Updates from April, 2010 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts

  • DistroMan 20:00 on April 30, 2010 Permalink
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    A Church in Crisis 

    “The church realizes that it doesn’t have a way out, at least not until it confronts the entirety of its problems,” said Alberto Melloni, the director of the liberal Catholic John XXIII Foundation for Religious Science in Bologna, Italy.

    This is more than just a throwaway line by some priest looking for his own 15 minutes of fame during the mess that the Catholic Church has managed to create for itself.  After all their attempts to deflect criticism against themselves for this mess, it still hangs over them like a dark cloud that just won’t let the sun shine on the Vatican.

    A Cloud Hangs Over The Vatican And Won't Go Away

    A Cloud Hangs Over The Vatican And Won’t Go Away

    Just in the last week 3 more Priests have resigned and you can bet there will be more to come.  There seems to have been a process started here that will not stop until a full and open accounting has taken place.  If the Vatican chooses the wrong path now, the Church will never recover.  This cloud will hang over them forever and nobody will be able to look at a priest without wondering.  Even the innocent, as far as any priest can be innocent if he hasn’t spoken out and challenged the Pope’s direction in this matter, will be looked at with open suspicion.  There is already a dramatic decrease in the numbers of young men entering the priesthood.  This scandal can only make these already weakening figures, drop further and faster.

    Actually, I don’t believe that the Church will ever recover fully. I think that it will continue to decline forever until it becomes nothing more than an historical curiosity, but that needn’t happen as fast as it otherwise might if they choose wisely.  There are far more good and decent people who are followers of the Church that don’t deserve to see this happen in this manner.

    What I do think needs to happen is for the Pope to come clean about his whole history and the history of this Child Abuse scandal.  It ALL needs to be brought out into the light of day so that those who should be convicted are, those who deserve help get it, the church can be freed from this cloud and then go through an enlightenment of its own.

    As I said earlier, I do not believe the Church will go on forever, it is way past that, but it should be allowed to die a dignified death.  While doing that there should be ongoing oversight to make sure this doesn’t ever happen again.  Those who do not believe the Church needs to mend it’s way,  doom it to oblivion with a worse reputation than is necessary.  The bottom line here is that I think the Church should be relegated to history in a manner that does not reflect badly on society itself.  There is no need to become the bad guy here and cause more damage than we can help.  There is much to be learnt from the history of the Church, including the artwork, music and literature that have come out of it and because of it.  None of that should be lost.

    KEEP THE GOOD, LEARN FROM THE BAD, MOVE ON

     

  • DistroMan 19:00 on April 29, 2010 Permalink
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    The Bible is NOT the word of God. Not even close. 

    I have a problem with the Bible on many levels.  One is that it is just plain bullshit, but more than that is that people believe that bullshit and do so with full knowledge that it is bullshit.  I know that many xtians would like to argue the point with me over that, but it is still true.  I’ll explain.

    Onto the fairy story: God is omnipotent and omniscient.  God made us.  God gave the Ten Commandments to Moses.  <—-  Right there.  That’s the problem.  God, in his infinite wisdom gave his message to a man he knew to be fallible.  God knew we were corruptible.  Also, he only gave us the Ten Commandments.  He didn’t give us the Bible.  He didn’t give us any of those stories.  They were written at least 3o years after Jesus was thrown off the island.  None of those guys even knew Jesus.  So we have a book that is supposed to be the word of God that God didn’t write, that tells us stories of Jesus by people that didn’t even know him.  Not to mention that many of those stories contradict each other.  Oh, oh, mustn’t forget that there is no proof as to who actually wrote the Bible either.  That too must be taken of faith.

    If you hired a biographer to write your story would you accept this when they handed it to you?  If you were the publisher, would you accept a book so badly written and risk losing money on it?  Of course not, so why would god accept such a hodge podge of contradictions,  outright lies, behaviour that is not only violent, genocidal, petty, racist and misogynistic, but downright incestuous and pornographic in parts?  Not only would a god not want to have this be his words, but I would think that any intelligent being would have put a stop to it before it spread.  We sue people for slander for far less, so why would a god allow it?

    The Bible is an insult to any intelligent human being that is really honest with themselves and not willing to give up their freedom, self respect, morals, ethics and their right to self determination to a non-existent figment of the imagination of some power hungry, desert dwelling freak bent on domination of all he surveyed and beyond.

