It's not an accurate or kind description of believers and even comes off as being too simplistic in light of knowledge and research done into why people believe (http://blogcritics.org/books/article/book-review-gods-brain-by-lionel/). The point is, we should not allow a person's strong opinion on an issue be viewed as fundamentalism. Otherwise, we start throwing the word around too easily.

De-baptism.

FOXNews.com - U.S. Atheists Reportedly Using Hair Dryers to 'De-Baptize'

The dryer, it burns!

American atheists lined up to be "de-baptized" in a ritual using a hair dryer, according to a report Friday on U.S. late-night news program "Nightline."

Leading atheist Edwin Kagin blasted his fellow non-believers with the hair dryer to symbolically dry up the holy water sprinkled on their heads in days past. The styling tool was emblazoned with a label reading "Reason and Truth."

Kagin believes parents are wrong to baptize their children before they are able to make their own choices, even slamming some religious education as "child abuse." He said the blast of hot air was a way for adults to undo what their parents had done.

"I was baptized Catholic. I don't remember any of it at all," said 24-year-old Cambridge Boxterman. "According to my mother, I screamed like a banshee ... so you can see that even as a young child I didn't want to be baptized. It's not fair. I was born atheist, and they were forcing me to become Catholic."

Kagin doned a monk's robe and said a few mock-Latin phrases before inviting those wishing to be de-baptized to "come forward now and receive the spirit of hot air that taketh away the stigma and taketh away the remnants of the stain of baptismal water."

Ironically, Kagin's own son became a fundamentalist Christian minister after having "a personal revelation in Jesus Christ."

"One wonders where they went wrong," he chuckled to the TV show.

"Monkey Trial" 85 Years Old Today - Tech Talk - CBS News

"Monkey Trial" 85 Years Old Today - Tech Talk - CBS News

From Charles Cooper:

Later this month Dayton, Tenn. will host a weekend festival capped off by a dramatization of the trial which engraved this small town's name into the nation's cultural narrative. Exactly 85 years ago today, a Dayton schoolteacher named John C. Scopes went on trial, accused of violating a state law prohibiting the teaching of the theory of evolution.

What came to be known as the "Monkey Trial" (subsequently immortalized by journalist H.L. Mencken), the case was a showdown between progressives and creationists, who wanted to ban the teaching of Charles Darwin's writing about evolution from local schools.

William Jennings Bryan, a three-time candidate for president, led the prosecution. He was pitted against the famous Chicago attorney Clarence Darrow. The trial lived up to the hype, but it ended on a flat note.

Toward the end of the trial, Darrow asked the jury to find Scopes guilty because he intended to appeal the verdict to the state's Supreme Court. The jury complied and Scopes was fined $100.

The following year, Tennessee's Supreme Court reversed the decision on a technicality.

Writing for the majority, the court's chief justice dismissed the case, saying "We see nothing to be gained by prolonging the life of this bizarre case. On the contrary, we think the peace and dignity of the State, which all criminal prosecutions are brought to redress, will be better conserved by the entry of a nolle prosequi herein. Such a course is suggested to the Attorney-General."

But the battle over evolution continues. Only last month, a federal court prevented the Institute for Creation Research's plans to award master's degrees in science education from "a Biblical scientific creationist viewpoint.

85 years on and America still remains as ignorant as ever when it comes to evolution.

Atheist ads appear on billboards - National - NZ Herald News

Atheist ads appear on billboards - National - NZ Herald News

From The New Zealand Herald:

Controversial billboards promoting atheism today appeared in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch, after NZ Bus refused to run the ads on bus sides.

The New Zealand Atheist Bus Campaign last year raised more than $22,000 to fund ads to run on buses, but NZ Bus declined to run them after receiving a number of complaints from the public and staff.

The group announced last month the ads would appear on billboards instead, while taking a discrimination case against NZ Bus.

The New Zealand campaign organisers had chosen three winning phrases from more than 900 public submissions to an online billboard generator.

