I have been engaged in an ongoing discussion with several friends about the concept of human Free Will, a cornerstone of all Abrahamic religions. If humans do not have Free Will, the whole scheme of sin and salvation collapses.
Category Religion and Society
The Daily Beast recently reported the following:
According to a Pew Research Report released earlier this year, the percentage of the U.S. population that identifies as Christian has dropped from 78.4 percent in 2007 to 70.6 percent in 2014. Evangelical, Catholic, and mainline Protestant affiliations have all declined.
Busybody: noun; a person who mixes into other people’s affairs; meddler; gossip
Every year at this time, as predictable as snow in Saskatchewan or icicles in Idaho, it happens. The bleating about the “oppression” of Christians starts anew. Usually, it is triggered by some evangelist group that wants to place a nativity crèche on a courthouse lawn or a public park.
I have been quite outspoken in recent times about what I believe to be a necessary and inescapable connection between Islam, as properly understood (yes, that notion is wrought with issue) and violence (and intolerance). I have even debated this publicly and given a public talk on the topic (at the University of Exeter).
The BHA has just announced the latest Freedom of Thought report: Global persecution of humanists, atheists and the non-religious has risen…
James A. Lindsay, who wrote Dot, Dot, Dot, with its foreword by the late Victor Stenger, has written another cracking…
I am reposting this in response to the terror attacks in France last night, resulting in the deaths of over one hundred people. As ever, the internet is awash with right-wing shouts to “kill all Muslims” and refugees, to the left-wing shouts that it is the Imperial West to blame and not Islam or Muslims. Neither of these positions are correct. It is obviously thoroughly complex, indeed involving international politics. However, to deny the Qu’ran, Muhammad and the Hadith causal responsibility in these atrocities is to deny the self-determination of those very terrorists who claim that they are doing these actions in the name of Islam and their god.
From the very beginning, I was primed to be a Liberty University student. My upbringing as a dissatisfied fundamentalist Christian had built an aching for a more accepting, understanding religion that focussed less on the semantics and more on the sincerity. Growing up, I was surrounded by people who defined their faith as the drinks they avoided and the movies they skipped, and I longed to find a community that emphasized their personal relationship with Christ over their public acts of piety.
My first impression of Bob Jones University was a glowing one. Every year, hundreds of high school students are bussed onto the campus from conservative churches and schools (half-jokingly referred to as “feeder schools” by students and faculty at BJU) to visit for a week. This year, I was one of those lucky kids. Getting my first glimpse at real college life was a moment I’d long anticipated, and for the week I was there it was everything I wanted.
The Guardian reports this insanity: Parents fatally whipped teen who wanted to quit church, New York court hears A mother…
This is a really important topic and piece which I think needs to be understood by many, not least the politicians working on the world stage. In fact, politicians seem these days to lack in philosophical rigour and understanding. Let me show you one such example here. The topic of Saudi Arabia, its history of human rights abuses, and it sitting so ironically on the UN Human Rights Council is one which is hitting the media outlets in the UK presently.
The BHA reports this annoyingly insane story. Please tweet them or email a complaint:
The British Humanist Association (BHA) has reacted with alarm at news that a non-religious human rights activist, Maryam Namazie, has been denied the opportunity to speak at a student society event, seemingly because she is an advocate of secularism who is critical of religious extremism.
The Founding Fathers are still on the front line of debate amongst atheists and Christians, secularists and theocrats alike. All these years later there is still confusion abounding. Part of the reason why is that there are many misquotes (and this can happen on both sides). Here, for example, is a quote (A letter from Adams to Jefferson) sometimes used by secularists:
“I have been the biggest hypocrite ever,” Josh Duggar wrote, in a confessional statement he later took down. Indeed, it has been a tough summer for the former reality TV star and executive director of the Family Research Council’s lobbying arm, now exposed as a former child molester, porn addict, and Ashley Madison-using adulterer.
This post is one of my most popular pieces on this blog, and I am revising it slightly to make it even tighter, reacting to previous comments on the last version of this piece. I have tried to be detailed enough for it to be fairly comprehensive, though it could be more detailed; then again, it could be shorter and more digestible. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.
I recently had a fascinating debate with David Warden of the Dorset Humanists concerning Islam, which I have written fairly extensively about. The debate was really well-mannered and a pleasure to be involved with. Thanks to the Dorset Humanists for hosing and inviting me. Here it is:
This news comes from the British Humanist Association:
Taking questions in the Senedd, the Welsh Minister for Education and Skills, Huw Lewis, has announced that he wants to see a transformation of the way in which Religious Education is taught in Wales. Under the new proposals, and in a significant break from the current system, the subject would be renamed and incorporated into a new ‘Religion, Philosophy and Ethics’ syllabus
Adam Curtis has made some brilliant documentaries. Watch this one. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3NIXAxt2MQ
The Guardian reports this extremely interesting set of British attitudinal survey results. Check the ones on religion out: Religion Which…
Urghhh. This was so painful to watch. They should be had up in court for misinforming and mischaracterising. This is…