    If, and I doubt it, but if there are any xtians reading this, please, for just one day put aside your ‘beliefs’ and read the Bible from the beginning as if you’d never read it before.  Most probably haven’t, which is a plus for them really.  Read it with an open mind, a critical mind and think about how unlikely what you are reading really is.  Do not equate anything you read to what you already know and tell me what you think about a book written in this manner that purports to tell you how to live your life and what to tell and do to your children.

    THINK ABOUT IT AND LET ME KNOW

     

    • Greybeard 11:33 on April 29, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply

      God had a great opportunity to put some very useful information into 'his' book but strangely he declined to do so. He could have informed us of the Universe and our place in it. He could have told us about the Heliocentric Solar System; he could have enlightened us about science.He could have at least told us the principles of electricity. He could even have made it quite clear that he will not tolerate his priests molesting innocent children for 2000 years.

      Instead of giving clarity he gave us a dog's breakfast of conflicting stories, written by primitive blood-thirsty flat-earthers who knew no more about the Universe than anyone else of that era.

    • Sal 06:41 on April 30, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply

      Before you insult me for being a brainless Christian, you should know that I'm atheist. I don't believe the bible is the word of God, but your arguments sound like a teenager's rant. You don't back up your one argument: you can't prove who wrote the bible. Other than that, it is just baseless insults.

      While there are Christians that are arrogant, ignorant, stupid, and over zealous, there are more nonreligious people that act just as irrationally. Instead of ranting about Christianity, why not stop and actually think why people like you are so intolerant and angry about something that doesn't really affect anything?

    • DistroMan 07:02 on April 30, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply

      Angry? Yes. I am. I'm very angry about the abuse that has been handed out to countless tens of thousands of children by these so called pillars of moral society. They are nothing of the sort and don't deserve the respect they so vehemently demand. Intolerant? Again, yes. I'm very intolerant of people who commit these crimes and I'm intolerant of those who support them by either actively speaking out in their defense or sitting quietly by and not caring as long as it isn't their children who are being harmed. But I am not just being angry and intolerant because I'm an Atheist. You don't know me well enough to make those judgments. I suggest you just read the words and not try to attach unwarranted emotions to them.

      I do not believe in the Bible itself or the claim that it was written by anyone who even remotely knew Jesus or what God wanted. Do I care that I don't back that up? No. It's my opinion and I'll voice that opinion how and when I like.

      Of course I can't prove who wrote the bible. Neither can they. That is the point. How then can it be called the word of god?

    • the diff 22:25 on May 1, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply

      First, I want you to know I do not know you, or have ever read anything else you’ve blogged about, so I’ll ask you forgive my ignorance if you’ve addressed certain things previously. This was sent to me by a friend, who is an atheist, in whom I enjoy having great discussions about a multitude of things. Anyhow, your post intrigued me, and I felt compelled to reply, not in an attempt to proselytize, but because I think debate clarifies everyone’s position, and allows both sides to speak for themselves. Your post brings up excellent questions and points of contention, but in the interest of time I will stick to the one you pointed out as the most important, that being Moses and why on earth an omnipotent god of creation would use such a flawed human being to free His people from the bondage of the Egyptians (For the moment I would ask you suspend your disbelief on both the accuracy of, and Moses’s authorship of the Pentateuch and leave that for another discussion). Based on Moses’s own telling of his story, at the time of his first encounter with God, he’d already murdered and Egyptian and fearing his own life fled into the desert. Why would God, again in His alleged infinite wisdom, choose a man who had already broken one of the commandments before He’d even had an opportunity to give them out yet? If you look at the major figures of the bible, there is a similar theme. David was an adulterer who sent the husband of the woman he’d taken to bed out to die in battle so he wouldn’t get caught. Paul, the claimed author to over half of the epistles in the new testament, spent most of his time prior to conversion murdering as many Christians as he could find. Yet again, God chose these men to lead His people, and even called David a man after His own heart. The reason is simple. Based upon the lives of all these men, no one could conclude anything (again this supposes you actually believe these stories to be historically accurate) but that a God far greater than them placed them into the situations they were in to bring glory and honor to His name. Time and again the pattern is the same throughout both the new and old testament, that God chooses the most ridiculous and unlikely people to do amazing thing for His purpose, simply to make a mockery of those who in pride and arrogance place themselves above others.
      Obviously this reply doesn’t address even a tenth of the problems you have with the bible, mind numbed robot christians, or a multitude of other religious grievances, but I am lazy, so i’ll leave those be.

