I asked a Christian poster to this site if he kept the Sabbath holy or if he profaned the Sabbath by going shopping, or perhaps eating at McDonalds after church, etc. Here’s what he said : First and fourth commandments say the same thing. The NT doesn't mention the fourth Commandment to keep because Jesus is that Commandment. He mentions to keep the other nine but that one was replaced by the New Covenant in Christ. You are missing out on some very important teachings that is wonderful let me explain a bit. Lets take the Sabbath in Genesis 2:2-3 "And God had finished on the seventh day his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day, and hallowed it, because that on it he rested from all his work which God had created in making it." He rested, not because he was tired but that the work was complete. Now we have a completion in Jesus and we are in His rest. Hebrews 4:1 "Let us therefore ...

By DagoodS Does God lie? Interesting question to demonstrate our inability to verify claims made about God. I occasionally have the following conversation: Christian: God does not Lie! Me: How do you know? Christian: Because He says He tells the truth! Me: But if he could lie…couldn’t he be lying when he says he always tells the truth? How can you tell the difference between a lying God saying, ‘I always tell the truth’ and a truthful God saying, ‘I always tell the truth’? I leave it to the theists to wrestle among themselves as to whether God can lie. The follow-up question is: Regardless of whether or not God could; WOULD God lie? Think of all the reasons humans lie. Primarily because we think our position is better served to lie instead of telling the truth. As children we lie to avoid the consequences the truth would bring us. Better to blame the broken television on a sibling than take the punishment ourselves. As adults, we lie to avoid a fight with our spouse. Or ...

Dr. Bart D. Ehrman is a New Testament scholar, textual critic , an expert on early Christianity , a professor and the chairman of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the author of "Misquoting Jesus: The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why." Ehrman attempts to discern, as near as possible, the original wording of the gospels, epistles, and other ancient texts. He champions the thesis that early Christians, as they developed a single, orthodox doctrine, altered the Biblical texts in order to make them more uniform and in line with changing beliefs. Ehrman was an evangelical Christian as a teenager, and was very interested in what he thought was God's true message. However, Dr. Ehrman's subsequent close analysis of the Bible and research into the field of textual criticism destroyed his faith in the Bible. Ehrman is now an agnostic, and is a prime example of someone who has looked at Christianity deeply but found it to be ...

From By The Book Comics Click on the image for a larger version. There are so many contradictions in the Bible, you have to be careful or your kids will figure it out. You just can't go in there willy-nilly and read it yourself! Please ask your preacher which verses are okay to read. Better yet, just listen to the sermon on Sunday and don't try to read (or think) for yourself. — DocMike

The Humanist Network News (HNN) Audio Podcast is a monthly one-hour talk show created by the Institute for Humanist Studies . Every episode of the HNN Audio Podcast explores a different area of humanist thought, from politics to pop culture. Click on the player to listen to this month's broadcast. Direct Download Synopsis of this month's episode: Segment 1: Sam Harris on "The Problem of Atheism" Interview: Sam Harris, author of The End of Faith explains why people should not identify as atheists, humanists or Brights. Harris also says that religion testifies (more or less) to the possibility of extraordinary self-transformation, which is why he feels that we must develop a scientific language for talking about "mysticism" or "spirituality." Interview: Daniel Dennett, author of Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon responds to Harris. Dennett recognizes the limitations of the atheist label, but thinks the atheist label needs to be...

Video presentation by Richard Dawkins Part I: Part II: The Enemies of Reason is a two-part television documentary , written and presented by evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins . From the makers: Is it rational that the dead can communicate with the living and give sound advice on how they should live their lives? What about sticking pins into your body to free the flow of Chi energy and cure your illness? Or the bending of spoons using your mind alone? Is that rational? Richard Dawkins doesn’t think so, and feels it is his duty to expose those areas of belief that exist without scientific proof, yet manage to hold the nation under their spell. He will take on the world’s leading proponents in their field of expertise, meet the victims who have used them and expose the history of the movements – from the charlatans who have milked these practices to the experiments and testing that have failed to produce conclusive results. [1] The documentary was first broadcast on Channel 4 ...

A watchdog group claims that members of far-right-wing evangelical Christian groups are having an undue influence on the U.S. military. More on this available at the Christian Science Monitor . From the horse's mouth: Military Ministry with MajGen Bob Dees

August Berkshire, the public relations representative for Minnesota Atheists and Vice-President of Atheist Alliance International , has put together a simple, concise list of 21 Unconvincing Arguments for God (PDF). Here's his list: (1) Holy Books - Just because something is written down does not make it true. This goes for the Bible, the Qu’ran, and any other holy book. It is circular reasoning to try to prove the god of a holy book exists by using the holy book itself as “evidence.” People who believe the holy book of one religion usually disbelieve the holy books of other religions. (2) “Revelations” - All religions claim to be revealed, usually through people called “prophets.” But a revelation is a personal experience. Even if the revelations really did come from a god, there is no way we could prove it. As Thomas Paine said, it is a revelation only to the first person, after that it is hearsay. People of one religion usually disbelieve the revelations of other religio...

