Thoughts of a Freethinker

Both of the big branches within Christianity, Protestantism and Catholicism, have their own long game strategies. The long game is this question, what will happen within the faith or to the faith after we're all dead? The long game in Protestantism is a free enterprise, free flowing structure where new denominations/factions can and no doubt will replace old ones. The new ones will fit cultures of the future and the old ones will be forgotten. Just as today's denominations/churches believe different ideas than they did several generations ago, so future ones will be much different than ours today. Southern churches once preached that God put different races on different continents and did not intend for them in intermarry. That has slipped into the waste bin of time.  The long game is different in the Catholic Church which believes it cannot be allowed to go out of business. It plays the long game, when we're all dead, skillfully for the most part. Success comes from its ...

How many things that "will destroy our society" has the right run up the flagpole in the last few decades? It was a gay partner sharing health care benefits like a heterosexual spouse will ruin marriage. And, gay children in schools will turn others gay. Then, trans children using the wrong rest rooms will cause rape. Books about two fathers or two mothers would make the entire society gay. In 1984 when I, as a Mayor, signed the first Gay Rights Proclamation thousands said the city would be swamped with gay people. The current thing that will bring down our society is "men who dress as women." Maybe the field of study called sociology and its similar field, anthropology, would help. There we would learn some societies have very strict rules on how people dress and others do not. We would learn that societies which adopted the Christian religion are quite hung up about "men who dress as women" but the culture does not have rules against "women who dres...

Recently, the Vatican defrocked Frank Pavone. His diehard fans are outraged. This is because he cleverly manipulated his fans and the press all the while living well from donations and, apparently, abusing some women. By making abortion the "sin" of the century, and himself the main opposition to this one sin, he himself could get away with any sin he pleased.  As the link points out, Pavone was the perfect priest for the Trump era. Trump is so self-important laws have no role in his life. He felt accountable to no one. Women were there to be had. Pavone and Trump are interchangeable.  Pavone was very successful raising money. In his mind, abortion was so important in Catholic beliefs and he was so important in anti-abortion the money he raised opposing it was his to do with what he liked. The Catholic Church, the brand name he used to raise this money, thought the money belonged to it. When he gave the Vatican the bird, it gave him walking papers. With polls showing the majo...

The National Prayer Breakfast has for years been run from a secretive organization that looked dark. Last year there was a huge crowd that included some Russians. No one knew who they were or why they were there. The 2023 version will be much smaller and the publicity claims it will not be the shadowy event of the past.  An atheist group claims with considerable pride the event has been cancelled. As a practical matter this is correct. The President will not attend and, apparently, only some members of the House and Senate. Without the President the event will not be newsworthy, and it is not entirely inaccurate to say the National Prayer Breakfast that has been held for decades is gone.  The National Prayer Breakfast is one of those carefully choreographed events made to appear as though Christianity is the default approved national religion of this country. Having large events at the National Cathedral is another. W. Bush appeared there after 9/11. Better for our country wou...

The Pope made the news with a simple statement of something that is self-evident. Sometimes in religion a leader will says something practical and it shakes the earth. The Pope said, "Homosexuality is not a crime." The recently dead Pope Benedict a few years ago used his annual opportunity for international press coverage, the holiday mass, to tell the world about the evil of gay marriage. That Francis said homosexuality is not such a big deal is almost a direct counter message.  Francis once admitted, under questioning from the press, that homosexuality is a sin. He has never repeated this, however. Recently he canned a Cardinal who repeated the sin line. Franis does not want sin, the Catholic Church and homosexuality linked. There is lots of speculation about whether Francis has been intimidated by the living Pope Benedict. It really doesn't matter, Francis is playing the long game for the Catholic Church, conservatives are not. If those with the money, those in the pew...

I've been saying here for years the man/woman behind the pulpit needs to preach what those in the pews want to hear. Those in the pews, then, write the sermons. It is becoming clearer by the day support for Trump is more mixed than ever. This has to mean some preachers/priests are trying to figure out what to say--they need money on the collection plate. It is so obvious a prominent Christian columnists wrote a parody about the dilemma.   Today a news source says Trump is fuming about an official in Georgia who says Trump's phone call asking for find several thousand more votes reminds me of a story I followed a few years ago. This involved the then Governor of Illinois, Rod Blagojevich. Blagojevich was recorded or it was recalled saying to another official he needed money if he was going to appoint a certain person to an open Senate seat. Gov. Rod was never paid anyone. But, he went to prison for a few years. To my amateur eyes, Trump's recorded phone call sounds like that...

