I should use parables more often

They seem to sneak past the alarms that my bluntness usually sets off. Mike Dunford has a nice quote from that subversive radical, Terry Pratchett:

“Look at it this way, then,” she said, and took a deep mental breath. “Wherever people are obtuse and absurd . . . and wherever they have, by even the most generous standards, the attention span of a small chicken in a hurricane and the investigative ability of a one-legged cockroach . . . and wherever people are inanely credulous, pathetically attached to the certainties of the nursery and, in general, have as much grasp of the realities of the physical universe as an oyster has of mountaineering . . . yes, Twyla: there is a Hogfather.”

(For those not familiar with the backstory, the Hogfather is the Santa Claus equivalent in his fantasy stories.)

Third time is the proof

There’s just no way around it any more. IF:

  • If you’re from Colorado, and
  • if you’re a fundamentalist Christian,
  • then you must be gay.

There’s nothing at all wrong with that, of course, and you should just stop living a lie and come out with it.

We should have known, I think. The bright lights, the adoring audiences, the singing, the showmanship…being a pastor at one of these fundie megachurches is just like having a hit show on Broadway.

Paszkiewicz is famous now!

David Paszkiewicz, the history teacher recorded while proselytizing to his students, has made the NY Times. Here’s the familiar part:

Shortly after school began in September, the teacher told his sixth-period students at Kearny High School that evolution and the Big Bang were not scientific, that dinosaurs were aboard Noah’s ark, and that only Christians had a place in heaven, according to audio recordings made by a student whose family is now considering a lawsuit claiming Mr. Paszkiewicz broke the church-state boundary.

“If you reject his gift of salvation, then you know where you belong,” Mr. Paszkiewicz was recorded saying of Jesus. “He did everything in his power to make sure that you could go to heaven, so much so that he took your sins on his own body, suffered your pains for you, and he’s saying, ‘Please, accept me, believe.’ If you reject that, you belong in hell.”

The story also documents some of the reactions in the community. It’s mostly negative…against the student who dared to document the flagrantly illegal actions of the teacher.

In this tale of the teacher who preached in class and the pupil he offended, students and the larger community have mostly lined up with Mr. Paszkiewicz, not with Matthew, who has received a death threat handled by the police, as well as critical comments from classmates.

Greice Coelho, who took Mr. Paszkiewicz’s class and is a member of his youth group, said in a letter to The Observer, the local weekly newspaper, that Matthew was “ignoring the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, which gives every citizen the freedom of religion.” Some anonymous posters on the town’s electronic bulletin board, Kearnyontheweb.com, called for Matthew’s suspension.

Despite the fact that even conservative legal organizations are saying that Paszkiewicz is basically indefensible, no action has been taken against him.

(via The Island of Doubt)

Oh, well, that’s all right then

Here’s another article on that freaky Left Behind video game. The rationalizations for the ability to kill people violently in the game are fascinating.

Left Behind Games’ president, Jeffrey Frichner, says the game actually is
pacifist because players lose “spirit points” every time they gun down
nonbelievers rather than convert them. They can earn spirit points again by
having their character pray.

Isn’t the most wonderful version of pacifism ever? Go out, butcher a few people, engage in a warlike campaign…and as long as you beg an invisible man’s forgiveness afterwards, you can still call yourself a pacifist. With that kind of reasoning, Ted Haggard is a heterosexual, Bill Bennett is a cautious investor, and Ted Nugent is an environmentalist. No wonder Christianity is popular among hypocrites.

It’s all OK if you are a Christian

Our country, with the approval and encouragement of George W. Bush, has been carrying out a program of religious indoctrination and the unconstitutional endorsement of evangelical Christianity. Federal money has been funneled into “faith-based” programs that make religious dogmatists prosper, and have no other actual, real-world value. The clearest examples are the prisons, where con artists like Chuck Colson have been engaged in a kind of ministry that is actually religious extortion and bribery.

The cells in Unit E had real wooden doors and doorknobs, with locks. More books and computers were available, and inmates were kept busy with classes, chores, music practice and discussions. There were occasional movies and events with live bands and real-world food, like pizza or sandwiches from Subway. Best of all, there were opportunities to see loved ones in an environment quieter and more intimate than the typical visiting rooms.

