Religion
Tag archives for Religion
The Superbowl and God
Posted by Greg Laden on February 2, 2013 
The Public Religion Research Institute has conducted a poll about the Superbowl They found: 27% of Americans believe that God plays a role in determining which team winds a sporting event. 53% of Americans believe that god rewards athletes who have faith with good health and success 42% of Americans don’t think that those 53%…
Quiet down the atheists
Posted by Greg Laden on December 14, 2012 When Atheists talk, people listen. Then, they tell them to shut up. David Phillip Norris of the Twin Cities recently wrote an article for MNPost called With talk of tolerance and equality, one group is still forgotten: atheists. This was written as a reflection on the just finished and rather dramatic fight against an anti…
How many people were killed as Witches in Europe from 1200 to the present?
Posted by Greg Laden on December 2, 2012 
I recently came across a reference to the total number of people killed for being Witches in Europe since the historically documented practice began in the early Middle Ages. (The idea of Witches is much broader than the European practice.) The number was in the tens of thousands. Looking at the reference for this in…
The Perfect Christmas Gift for my Minnesotan Friends!
Posted by Greg Laden on November 16, 2012 Atheist Voices of Minnesota: an Anthology of Personal Stories was released earlier this year. It is chock full of personal stories about the journey from some place to atheism, written by Minnesota authors such as Norman Barrett Wiik, Elizabeth Becker, Kenneth Bellew, Ryan Benson, August Berkshire, Donald L. Boese, Ryan Bolin, Jill Carlson, Justin M.…
A multiplicity of strategies is better than infighting when addressing creationism and related problems
Posted by Greg Laden on May 4, 2011 I have always thought, naively and probably incorrectly, that what defined Accommodationist is what they think, not how they argue. At the same time, I have always thought that what defined a “New Atheist” is how we argued, and not what we think.
This video will make you throw up a little in your mouth.
Posted by Greg Laden on March 4, 2011 Or worse. Below the fold. Not work safe. Don’t be holding the kitty or you might squeeze it by accident:
Religion crossing the line: “God is not so silly to allow people to perish” from floods and storms
Posted by Greg Laden on February 16, 2011 How do you separate harmless belief in religion or superstition and … well, harmful belief in religion or superstition? We have been having a bit of a go-round* between some of my regular blog readers, including my Catholic but not anti-Evolution niece whose daughter recently acted in a commercial for the Creation Museum in Kentucky.…
Game Show Will Pit Religious Leaders Against Atheists
Posted by Greg Laden on January 15, 2011 In Turkey, there is a game show in which representatives of several religious cults (Islam, Christianity, Buddhism, and Judaism) attempt to convert one or more of a group of ten atheists to their religion. The atheists are pre-certified by a panel of experts and any converts are traced for a period of time to ensure…
Andrew Brown is an Ignoramus
Posted by Greg Laden on September 23, 2010 Andrew Brown has written a blog post about the atheist rally in England at which Dawkins gave his now famous speech. Brown quote mines Dawkins in a way that is utterly abominable. Dawkins, in his speech, discusses a somewhat complicated relationship between certain facts … not too complicated but complicated enough that an ignoramus would…
Hitler’s (Christian) Pope
Posted by Greg Laden on September 17, 2010 Summary of Hitler’s Pope: The Secret History of Pius XII from Library Journal: Relying on exclusive access to Vatican and Jesuit archives, an award-winning Roman Catholic journalist argues that through a 1933 Concordat with Hitler, Pope Pius XII facilitated the dictator’s riseAand, ultimately, the Holocaust.
The True Story of Easter
Posted by Greg Laden on April 1, 2010 This is not only the true story of easter, but it is also a commentary on which is better, cats or dogs. Verily, many mysteries are explained in this epic documentary:
Don’t be a Jew
Posted by Greg Laden on June 27, 2009 Joseph and Mary, and Little Joe and Mary, and Grinker and I, sat around the table where most of the dinner had been laid out. Additional bits and pieces of the dinner would be brought out as needed shortly, but now it was time to pray. So we held hands and bowed our heads, and…
Creationism and Evolution in the Classroom
Posted by Greg Laden on February 16, 2009 So, yesterday Afternoon, there was a meeting of the Minnesota Atheists that included a one hour panel discussion of evolution, creationism, science education, and so on. The panel was moderated by Lynn Fellman, and included (in order from right to left as the audience gazed on) Randy Moore, Sehoya Cotner, Jane Phillips, Greg Laden, and…
The Bible as Ethnography ~ 05 ~ The Virgin Birth
Posted by Greg Laden on February 15, 2009 I have a cousin in law who tells this story: Her youngest child found out about sex. Then he made the connection that if he existed, his parents must have had sex. So he confronted the parents with this, and mom was forced to admit, yes, of course, this is how babies get “made” and…
The Bible as Ethnography ~ 03 ~ Sometimes a Snake is Just a Snake. But not in this case….
Posted by Greg Laden on February 13, 2009 Genesis 2 ends with Adam and Eve being naked yet not ashamed. In Genesis 3, the Serpent, who is wiser than average, tricks Eve into partaking of the forbidden fruit of one of god’s two magic trees. This results in Adam and Eve recognizing their own nakedness, and compelling them to produce the first clothing.…
The Bible as Ethnography ~ 02 ~ In The Beginning…
Posted by Greg Laden on February 12, 2009 Genesis 1 and Genesis 2 (5 – 25) are distinctly different and contradictory origin stories. The biblical origin story represented in this text has long been known to resemble a set of Sumerian stories that mainly deal with a multitude of gods interacting (some of these gods are converted to humans in the biblical version).…
The Bible as Ethnography ~ 01 ~ Introduction
Posted by Greg Laden on February 11, 2009 As a child in Catholic school, and later in public school and being sent off to “release time” religious instruction, I had the opportunity to read most of the Old and New Testaments of the standard bible. Later, in junior high school, I became interested in comparative religion, and read it all again, together with…
, which is now available for the 
