Posted inMorality Politics

Judge’s gay marriage ruling is putdown of religion

Out here on the left west coast people are pretty tolerant and open-minded, by and large. For example, in a few months Californians are going to vote on legalizing marijuana. Oregon probably will follow in 2012. So I was surprised when a ban on gay marriage passed in California a few years ago. Now that a federal judge, Vaughn Walker, has declared the ban unconsitutional, it's becoming more obvious why voters were taken in by the spurious arguments of Proposition 8. Religion is the main culprit. A front page story in yesterday's The Oregonian contained these telling quotes: Walker, in…
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Posted inPolitics

“Saint” Sarah Palin shows danger of mixing religion & politics

Often people say, "What's the harm if people believe in whatever religion they want to, no matter how weird it might seem to others?" Well, here's a good example of some harm: the June 21, 2010 cover of Newsweek. The caption under the photo of Palin with a halo and hands prayerfully folded reads:Saint SarahWhat Palin's appeal to conservative Christian women says about feminism and the future of the religious right.I've been told by a friend who was born in Germany, visits Europe regularly, and keeps up on European goings-on directly via reading online news sources that politicians in Europe…
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Posted inFundamentalism Politics

Texas dismisses Thomas Jefferson from schools

We didn't need more evidence that religious fundamentalists are dangerous wackos who seek to undermine American freedom and independence -- but, sadly, here it is:The Texas State Board of Education removed Thomas Jefferson from the school curriculum, replacing him with John Calvin, who, not surprisingly, also was a religious wacko.Jefferson, on the other hand, held unconventional Christian beliefs and strongly argued for the separation of church and state. He also, of course, was the third president of the United States, the principal author of the Declaration of Independence, and one of the most influential Founding Fathers of the United States.But…
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Posted inPolitics

Evidence of Rumsfeld’s Christian war

Here's a great example of how unsupported religious beliefs get mixed up with politics and foreign policy, helping lead to war:Slides of former Bush defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld's briefings to the White House where he juxtaposed war images with inspirational Bible quotes.Take a look.
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Posted inPolitics

Sarah Palin’s Christianity is scarily senseless

Yesterday I thought I'd pushed the car radio button that brought up Oregon Public Broadcasting, so I wasn't all that surprised to hear Sarah Palin's distinctive voice. It appeared that she was being interviewed by someone with a Christian bent. I figured that an excerpt from the interview was being played so it could be discussed from OPB's usual moderate perspective. But Palin and the man she was speaking with kept on talking. I heard her refer to him as "Dr. Dobson." That spurred me to glance at the radio setting. Oh my God! I had stumbled onto the dark…
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Posted inPolitics

Pray for McCain-Palin (they need it)

Thanks to Pharyngula, I learned about a Pray for McCain-Palin web site, which I was pleased to visit, adding my voice to a poll about whether McCain's pick of Palin made me more or less likely to vote for him. I'm totally supportive of this site. It's hard to think of anyone who needs prayer more than John McCain and Sarah Palin. (Proof, here and here.) In case you're not sure about how to pray, the site provides some helpful specific prayer requests. My favorite is: Pray for the peace of mind of the candidates & their families and that…
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Posted inPolitics

McCain campaign says God wants Obama to lose

Reason number 439,816 to not vote for John McCain (don't have time to list rest of them): A minister delivering the invocation at a McCain rally asked that God protect His reputation by orchestrating an Obama loss – since non-Christians are rooting for McCain's opponent. "There are millions of people around this world praying to their god—whether it's Hindu, Buddha, Allah—that his opponent wins, for a variety of reasons. And Lord, I pray that you will guard your own reputation, because they're going to think that their God is bigger than you, if that happens," said Arnold Conrad, the former…
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Posted inPolitics

I’m praying that Sarah Palin never becomes V.P.

Though Sarah Palin's hotness makes her more appealing to look at, compared to the usual wrinkled right-wing religious white guys, her Christian zealotry is just as scarily ridiculous. Scary, because here's a God is on my side true believer who could, just possibly, heaven help us, be a heartbeat away from the presidency. Oh, wait! We already have a president like that. So what's the problem with another one? Lots. By comparison, Sarah Palin actually makes George Bush look minimally competent and well-informed. So her astounding fatuous cluelessness, when combined with her trite Christian fundamentalism, results in an exceptionally dangerous…
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Posted inPolitics

God rejects prayers for rain on Obama

Excellent news for those of us who want Obama to win in November: God is on his side! You want proof? Easy. Anti-Obama Christians have been praying for rain in Denver tomorrow, to wash out his outdoor acceptance speech. Here's the forecast. 0% chance of precipitation. Will a miracle happen? Odds aren't zero, but close to it.
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Posted inPolitics