According to research done among generation Z, there is a strong interest in the spirituality of crystals. There can be no doubt mysterious powers from crystals predates Christianity. In my childhood, the powers of comic book star, Superman, came from a crystal. I've written before here about the booming sales of tarot cards. According to the link, tarot cards are used along with crystals.  Those called generation Z were born between 1990 and 2010. Their parents are generation X. We all know generation X was Christian lite and Z is lighter.  Christianity has testimonies of how the almighty saved them from sin, death and hell. Those who worship with crystals provide a lot of testimony one can see on the link. It is said they can heal.  We know from surviving writing there was a lot of superstition and many gods during the pre Old Testament period. It was all part of the freewheeling pagan religion which was not one faith but took many forms. It would make sense that when b...

On sites that discuss the Catholic hierarchy this week is a scathing story about Cardinal Pell. Pell, who died recently, was the Pope's right hand guy trying to straighten out the Vatican's complex and seemingly uncontrolled finances. Pell, it turns out, was part of the underground effort within the Cardinals to line up votes against the liberal wing when the next Pope is selected. He and the other right wingers don't like this Pope's way of simply shrugging off those who slip a little outside the rigid rules conservatives love. Pope Francis, on the other hand, is replacing Cardinals as they pass 80 years old or die. He now has appointed almost the two-thirds it will take to appoint a liberal Pope to replace Francis. That does not mean all of his appointees will do this but it is placing conservatives, like the late Pell, facing an uphill battle.    All of this illustrates how ridiculous it is to believe the Catholic Church, or any denomination or free standing church,...

A few years ago, I was knocking on doors for Democrats when a red faced angry man shouted, "I'm not a Democrat, I'm an American. Republicans are Americans." I suppose he meant Republicans are Christians and this is the only real American.  Those of us who do not believe such bull $hit are helped by moral failures among Christian Republican preachers and politicians. Priests and preachers rung up for sexual issues have helped. Secret gay Republicans being exposed have helped. But no one can help our side moral than the lying money-grubbing Donald Trump. Some Christian leaders are trying to throw him under their bus. But that will not work because he has out maneuvered them. They can express their doubts but there will be no competitors. They have burned their bridges with Democrats and left themselves with only this buffoon. Even the Christian right has to know Trump is not a believer. He was used as a tool for what they wanted.  There is an old saying in politics that...

Reading these days about global warming make one realize the earth is going about what it has done for millions of years and does not know or care one twit about humans. For nearly all of its existence, there were no humans on earth. Only recently did we show up. There are scenarios, i.e. models, where humans are no longer on earth. The entire process of life would start over. While it's impossible to know for certain the future, we know a lot about the past. There were no humans. For some reason, this absence of humans for most of the earth's history does not register much in the human mind. So far as I know, every religion has a fictious story about the beginning of the earth. And, it usually has humans central to the tale. The book of Genisis has man created right there at the beginning. Then it goes on to falsely claim man is the ruler of everything else. That would be nice if it were only true.   It seems like people around the globe would make better decisions about the ...

I've been writing here since forever that women who get abortions will be sent to jail if the forced-birth segment of Christianity and U.S. politics prevails. This idea was scoffed in the comments of this blog at first. No, it was said, the woman is not held responsible. She is a victim. The huge "abortion industry" caused her to have an abortion.  This scheme, making medical professionals the scapegoat was developed because abortions were done at specific locations by specific professionals. Demonization of this small group was attractive and easy. Now pills arrive in the U.S. from all over the world. The pills and the abortion take place in the woman's home. The villains, once easily identified, have now vanished into thin air.  That the woman is not responsible was bull $hit/propaganda from the religious right from day one. It came out of the Catholic hierarchy and was glopped onto by the Protestant right. We all know the truth, that women are the ones who make the...

It is laughable when one reads statements by those trying to put a happy face on Christianity's declining numbers. Often the apologist will try to appear wise and knowledgeable saying like, "Well, people are not really leaving the faith. They are just finding new ways of practicing it outside the confines of denominations."  I've not seen evidence that leaving the confines of denominations is finding a new way of practicing Christianity. It is, instead, people finding their own version of a god. They might refer to it as "God" but it will be his/her own version of "God" which is really just another god. It would be most helpful to see a comparison by a prominent apologist of the new "nones" and paganism. The number of nones now is larger than nearly all denominations. It is so large it is the league of Catholics and Southern Baptists. If nones are a branch of pagans , as it seems to me they are, it means paganism is a major U.S. religion....

