Cover via Amazon By Valerie Tarico Bill O’Reilly is in heaven, because the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) has given him a platform from which to launch his latest series of tirades about “The War on ChristmasTM.” Alongside a manger scene and a holiday tree, the executive office building in Washington State now has a plaque that says, “At this season of the Winter Solstice , may reason prevail.” It goes on to add: “There are no gods, no devils or angels, no heaven or hell. There is only our natural world. Religion is but myth and superstition that hardens hearts and enslaves minds.” The sign was placed by ex-evangelist Dan Barker (author of Godless ) on behalf of Washington members of the FFRF, an organization that works largely on separation of church and state . As nontheist and a Washington State member of the FFRF, I have mixed feelings about the sign. Not about the fact that it exists, mind you. Our governor and attorney general have issued a joint statement: The...

A video by gogreen18 Greg Epstein, Harvard's Humanist Chaplain, requested feedback on his Newsweek/Washington Post/On Faith post, " Less Anti-theism, More Humanism ," where he argues: In most people’s minds, “ religion ” does not just stand merely for belief in an unseen, all-seeing deity with a baritone voice and a flowing beard. It stands for the things we hold most dear: family , tradition, and community. Memories of lost loved ones and consolation in the face of death. The organized pursuit of social justice . Not to mention music, art, architecture, and I could go on and on. These things are all good. If you take a rhetorical blowtorch to religion without acknowledging the way it provides them, you get precisely what we have today: a nation and world where despite all our scientific knowledge , 80 to 90 percent of people say they are religious. In short, Epstein seems to be against outspoken atheism. What do you think? Related articles by Zemanta We Are All ...

Ever wonder where we get our Christmas traditions ? This video explains where the most popular Christmas traditions come from. More articles on Christmas: LINK

By DocMike You can't swing a dead cat in many US cities without hitting a religious billboard. But when the Freedom From Religion Foundation put one up that simply said, "Imagine No Religion", Christians went crazy! The sign company received so many calls from people who were "offended" that they took the sign down. And when The Colorado Coalition of Reason put this one up the religious press had a field day. So why are they so offended? What are they worried about? If churches all over the country can post hell threats and cutesy little "What part of 'Thou Shalt" don't you understand" signs, why can't a non-religious group post something as non-threatening as these signs? The answer can only be that religious people realize their belief system is so fragile, so delicate, that anything that provokes thought and reason will likely change the minds of some of their flock. Or worse, these insidious non-believers could create a change i...

Image by TracyJones via Flickr By Neal Stone First off, I haven't written for a while. I am out of phase. What I mean is that I tend to switch back and forth between technical and creative. My research in the historical Jesus has also begun with interesting results so far. But more on that in a later post. Out of curiosity I was browsing local ministries in my area, just to see what weird stuff was going on around here. First off I was amazed at all the bizarre religious crap I found -- even prophetic dancing! What also stood out was the many photos of the ministers praying, looking up into heaven, hands together, looking so spiritual. It looked anything but humble. So, I decided to write a little skit that follows a Christian gal I actually know. This skit is based on my experience along with a little fiction thrown in that's been inspired by other Christians I've known. This is how I view her and people like her. Please pardon my lack of playwriting skills. The o...

"Battle Of The Demons" by KmountMan By Angela The earliest fights between my mom and step-dad were about church and music. My mom became a Christian before my step-dad did. By this time my grandma and grandpa had both become Christians due to my mom's influence. It was a good thing (for a while) and their life began to change too. Over time each of my mom's three siblings would come to the same conclusion, Jesus was the answer. Over time I would come to doubt that conclusion. If Jesus was the answer why did I have so many questions? We attended a small Nazarene church with my grandma, grandpa, my mom's older brother, his wife and my mom's youngest brother. I liked going there on Sundays, sitting with my grandma and grandpa. The benches were hard wood and slippery, but I felt soft and safe. My dad never liked the church. He would go, but he always complained about how boring it was. When the service was over he wanted to get out of there as fast as h...

SILHOUETTE CITY :: 2 minute trailer Trailer for SILHOUETTE CITY - the first post-Bush investigation into the nature of the radical Christian right . It follows the spread of apocalyptic Christian nationalism from the marginal groups of the 70's-80's to today's mainstream Christian right. With the impending re-marginalization of Christian nationalists on the horizon (with the election of Obama ), the film explores the lengths to which religious militants in America are prepared to go for their beliefs. SILHOUETTE CITY :: excerpts Excerpts from the upcoming nonfiction film SILHOUETTE CITY - an investigation of apocalyptic Christian nationalism. SILHOUETTE CITY excerpt: Council for National Policy Meeting Excerpt from the film SILHOUETTE CITY. In Spring 2008, Republican presidential candidate John McCain told the Council for National Policy: "I want to look you in the eye and tell you I won't let you down." This is the only known video documentation of the CNP...