Obama outshines McCain in faith forum

I doubt that Barack Obama will be using a Church of the Churchless endorsement in his presidential campaign, but I'll offer it anyway: he got more kudos from me than John McCain did as I watched yesterdays' "Civil Forum" sponsored by Rick Warren's Camelback Church. Still, neither candidate impressed me from a churchless perspective. No big surprise. Heck, they were speaking in a church. And trying to appeal to evangelical voters. Both Obama and McCain struck me as sincere. Each has deeply felt religious convictions, so far as I could tell. I expected McCain to be less comfortable in the…
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Posted inPolitics

Dobson’s illogical attack on Obama

"Illogical" and "fundamentalist" are so closely associated, it isn't big news when a closed-minded evangelist says stuff that makes me go Huh? But James Dobson has broken new ground in crazy ass theological reasoning, as described in a CNN story: "Evangelist accuses Obama of 'distorting' Bible." Dobson is righteously pissed at Obama for making terrific religious sense. In comments aired on his radio show Tuesday, Focus on the Family founder James Dobson criticized the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee for comments he made in a June 2006 speech to the liberal Christian group Call to Renewal. In the speech, Obama suggested…
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Posted inPolitics

Obama recognizes limits of faith

This is a great speech by Barack Obama on the proper place of religion and faith in public policy. He should get the churchless vote with these sentiments. Obama certainly has mine. I just wish he'd repeat it now, saying the same things he did in 2006, since he has a much bigger audience as the Democratic presidential candidate. For the broadband impaired (I'm not aware of a transcript of this video), here's some of what Obama said in the five minutes. These aren't quotes, just a summary of main points. --This is a nation not only of Christians, but…
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Posted inPolitics

Curse the National Day of Prayer

Here on the West Coast there's still a few hours left to take part in the National Day of Prayer (May 1). My recommendation: swear at it. That's the tack one of my favorite web sites, Pharyngula, took. In the midst of a post on this ridiculous religious observance I found a well-spoken pithy piece of advice. "Fuck the National Day of Prayer." Now, that might seem a bit harsh. What's wrong with warm fuzzy prayer? Well, nothing. So long as you're into having one-sided conversations with imaginary people. But a few minutes of browsing the official web site of…
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Posted inPolitics

Bitterness and religion: some advice for Obama

I've been doing some thinking, from my churchless perspective, about the controversy over Barack Obama's remark that people in struggling Pennsylvania towns are bitter and cling to religion (among other things). And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations. Clinton has seized on the words "bitter" and "cling" in blasting Obama for his supposed elitism. On cable news today I kept seeing her new ad being played. In the ad a Pennsylvania woman…
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Posted inPolitics

Obama paints a pleasing shade of religious gray

There's too much black and white in the world. Especially when it comes to religion. Believers adore crisp, clean demarcations between right and wrong, faith and faithlessness, truth and falsity, sacred and profane. Me, I'm increasingly into gray. Not that there's anything wrong with black and white. After all, their mixture produces the subtle shades that I like. Politicians, though, are under a lot of pressure to stake firm positions. "You're either with us, or against us" is a simplistic example. So this morning I was eager to read Barack Obama's speech on race and religion to see how he…
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Posted inPolitics

Irreligious questions for the presidential candidates

Oh, if only the press would have the balls to ask the twelve questions John Allen Paulos wants posed to our presidential candidates. A sampling: For Huckabee: Do you really believe, Mr. Huckabee, that the Earth is only a few thousand years old and that humans and dinosaurs cavorted together? For Romney: Do you not see an implicit religious test in your statement that "Freedom requires religion, just as religion requires freedom"? Furthermore, are not, respectively, most of Europe and some Islamic countries obvious counterexamples to your statements? For others: Do any of you think God speaks to you, only…
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Posted inPolitics

Huckabee wants Constitution to be “God’s standards”

Only in America. And Iran. Few countries in the world would entertain the idea of founding their constitution on a religious standard. Sadly, I live in one. It's astounding. A leading contender for the presidency of the United States, Mike Huckabee, says: I have opponents in this race who do not want to change the Constitution. But I believe it's a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living god. And that's what we need to do -- to amend the Constitution so it's in God's standards rather than try to…
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Posted inPolitics

Founders’ faith was pretty much faithless

Listening to conservative talk radio before Christmas, to hear what the uninformed and clueless have to say, I wasn't disappointed when the subject turned to how the founding fathers of the United States supposedly were devout Christians. That's a bunch of hooey. The main evidence that usually is dragged out for this crock of historical B.S. is the reference in the Declaration of Independence to the Creator. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit…
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Posted inPolitics

Questioning a politician’s religious belief isn’t unconstitutional

In a recent column, "An Overdose of Public Piety," Charles Krauthammer gets the issue of religion in politics partly right and partly wrong. That's pretty good for Krauthammer, because usually I find myself disagreeing with his conservative world view. But in this piece he appropriately decries how Republican presidential candidates, like Mitt Romney, feel that the only source of genuine inspiration for "values voters" is religious belief. Romney has been faulted for not throwing at least one bone of acknowledgment to nonbelievers in his big religion speech last week. But he couldn't, because the theme of the speech was that…
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