“We must acknowledge that science and reason have their limits. It is sheer arrogance to suppose they can explain everything.” … Read the rest
Germany: Jewish dance group stoned
Jun 24th, 2010 | Filed by Ophelia BensonPolice said several Muslim immigrant youths were among the attackers; some shouted “Juden Raus.”… Read the rest
Cops raid headquarters of Belgian Catholic Church
Jun 24th, 2010 | Filed by Ophelia BensonThe archbishop’s palace has been sealed; a retired archbishop’s computer has been seized.… Read the rest
Jerry Coyne on natural selection in humans
Jun 24th, 2010 | Filed by Ophelia BensonThere is evidence – not conclusive, but suggestive – that it happens.… Read the rest
The blessing is not that God will actually do anything
Jun 23rd, 2010 5:12 pm | By Ophelia BensonAt the end of his oil spill speech last week, Obama got into some god talk – quite a lot of it, as a matter of fact. He told us about that pretty custom, “The Blessing of the Fleet.” He explained that what’s so pretty about it is not that it works, because it doesn’t, but that we have goddy company while we drown or choke on oil.
For as a priest and former fisherman once said of the tradition, “The blessing is not that God has promised to remove all obstacles and dangers. The blessing is that He is with us always,” a blessing that’s granted “even in the midst of the storm.”
The blessing is that he is … Read the rest
Nothing fails like prayer
Jun 23rd, 2010 | Filed by Ophelia BensonObama told us to pray over the oil spill. How’s that working?… Read the rest
Prince William made Fellow of Royal Society?!
Jun 23rd, 2010 | Filed by Ophelia BensonHis father, the well-known science hater, is also a member of Britain’s national academy of science. … Read the rest
Reasons
Jun 23rd, 2010 11:59 am | By Ophelia BensonAs we’ve seen, Chris Mooney remarked a couple of days ago that “The fact is, journalism (and dialogue) about science and religion are pretty difficult to oppose.”
Actually they’re not. There are reasons for opposing some general enterprise of treating science and religion as necessarily connected, and there are reasons for opposing much of the product of that enterprise, too. There are also reasons for doing the opposite.
One reason for opposing the product, frankly, is that it tends to be a boring vacuous waffly waste of time. Witness the detailed blow-by-blow account by Tom Paine’s Ghost of the World Science Festival session “Faith and Science” for instance.
Check it out. It’s mostly harmless, it’s pleasant enough, but it’s at … Read the rest
Mo believes in women’s rights
Jun 23rd, 2010 | Filed by Ophelia BensonTheir very own special, different, unequal rights.… Read the rest
Jesus and Mo on ‘so did Mohammed’ campaign
Jun 23rd, 2010 | Filed by Ophelia BensonDamn those Islamophobes – always digging around in the past, looking for dirt.… Read the rest
No prayers before Leicester City Council meetings
Jun 23rd, 2010 | Filed by Ophelia BensonMayor: “religion, in whatever shape or form, has no role to play at all in the conduct of council business.”… Read the rest
Other hatemongers on list of Toronto conference
Jun 23rd, 2010 | Filed by Ophelia BensonSuch as Sheikh Hussein Yee, who once said Jews are the “extremists of the world” and will “go to Hell.”… Read the rest
Togetherness
Jun 22nd, 2010 5:32 pm | By Ophelia BensonOne more thing about Mooney and the jollification at the AAAS last week. Mooney keeps talking about dialogue between religion and science, bringing religion and science together. But what actually happened at the jollification, and what Mooney asked about there, was religious people and scientists talking. That’s a different thing. Obviously religious people and scientists can talk any time, and it’s unexceptionable that they do. But the fact that religious people and scientists talk to each other doesn’t mean that religion and science are somehow getting closer together, or even having a dialogue.
Oh don’t be silly, you may say; that’s what they mean – by “bringing religion and science together” they mean religious people and scientists talking to each … Read the rest
For real?
Jun 22nd, 2010 4:29 pm | By Ophelia BensonA London council was at the centre of a religious row last night after it announced it had dumped Christian prayer in favour of poetry readings at the start of council meetings…The vast majority of councils choose to start meetings with Christian Prayers while a handful of other local authorities begin with other faiths.
Is that true? Most councils start meetings with prayers?
It sounds crazy. Anybody know the facts?… Read the rest
Tarek Fatah on a parting insult to Aqsa Parvez
Jun 22nd, 2010 | Filed by Ophelia BensonThe Toronto Star sent a reporter who has for years celebrated the hijab and niqab to cover the trial of her father and brother.… Read the rest
Gita Sahgal’s speech at One Law for All rally
Jun 22nd, 2010 | Filed by Ophelia BensonBeware when you hear talk of balancing of rights. Generally, it a code for denying women rights.… Read the rest
The eyes of Texas are bloodshot
Jun 22nd, 2010 3:22 pm | By Ophelia BensonThe Texas Taliban Republican Party really is a hoot. Their new platform wants to set up an Inquisition, take the suffrage away from women and Nigras, send Jews to Iceland to do sumpin about that there volcano –
Okay, I’m lying. No all the platform wants to do is, for instance,
restrict citizenship to children born in the United States whose parents are citizens
That’s all – it just wants to repeal the 14th Amendment, that’s all. You know – the one that was passed in the wake of the Civil War, that undid the infamous three fifths rule in the Constitution and the equally infamous Dred Scott decision. And you know what else that particular red-hot idea would … Read the rest
Texas Republicans go for broke
Jun 22nd, 2010 | Filed by Ophelia BensonMake gay marriage a felony! Legalize whuppin’ in public schools! Make Obama a non-citizen in Texas! Yee-ha.… Read the rest
20 June a huge success against Sharia and religious laws!
Jun 22nd, 2010 | By Maryam NamazieSeveral hundred people joined One Law for All on 20 June at Downing Street to show their opposition to Sharia and religious-based laws in Britain and elsewhere and to demand universal rights and secularism.
A new report “Sharia Law in Britain: A Threat to One Law for All and Equal Rights” was published on the day to coincide with the rally. Human rights activist Gita Sahgal said of the report: “I think it is highly significant that in Britain there has been silence where there should have been condemnation. There is active support for ‘Sharia laws’ precisely because it is limited to denying women rights in the family. No hands are being cut off, so there can’t be a problem. … Read the rest