The three slogans appearing on billboards were: "In the beginning, man created God", "Good without God? Over one million Kiwis are" and "We are all atheists about most gods. Some of us just go one God further".

The ads also featured the phrase "There's probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life", borrowed from the British Atheist Bus Campaign which caused a storm when it launched last year.

The New Zealand campaign organisers were now asking for more donations from people who wanted to see the billboards spread to more cities.

About $10,000 of the group's funds would go towards the billboards, Mr Fisher said last month.

In March, the group applied for legal representation from the Office of Human Rights Proceedings to pursue its discrimination case against the company.

NZ Bus said it declined to run the ads because the campaign had drawn a "significant reaction" from passengers and staff, with a number finding it distasteful or distressing.

"NZ Bus has the right to decline advertising that may, in its perception, be considered controversial or divisive," spokeswoman Siobhan O'Donovan said.

Mr Fisher said the billboards would get the atheist message out into the public while the group awaited the office's decision.

- NZPA

Glad to see this going forward. I frequently see religious signs, often biblical quotes, as I'm driving through my region. I may disagree with them but I'll never get up in arms about the right of others to display them. A point that seems to missed by those who protest against the atheist ads.

Atheists sue Florida city over prayers at meetings - Florida AP - MiamiHerald.com

Atheists sue Florida city over prayers at meetings - Florida AP - MiamiHerald.com

From the Associated Press:

Atheists in central Florida are suing the city of Lakeland over its practice of opening city commission meetings with prayers.
Atheists of Florida filed the lawsuit Monday in U.S. District Court in Tampa.
A federal appeals court has ruled that Lakeland's invitations to local clergy to offer prayers is constitutional, but the judges also stipulated that governments must make a reasonable effort to include all religious faiths.
The director of the atheist group's Lakeland chapter says Lakeland hasn't made that effort. The lawsuit claims the group was made to feel uncomfortable because they did not stand during the prayers or say "under God" while reciting the Pledge of Allegiance.
Mayor Gow Fields says he had expected the lawsuit. He declined further comment.

Friendly Atheist by @hemantsblog � Church Members Sue after Doomsday Fails to Occur

Friendly Atheist by @hemantsblog � Church Members Sue after Doomsday Fails to Occur

It's sad to see these scum preying off of people's fears.

UNI Freethinkers and Inquirers: An Examination of Morals

UNI Freethinkers and Inquirers: An Examination of Morals

From guest blogger, Cory Derringer:

When arguing for the validity and justice of infinite punishment for finite crimes, Christians often appeal to the reasoning that sins against a higher authority are more serious than sins against a lesser authority. Since God’s authority is infinite, they claim, we deserve infinite punishment for transgressions against Him. There are two reasons why this line of reasoning does not pass my smell test: first, the standard by which we are judged is not the standard by which we were created. Second, the application of infinite punishment counteracts what should be the end goal of punishment to begin with.

I am sure many of you will find yourself disagreeing with my first statement, thinking something along the lines of: “Of course we should be judged by God’s standard of morality.” But this is merely a statement of your position, and doesn’t really solve anything. Let’s get to the root of the matter: WHY should we be judged by God’s standard of morality? One argument is that God decides justice, and so actions or decisions He makes are just by definition. This “Richard Nixon” God is always just, even when he violates our own moral compass. In short, proponents of this argument believe that we must trust the Bible’s morality over our own. I would echo Sam Harris in contending that the reason Christianity is so popular in our modern world is not that it boasts an omnipotent God, but that in general, it is morally in tune with the majority of the population. (This is especially convenient because the majority of the population does not read the fine print, I am sure. However, that is the topic of a different conversation) In short, most Christians use their moral compass to decide that the morals advocated by Christianity are valid. They conclude from their moral compass that the Bible is true, and then to decide from the Bible that the Bible is more valid than their own moral compass. This reasoning manages to be both circular and contradictory. The only way to avoid unnecessary circular reasoning at this point is to judge the Bible based solely on one’s own moral sense. If this is true, then it is reasonable to make a conclusion on the morality of the Biblical God based on whether or not God outrages the moral compass.

