I don’t understand New Labour.

[Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor] was poised to become the first Roman Catholic bishop in the Upper House since the Reformation, as part of a drive by the Prime Minister to appoint senior leaders of all the main faiths to sit alongside Church of England bishops. Privately, Gordon Brown had told the cardinal that he was keen for him to provide leadership in the Lords once he had secured backing from the Catholic Church.

Why? Why the hell? Do we really have to bother pointing out that Gordon Brown is the leader of the Labour party? Do we really have to bother pointing out that the Catholic church has not generally been seen as an ally … Read the rest

So I guess Tennessee schools must not be very good – not if the mayor of Arlington is anything to go by. He’s on Facebook, so he shared some thoughts there.

Ok, so, this is total crap, we sit the kids down to watch ‘The Charlie Brown Christmas Special’ and our muslim president is there, what a load…..try to convince me that wasn’t done on purpose. Ask the man if he believes that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and he will give you a 10 minute disertation (sic) about it….w…hen the answer should simply be ‘yes’….”

See that’s why I’m not a big fan of religion and the claims it makes – I don’t like being told … Read the rest

Austin Dacey points out an interesting document.

In 2006, ISESCO [the Islamic Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization] published a Guide for the Incorporation of Reproductive Health and Gender Concepts into Islamic Education Curricula, obviously a critically important subject area where some scientific facts are in order. The Guide, which can be found on ISESCO’s Web site, is addressed to curriculum developers, textbook writers, and those responsible for training instructors in formal Islamic education for students aged six to nineteen. Its introduction stresses the need “to supply, at the proper time, adolescents with appropriate health information on the biological aspects within the framework of Islamic rulings and values” and emphasizes “the fact that Sharia, whether in its original or

The Vatican is restless, and fretful, and aggrieved. The Vatican thinks it’s all most unfair.

the Vatican is concerned about the way in which human rights are being used to regulate the activities of church organisations or to restrict religious displays in public places. For example, the decision of the European Court of Human Rights to order the removal of crucifixes from the walls of state schools in Italy was greeted with dismay by Catholics.

Why? What business do ‘Catholics’ have being dismayed about such a thing? Do the state schools belong to them? No. Do they have authority over state schools? No.* So what business would they have sticking their paraphernalia on the walls of classrooms in state … Read the rest

Beautifully put:

This rejection of the theistic God, and acknowledgment that the problem of evil cannot be swept away through theodicy, might sound like music to atheists’ ears…But rather than characterizing such a position as a significant concession to the new atheists, Armstrong insists on continuing to regard them as her primary opponents. Moreover, she is unable to hold herself consistently to her own apophatic view…[O]n her understanding the apophatic position, rather than discouraging metaphysical speculation, in fact licenses and encourages it…In other words, it is precisely our lack of knowledge of God that enables us to say, well, pretty much whatever we want about God…This is mysticism and metaphysical hand-waving raised to a truly objectionable level. If you

The Irish Times notes how globally the Vatican thinks and acts.

Ultimate responsibility for the way in which the safety of children was so recklessly ignored does not lie with any individual bishop. It does not lie even with the Irish hierarchy as a whole. It lies with the Vatican. We know this because the approach to allegations of child abuse was consistent, not simply between bishops or across Irish dioceses, but around the world. There was a way of doing things – keeping the crimes secret and moving the abusers on to another parish until the whole pattern began to repeat itself.

World government with a vengeance, that is – a theistic institution that has managed to make … Read the rest