The book I'm reading, The Treeline; The Last Forrest and the Future of Life on Earth, is based on the travels of the author, Ben Rawlence, as he circled the tree line of the North Pole. It was a genius idea for a book because it illustrates the perils of global warming in a tangible way. All other material I have read discussed ice core samples, melting of northern ice, sea level rise, etc. The north pole tree line is something more understandable. What is happening to the tree line is very sobering.  The part I am reading just now is about the tree line in northern Siberia. For the author to get there was so complicated I did not have the patience to follow on a current map. It is at least 6,000 miles from Moscow. He flew to the northern most airport, hired a translator, vehicle, two driver/mechanics and a vehicle with rubber tracks for otherwise impassible terrain. The vehicle pulled a tank of diesel fuel to last not only the travel for several days but to idle when not in use. T...

Rural to urban migration is one of the biggest contributors to the direction of societies. Children go from being economic assets to the family to being economic liabilities. Using the language of economics they stop being producer goods and start to compete with other consumer goods. Now it has happened in China. It's population has begun to fall .  While this is good news for the planet earth, its population will continue to rise for many more years. Then, it is predicted to slowly fall. Many time predictions fail to materialize but rural to urban migration seems like a human pattern. It was even the case with early humans who made a living growing their own food. There was always danger, from competitive humans and/or animals preying on humans. The solution was to live in groups that defended together but going out to tend crops when it was safe. Cities were what allowed human populations to thrive.  We know China had a two-child policy for quite a while. Smaller numbers of...

I'm reading a book The Treeline; The Last Forrest and the Future of Life on Earth by Ben Rawlence . The author traveled to countries that encircle the North Pole to look at the northern most tree line. While in these countries he visited with scientists who were studying how the climate was affecting where trees "are walking" today as opposed to their historical locations and species. There is no room for climate change deniers or for those who claim what we are seeing is the same thing that has occurred and is part of natural patterns. It certainly is true there have been cycles of vast climate change in the millions of years of the earth's history. Here in the upper middle west a giant glacier flowed from the North, the Red River Valley, to the Southeast, falling apart in central Iowa. This was only 10,000 years ago. Humans were here already having started between 200,000 to 300,000 years before. There are native groups in Eastern Canada who claim their ancestors li...

A preacher known as an aggressive "church planter" died on Friday when his airplane crashed . His name was Clint Clifton and he left half a dozen small children for his wife to raise. He had a Face Book page that linked to a lot of his writing and from that one can discern much of his reasoning for frantic efforts to start new churches.  He wrote short books on why and how to start churches. One might think dumping collection plate money into new churches is a waste because numbers in Christianity are falling. This preacher did not deny the falling numbers, he even used them to justify the money he took from donors to pay for his salary and airplane.  In his writing he went over in detail the number of churches which close every year in the U.S. Far more close than start up. He thought if the faith could ramp up the numbers of starts things would not look so bleak. Where would all the subsidy money for these new churches come from? He had an answer. He pointed out that all ch...

I'll hand it to the Republican Party. It is good at sending one message and doing something different. An example is the "born alive" bill. In theory , it would require the same services of a fetus that a newborn baby receives.  This bill was passed by Montana Republican politicians and then rejected by voters. Republicans in the House know the U.S. Senate will not consider the bill or will vote it down. But they will be able to say, "We tried." Some are trying to steer clear of passing more bills to prohibit abortions. Smart politics if people fall for it.  One thing good about a Republican majority in the House is the opportunity to show the world what absolute whackos many of them are. We are already seeing religious zealotry. They will soon be showing us their anti-tax zealotry. Shutting down parts of the government has not been shown to be popular but it is not as unpopular as trying to ban abortions. The Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe unset the nic...

News about how women in backward states are finding their way to progressive ones to get abortions keeps coming in. A new bit of information is how busy small border towns with clinics have become since the overturn of Roe. Some towns need more motels to serve patients. Women are driving over 500 miles to get abortions. Women who can afford plane tickets fly to clinics often many states away that are near airports. Our clinic in Fargo just moved a few minutes east out of Fargo and into Moorhead. It is only 15 minutes from the airport and is seeing some patients who fly in. I've read clinics all over the U.S. are seeing patients from Texas. That is predictable because Texas has a population of 30 million. Compare that to some 700,000 in N.D. and four million where I live, Iowa. That would mean at least 30 times as many abortions in Texan as in ND. Now that Texas is discouraging abortions it means many clinics in other states will be busy with only patients from Texas. Several states...