Another popular argument is that God’s justice is preserved because he gives humanity a way out: all those who accept Christ escape judgment. To counter this, we must only be reminded that it is God who put us into this dilemma in the first place. The idea of sending a “savior” so that the credulous may escape punishment does not even come close to making up for sending even a single person to everlasting anguish in Hell, much less sending the overwhelming majority of humanity there. It is unjust to place humanity in this crisis of free will in the first place (assuming for the sake of argument that we do indeed have free will). This point is one that I will later expand on: infinite punishment for a finite crime is never just.

Now that we have concluded that the “savior” is insufficient to justify sending the great majority of humanity to everlasting punishment for comparably insignificant crimes, we must again ask why our actions should be judged by God’s perfect standard rather than our own imperfect one. The only conclusion I have been able to come to is that God’s standard of perfection is unachievable, which is a point that many of my Christian friends will agree on. Where we disagree is my second conclusion: that it is immoral to hold an imperfect being to a perfect standard.

We were given the ability to achieve the human standard of morality, but we are to be judged by the Godly standard of morality. That is unjust in itself. If God wanted to judge us on the basis of perfection, he should have thought to invent a perfect species. In short, the fact that God creates us with shortcomings and then condemns us for possessing them is unjust, much more so when you take into account the fact that we are condemned to eternal suffering on this basis. In my next section, I will explain how eternal punishment is unjust in any circumstance.
In order to evaluate the justice of infinite punishment, let us examine the purpose of punishment. When a small child steals a candy bar from a convenience store, a concerned parent may make the child apologize to the store owner and repay the cost of the stolen item in some way. The parent may take away privileges or even resort to corporeal punishment. When someone steals a car, our society thinks it appropriate to send them to jail for a period of time. When a drug addict is caught, they may serve prison time accompanied by rehab. The vast majority of punishments (with the exception of the death penalty or a lifetime prison sentence without the possibility of parole) have the goal of reforming the convict, or at least deterring them from committing the offense again. When we punish our children, it is not for the sake of their suffering, but so that they may learn not only that stealing (or lying, or cheating) is wrong, but why it is wrong as well. This is the goal of punishment, and it is the reason infinite punishment for finite crimes is ultimately immoral. An eternal punishment in Hell offers no chance of reformation or improvement for the guilty party, and thus defeats the primary purpose of punishment in the first place. Infinite punishment is punishment for the sake of punishment, not for the sake of justice. This is sadism by definition.

To conclude, the God of the Bible uses neither a just system for judging humanity, nor a just punishment for those who are found guilty of breaking His laws. If the Bible is true, He creates mankind without the ability to be perfect, and then judges them to be worthy of eternal punishment on the basis of this imperfection. Because of this, and because eternal punishment is by definition unjust and sadistic, the Christian God, if He exists, can and should be considered a tyrannical and malevolent God.

No, You are Wrong

Letters to the editors from Creationists are always good for a laugh:

I'm writing in response to the recent article featuring Susan Mule searching for a non-creation science textbook for her home-schooled daughter. I'm also home-schooled, and I love studying science. I believe in creation; however, I enjoy learning about evolution too. Knowing both sides of science is important to me because that's the only way to decide what I believe.

Well I'm glad this person enjoys learning but, creationism is not the other side. No credible science will make that claim.

Although evolution is often referred to as proven, it's the theory of evolution - which means that it's not 100 percent correct. It assumes many important things, such as the formation of the world, how geological formations were formed, millions of years for the formation of life, etc.

I'm getting tired of actually typing out the rebuttal to these washed-up arguments. If you follow this blog, you know what's wrong with this statement.

The rest of the article is filled with similar crap.

