Christian News and General Irrationality

Sometimes when a story that as something to do with Christianity I read the some of the Christian news sites. They always make a great laugh! For instance this story about the discovery of Rameses II's first born. His remains are tell he was killed by blunt force trauma to the back of the head (I guess god likes to get his hands dirty sometimes :-)
But that's not what funny. In the article they talk about the interpretation of the bible and how there are disagreements on many issues. They go on to say that something's in the bible are figurative. They continue and say that their interpretations change as they learn more about the ancient languages it was written in, but then they can't say believe evidence over text! They basically say believe the bible until solid evidence is found contrary and then we'll change our interpretation of the bible!?! It amazes me how someone can follow a logical argument and still come up short of a logical answer because it's not what they believe!

The funniest news is "famed" atheist Antony Flew now believes in a deity... He's turning 82. Guess his mind's still intact, LOL!

Ventura, Lennon and me

This article seems to give more credence to my belief that I'm on the majority side of the secular argument, especially when it comes to polititions. In some places it reads like it's from opposite-world; Joan Campbell, general secretary of the National Council of Churches, said, "Karl Marx said something like that. I don't think he wants to be associated with him."(lol!) The claims seem reasonable and fall very close to what other people in power have said: there are plenty of non-religious elected politicians they just don't want to come out of the closet since the climate, especially politically is uncomfortable. I don't think Mr. Ventura made a good political move saying what he says but he is still right. Too bad that doesn't count for anything, especially in Bush's America.

Communicating with the Others

I've often felt it was rather difficult to express my atheist/scientific beliefs to non-physicists, since these beliefs are derived from the scientific world. But these views cross over into every other aspect of my life including politics and social ideology. So how do you sum up these ideas in a neat fashion similar to the "our father," but less dry: Imagine by John Lennon. I haven't heard that song since long ago when I learned to play it on the piano. Recently I relistened to it and was stunned! (Not because someone else had put the general idea into a beautiful melody but because I could very easily explain my beliefs to the older generations by naming the song). This works especially well since most people are especially fond of the song. Also it's a great note to go out on when the discussion turns ugly (usually when the religious person has one or more of their feet in their mouth and starts to get angry).

Imagine, I'm not the only one :-)

There are others!!

I'm rather happy tonight. Two great things happened to me today. The first was when my visiting cousin, who is 100% Roman Catholic and has attended World Youth day in Rome and Toronto, heard stories about the activities of the American religious extremists (such as pharmacists not distributing the pill and Jerry Farwell's new group) and he laughed in disgust!! Whoof! This gives me hope since it implies that moderate religious people don't agree just because they are officially in the same religion.

The second thing was from NOW ,as always, which had an interview with Richard Dawkins. The central argument was the that evolution is a pivotal stone in education since it reinforces the fact that you must only believe in what the evidence tells you. The reason this made me soo happy is the few tidbits he pointed out. Approximately 90% of the American Academy of Science are atheists!! These are the top scientists in their field in the world! I always thought that since I knew soo little and was an atheist older, wiser, scientists would also be atheists. I'm not happy about being right, just about not being alone (relatively and [mostly] present company excluded :-). Roman Catholics are the world's largest individual religious sect, yet they are slightly outnumbered by secularists (source). It seems as affluence rises, so does atheism. Also we secularists (athiests included) are the majority world wide, that's Grrrrrr8!!