  The passion to regulate the lives of everyone else is on full display . Across the country religious zealots are trying to limit women from getting abortions. They are trying to claim they are personally affected by the abortions of others when they are not. It's as if when one person thinks favorably about abortion another's religion is offended. Where I live the right-wing governor has had a full court press for giving millions of dollars to families whose children attend religious schools. The governor herself hates gay and trans and wants abortions banned. While I assume she thinks private/religious schools will teach her religious views she might be surprised if schools more liberal than public schools pop up and take her money.  The link talks of efforts to stop female soldiers from abortion access in military hospitals. Why would we not encourage pregnant military personnel from getting abortions? Getting an abortion keeps her on the job and saves us taxpayer money....

I'm reading a book, The Mafia; The Complete Story published in 2019. One reason I pick up books about the Mafia is because a very distant relative named George Johnson, who grew up in my tiny town, was the U. S. Prosecuting Attorney in Illinois. He put Al Capone in jail when all others had failed. Capone and those like him mostly avoided jail by threatening witnesses. Johnson did not to go after Capone for murder charges or illegal whiskey because it would have required testimony from scared people. Instead, he used public records and Capone spent some years in prison for tax evasion. The other reason I like to read about the Mafia is the role of prohibition in its success. Prohibition opened the gates of money to the Mafia. Prohibition of alcohol, in turn, is so similar to prohibition of abortion one can see the future from this past.  Roots of the Mafia go back some hundreds of years to Sicily. Because Sicily was on an important trade route, various countries captured and lost i...

On Jan. 6 a crazy with buffalo horns stood at the podium in the Senate Chambers and offered up a quite elegant prayer. He asked God to direct the nation on a good path (or something like that). Ironically, a prayer was also offered at the same spot on the same day by the Senate's Chaplain. The Chaplain's prayer was quite similar. Today the latter prayer is considered quite favorably. The former is "Christian Nationalism." There can be no doubt, however, they are both Christian Nationalism. Political cycles keep on repeating themselves. Today there is an effort to defund certain agencies. The popular candidate just not is the IRS. President Reagan played the same game. He appointed people to head agencies who saw their job as running those agencies into the ground. One was appointed to head Environmental Enforcement. Eventually she was convicted of something and disappeared. Then there was James Watt who was appointed to run the Department of the Interior. He did not l...

Conservative religious groups are forever cloning the names of liberal groups for their own advantage. For example, when the abortion clinic opened in Fargo, an anti-abortion group immediately put an ad in the local yellow pages calling itself Women's Health Clinic (or some similar name) and after the name, "abortions." The idea was to trick women into calling them instead of the clinic that actually provided abortions and giving pregnant women an ear full about the evils of abortion. The phone company, and maybe a judge, made them stop doing this. I was surprised to see a liberal group I have given money to doing the same thing. The Iowa Environmental Committee has announced that next week it will hold a "Prayer Breakfast." Every reader has no doubt heard of the "National Prayer Breakfast" which U.S. Presidents seem required to attend. Those who follow the event carefully have noted it is attended by some questionable people, including several Russian...

Almost out of sight are those who study theology as if it was simply another discipline like psychology or botany. Such study probably has moved along at least slightly the societal exit from organized religion. Within this field of study are questions about why humans believe. Is there some human trait, perhaps developed during evolution, that pushes many humans to believe in some invisible being or rules of behavior from some source never established to have existed? Then there is the question somewhat separate from believing, the question of the beliefs themselves. Is there some independent way to establish why humans are drawn to some beliefs and not to others? A recent academic article by an academic theologian speculated on whether the scientific approach to religion might eliminate his entire field of theology. Certain assumptions underly all of this. We, that is most of us, think more science and/or systematic inquiry is better than less. There is a section of our society, usu...

The recent dust up in the House of Representatives was Christianity pushing itself even more into governing of the U.S. It is a guarantee we will see money held back by the House when some religious members see sin in the government. It will continue what polls have shown, younger voters do not like the old-time religion. The Republican Party's own internal studies have confirmed it is losing ground among the constituencies it needs to remain in power. I suppose the average party leader is like the average fundamentalist Christian and wants the party to be about himself, not anyone else. Mostly, church goers and their leaders aren't concerned with the hemorrhaging of youth out of the faith. The youth are wrong and need to shape up. Current aging members are right so why should they be the ones to change? I didn't watch all the clown circus when Republicans finally chose a new speaker but once a congressman quoted the Bible to make some point. We're going to see and hear...

