How to ruin your next family dinner: Religion + Politics

Evangelicals, Trump, and Kavanaugh

Karen Swallow Prior answers the questions: "How does a deeply religious group of people continue to support a president who has repeatedly acted in ways they consider immoral?"

and

How important would you say Brett Kavanaugh's nomination is for the evangelical community?

This is fun!

I didn't have anything good for a 2017 post, so I promise to do two posts in 2018. And I'm good for it.

Here's 2018 post #1: https://samharris.org/sam-harris-jordan-peterson-vancouver-night-one/

It's fun. It's like a slow tennis match of ideas, but no one wants to win.

Montana Gubernatorial Candidate Greg Gianforte on Retirement

Update: Part of this recording is being used in political ads in MT now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vco1qFYCRjk

Greg Gianforte is running for governor of Montana. Greg made nearly three-quarters of a billion (with a B) dollars when the software company he started was sold. He has some very interesting bible-based views on retirement.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvLkJTFnjK8&sns=em

Is Chief Executive Officer of a Software Company mentioned in the bible? That must be in one of the lost gospels. 

Would voters entrust the White House to an atheist?

http://www.npr.org/sections/13.7/2015/08/10/431205042/should-we-distrust-atheists

Awkward Moment's Children's Bible and the new billboard campaign

A friend recently sent me the book Awkward Moments Children's Bible. It cracked me up.

Today, I hear that they are running a Indiegogo project to raise funds for billboards. It's their Preaching Back at You campaign. I love these guys, just telling it how it was written.

How I know that no one is reading my blog

I misspelled the word atheist in about 100 places (my fingers just type "ie" out of habit) and no one had commented on it yet. Nitpicking is a cornerstone of the internet, so I figure no one reads this. And really, why should they?

Awkward Moments (Not Found In Your Average) Children's Bible

This book just showed up in my mailbox one day. I'm glad it did.

http://www.amazon.com/Awkward-Moments-Found-Average-Childrens/dp/149217744X

How to suck at your religion

Great comic strip from The Oatmeal. It made me think of Chick tracts.

http://theoatmeal.com/comics/religion

USPS discriminating against Atheists? A study by Atheist Shoes.

I have friends and family who work for the USPS. To hear them tell it, the USPS is a pseudomilitary organization--in management style, not weaponry, although I do wish the had a mail cannon--run by former soldiers, sailors, and airmen (airpeople?) who passed the Civil Servant's exam. Mostly due to episodes of MASH that featured the lovable Father Mulcahey, and the saying, "There are no atheists in foxholes," I've always thought of the US military as a somewhat religious organization. Not like the Catholic church is a religious organization; more like the Salvation Army, I guess. So, I wasn't really surprised to learn that there might be a correlation between the labeling of Atheist Shoe's packages with a giant "Atheist" sticker and the retarded (in the delayed or impeded sense of the word) delivery of their packages.

 http://www.atheistberlin.com/study

Be sure to read some of the comments. And if you like comments, read some of the comments on Merriam Webster's definition of the word "retarded." Or as spelled in the first comment, retarted.

War on Christmas: Even the Pope Emeritus is getting in on it.

Pope Benedict's book debunks aspects of the Christmas story. Now, if we can just get him to agree the entire story is a myth...

http://www.cnn.com/2012/11/22/world/europe/vatican-pope-jesus-book/index.html

Signs this blog is going downhill

Here are a few fun posts from CNN. Yes, CNN.

These relate to the atheist group, American Atheists, Inc., and the billboards they've been buying.

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2012/03/01/atheist-group-targets-muslims-jews-with-myth-billboards-in-arabic-and-hebrew/

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2010/11/30/dueling-billboards-face-off-in-christmas-controversy/

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2013/03/03/first-on-cnn-atheists-ratchet-up-rhetoric-use-billboards-to-attack-republican-politicians/

This is my favorite, though. Sarah Palin gets all pissy because she said she would create laws based on god's law and the billboard read an understated should:

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2013/03/04/atheist-group-apologizes-for-misquoting-palin-but-defends-billboards-intent/?on.cnn=1