  • DistroMan 20:00 on April 28, 2010 Permalink
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    Our Father, who art in heaven, why do you hurt us so? 

    No, I haven’t turned all Fundie on you.  I was just thinking about God.  He’s supposed to be our father so let’s look at that word for a minute.

    Father:

    1. a male parent.
    2. a father-in-law, stepfather, or adoptive father.
    3. any male ancestor, esp. the founder of a race, family, or line; progenitor.
    4. a man who exercises paternal care over other persons; paternal protector or provider: a father to the poor.

    That’s pretty clear, but a little too clinical.  I was thinking more along the lines of the things you think about when you see your father come home at the end of a long days work.  What you think when you go to visit him on Father’s Day.  What you think when you see a father playing with his infant children.  The joyful thoughts that go through your mind when you think about ‘Dad’.  I know that not all of us had fathers like that, but those are the things that fathers are supposed to be.  Kind, gentle, loving, caring, sympathetic, protective and moral role models.  If that is what we expect our fathers to be and what we as parents think we should be, why do we accept a god that doesn’t fit into that mold?

    He starves us, burns us, drowns us, buries us in earthquakes, turns us to dust, infects us with all kinds of nasty viruses etc, sends plagues down upon us, kills our children with bears, has our mothers, sisters and daughters raped, kills whole villages and sends us to a place called hell if we don’t kiss his hoary old butt at least once a week.  If he doesn’t respect us enough to treat us better than that, he doesn’t deserve our respect either.

    Every civilisaton on earth has laws that put mongrels like that in jail.  Some even put them to death.  And yet, everyday there are people who get down on their knees and tell God how much they love Him and His merciful ways.  Something just doesn’t seem right here.  When we see murderers in jail and the people that go to visit them as if they are heroes of some kind, we look at those people and wonder what mental condition they have.

    This is NOT ‘father’ material here folks.  You could put all our dictators and despots from right throughout history together and still not make up 1% of the evilness of what God has done to us.  So get over it.  He isn’t real.  Just a figment of some desert dwelling power hungry dictator from thousands of years ago.  It was their way of controlling people and you are being controlled.

    But…

    Now, let us take the opposite position for just a minute and say that God is real.  So what?  I still wouldn’t care.  After all the crap he has put us through and the lies he’s told us, I am more likely to believe that Satan was just one more person/angel that didn’t think God was ‘all that and more’, so he said so just like we do as atheists.  Then God kicked him off the Island.  Good enough for me.  I’ll take the chance that God is just making up stories about Satan to scare us like some parents do with their kids.  I think the odds are in our favour that way too.  God is a lying sack of crap and not worth trusting.

    RELIGION

    JUST ANOTHER MULTI LEVEL MARKETING SCHEME/SCAM

     

    • Greybeard 10:56 on April 28, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply

      It just shows how brainwashed people are.

      If he made everything, then lets not forget he gave us diseases like cancer and gangrene; geo-catatastrophes; vehicle accidents; criminal behaviour; and every misfortune you can imagine. He makes us ill, he gives us pain and suffering and even deliberately murdered millions…. if my Father had done any of that he would have been punished – and yet they go to church every sunday to sing god's praise.

      "All things bright and beautiful, All creatures great and small, All things wise and wonderful: The Lord God made them all."

      As someone said recently, that has to be the chimpanzee part of their brains doing all the thinking.

  • DistroMan 20:00 on April 27, 2010 Permalink
    Tags: , enlightenment,   

    The Ongoing Enlightenment of Religion 

    Earlier I began to wonder about the ‘fact versus metaphor‘ problem that is giving a lot of believers a crisis of faith.  I have not yet met or heard two believers that agree on everything in the bible.  Where one will say that Creation is real another will say that it’s just a metaphor for the beginning because they know that evolution has been proven.  There are many, many sections of the Bible that cause believers a problem in this way.