Get the Crucifix Out of the Classroom

From Victor L. Simpson:

An emotional debate over crucifixes in classrooms is opening a new crack in European unity.

It all started in a small town in northern Italy, where Finnish-born Soile Lautsi was so shocked by the sight of crosses above the blackboard in her children's public school classroom that she called a lawyer to see if she could get them removed.

Her case went all the way to Europe's highest court — and her victory has set up a major confrontation between traditional Catholic and Orthodox countries and nations in the north that observe a strict separation between church and state. Italy and more than a dozen other countries are fighting the European Court of Human Rights ruling, contending the crucifix is a symbol of the continent's historic and cultural roots.

"This is a great battle for the freedom and identity of our Christian values," said Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini.

The court case underlines how religious symbols are becoming a contentious issue in an increasingly multiethnic Europe.

French legislators begin debate next week on a draft law, vigorously championed by President Nicolas Sakorzy, that would forbid women from wearing face-covering Islamic veils anywhere in public. Belgium and Spain are considering similar laws.

In its Nov. 3 ruling, the European Court of Human Rights accepted Lautsi's contention that a crucifix could be disturbing to non-Christian pupils and said state-run schools must observe "confessional neutrality." Rulings of the court are binding on the 47 members of the Council of Europe, Europe's chief human rights watchdog.

Crucifixes are on display in many public buildings in Italy, where the Vatican is located, and the Roman Catholic Church has encouraged support for keeping them. They will be taken down in schools, however, if the court ruling stands.

Despite the rhetoric, Italy has given no hint that the issue would be enough to compel it to quit the council, something no country has ever done.

Arguing the appeal Wednesday, New York University legal scholar Joseph Weiler stressed the importance of national symbols "around which society can coalesce."
"It would be strange (if Italy) had to abandon national symbols, and strip from its cultural identikit any symbol which also had a religious significance," said Weiler, an Orthodox Jew who wore a yarmulke while addressing the 19-judge panel.

Taken to the extreme, Weiler elaborated in an interview with Italy's La Stampa newspaper, the case for secularism could endanger Britain's national anthem "God Save the Queen."

Lined up with Italy are such traditional Catholic bastions as Malta, San Marino and Lithuania. The Foreign Ministry of the late Pope John Paul II's Poland — where crucifixes are displayed in public schools and even in the hall of parliament — says the country "supports all actions that the government of Italy has taken before the Council of Europe."

The list also includes such heavily Orthodox Christian countries as Greece and Cyprus, as well as Russia, Ukraine and Bulgaria, which lived through religious persecution under communism.

"The support from so many other countries — we are talking here about a third of the membership of the Council of Europe — has given the case great political significance," said Gregor Puppinck, director of the European Center for Law and Justice, a Christian lobbying group.

A final ruling is not expected before fall. Lautsi filed the first complaint in 2002, and both her children are now in their early 20s.

The debate over the role religion should play on the largely secular continent has been simmering for more than a decade.

For years, Pope John Paul called on the European Union to include a reference to the continent's Judeo-Christian heritage in a new constitution, lecturing European leaders whenever they came to Rome. But France and other northern countries blocked such wording.

John Paul's successor, Pope Benedict XVI, urged Europeans to defend their continent's religious and cultural heritage just a week after the November verdict on crucifixes.
Benedict has held up the United States as an example, saying he admires "the American people's historic appreciation of the role of religion in shaping public discourse." The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled in favor of government displays of religious materials such as the Ten Commandments when their purpose was educational or historical rather than religious.

Some Muslims in Europe see supporters of crucifixes in classrooms as applying a double standard to religious tolerance.

Said Bouamama, a Muslim sociologist and specialist in immigration questions in France, says the push by Italy and other nations "reflects a clear preference for Christianity, meaning that tolerance is only extended towards one religion and not for all."

Such a measure must be "either for everyone or for no one. If not, it will produce even greater division," said Bouamama, a researcher at a French institute that trains social workers.

