Through the filter of time ... a repost that may still be interesting to you from two years ago.
I had a dream last night that I was in the kitchen cooking Calamari, when several medium sized octopi crawled out of the pot and led me to the basement, beckoning me to come near the computer. They formed a stack, one on top of the other, and the top octopus took the mouse in one tentacle and opened a web browser. Then it typed in a URL and up came a post by PZ Myers extolling me to blog about an entry on the Chalcedon Foundation web site. I awoke in a cold sweat and tried to forget about the dream, but it kept haunting me all day long.
Never let it be said that I don't know a sign from god when I see one.
OK. "Established in 1965, Chalcedon (kal-SEE-dun) is a non-profit 501(c)(3) and Christian educational organization devoted to research, publishing, and promoting Christian reconstruction in all areas of life." You can go to their web site if you want to give them money. You can find it by entering the appropriate search terms in Google.
See, there is this christian belief that comes from the Old Testament. This is one of those cherry picked quotes from god used to justify what by any other standard would be immoral behavior. The kind of immoral behavior in which no atheist could engage because atheists don't have this need to impose their interpretation of the will of god on innocent bystanders and infidels. It goes like this:
God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground."
The stated mandate of the Chalcedon Foundation is to fulfill the will of god by honoring this specific directive. The Chalcedon ToDo list:
- Be fruitful
- Increase in number
- Fill the earth
- Subdue the earth
- Rule over the fish
- Rule over the birds
- Rule over every single living thing
(I, personally, am into Number 5. I find a Mepps Agila number 5 or 6, yellow, will subdue pretty much anything but a walleye. I'm still working on walleye.)
But seriously, have you ever seen anything so utterly, blatantly obnoxious?
Anyway, The Foundation was founded by this guy named Reverend Rushdoony, who looked vaguely like a cross between Colonel Sanders and Darth Vader. He died in 2001. I put his picture on this post because it matches so well with this list of things to do. Rule over the fish. Indeed.
I am starting to see why the octopi came to me in this creepy dream. They want to help their friends the fish.
Andrea Schwartz, a home schooler, writes a commentary on this blog, which was the item of interest to PZ Myers, and by extension, the octopi.
It starts with:
I Love Teaching Evolution
and the only really important things she says in the essay are:
isn't [teaching evolution] the very reason many Christian parents remove their children from state schools -- to get away from such teaching?
and
Evolution is a topic that repeatedly enters into our curriculum the same way that sin is a topic that gets covered in depth.
... Oh, and this ...
Secular government schools insist that the foundation of a child's education be based on deception and falsehoods specifically designed to alienate the child from the God of Scripture. It is precisely for this reason that statist educators want children at younger and younger ages, while they are so impressionable. And, it is precisely for this reason that Christian parents should never relinquish their God-given responsibility to train up their children -- especially to those who either explicitly or implicitly deny the Holy Word of God.
This makes me want to quote the bible. Let's see. What does god say about people who lie? ...
If a man still prophesies, his parents, father and mother, shall say to him, "You shall not live, because you have spoken a lie in the name of the Lord." When he prophesies, his parents, father and mother, shall thrust him through. (Zechariah 13:3 NAB)
Ouch... That's going to hurt, Andrea.
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The next time Ray Comfort talks about how bananas are the atheist's nightmare, you should point to this post. This is a true atheist's nightmare. (Although I still get the shivers over the nightmare I had ages ago, in which evil balloon animals were trying to kill my girlfriend by forming themselves into the shapes of magical runes...)
From the website:
I think you've made a mistake there Greg.
That's obviously a post-Hammer photo of Christopher Lee.
Are you sure it's not a pic of the writer Paulo Coelho?
R.J. Rushdooney was the sort of fanatic that, as someone said, made people like Jerry Falwell afraid. His magazine, the Chalcedon Report, contained the article by Reverend Einwechter on stoning disobedient children. A few years back there was an entire issue devoted to Creationism/Antievolutionism. In his editorial, Rushdooney explained why the Genesis account of Creation was to be interpreted literally as six 24-hour periods (because otherwise the entire Bible and basis for religion would be in doubt). He also described democracy as a heresy to be overthrown.
Did you mean Dooku? I don't remember Darth Vader ever looking like that.
Hilarious. Count Dooku = Christopher Lee. :)