Image by Swamibu via Flickr By Ty H Philips For over two thousand years, western society has been influenced by the teachings of an obscure mythical figure known as Jesus of Nazareth. Why he was called this, is unknown, aside from his disciples trying to fulfill prophecy on their own, because he was neither born there, had family from there, nor ever lived there. Many, including myself, will argue that we are less influenced by the stories of Jesus as much as we are by the teachings of Paul and the future Roman Catholic Church . This paper will be a detailed refute of the ethicalness of the Judeo/Christian faith. I have been plagued, harangued, and fearful of my own objections on many grounds. First being raised in a fundamental and charismatic Christian household, I have ingrained in me, the teachings of a school of Christian thought called, Dispensationalism. This school of thought was created in the 1800’s by John Nelson Darby . Prior to this period, no Christian had h...

by Lance Courtney just posted an excellent rant on November 27th titled " Satan's waiting, and you better believe there are NO donuts ." I was going to write a quick reply, but the more I thought about it, the more it turned into a full on rant. So thanks Courtney for your post. My rant has to do with Courtney's observation that all sorts of Christians constantly say that non-like minded Christians are not "real" Christians. We have heard liberal or progressive Christians on this site say that the hate filled fundies are not real Christians. And we all know that to a fundie, pretty much all the other so-called Christians are obviously fakes. I even saw a YouTube video of Texas preacher RA Smith saying that he would not even listen to the preaching of anyone that reads the NIV Bible . How is that for exclusionary? So here is the deal. In the Bible , specifically John 17, Jesus prays to the father on the night before he gets pinned to the cross. H...

By William S. Burroughs “Thanks for a Nation of Finks,” says America’s Poet, William S. Burroughs, in this beloved Thanksgiving Prayer. (It is traditional for the head of household to recite this prayer before the Feast.)

“Hell” by Hans Memling , 1485 By Courtney I pointed out (in My Atheist Manifesto ) that the Bible claims that people will know Christians at first glance 'by their light,' being such serene and loving beings, and how that's actually never the case. Christians rebut this, with such reliable consistency that you could bet your house on it, by claiming that most Christians are not 'true' Christians. Let's pretend that this is true for an instant. In that case, we can glean two things: It is extremely hard to be a Christian, as only very few people can pull it off despite all the millions that are trying, and If only 'true' Christians get into Heaven, as they say, then even MORE people than we already know of are headed toward eternal torture. The vast majority of God 's beloved creations will die and be tormented, the killers along with the nonbelievers, the stubborn rationalists who insisted upon working in the soup kitchens rather than just TALKING a...

By TruthSurge The standard in morality monitoring just got better. The MoralMaster 2.0 can gage your morality with a few quick questions. Don't wait! Call now and get your own MoralMaster 2.0 morality monitor! It could save you an eternity of regret !

By Brian Crisan Atheism is a lack of belief in supernatural deities (i.e. God); the opposite of theism. Atheists as a whole do not have a consensus on how to define atheism. A number of the issues involved in defining the term appear below. Implicit and explicit atheism Implicit atheism is defined as a lack of belief in a god. Any person who has not been exposed to religious beliefs about the existence of god falls within the definition of implicit atheism. Atheists generally consider this definition inclusive of babies and little children who haven't yet formed opinions about the existence of supernatural deities due to a lack of exposure to them. Explicit atheism is defined as a conscious rejection of the existence of a god. Strong and weak atheism Strong atheism is defined as a type of atheism in which a positive assertion claiming the nonexistence of a god is made. Strong atheists would make the statement, "God does not exist." Weak atheism is defined...

By Ed Current

By Tasida The pastor at Laker Life, a bible study that I sat in on for a few weeks, has said more than once to me, "Sid, you are wrong. You know I love you, but you are wrong." Another lady who attends the Laker Life meetings has also said to me in passing, "Love ya!" And in Denver, where a local atheist group commissioned a billboard that reads, "Don't believe in god? You are not alone," one Pastor Willard Johnson commented, "We denounce what they are doing. But we do it with love, with gentleness, with decency and with compassion." I suppose I should feel blessed with all this freak'n love coming my way, but I don't. How could I possibly be against something as good as love? Well, I'm not. But unlike the word " God ", which could mean anything from the interceding tyrant of the Old Testament to a warm, fuzzy, amorphous blob of universal quasi-energy, the word "love" actually means something. Something impo...

Can We Ever Be Right About Right and Wrong? Sam Harris is the author of The New York Times bestsellers, The End of Faith: Religion, Terror and the Future of Reason , which won the 2005 PEN/Martha Albrand Award for First Nonfiction, and Letter to a Christian Nation . His writing has appeared in Newsweek, Los Angeles Times , The Atlantic, The Times (London), The Boston Globe , The Annals of Neurology, and elsewhere. He is currently researching the neural basis of religious belief while completing a doctorate in neuroscience. He is also a Co-Founder and Chairman of The Reason Project .