France has western Europe's largest Muslim population, about 5 million, and largest Jewish population, about half a million. Its generally moderate Muslim community has shown itself reluctant to pursue court action in cases involving clothing issues, as when France barred Muslim headscarves from classrooms in 2004.

The European Union calls for the separation of Church and State so all religious symbols should be removed from public places. The problem is the excuse being made that because Christianity is part of the culture those symbols can remain. That is not a secular position. Either ban everything or allow everything. No religion should be given preference.

Richard Dawkins Highschool

From Martin Beckford:

The author of The God Delusion, who has previously described religious education provided by faith schools as a form of child abuse, said he would want pupils to be taught to be skeptical and to appreciate the value of evidence rather than receive “indoctrination” about atheism.

He also said that his “free-thinking school” would provide lessons about the gods of ancient Greece and Norse legend, and would treat the Bible as a work of literature rather than a basis for morality.

The former Oxford University professor and evolutionary biologist, now a bestselling author who has called for the Pope to be arrested for “crimes against humanity” during his visit to Britain, made his comments during a webchat with users of Mumsnet.

Prof Dawkins was asked to set up a “secular school” or an “atheist free school” as an antidote to faith schools by women who believe they are divisive and anti-scientific.

Under plans disclosed by the Coalition last week, parents, charities and voluntary groups will be able to set up “free schools” funded by public money but independent from state control.

He replied: “Thank you for suggesting that I should start an atheist free school. I like the idea very much, although I would prefer to call it a free-thinking free school.

“I would never want to indoctrinate children in atheism, any more than in religion. Instead, children should be taught to ask for evidence, to be sceptical, critical, open-minded.

“If children understand that beliefs should be substantiated with evidence, as opposed to tradition, authority, revelation or faith, they will automatically work out for themselves that they are atheists.

“I would also teach comparative religion, and teach it properly without any bias towards particular religions, and including historically important but dead religions, such as those of ancient Greece and the Norse gods, if only because these, like the Abrahamic scriptures, are important for understanding English literature and European history.”

In reply to another questioner, Prof Dawkins said: “The Bible should be taught, but emphatically not as reality. It is fiction, myth, poetry, anything but reality. As such it needs to be taught because it underlies so much of our literature and our culture.”

He also disclosed that he plans to make a documentary about “the present education system and the role faith plays within it”.

Under current rules, all schools are supposed to provide “collective worship” each day, usually in assemblies, although parents can withdraw children. Schools also have to teach religious education under the National Curriculum, but “free schools” would likely be exempt from this.

I'll go one step further and say that this should be the model for public schools everywhere. Education should be about providing a multitude of views and allowing children to form their opinions based on the evidence.

Oh No! Not the Atheist Billboards! Please God No!

From Fox News:

New billboards that promote "one nation" -- but no "God" -- are causing a stir in a Florida community.

Atheists of Florida, a group that advocates the separation of church and state, put up five signs Wednesday in Lakeland, targeting the area’s devout Christian population, MyFoxTampaBay.com reported.

Members of the organization's Lakeland chapter say they aren’t looking to convert Christians to atheism, but send a message this Fourth of July that atheists are Americans, too.

"There's quite a strong representation of religion out here and we feel that this is really where the message should be," Atheists of Florida president John Kieffer told the TV station.

The billboards read "one nation... indivisible," excluding the phrase "under God." The reference to God in the Pledge of Allegiance was added by federal law in 1954, on Flag Day.

One of the billboards stands across from a VFW Post, and Vietnam veteran David Kissell told the station he thinks it's a disgrace to our country.

"Our nation was formed under God and its principles, and it's a shame we allow this to happen in our neighborhoods," Kissell said.

Kieffer, also Vietnam veteran, admits that gaining acceptance as an atheist and changing back the Pledge will not be easy.

"It's going to be a struggle and it's going to be hard work," said Kieffer. "We are fighting a majority. The majority of this country would not agree with our world view, however we're Americans too."

