Islamic countries like Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and Bangladesh are notorious for their vicious anti-blasphemy laws and the vigilante behavior of its Muslim fanatics who attack and murder those of different religions and also non-believers and skeptics.
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Back in 2014, I wrote about an interesting legal case out of Los Angeles where a new county seal was being proposed that would put a cross on the roof of an image of a church on the existing county seal. The case was interesting because of the role that history played in it and I discussed the legal aspects of it in that earlier post and will not repeat them here.
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This is an excellent film that deals with the true story of the Boston Globe‘s 2002 expose of the Catholic Church’s shameful role in covering up the repeated sexual abuse committed by its priests in the Boston diocese and that the cover-up went all the way up the chain to Archbishop Cardinal Law who orchestrated secret settlements with the victims.
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David Silverman is the president of American Atheists and is a person who was born to wear the label of ‘militant atheist’. CPAC is the Conservative Political Action Conference, an annual gathering of some of the most extreme conservatives in the country, many of whom are extremely religious. Samantha Bee sent one of her producers to see what happened when Silverman attended CPAC three weeks ago.
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Desperate people are easily exploited and now another one of those exploiters has been exposed. An outfit called the Christian Prayer Center advertised that they could get many people to pray for one’s need and provided testimonials to the power of such mass prayers. It turns out that those testimonials were fake and that no one actually was praying on behalf of those who sent in money.
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It is clear that god has been jerking the Republican party around. Many of the candidates vying for the nomination said that god had played a role in their decision to run. This article back in July of last year discussed god’s role in the decisions made by Scott Walker, John Kasich, Ben Carson, Rick Perry, Rick Santorum, and Mike Huckabee to run for president.
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People in the west tend to think of Buddhism as a somewhat austere and ascetic religion and its monks as people living a simple life. Those of us who grew up in predominantly Buddhist countries know otherwise. While there are undoubtedly many monks who fit that description, there are also many who enjoy the pleasures of the material life, living and eating well, driving around in luxury cars, and getting involved in politics in a big way, often to advance reactionary agendas.
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The US has long been considered an outlier when it comes to religious beliefs, with much higher numbers of believers and churchgoers than in other parts of the developed world. But a new study says that that gap seems to be closing, and once again it is the young who are leading the way.
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In the US someone can set up a bogus church and proceed to fleece people by getting them to donate money, even what they cannot afford. Those donations are tax deductible and the pastors get to live the high life with fancy houses, private jets and the like at our expense. The government will not touch them because as soon as they do, people will scream ‘religious persecution’.
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