Schools teaching Intolerance
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- Created on Monday, 12 November 2012 06:21
- Published on Monday, 12 November 2012 06:21
- Written by John Draper
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If ever there was a doubt that Religious schools are bad, Toronto Police recently issued some warnings. Because of public complaints in May, the Toronto School Board revoked the permit of Scarborough's Islamic East End Madrassah and the Toronto Police initiated a review of books used in teaching their students. In their report, the Police said they could not find any actual criminal offenses but they publicly warned the operators that their teachings were contrary to Canadian values. The school had a web site (since removed) which made it clear that it was not just an oversight - they really did think that Jews were "treacherous" and "crafty". The curriculum documents not only referred to Jews in crude terms but also said "good Muslims" could not listen to music, that girls should limit their involvement in sports and that Islam was "the best and most perfect of all religions." In addition, the books said boys should exercise to be ready for jihad, which they said "sometimes also involves fighting a war against an unjust ruler" and quoted Muslim scripture that said "fighting (in the cause of Allah) is ordained unto you."
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What Mormons believe
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- Created on Saturday, 10 November 2012 06:18
- Published on Saturday, 10 November 2012 06:18
- Written by John Draper
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We know Mormons have weird beliefs and many Christians see them as not truly Christian. That’s because Mormons see the biblical story of Jesus as only part of his story. But their beliefs are not well understood by others since most of the articles about Mormons focus on how they were founded and why their founder Joseph Smith was a fraud. (Proof here). But when it’s all spelled out, their beliefs really are weird. Some would say no more weird than a virgin birth and a resurrection from the dead, but they have a quite different view of their afterlife (including polygamous gods), they believe in multiple gods (although only the “top god”, Elohim, is worshipped), Jesus and Lucifer were brothers, Jesus had 3 wives, and some of the original beliefs are inherently racist. Notice that I label them “original” since they now play these down or pretend they never happened, much like Christians selectively ignore large parts of the Old Testament.
Did Romney scare with his Religion?
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- Created on Thursday, 08 November 2012 06:32
- Published on Thursday, 08 November 2012 06:32
- Written by John Draper
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The analyses by political pundits on Obama's win are missing some key points. Yes they blame Romney for alienating Hispanics and blacks and they blame Republicans for alienating women but they miss some other things related to Romney's religion. It's also interesting that while Democrat workers trusted the polls based on scientific surveys, Republicans tended to go on faith that their way of thinking would win. In fact, the results were very close to the predictions made by ace statistician Nate Silver at his blog FiveThirtyEight. We shouldn't be surprised since most Republicans are also born-again Christians where science, math and logic have no part in their thinking process.
The Purpose of Life
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- Created on Tuesday, 06 November 2012 06:40
- Published on Tuesday, 06 November 2012 06:40
- Written by John Draper
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A religious person will often say: "Without God, there is no purpose for your existence". They say that because they think it's important. They crave a purpose in life so there must be such a thing. But why? Why should there be a purpose for our life or for that matter anything in the universe? A common answer is that life is meaningless without a purpose. Is it? Can we not enjoy it? I don't mean just physical pleasures but also the satisfaction of helping others and of contributing to the world. Wanting there to be a purpose does not make it so. It's not even a good reason to why it should be true.
Proving Christian God does not exist
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- Created on Sunday, 04 November 2012 07:05
- Published on Sunday, 04 November 2012 07:05
- Written by John Draper
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Absolutely proving that God does not exist is a logical difficulty - Carl Sagan compared it to proving that there is no invisible dragon in his garage. (more here) But some Christians seem to think that because they want to believe in God (for whatever reason), then they need someone to disprove their belief before they would give up on it. OK. Let's do that.
There are all kinds of possible Gods, but the one that matters here is the Christian God that's described to church-goers by priests, ministers and pastors. That God is loving (to certain people), perfectly good, a perfect creator and a perfect communicator. Christians also say that we can know about this God because he's described in the Bible. So let's see if they have it right. I'd say that they have it backwards - the bible describes a God who is not perfect so if there is one, he's not what Christians believe in. Their God does not exist. Another God won't do - Christians have already rejected the Islamic Allah, the Roman and Greek Gods, the Gods of the Aztecs, Incas and Egyptians and for that matter, any other God at all.
Historical Jesus and the invented Resurrection
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- Created on Wednesday, 31 October 2012 06:21
- Published on Wednesday, 31 October 2012 06:21
- Written by John Draper
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Was there an historical Jesus? Did such a person actually exist? I suspect he did - or at least a preacher with a name like that probably existed around 0 to 30 CE. Biblical scholar Bart Erhman has just released his book titled Did Jesus Exist and he concludes that there was an historical Jesus. But was it one person or a composite? As Brian Palmer at Slate points out: "Many people shared the name. Christ's given name, commonly Romanized as Yeshua, was quite common in first-century Galilee. (Jesus comes from the transliteration of Yeshua into Greek and then English.) Archaeologists have unearthed the tombs of 71 Yeshuas from the period of Jesus' death. The name also appears 30 times in the Old Testament in reference to four separate characters”.
If there was a real historical person – if a man who was at least approximately as described in the New Testament did exist – does it matter? Should we attach any meaning or significance to that?
Egypt going Sharia?
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- Created on Friday, 02 November 2012 06:17
- Published on Friday, 02 November 2012 06:17
- Written by John Draper
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The west cheered when Egypt threw off their dictatorship and went to a democracy - but is that an improvement? As discussed here Muslims don't want democracy because it allows and promotes racial diversity, sexual liberation, gender equality, trust and social tolerance. No. They want it because they see it as adding to their prosperity. They want the "good" of western countries without giving up on their Islamic faith. They want democracy and Sharia law simultaneously. If the majority want Sharia, it would seem to be democratic to implement Sharia. But Sharia simply means the laws as laid out in the Qur'an which are not compatible with equal rights, tolerance of other religions or any of the values normally associated with democracy.
Survey on U.S. Religions and Churches
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- Created on Monday, 29 October 2012 06:43
- Published on Monday, 29 October 2012 06:43
- Written by John Draper
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Most surveys of Religion are done by the Pew Research Center's Forum on Religion & Public Life, but the smaller Public Religion Research Institute, also publishes statistics from time to time. Pew is non-partisan and apparently secular and focuses on "issues at the intersection of religion and public affairs" but the Public Religion Research Institute is run by a group of religious people - a Rabbi chairs the board which includes evangelicals, Catholics and mainstream protestants. Their surveys can be expected to be concerned about the drop in Church membership - for example a recent blog on their web site was headed Most Religiously Unaffiliated Americans Still Believe in God. In addition they would be interested whether Christian values are reflected in public policies. It's strongly Judeo-Christian - there are no Hindus, Muslims, Scientologists or members of other non-Christian religions on their board.