    As science proves more passages in the Bible to be erroneous, the more  believers will say that those things were just metaphor.  I’m very interested to see how long it takes before we have exhausted the sections of the Bible that allow science to affect them in this way.  At that time, how many fundamental believers will still exist?  And what kind of people will they be?

    By the time we have reached this point we will also have done the same to the other religions as well.  They can’t just say that science advances only apply to the Christian Bible.  Science is not religion specific.  It applies across the board.

    Another thing that is hurrying up this enlightenment is the rate at which atheism is growing as young people are growing up these days.  Now that atheism is ‘out there’, they are starting to think for themselves more than ever.  As they leave home to attend college they are removed from the parental and community influence which allows their mind free rein.  The atheist groups are growing all over the world and the young people are joining them now more than ever before.

    We also have the fence sitters.  I once heard Christopher Hitchens call them ‘the people who live by two sets of books’.  They can’t all continue to live this way forever.  There will be those that just can’t balance the dichotomy of such thinking.  There will be those that will still profess to believe even though they don’t, just because it is the way it has always been in their lives.  There will be those that will move to another community so they can be truthful to themselves and live without that imbalance.  There will be those who will ‘out’ themselves in their own community, but be forced to live like pariahs, on the outskirts of the group, being looked at like freaks in a circus.

    There are those who are so involved and ‘secure’ in their faith that even though they know that it isn’t all true and science can prove that, they will stick their fingers in their ears every time another bible passage is proven false and yell ‘I CAN’T HEAR YOU, I CAN’T HEAR YOU’ till you go away in frustration.  They just don’t want to know, even though deep down they already have that suspicion.   With them, it is more taking away their security blanket than eroding their faith.  They have been ‘believers’ for so long, they are afraid of living without their little safety net.

    How many more are like Mother Theresa and have never believed, but continue to live the life, go to Church, sing hymns, pray etc?

    We absolutely must continue to slowly push for secular government until we have achieved it fully.  We must continue to speak out, but without becoming extremist in our views as that will only backfire by making the fence sitters dig their heels in.  We must also be careful to not allow religion to sneak into society in small ways as that just gives them another foothold that will be hard for us to dislodge.  Stop them where they are now, and slowly push them back.

    ENLIGHTENMENT OF RELIGION IS THE AIM

    TILL IT DISAPPEARS UP IT’S OWN WORMHOLE

     

    • Greybeard 07:57 on April 28, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply

      Religion will never disappear. The best we can hope for over the next decade is to eliminate their majority.

      Unfortunately, as their numbers shrink, they will become even more strident and mentally unstable than they are now.

  • DistroMan 20:00 on April 26, 2010 Permalink
    Tags: , , , , Humanity, , , , , ,   

    Priests: Ooooh Girls! Nom Nom Nom. 

    A lot of people, including myself have referred to Priests as ‘Boy Buggerers’.  Most of the time though, I have chosen to use the term ‘Kiddie Fiddlers’. I did this because I have always thought the day would come that the girls would speak out and tell their stories of abuse at the hands of the Priests. I thought this, because I’ve never believed as the Catholic Church would have you believe, that the child abuse is because of Homosexuality. I believed then as I believe now, that the main reason is a mixture of pedophilia and the idiotic Celibacy rule they have in place.

    So, as I said previously, there are now a few women coming out and telling their stories.  Why now?  This is due to the fact that back in the early 70′s the Catholic Church changed it’s rules on allowing female altar servers.

    Researchers say disclosure of abuse is typically delayed for about 30 years, which means women assaulted as children are just starting to come to terms with what happened.

    It is now coming to light that girls are far more likely to be victims of Priestly assault if they are available.  As they have been now for 40 years, I highly suspect that the numbers of women taking action against the church will climb slowly until it reaches a critical mass and then it will explode.

    Oh, a little explanation of how the cake is being sliced might help here.  The fact is that the majority of Priests are heterosexual.  But, as they didn’t have girls to prey on as readily as the minority of homosexual Priests had boys, not much was happening with them.  So we’ve mainly heard about the  homosexual boy buggering Priests.  Once girls were placed on the Catholic Altar of Love, it gave the majority, the heterosexual Priests something to go after.  Now think about that.  If we have had such a problem with abuse to boys, how bad is it going to be now that the majority of Priests have their own toys to play with?  Admittedly, there aren’t as many girls taking on the job of serving at the altar, but there are more Priests with an eye for them.  This could and most probably will be a big problem in coming years for the Church.