But the only way an inmate could qualify for this kinder mutation of prison life was to enter an intensely religious rehabilitation program and satisfy the evangelical Christians running it that he was making acceptable spiritual progress.

The article documents many instance of this kind of behavior line up at the trough and get cash—large amounts of cash—to proselytize to captive audiences. It’s genuinely despicable. This is exactly why the government should not be involved in favoring one religion over another—these gasbags cannot be trusted to put the interests of their target audience above their need to preach dogma.

For another example of the sleazy behavior of evangelicals, I give to you Kent Hovind. Hovind is a dishonest creationist who was caught committing tax evasion. Not only was he skimming to enrich himself, but by playing games with their salaries and paying them under the table, he was screwing over his employees, which seems to be a most Christian thing to do. He’s been convicted and thrown in jail, and he has been sporadically posting blog entries from prison. These are appalling stories of a con man who can’t stop bilking his fellow inmates.

have also been teaching math and science to some of the others. It is great to see convicted drug dealers get excited when they learn fourth grade level math for the first time. I have spent quite a bit of time with one 29-year-old man who cannot read at all. I have been teaching him phonics and we are reading Genesis 1, 2, 3 and John 1, 2, and 3. His face lights up when he sees that he can do it. I offer commissary items like soup or coffee to men who memorize Bible verses. There is no way to describe the joy that they show when they get it right. Many have never memorized scriptures in their life, and maybe that is why they are in jail. Scripture helps us to “cleanse our ways” Psalm 119:9-11.

Hovind is not a good teacher. I’ve heard his lectures; he’s a fraud and a liar who babbles at a frantic pace, who has been peddling anti-scientific crap for decades, and now he claims to be teaching science to his fellow inmates. This is an injustice. We’re locking up these poor fellows as punishment, isn’t it a bit much to also allow a bunco artist like Hovind to fill their heads with lies and actively contribute to their ignorance?

Also note the outright bribery I highlighted in the quote—the man has no shame at all.

In fact, he is so shameless I expect that he’ll soon be applying for federal aid in his propaganda efforts…and given the record of this Republican administration, he’ll probably get it. After all, a belief in Jesus seems to be sufficient qualification for any clown to be a teacher (or a president!), overcoming any amount of stupidity.

(crossposted to The American Street)

Maybe I should beg for nickels so I can buy a pair of roller skates

Jebus, but I am in the wrong business. Benny Hinn is getting his flock to buy him an airplane.

As a result, we have recently taken delivery on our Gulfstream G4SP plane, which we call Dove One. I have enclosed a beautiful photo-filled brochure to explain more about this incredible ministry tool that will increase the scope of our abilities to preach the Gospel around the globe. Now we must pay the remainder of the down payment, and I am asking the Lord Jesus to speak to 6,000 of my precious partners to sow a seed of $1,000 in the next ninety days. And I am praying, even as I write this letter, that you will be one of them!

“Sow a seed”…of six million dollars? So he can buy a fancy new jet? This is what Christianity is really good for: providing an environment in which grasping, greasy-haired, forehead-thwacking freaks can prosper, where piety is measured in dollars and the moneychangers have inherited the temple. Faith is just another word for credulity, and preacher is a fancy name for parasite.

What’s wrong with this statement?

Something is odd about this comment:

…to help make his point that the bible was the word of god, he introduced the Dead Sea scrolls. He said that they were 3,000 years old and that scholars had found that they were identical to the modern day bible. In fact, he said, “Every dot over every ‘i’, every cross of the ‘t’, every comma, and every period is in the exact same place as in the bible in your hand” (quote paraphrased).

And to this day in Hebrew school, the children receive careful instruction in dotting i’s and crossing t’s.

Demon squid?

This is just not right. Orac finds some wacky spiritualist ‘healer’ who claims to have the cause for diabetes: a demon, the great spirit squid of doom. What? A squid demon? How kooky. Everyone knows no self-respecting squid demon would confined itself to screwing up one subset of cells in your pancreas.

You’ll have to read the original page to find a list of other demons. There is, apparently, also a Demon of Excessive Foot Odor which you can cast out, and you can also have Demons in your Blood Sugar.