Bless the Lard! I am pleased to announce that the Spook of Kryasst who is also somehow magically Him has magically inspired me to enter the race for President of the United States! Glory! I am running as an independent candidate. I represent not the Republicans or the Democrats or even the Libertarians - but the One who Croaked in the Spook and Magically Undeadened Himself for us all! I represent KRYASST , and I pledge to do what must be done to restore our nation to the greatness it enjoyed when the Lard and His Word were revered in this country. As your future president, I rest my campaign upon the following Twenty Promises: If elected, I will restore mandatory prayer in our public schools. Our children will start their mornings off right with a humble prayer of thanksgiving before Alrighty Gawd acknowledging His Lardship, followed by the Pledge of Allegiance with the words “ UNDER GAWD ” clearly stressed. If elected, I pledge that no child will be left spiritually behind. Every chi...

Reposted from: Freethought Café by J.C. Samuelson Arrogance. It's a charge often levelled against those who reject religious faith, among whose numbers can be found many scientists. And, surely there are some scientists and their supporters who are arrogant, just as there are arrogant believers. Yet, while both hold humility as a high ideal, frequently it is the scientist who manages to inspire us by the very public admission of a mistake. In fact, science, more often than not, progresses in spite of arrogance, with advances made by disproofs, rather than proofs, of a theory. One case in point would be the oft-repeated story of the aging zoology professor at Oxford who, after fifteen years of championing a particular theory, admitted his error after a visiting lecturer disproved that theory. Richard Dawkins recounted the tale in the series, Root of All Evil, but here it is as it was written in Unweaving the Rainbow : "Arrogant or not, we at least pay lip-service to the idea ...

By John W. Loftus He or she needs to defend the existence of the social Trinitarian God (versus an anti-social Trinitarian God) of the Bible (which had a long process of formation and of borrowing material from others) who never began to exist and will never cease to exist (even though everything we experience has a beginning and an end), who never learned any new truths, who does not think (for thinking demands weighing temporal alternatives), who is not free with respect to deciding his own nature, who revealed himself through a poor medium (history) in a poor era (ancient times), who condemns all of humanity for the sins of the first human pair, who commanded genocide, who allows intense suffering in this world (yet does not follow the same moral code he commands believers to follow), who's Son (the 2nd person of the trinity) became incarnate in Jesus (even though no one has ever made sense of a person who is 100% man and 100% divine) to be punished for our sins (even though the...

By Bill J I was reading up on an old friend from the ministry the other day. He went back to his roots in ministry and is providing counseling to people burdened by anger, depression and other issues. I recall his teachings and how they influenced me and others in ministry. Looking back I now see how narrow his views were and apparently still are. It is unfortunate that people tend to look to pastors for a lot more than the pastors can offer. My friend sees much of the world through the eyes of religion and his unique version of counseling. He equates depression, addiction and financial problems with harboring secret or not so secret, hatred, un-forgiveness and anger toward people who hurt you. His solution is to talk people into reliving the emotional pain of past experiences and then encourage them to forgive. This brings up a whole host of issues regarding his method and his proof that it frees people from things like depression, addiction, etc. On his website, promoting his book, o...

By Tiny Frog There’s a guy who comes into one of the local coffee shops - 40ish, a businessman, and speaks with a foreign accent. I had met him a few months ago. I didn’t know he was a Muslim until a few weeks ago when he mentioned fasting for Ramadan. Last night, I was working on my laptop at the seat next to him, and he said something to the effect that the US should withdraw from Iraq and let the Sunnis and Shia fight it out. I just kind of nodded, not really intending to get into a political discussion. I don’t recall exactly how we got on the subject, but we started talking about Islam. He was from Palestine and was a Sunni - although, he had a number of conservative Christian business partners and friends. He seemed moderate enough, didn’t have the “I’m a fanatic” beard, had lived in the US for 20+ years, but he prayed five times a day and had socially conservative views. I was interested in hearing his view of Islam, though, so I was asking him some questions about it. He starte...

By Atheist Tooth Fairy (ATF) In learning about the oh-so-many flaws of the Christian dogma, one issue I rarely see come up in discussion is how the Christian God determines who deserves the 'reward' of heaven. Now, I do realize that some denominations shun the concept of “Being Saved”, that the more fundamentalist Christians proclaim as a requirement to gain entry to God’s Heaven. However, it seems the majority of Christians we see come in here tend to believe one needs to “Be Saved” or one will burn in Hell. So for the sake of debate here, let us assume that an adult can't reach those Pearly Gates by using the ‘works’ method and one really must accept Jesus as one’s personal savior and/or be “Reborn”. My first problem with this heaven concept, would be with the children who have not yet reached this “Age of Accountability”, that so many speak about. Obviously the more common Catholic school of thought was, that if one was baptized (usually as an infant) that this infant...