A gay friend in Fargo went to graduate school in Alabama. He talked about the strong support for gay and trans in the theater department where he studied and the productions with gay themes that are put on stage. On the web, one can read about a wealthy benefactor who make available a resort for gay people to use for their organizations' retreats. Yet, Alabama has more anti-gay state laws than any state in the U.S. It is red neck center. A columnist at the NY Times recently reviewed her visits to Alabama to see what gay life is like there today. She talked to a long-time school teacher, popular with students and parents. His hobby was appearing in drag shows. He donated the money he made to community causes. When a member of the audience shouted a gay taunt, he replied he has been a teacher of decades and heard it all before. Unfortunately, a reporter was present and thought the colorful exchange would make good copy. After some months of controversy, he was forced out of his schoo...

I just finished reading Reorganized Religion; The Reshaping of the American Church and Why it Matters  by Bob Smietana. Smietana wants badly to see the U.S. version of the local church survive. He tells in detail why it helped him during difficult times of his life. He is, however, a journalist and covers well all the problems facing the local church.  One of the topics he discusses is the cultural notion of respect and authority. He laments the plight of those whose career has been in religion. They worked hard to reach the pinnacle they sought. It was to be a theologian with status or a preacher/priest who moved up in the size of churches and status among peers. All of this, only to land at a point in history where no one cares what he/she thinks about them or their views. It happened not because of their own shortcomings but is a society-wide phenomenon. Tonight, I am watching the Republican party long-timers in the House be ignored by relative newcomers. To illustrate, he...

According to the NY Times, abortion pills have been approved for sale at any qualifying pharmacy to be picked up or mailed with only a confidential prescription. Abortions using these pills now account for about one half of all abortions. Formerly use of the pills was supposed to have been in a doctor's presence. I assume that when this system gets streamlined a woman will be able to call her doctor, or some other doctor, and have her prescription sent her.  With these medical abortions becoming more popular each year this new system should make it easier than it ever has been in history to get abortions. Efforts will be made to stop this is some states by there will be thousands of abortions performed right under the noses of pious right-wing clergy and politicians. Already, the hypocrite religious commentators are saying, "This is not safe. The pills should be taken in the presence of a doctor." This is quite dishonest. Anti-abortion whackos want women who are pregnant ...

In one of his social media posts, Trump said the election losses in 2022 were not his fault. Instead, he said, they happened because anti-abortion politics went "too far" in restricting abortions. Trump, who has always seems a few ounces lite in brain cells, does not seem to recognize that his own appointees on the Supreme Court are the single reason some states have put into place draconian laws against abortion.  What Trump pushed along was a view of society that is not reality based. An incumbent House member from Michigan who was defeated in the primary by a Trump Republican then watched that Republican be defeated by a Democrat. He made the observation Democrats have a more accurate view of reality than most Republicans at this time.  Today I'm watching the Republicans in the House try to pick their leader of the House. A few pundits are pointing out the Republican Party put itself in this dilemma by opposing abortion. As a result, some House races were expected to g...

We can't know today how future court battles about abortion will play out, but we know for sure they are lined up over the horizon. As soon as Roe was overturned the arguments that should have been addressed by the Supreme Court appeared in court. These include women of the Jewish faith, for example, who say their religion teaches human life begins at birth and anti-abortion legislation in their state discriminates against people of their faith.  I'm simply unable to understand why Trump's Supreme Court appointees could not understand their opposition to abortion is based only on religion and on one religion only. It is as if they have been sleeping under a rock all of their lives. The truth is, of course, they believe their religious views are the right ones and all others are wrong. As a columnist wrote recently, it is only right  from their religious view that their views be imposed on all others. While courts have a lot of discretion on what is admitted for litigation, ...

Both abortion rights and anti-abortion groups were gobsmacked in 2022. We all know abortion rights groups were hit with what was a few years ago unthinkable, overturn of Roe v Wade. Anti-abortion groups, in turn, were hit with abortion numbers that remained stubbornly strong. There is some consensus that abortions dropped by a tiny 6%. This leaves out the likely increase in unreported use of abortions by pills and improved birth control. On top of that bad news for anti-abortion groups were the election results which demonstrated abortion rights can be an appealing political issue. And the link, from an anti-abortion source, points out, anti-abortion political operatives learned to their surprise there is not a reservoir of political support among voters to eliminate abortion.  Having watched Democrats wallow in low budget campaigns for decades, it was surprising a couple of election cycles back how much money liberal politics can raise. It can swamp Republican fund raising. I lear...