    We must ask though, why is this only coming out now?  It is not only because the women weren’t ready to speak up earlier.  We’ve been hearing all kind of reports of abuse of boys now for decades until it exploded this year, so shy in all this time during all these reports and all the investigations has there been no word of the girls and their victimisation by the priesthood?  The Priests have had their chance to speak up.  The Vatican will have known of many cases that they’ve had to hush up and yet they’ve been quiet as well.  If they had have come clean about this situation at the same time they might have had a chance to weather the storm.  Keeping quiet and trying yet again to cover it up  will only end in disaster.

    IF the girls leave it too long though, the church will just go through the motions as they are doing now.  IF the girls all come out now, the storm will grow to a point the Catholic Church will not be able to just ‘sigh’ and look away calling us ‘petty gossips’.  So girls, I implore you to speak out now.  Give them all you have.  Do not let up and allow them to become complacent all over again till they can ignore you.  This also goes for any men out there that have not yet spoken up.  Do so NOW!

    Many, many victims have said that if the Vatican, the Priests or Parents of earlier victims had have spoken out, they would not have been abused.  They must be forced to face the law now or they will continue to abuse.  Think of your children, your grandchildren and all the families to come who do not deserve to be ripped apart by this monster we call the Holy Roman Catholic Church.

    FOR THE CHILDREN OF THE FUTURE


    More reading: Girls Abused

     

  • DistroMan 20:00 on April 25, 2010 Permalink
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    We have to oppose this Atheist Movement – Jim Wallace 


    New Militant Atheism (Politics InFocus) 23.04.10 from InFocus Christian News on Vimeo

    Jim, you say that 2500 attending the Atheist Convention isn’t much and that two years ago we only had 19 at another conference.  Percentage wise, I’d say that is growing at a rate you could never have imagined.  Try thinking about what that means for the future.   The reality is that it would have been bigger than 2500 if we would have been given the same support as Christians got when they held their convention.  But after being purposefully held back by gutless bureaucrats who are afraid of upsetting the Christian Lobby and then to have those numbers used against us is disingenuous to say the least.  For the Convention to sell out completely, and early, in the face of such petty mindedness shows that it is much more popular than anyone would have thought.  Of course, if we look back to comments made beforehand and the childish laughter when comments were made about the convention by certain Christians, you would have thought we’d still only get 19 attendees.

    The real problem here isn’t the Atheists anyway.  It is the Christians.  They have a very warped view of Atheists and no matter how hard we have tried to get them to understand that the only difference, and there is only one, that we believe in one less god than they do, they will not let it go.  They have attacked us at every turn.  Atheists are only being good people, doing good things, trying to have a community that believes in them and the good they do and you do nothing but demean, decry and diminish our achievements.  That is beneath you and all you supposedly believe in Jim and all it achieves is to set us against each other.  THAT is the fault of Christianity.

    If Christianity was not trying to interfere in the lives of people who do not hold the same beliefs, none of this would be happening.  You have killed us for centuries.  You have tortured us for centuries.  You have oppressed us for centuries.  You have driven us from our lands for centuries.  You abuse us on the streets.  You abuse us in the papers.  You abuse us on the radio.  You abuse us on television.  You abuse us on Youtube.  You abuse us in the bible.  You abuse us in the pulpit.  You continually tell us we are sinners.  You tell us we are going to burn in hell.  You tell us we can’t have Ethics Classes for our children.  You tell us we shouldn’t have signs advocating that non-believers are good people.  You stop us from getting support for our conventions.

    Why Jim?  When nobody was giving you any trouble whatsoever and only trying to do good for themselves and others, you couldn’t leave well enough alone.  You attack us at every opportunity and for what?  Tell us what we have done that even comes close to being  .0005 percent of what Christianity has done to us?

    What makes me laugh so much is the waffle about numbers as if we were insignificant, but in the next breath you say that Christians need to oppose us.  Yes, that does make me laugh.  You make me laugh, your words make me laugh and your feeble beliefs make me laugh.  You expect immediate and unending respect for yourselves and your beliefs but treat anybody with different beliefs like they are dirt to be trodden underfoot.

