Timothy Egan on the Missionary Impulse *

Feb 25th, 2010 | Filed by

Laura Silsby owed her former employees unpaid wages, so she thought she would be useful in Haiti.… Read the rest



‘Saving the Sacred in a Secular Age’ Conference *

Feb 25th, 2010 | Filed by

Templeton Foundation co-sponsors conference presenting ‘religious responses to contemporary secularism.’… Read the rest



Senior Saudi Cleric Orders Killing of Muslims Who *

Feb 25th, 2010 | Filed by

Who allow the sexes to mix freely in the workplace or in educational institutions.… Read the rest



Intelligent People Have Evolutionarily Novel Values *

Feb 25th, 2010 | Filed by

Intelligence does not correlate with values old enough to have been shaped by evolution.… Read the rest



Rushdie is Writing a Book on the Fatwa *

Feb 25th, 2010 | Filed by

What it’s like to have theocrats in charge of your life.… Read the rest



20 questions – no make that 21

Feb 24th, 2010 5:27 pm | By

Jerry Coyne points out another outbreak of godbothering from Francis Collins – which is all the more inappropriate (the apt word, for a change) now that Collins is director of the National Institutes of Health. (The outbreak is inappropriate, not the pointing it out.) The publisher does not omit to get in the obligatory slap at those god damn pesky impertinent inappropriate noisy New Atheists:

“Is there a God?” is the most central and profound question that humans ask. With the New Atheists gaining a loud voice in today’s world, it is time to revisit the long-standing intellectual tradition on the side of faith.

‘Is there a god?’ is not the most central and profound question that humans ask; far … Read the rest



Religious Schools Allowed to Teach Nonsense *

Feb 24th, 2010 | Filed by

There’s no subject other than sex that schools can teach with their own version of the truth. … Read the rest



Pope Should Come Clean About Magdalenes *

Feb 24th, 2010 | Filed by

The church that revered Mary the Mother of God, yet treated all mortal women as sinners and whores. … Read the rest



No Anti-Hate Banners for Wyoming! *

Feb 24th, 2010 | Filed by

Not if they include no hate for gay people. All very well to oppose hate, but there is a limit.… Read the rest



Francis Collins ‘Proves the Rationality of Faith’ *

Feb 24th, 2010 | Filed by

And he does it once and for all, at that.… Read the rest



Stanley Fish Has Read Another Book *

Feb 24th, 2010 | Filed by

This one by Steven Smith, who says there are no secular reasons. Fish is impressed.… Read the rest



The Freethinker Talks to A C Grayling *

Feb 24th, 2010 | Filed by

About life the universe and everything.… Read the rest



Pregnant Nicaraguan Woman Denied Treatment *

Feb 24th, 2010 | Filed by

For metastatic cancer. If she wanted cancer treatment, she shouldn’t have gotten pregnant!… Read the rest



Those grovelling bishops kissing Pope Benedict’s hand

Feb 24th, 2010 11:27 am | By

A scorching piece on Catholic brutality in Ireland by Sharon Owens.

The church that forbade birth control, yet despised big families of starving, barefoot children. The church that encouraged education yet hated free-thinkers. The church that revered Mary the Mother of God, yet treated all mortal women as sinners and whores. The church that raved about poverty and humility, yet lined the walls of the Vatican with priceless works of art. The church that took the pocket money off children during Lent, yet covered up the brutal rape and buggery of little boys and girls for more than 50 years. And I wondered, looking at those grovelling bishops kissing Pope Benedict’s hand, do they really understand, even now, why

Read the rest


Hair of the dog

Feb 24th, 2010 11:17 am | By

It turns out that American foreign policy isn’t too religious, it’s not religious enough. So says the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.

American foreign policy is handicapped by a narrow, ill-informed and “uncompromising Western secularism” that feeds religious extremism, threatens traditional cultures and fails to encourage religious groups that promote peace and human rights, according to a two-year study by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. The council’s 32-member task force, which included former government officials and scholars representing all major faiths, delivered its report to the White House on Tuesday. The report warns of a serious “capabilities gap” and recommends that President Obama make religion “an integral part of our foreign policy.”

Yeah great – then we can … Read the rest



Fact-checking Bjørn Lomborg *

Feb 23rd, 2010 | Filed by

His extensive references make him look careful and authoritative, but Howard Friel checked them, and…… Read the rest



PZ on Fodor and Piattelli-Palmarini *

Feb 23rd, 2010 | Filed by

They get everything wrong.… Read the rest



Boston Review on Fodor and Piattelli-Palmarini *

Feb 23rd, 2010 | Filed by

Ned Block and Philip Kitcher on what What Darwin Got Wrong gets wrong.… Read the rest



Murder Trial of Alleged Cult Members Begins *

Feb 23rd, 2010 | Filed by

They are accused of starving a 1-year-old after the boy would not say ‘Amen’ before a meal.… Read the rest



Tariq Ramadan Says ‘Islam Has Much to Offer’ *

Feb 23rd, 2010 | Filed by

‘Islamic literature is full of injunctions…Neither is it introducing dogmatism into the debate.’… Read the rest