In January, a court rejected a request by a Christian convert from Islam, Mohammed Higazi, to have his new religion written on his identity card.

The following month however, a court decision authorised 12 converts to Islam who then reverted to Christianity to have their original faith marked on their ID cards.

In Higazi’s case, the judge based his decision on Sharia, Islamic law, to prove that one cannot convert to an “older religion”.

“Monotheistic religions were sent by God in chronological order… As a result, it is unusual to go from the latest religion to the one that preceded it,” the judge said at the time.

The “latest” religion? Seriously? By that logic, Scientology is truth. But of course, it’s just an example of people finding any excuse possible to make them right. Reality is bent to fit their own predetermined conclusions. It’s not too bad when people just talk, but of course, it can become very scary when people take it to the next level.

According to Bentley and a handful of other “hyper-charismatic” preachers advancing the same agenda, Joel’s Army is prophesied to become an Armageddon-ready military force of young people with a divine mandate to physically impose Christian “dominion” on non-believers.

The article says there are thousands of people coming to hear these preachers. I guess it’s too much for me to hope that it’s so they can tell their children not to be that stupid. These people seriously believe that end times from God are coming as predicted in the Bible. But if they don’t come, by golly, they’ll make them happen anyway. Logic is irrelevant compared to the whims of radicals.

On a lighter note, I’ll leave you with a rather humorous example of this perception failing miserably, as religion butts up against reality and falls short yet again. Apparently a bank founded on “Christian-oriented philosophy” (which apparently includes using all income to pay the CEO an exorbitant salary) failed miserably.

And of course, it’s incredibly special.

Kirk Harper spotted the moth on an RV trailer Monday, and right away could tell it was unique.

“I immediately thought it looked like Jesus and that was what was so cool cause you’ve seen His face in grilled cheese sandwiches and windows and things but on a moth’s back…we thought that was pretty neat.”

I don’t even see a face. Anywhere. Somehow they are managing to be even more ridiculous.

And this tree Mary is a blessing on the area.

Moreau, an 18-year superintendent of a downtown condo building, said he did a double-take.

“At first I thought I was seeing things,” he said. “Then I went and got my mother-in-law to tell her. She was overwhelmed by it. She was crying.”

What’s more, Moreau’s mom-in-law, who is in her 70s and lives with the Moreaus, last week received test results showing that her lymph node cancer appears to have been cleared.

Even for this blog, that is mind-numbingly stupid. But anyway, there’s something the person who originally saw Mary would like to clear up.

“I’m not a wacko,” Moreau said yesterday, adding he was stone-cold sober.

Dr. Jason Rosenhouse visits the International Conference on Creationism. He has three updates on this on his blog, but I linked you to the one I found most entertaining. It includes a sign admitting that creationists are doing a poor job of making any sort of “creatonist model” and a quote from a speaker there who says that creationists need to be less reliant on evidence and more reliant on faith in arguing for creationism. Is that even possible?

This story angers me. A high school girl goes to the principal after being taunted for being a lesbian, and the principal “told her homosexuality is wrong, outed her to her parents and ordered her to stay away from children,” and further “suspended some of her friends who expressed their outrage by wearing gay pride T-shirts and buttons.” That principal deserves a punch in the face.

Good news, for once: Americans are growing increasingly wary of mixing religion and politics.

God’s mom lays the smackdown on god, revealing the truth about god’s size… or lack thereof.

The comic is completely correct, obviously. I’m sure pretty much everyone reading this knows at least some people who say they depend on religion in some way. But depend on it for what? How does it help? Especially since everyone is better off depending on a logical analysis of the world around you. Religion just results in intellectual starvation.

This post was originally inspired by a news story way back in July 2006, about some women being ordained Catholic priests in my native Picksburgh, PA, and the Catholic church’s subsequent threat to excommunicate them. It so happens that eight days ago, the church carried through on that threat (just in time for Easter!) for some of the women who dared become priests.

I decided that in celebration of Easter, when Jesus and his penis were nailed to a cross to atone for all of our sins, I should re-post my humble words so they might be preserved for posterity.

(more…)

Try to ignore the nightmare that is that article’s grammar. Anyway:

Recently, lori’s husband was petting sissy when he noticed…

“He says ‘i swear that looks like jesus with a shroud on’ and i’m like ‘ok,’ and then my son took that picture, and it was like ‘wow!’”

Like, omg!

After a closer look, you might see the “shroud of turin.” And even if you don’t… “then they might think we are weird crazy or something.”

No crazier than many other people.

Anyway, this reader sent Brian a link to this article with a good absurd Jesus image (and actually links here!).

I personally see Charles Darwin, but I’m one of those heathen evolutionists.

The article also mentions the absurdity of Jesus being portrayed as white. That never fails to amuse me, especially when it comes from fundamentalists who claim the Bible is inerrant. The Bible also says Jesus was a Jew who was most certainly not white.

It’s funny because that’s the only way creationists can counter all of the evidence for evolution: that we need to “teach all sides” to the argument. However, that only pertains to issues where science contradicts religious dogma. In all other areas, those same creationists are against anything that contradicts their beliefs. Do you think any of them would be for a class in studying Biblical inaccuracies? Of course not. They’re just a bunch of hypocrites who will do and say anything to push their religious ideology on everyone else.

I know religion holds no monopoly on either stupidity or hypocrisy, but sometimes it sure seems to struggle to hold onto a lot of both.

That’s right. It’s all atheism’s fault. At least, according to Norris Burkes.

Most of us are immune from the infectious strand carried by the likes of Adkisson or David Koresh. But there are subtle forms of infection just as there are more seemingly innocuous carriers.

In the world of religion, I’ve yet to see more infectious carriers than I’ve seen in the likes of Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins. These evangelical atheists would have you believe that all our problems stem from all forms of religious faith.

And then he quotes another fundie, Nicholas Kristof, who retorts with the oft-heard questions: “what about Stalin? What about charities funded by churches?”

This is where I bash my head against the keyboard.

Do these theists even understand that their “rebuttals” don’t even address the point? The fact that something bad happened not caused by an organized religion or that some churches do charity work hardly addresses the main point of Dawkins, Harris, or Hitchens. Nobody’s claiming religion causes ALL problems that exist, or that religion ONLY results in bad things. The claim is that religion, especially organized religion, is primarily harmful and readily and easily causes a bunch of bad things. Is that such a hard distinction to understand? Or is it because these fundies only speak in such absolutes that they have a hard time comprehending anything else?

But the kicker is that these fundies then turn around and say ATHEISM is harmful, which contradicts their entire argument on how religion can’t be considered bad. According to Burkes’s and many fundies’ own logic, atheism can’t be harmful because of the Inquisition and the fact that this atheist I know gave a buck to charity last week. Doesn’t make a whole lot of sense when it’s turned around, does it? I’m not sure whether this cognitive dissonance is entertaining, depressing, or just scary. Probably a mix.

Credit for finding the article: PZ Myers.