    IF there had have been any attempts by Christians to have a meaningful dialogue on the matters that you have a problem with, I daresay there are many that would take you up on it.  But how can that ever be thought worthwhile when all we ever get from you and yours is bile and venom?

    Oppose us all you like, but know this, we will never be quiet, we will never stop, we will never go away.  We will be here, yelling at the top of our voices, letting everyone know that ‘You Can Be Good Without God‘ and that we demand our rights as equal citizens in our own land.

    WHY JIM?

    Further articles on this subject: seantheblogonaut and GladlyTheBear

     

    • Steve Williamson 10:17 on April 25, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply

      Fantastic article!

    • Greybeard 13:32 on April 25, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply

      If they would only get out of our faces we would happily leave them to their own private delusions.

      They want total control.

      Of everything.

      They even want to control the content of the Ethics Classes that are provided for kids that don't go to their Religion Classes.

    • ERNIEPAUL IZERECKT 16:03 on April 26, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply

      All I can add 2 that is "PAYBACKS GONNA' B A BITCH JIMMI BOY' N' IT CAN'T COME 2 SOON!!!!!!!!! :)

  • DistroMan 20:00 on April 24, 2010 Permalink
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    Religion: Having your ethical cake and eating it too. 

    I have just finished reading this article: A crime is a crime, even for priests.

    As many of you reading this post of mine will know, I have been writing lately about the Ethics Trial going on in NSW Schools here in Australia.  How do the article above and the Ethics Trial relate to each other?  I’ll tell you Oh Curious Reader.

    The church still struggles to accept that priests’ sins of sexual abuse are also crimes for which the church shares responsibility.

    and

    You can’t be good without God.

    The Church wishes us to believe that colouring in pictures of Noah’s Ark and a few Angels in Scripture Classes is ‘Ethics’. Ok, we’ll call this ‘Religious Ethics 101′.  Once you get older and stop the colouring in, you get to hear more of the Bible Passages and get told you are ‘going to hell’ if you don’t behave, believe and begrudge freedoms to those who don’t believe the same as you.  We’ll call this ‘General Religious Ethics’.  If you are a super learner and super believer you can move on to ‘Advanced Religious Ethics’ and become a Priest or Nun.  Now, you would think that by the time you got to the ‘Advanced’ level that you would have been taught all the things you’d need to overcome the evil in the world.

    If Priests have learned all that ‘religion’ can teach them in their lives to the point that religion becomes their life, you’d think they would be at the apex of the ethical tree and unable to commit child abuse.  If that is not true, what value is there in ‘religious ethics’ for the lay person?  If the Pope can be said to have ‘Papal Infallibility’ and yet still be so blind as to the problems going on around him, not be able to make the proper decisions, not be able to see the problems he himself is causing by being so blind, be so ignorant as to insult the victims with his apologies that aren’t even apologies, allow known abusers to be given sanctuary inside Vatican walls, accuse those who call for proper reform of petty gossiping, not call to account Bishops who blame others for their own shortcomings, then again, how can the lay person expect to gain any real insight into ethical and moral behaviour from them or their teachings?  This is The Pope we are talking about here.  He should be SuperEthics Man. Defender of the Faith and all that is good, able to leap across pits of evil and save those about to lose their way.  He should not be able to leap about dodging justice and have the ability to bend the truth.

    So, if the only real ethics is Religious Ethics, and Priests and Nuns who have been to the top of the ethics learning tree are still able to abuse children, I have to ask what good their ethics are?  Are these the ‘ethics and morals’ we want our children to learn?

    Religion has become too akin to the Medicine Man and his bottle of miracle water that will ‘fix all that ails ya‘.

    It is time to toss aside that which is proven not to work and try the alternative offered by those who do not hide behind words like ‘Papal Infallibility’ and refuse to be held to account.

    ETHICS FOR GODS SAKE

    ETHICS FOR GOODNESS SAKE

     

  • DistroMan 20:00 on April 23, 2010 Permalink
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    Absolute, 100%, sheer freaking lunacy. 

