It looks like the Catholic church has decided to go all in on the issue of birth control.
Chicago’s Cardinal Francis George says that the church is willing to close its hospitals if their insurance companies are required to provide contraceptive services to all employees. [Read more…]
Vanderbilt University has stripped a Christian student group of official recognition because it had a clause that says “Criteria for officer selection will include level and quality of past involvement, personal commitment to Jesus Christ, commitment to the organization, and demonstrated leadership ability.” It was the phrase “personal commitment to Jesus Christ’ that resulted in the plug being pulled. [Read more…]
Was there an actual historical figure that corresponds to the biblical Jesus? The debate on this question has been going on for some time in academic circles but has seen a resurgence with the recent publication of Bart Ehrman’s new book Did Jesus Exist? The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth. [Read more…]
I first encountered the work of William Dembski during the time I was engaged in efforts to counter the intelligent design movement. He struck me as a smart guy who was trying to have his feet in two boats. He sought to be accepted by the scientific community by spouting sophisticated intelligent design stuff, while at the same time not alienating the fundamentalist Christian base that has no patience for anything that counters biblical orthodoxy. It is, of course an impossible task to bridge the two worlds as can been from his tortured attempts at bridging the Genesis story with evolution, that culminated in his laughable effort to explain how Adam and Eve killed the dinosaurs. [Read more…]
Charles Murray’s new book Coming Apart supposedly deals with the increasing divergence within the white community over the period 1950-2010. It compares two groups of white people in the 30-49 age range: upper middle class (defined as those with a least a bachelor’s degree and working as a manager or similar high-status professions) with working class (no more than a high school degree and those who work in blue-collar, service or low-skill jobs). [Read more…]
Now that he has put in place policies that are alienating young Catholics, Pope Ratzi is turning his attention to turning off women. As if the church’s policies opposing contraception were not enough, he now reprimanded a large group of US nuns known as the Leadership Conference of Women Religious and appoint a bishop as overseer of their activities because they “had challenged church teaching on homosexuality and the male-only priesthood, and promoted “radical feminist themes incompatible with the Catholic faith.”” [Read more…]
A couple of days ago, The Daily Show had a bit on the ‘war on women’ topic and in the process outraged Bill Donahue of The Catholic League, not that hard to do because he seems to be in a state of eternal apoplexy. In fact, going on TV and screaming that his finely tuned Catholic feelings are hurt seems to be his full-time occupation. [Read more…]
I am a little late to this story about how in the US extreme sensitivity to religious people’s beliefs can result in the most bizarre policies being implemented. For example, the New York City department of education has banned certain words in citywide tests because they may upset students. What words? ‘Dinosaur’ for one. [Read more…]