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Freedom From Religion Foundation Wins Again

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While I have enjoyed every visit I've made to the State of Oklahoma, I have to say it has an element in its politics that is just plain loony. Currently, that is a State Superintendent, Ryan Walters, has ordered all schools to teach the Bible. When American Atheists and the Freedom From Religion Foundation sent letters to school districts across Oklahoma warning them this was in violation of the U. S. Constitution and they should ignore the order, the Secretary of Education sued. He lost . Will he now get on to the docket of the U.S. Supreme Court and get the case reversed? Could happen. One of many problems the State Superintendent faces is that Oklahoma law gives local schools the exclusive power to decide curriculum. The State Superintendent does not have the power to enforce his own directive. Walters also required school districts to order the number of Bibles to equal the number of students. When districts said they did not have such money he got it from big money donors. He ...
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Did Religion Come from Intoxication

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Every reader has had his own experience with stimulants or intoxication. Maybe it was you yourself or people close to you. I had an experience that is perhaps a little different than many people.  A couple of decades ago my wife and I visited the country of Bangladesh. It remains one of the poorest countries in the world. Our friends/hosts there were natives who had spent time in Fargo, ND where we lived then. One of the several experiences our hosts provided us was a trip into the country where they chatted with several groups of rural people. Several were rural young women. The conversations were about the small loans they had received from a nonprofit. But I was distracted by the red around their mouths from chewing beetle nuts. Why did they have this habit, I wondered. It turns out beetle nuts or beetle juice has been enjoyed by locals in that part of the world for at least 4,000 years. Beer has been made for much longer. Smoking cigarettes is the beetle juice of western societ...
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Christian Faith was Once so Proud of its Missionary Work

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I suppose white missionaries went to Africa well over 100 years ago and Christians there are 3rd, 4th or 5th generation. Before Christian missionaries began converting locals other religious beliefs were already there. As Christianity moved in the old culture that fueled the previous religions remained. Ever since Christians thought they had the upper hand hammering down on the local culture the truth has reared its head. The original culture is still there.  There seems to be a slow realization in the U.S. religious community that using money collected from the pews is not bringing Christianity to those cultures quite as planned. Both those people converted and those born to native Christian parents are a branch of the faith different than the one back here. The original branch of the Presbyterian denomination recently closed down it entire missionary enterprise. Southern Baptists reduced the size of its operation. Watching videos of Lutheran Missouri Synod I see expressed often ...
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Theories About Why the Roman Empire Fell

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I'm far from an expert on history, but I enjoy learning about the Roman Empire. I've read a couple of books that try to explain how it became so successful and why it fell eventually. Today in National Geographic is a summary of those who argue the environment and disease played to big role in both its success and failure. During its long history there was some change in the earth's orientation to the sun. This has happened several times and may be happening now. This causes food production to rise in some areas and fall in others. When "Paul" of the Bible walked around starting churches were those he converted open minded because of theological arguments or because crops were failing. The Bible says people were waiting for another leader. More likely crops were not good and they blamed it on the Pagan gods. Maybe this new god would bring better crops. The more we learn about movements of people from place to place over hundreds of thousands of years before record...
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"Priests for Life" Watched the Moral Majority Die

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Frank Pavone, founder and chief of Priests for Life, posted an appeal to followers that they demand the new pope reinstate his credentials as a priest. He was defrocked by Pope Francis. Now he cannot do mass, funerals or weddings or present himself in any way as a priest representing the Catholic corporation. I suspect he wants his priest credential back because it helps him raise money. He may well be experiencing the same drop off of donations I suspect is happening to Tony at the Family Research Council.  Pavone was a priest when he started Priests for Life. As it grew, high up officials in the Catholic denomination began asking for information about Priests for Life. Pavone gave high officials the bird. I'm thinking he said something like, "Elvis is the King of Rock and Roll. I'm the King of Anti Abortion. You can't demand anything of me." Why did officials want to see Pavone's books? Why did they care? I'm guessing Pavone asked supporters in dioceses ...
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How the Climate Influences Religion

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I'm reading a book called Apocalypse . The book plots huge changes in human behavior that happened in response to apocalypses. As archeologists continue to discover more human history we now know there were humans living in many places before there were many feet of ice. The Red River Valley of the North is an example. They had to move. The black plague wiped out over half the population in Europe. There were floods and droughts where people had to change diets and move on.  Preceding each of these apocalypses generations lived with the anticipation things would remain as they were forever. If there was some memory passed down from generations before those events were probably not considered important to life at that moment in time. Lots of things in today's Christianity are climate dependent. There is no planning that some apocalypse might happen.  One of them is the abundance of food and housing. When I have mentioned the wisdom of limiting population growth or even reducing...
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Do You Know Anyone Experiencing a "Spiritual Hunger"

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I recently reviewed something from my life of many decades as a practicing Christian followed by many decades of being an atheist (yes, I'm an old guy). It was the list of things in religion that were and remain unverified. I can't list every one of them here but we've all heard the same ones. There are invisible beings, God wrote the Bible, there is a life when we are dead, there are agreed upon rules of sexuality, the Bible says things that aren't in the Bible, we are here from creation, there was no evolution, etc. All of these have always been preceded by the words, "This is the truth."  If there were a candid training program for Christian clergy, one unit would be entitled "How to make things seem real when probably they are not." Recently, I've noticed a new one. Almost every day just now some preacher is telling an audience, "There is today a spiritual hunger among people and we will soon see a huge revival." I've seen this ...
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