    New and Proposed Laws in the US.  I’m not saying much here, as they all speak for themselves:

    • Nebraska passed a law last week prohibiting abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy, a measure intended to target the few remaining providers of late-term abortions in the US.
    • Tennessee on Monday passed the first of what is expected to be a number of laws aimed at prohibiting insurance exchanges, created through President Barack Obama’s landmark health reform, from providing coverage for abortions.
    • A new Oklahoma law requires physicians to disclose detailed information on women’s abortions to the State’s Department Of Health, which will then post the collected data on a public website. The controversial measure comes into effect on November 1 and will cost $281,285 to implement, $256,285 each subsequent year to maintain. Oklahoma women undergoing abortion procedures will be legally forced to reveal:

      1 ) Date of abortion
      2 ) County in which abortion is performed
      3 ) Age of mother
      4 ) Marital status of mother
      5 ) Race of mother
      6 ) Years of education of mother
      7 ) State or foreign country of residence of mother
      8 ) Total number of previous pregnancies of the mother

    • Casper officials say an anti-gay sign painted on a homeowner’s fence near a high school will be allowed to remain because there’s nothing the city can or should do about it. Chris Trumbull painted the words “Leviticus 20:13, To be gay equals death” on his fence. Trumbull says the message is the Bible’s, not his. Trumbull’s property sits along a route between Roosevelt High School and the Boys & Girls Club where dozens of high school students pass every day. City Code Enforcement Supervisor Shelley LeClere says the city asked Trumbull to remove the message, but he declined.
    • If you live in the Peach State of Georgia, then you may have some protection if such an unconstitutional mandatory microchip order is ever imposed by the federal government or world agencies. The Georgia Senate has passed SB 235 which would ban mandatory chipping. The bill may be viewed HERE.

      “By passing this bill, we are sending the message that Georgia is committed to upholding its citizens’ constitutional rights and protection of their person,” the bill’s author, Sen. Chip Pearson (R-Dawsonville), said in a written statement. He said technology is moving fast and “we must be careful that it doesn’t come at the harm of citizens. The benefits of a microchip that can be internally implanted are also available in many external forms.” The Senate voted 47-2 in favor of the bill.

    It seems that the Religious Nutbags have begun to get the upper hand in the US.  I urge all the atheists in America etc to join your state group/s that fight for your rights as non-religious citizens.  Without your support it is hard for them to achieve your freedom and things just might get worse, if that is even possible.  Join up and show the God Botherers that there are big numbers against them.  Show the judges that they have backing to make the right decisions.  Show the people that if they run for office, they have people that will vote for them.

    The same goes here in Australia or wherever you live.  Join up.  Without those numbers, they can’t show they have the power to force change.  Numbers is what it is all about.

    BECOME ONE IN A MILLION

    THEN YOU’LL HAVE 999,999 FRIENDS

     

  • DistroMan 20:00 on April 22, 2010 Permalink
    Tags: , , , , , , ,   

    My letter to the Members of the NSW Legislative Council re Ethics Trial. 

    Hello,

    After having been alerted to the following webpage today,

    http://ow.ly/1Bzrp

    I am very disappointed as this seems nothing more than disinformation. As far as I understand it, the Ethics Classes are not replacing the SRE and therefore there is no need to be making these accusations.

    It also says that parents should not be forced to choose between the Government’s ethics course and religious education. Even if this were true, would it be any worse than them being forced to choose between religious education and sitting in a room on their own twiddling their thumbs

    Then they say that religious education has been a part of the NSW school system for over a hundred years and that there is no need to change the policy now. Is it change at this time that they are concerned about or change in itself?

    Lastly, they are calling on the Government to reschedule the new ethics syllabus and make it available to all students, regardless of their faith. What other areas of the childrens education would they have them miss out on?

    I doubt anyone could claim that we do not have a problem with our youth today. The excesses to which a huge section of them are now living their life is concerning to say the least. In more than a century that religion has been in our schools it has not been able to stave off this problem. The Ethics Classes could be the turning point for the future of our youth.

    Please do not allow a few voices crying out loudly to take this chance away from our kids. They deserve this chance to grow and prosper.

    Regards

    Distro Man

     

    • Greybeard 11:45 on April 22, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply

      These religious folks are very confused people. They see this as a threat to religious education in NSW, instead of an alternative.

      As you say, it is a form of disinformation, designed to whip up a storm.

      They label children who avoid religious indoctrination classes as 'consciencious objectors', equating them to young men who refuse to sign up for National Service and all the connotations that may imply in people's minds.