With all do respect to Kissell for what he went through in Vietnam, the man has no clue what he's talking about.

Creationism in Illinois Schools

From Jim Breeling:

Creationism is the name given to belief that the Judeo-Christian Bible story of Creation--creation of the universe and of humankind--is absolutely true. Vociferous belief in Creationism is more commonly associated with evangelical fundamentalist Christianity. However, various opinion polls have found that a majority of Americans subscribe in some degree to belief that the Bible story of Creation is true--that God created Heaven, Earth and Man. Degree of belief is shown to range from the fundamentalist convention that God created everything in its current unchangeable form about 10,000 years ago, to less rigid conceptions that God's act of creation occurred sometime in the past and then God stepped back to let everything run on its own within certain guidelines.

People who hold strongly to Creationist belief often see science, and the scientific method by which science is done, as a threat to their Creationist faith. This is especially the case for the Creationist view of the biological sciences--and most especially for the scientific understanding of biological evolution. The Creationist account of Creation of the universe and humankind is metaphysical--beyond human underatanding. It stands in opposition to alternative non-metaphysical explanation. It stands in opposition to the idea that non-metaphysical biiological evolution can explain how humans (Homo sapiens) evolved into our present form from earlier non-human and near-human biological entities.

People who believe strongly in Creationism often believe that it should be inerted into the science education curriculum in public schools, and be taught as an alternative metaphysical explanation for how the universe and humans came into being.

I bring this subject up because the question of whether or not to insert Creationism into the public school science curriculum may be forced onto the agendas of local and community school board in Illinois if Bill Brady wins the Gubernatorial election in November. Brady has spoken frequently (but not in his campaign for the Governor office) about his belief in Creationism. He has said that he would favor having the subject taken up by local and community school boards. (He has spoken of favoring dissolution of the Illinois State School Board).

The subject of Creationism in public education is inflammatory. Creationists may see it as fairness; opponents see it as a wrongful; and indeed un-Constitutional insertion of religion into public education. Battles over Creationism in public education can tear communities apart.I hope itdoes not happen in Illinois. I understand why believers in Creationism may try to make it happen.

I do not believe it is necessary because I do not believe that the way our ancestors explained Creation and how science seeks to understand and explain it are necessarily in opposition. Creation stories are common to all cultures. They represent Man's first addressing of the question that anstrophysicist Stephen Hawking has named the most fundamental question to be addressed by science: Why is there Something rather than Nothing?

We don't know precisely how the Creation stories came to be, but the poet W.H. Auden offered a definition of what they are--a poetic response to events beyond human control. Viewed through Auden's lens, Creation stories can be savored as poetry--often great poetry. The poetry has evinced poetic reponse through the ages. Stand in the great cathedral in Chartres and be stunned by the response of artists to the Christian story. Read Dante. I have five editions of his "The Divine Comedy"--four English translations and one in the original Italisn with Gustave Dore's magnificent steel engraving illustrations. I read Danto not because I believe he describes a physically existing Hell, Purgatory and Heaven but because I am moved by his description of the human condition. I read the Babylonian Epic of Gilgamesh and understand how ideas about Creation were percolating through the cultures from which the Bible story arose.

If the Judeo-Christian story of Creation is taught as truth in opposition to science, should fairness not dictate the teaching also of Creation stories of India, the Navajo, the Mandan and the Maya? Or, would it be more enlightening tostudents to teach all of them, as the powerful poetry they are--not in opposition to science, but on their own terms as words that have held men in awe ror 5,000 years?

To answer the question, sure. Creation stories can be taught in schools but, not as an opposition to science. If it provides children with more knowledge that is fine as long as having knowledge is not mistaken for having the knowledge that is most likely true. The Judeo-Christian story in particular could be offered as an entire course. When you consider the impact it has had on Western society and culture it almost seems foolish to not teach children about it. Again, as long as we aren't calling it an opposition or alternative to science but a myth like any other creation story.