About Atheism :: Objectification and Evangelization (Book Notes: Rapture Culture):

Few evangelicals understand how they come off to those they are attempting to evangelize; fewer still appear to care. This would appear to be a contradictory attitude: they act like they evangelize because they care, but if they really cared then they would not want to appear to be treating others like objects.

The apparent contradiction is thought to be resolved because evangelical Christians imagine themselves to be superior to others in the sense of having access to privileged information.

Hitler & Christian Anti-Communism (Book Notes: The Hitler Myth):

German nationalism was predicated on German Christianity, a Christianity in which religious doctrine and German “character” were to tightly interwoven as to be almost indistinguishable. Nazi socialism was distinguished from the more prevalent forms of socialism in that it was Christian and based upon Christian principles whereas the others were atheistic and therefore lacked a foundation of Christian values — not to mention German-ness.

Christian Nationalism: War Theology in Weimar Germany (Book Notes: The Holy Reich):

Christianity is proclaimed by its adherents as a religion of peace which transcends national borders in a manner that unites humanity. The reality, though, is that Christianity has been deeply involved not only with ideologies of nationalism, but also ideologies of war and violence. It's happened before and it could happen again.

Goose the Antithesis :: Moral projection in Christianity part 1 and Goose the Antithesis part 2:

As I hope you all know, projection is a common defense mechanism in cult-think, and Christianity is no exception. In fact, monotheistic religions seem to engender an inordinate amount of projection. Everything that Christians use to criticize their opponents is in fact a flaw of their own belief system.

Disproving the belief in consilience:

So how can the Christian religion possibly create a good context for science ? No, we have to maintain the hope of understanding reality and improving the human condition. Everything else is pointless and futile, including the Christian worldview. With God, there is only epistemic anxiety, moral conflict and a meaningless divine plan left for us. That's a worldview of despair, not science. Only diversity of thought, freethought, empiricism and atheism justify the rise of science.

Superlicious :: Catholic to Atheist in 2.5 Months:

That is, until one October (or maybe it was early November) night last year. I randomly googled ‘boy scouts evil’. I wound up at http://stupidevilbastard.com/, wherein the author talked about the boy scouts discriminating against atheists. Then it hit me: people who called themselves Christians, like I did myself, were total assholes.

UberKuh :: Is-Ought:

How does one get "ought" from "is" if "is" is all there is? Some philosophically educated theists ask this question of atheists. That is, how does one create a moral standard from reality if reality does not already contain one? Or, if nature is all that exists, then what tells nature how to act?

Braishrub.com :: Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart" illustrates possible reason why fundamentalist Christians dread Halloween.:

No wonder fundamentalists dread Halloween so much! To radical Christians, this holiday subconsciously forces them to face up to their worst fears that someday another belief-system might do unto them what they did unto others.

Evangelical Atheist :: Heaven House:

I’m sure all or most of you have heard about hell houses. Come Halloween, some of the crazier Christian churches throughout the United States borrow the concept of the classic haunted house and twist it into one of the sickest evangelical tools since the Inquisition. Instead of ghosts and goblins, hell houses depict graphic scenes of sin and damnation, focusing on such topics as abortion, homosexuality, fornication and the occult. Generally speaking, hell houses end with a vision of heaven, and the visitor is given a choice of whether or not to accept Christ into his life. In honor of All Hallows Eve, Samhain or whatever else you want to call it, I thought it might be fun to take you on a little tour of an atheist version. I give you… Heaven House! Muah ha ha haaa!

The skwib :: The Lost PowerPoint Slides (Age of the Universe Edition):

• So, first day of Creation was October 23, 4004 BC.
• That means Great Flood was 2348 BC.
• If only we could get this included in King James version of the Bible, then everyone would know it.

Excelsior :: Sunday School:

A recent post at Kingdom of Heathen found me digging up a cheat sheet I compiled a while ago about the Bible's view on women. Christian feminists, this is for you.

Look out, it's evil! :: Nothing Doesn't Work Like Prayer:

Just when you think that Americans can't possibly detach themselves any more from reality, something comes along that knocks your entire worldview on its head. The other night I saw a bumper sticker on the back of a van: "Pray for Our Troops—Operation Prayer Shield." All I could think of at the time was, "Woohoo—great job so far, guys! Keep up the good work!" No rational person could doubt that Operation Prayer Shield has been an unmitigated success from day one—almost as effective as, say, the Iraq War has been in protecting the world from terrorism.

The Huge Entity :: Mu Haiku: The Intelligent Designer's Mistake Motivation:

So this week's Mu Haiku mission, should you choose to accept it, is to ponder the evidence some more. Why did The Intelligent One make so many 'mistakes'?

kinselection :: In vitro fertilization is murder:

Now, if one believes that embryos are human beings, deserving of most if not all rights a human being should have, then one should oppose in-vitro fertilization even more than one opposes stem cell research or abortion – each and every in-vitro fertilization means not one dead baby, but more than a dozen! This is without even mentioning the hundreds of thousands of spontaneous abortions (i.e. miscarriages) that occur every year; a quick Google search turns up no results for research to end them under normal circumstances (it’s true that people are researching, for example, the effects of pesticide exposure and incidence of spontaneous abortion). It is distressing indeed that so many deaths seem to have escaped the notice of “pro-life” activists.

Skeptico :: Terrell Owens – what’s God trying to say now?:

Back in February I reported how pro footballer Terrell Owens, who broke his leg in December, was OK to play in the Super Bowl only seven weeks after surgery. Owens claimed his recovery was part of God’s plan to give him an even bigger platform during Super Bowl week than he otherwise would have had, thus proving God's greatness.

Jesus’ love alive in Mexico:

But only if you follow the right Jesus. Following the wrong Jesus will get you thrown out of your home.

Frank's Atheistic Ramblings :: We are more alike than you know:

For both atheists and theist, there is a tendency to stick to your own kind. You mostly read blogs about atheism or your respective theism. You occasionally venture over to the other side but only to disagree with them and point out how they are wrong.

The Daily Transcript :: More Data on Religion and Behavior:

So religious belief does not prevent you from committing a crime, committing suicide or dying early. It does make your teenage daughter more likely to get pregnant. In addition the more religious a society is, the more likely that a childbearing woman gets an abortion. And if the child is not aborted, it has an increased chance of dieing before the age of five. Perhaps increased religiosity results in a lack of education, especially for women? Or perhaps religion tends to antagonize woman's rights?

No More Mr. Nice Guy! :: Halloweenies:

You know, half the world's problems (or some huge portion of them at any rate) are due to the instinctive fear and loathing Christians feel for everything they don't understand, which is just about everything, their insistence on equating everything outside their narrow little circle with evil and Satanism, and their projection of their own twisted hang-ups onto everyone else.

Back To The Woom :: Rejuvenating atheism:

Against this trend, today's atheists need to reassert the optimism of the classical atheists. Contemporary atheism is all too often understood as (to quote the Daily Show's Stephen Colbert) "the religion devoted to the worship of one's own smug sense of superiority." This is fine -- intellectual superiority is certainly a huge benefit -- but it's not enough to give atheism popular appeal. Frankly, atheism has a lot more going for it than simply intellectual coherencee -- and these aspects are underemphasized.

Pooflingers Anonymous :: Comment Poo:

Who says I'm an atheist? Accepting that science works and that evolution is the most likely vehicle to explain the diversity of life on our little speck of dust doesn't mean I have to be an atheist. I simply don't believe in the same thing as you do. I lost my faith in man's interpretation of God long ago and found my own way... a way that keeps me intellectually and spiritually fulfilled. If that is unpalatable to you, I am sorry.