      The link you provided goes to a page that allows you to write to local pollies, based on postcodeThe message you send does NOT have to support the crackpot religious opposition to teaching ethics. You can say what you like and I would, if I had not already informed them of my opinion. I hope many do.

      • DistroMan 11:49 on April 22, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply

        Ah, but there are time when politicians need to have things said not once, but two or even three times. Do not let having spoken once, stop you from having your say again. Especially if you find a better way to put it or with even more passion. :)

    • Greybeard 12:39 on April 22, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply

      Once a king, always a king but once a night is enough. Passion or not.

      I received a number of acknowledgements from the message I sent to every NSW MP but only one really attempted to provide me with a satisfactory answer. He failed.

      Here's one paragraph of what he said: "The problem with ethics classes is that the content can be very subjective. The content of an ethics class, more than any other subject, can be very much influenced by the individual beliefs of the person teaching the class."

      They want religion to control the Ethics Class that is an alternative to the Religion Class. It's a bit like a Free-thinker conducting a Religion Class.

      • DistroMan 12:46 on April 22, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply

        Which only proved said MP failed to read up on how the trial is being conducted and how the teachers are approaching the subject. I'm glad others seem to know what it's about. I got one answer stating that 'I support the trial and look forward to its successful completion and application generally in all schools.'

  • DistroMan 20:00 on April 20, 2010 Permalink
    Tags: , , , , , ,   

    Why the Catholic Church can never be trusted again… 

    When an institution becomes so fragmented that nobody knows what anybody else is doing to the extent that the head honcho claims no knowledge of what is happening, you have to wonder what controls are in place.  When different parts of said institution are going off on their own and making claims so outrageous that even their own followers are distancing themselves from their extremist views, you have to ask whether it is all worth it?

    • Sex abuse scandals in the Roman Catholic Church are proof that that “the Devil is at work inside the Vatican”, according to the Holy See’s chief exorcist.  And as the chief exorcist of the Roman Catholic Church, it’s his job to expel the devil when someone is possessed. Amorth, the founder of the International Association of Exorcists, has performed more than 70,000 exorcisms in his career, he estimates.  That is averages 3 a day, every day of his career.  Oh yeah, we believe you.  Sure thing.
    • A prominent Roman Catholic bishop in Mexico blamed eroticism on television and Internet pornography for child abuse by priests, in the latest incendiary comments on sex scandals in the church. I have to ask why the priests are even watching that kind of thing. If they stick to their vows it wouldn’t even arise, pardon the pun.
    • Several controversial comments made by Catholic clergy, including on Monday when the Vatican’s secretary of state, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, said priest pedophilia was linked to homosexuality not celibacy. Wow, even when it’s little girls that are being abused?  You lot really have lost touch with reality.  Even if you are right though, you must admit to the irony of the gay hating Catholic Church being overrun by gays.  Now you have to hate yourselves and stop giving yourself health benefits.
    • I just have to add this bit.  It shows, even though I agree with this fellow, how little control the Vatican actually has. A Roman Catholic bishop has called on EU leaders who are Christians to speak out against the Vatican if it makes “stupid” remarks, such as a recent declaration that homosexuality causes paedophilia.  Peter Moran, the Bishop of Aberdeen in Scotland, said the church’s cover up of child abuse in Ireland 40 years ago was facilitated by “an exaggerated deference toward the clergy.”
    • The Vatican was hit by another embarrassing revelation this week when a website posted a letter by a senior cardinal heartily congratulating a French bishop in 2001 for not denouncing a self-confessed abusive priest to the police.  Yep, just keep patting yourselves on the back for being the out of touch, kiddie fiddlers that you are.  We are all so impressed.  NOT.

    After hearing Papa Joe and his Cohort of Evil all saying that they didn’t know what was going on or how bad it was, to now see this kind of thing day after day just leads me to wonder who is in charge over there?  The Vatican know nothing other than that the Devil is loose inside it’s walls and it priests are starting to call for blood.  It really is time that Joe took a good look at himself and stood aside.  The Holy Roman Catholic Church needs a new leader.  One that has the balls to do the job Joe should have done 5 years ago when he first took office.

    First order of business for whoever takes the job would be to repeal both the Crimen Sollicitationis and De Delictis Gravioribus.  Any words uttered with those two documents still in force mean nothing to the world and those who matter most, the abused.

    TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOUR ACTIONS

     

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