1. Victims: Pope Benedict Protects Accused Pedophile Bishops

Comment #162850 by gtcc on April 17, 2008 at 2:56 pm

Lest we not forget:

the "great profit" mohammed, at the age of 52 was having sex with Aisha - she was 9 years old!

2. Victims: Pope Benedict Protects Accused Pedophile Bishops

Comment #162431 by gtcc on April 17, 2008 at 12:31 am

It's my belief that old Clergymen with a raised habit can easily outrun little boys with pants down!

3. Huckabee Wants A 'Faith-based' Constitution

Comment #112544 by gtcc on January 17, 2008 at 12:44 pm

I would have thought this news item would appear on RD website:
"Pope cancels trip to Rome university after protests"
SEE HERE:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2008-01-16-pope-visit_N.htm

4. Questions Delay Creationist Master's Degrees

Comment #112540 by gtcc on January 17, 2008 at 12:40 pm

I would have thought this news item would appear on RD website:
"Pope cancels trip to Rome university after protests"
SEE HERE:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2008-01-16-pope-visit_N.htm

5. How Evolution REALLY Works

Comment #112539 by gtcc on January 17, 2008 at 12:38 pm

I would have thought this news item would appear on RD website:
"Pope cancels trip to Rome university after protests"
SEE HERE:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2008-01-16-pope-visit_N.htm

6. Ben Stein Bribing Schools to See His Anti-Evolution Movie 'Expelled'

Comment #112534 by gtcc on January 17, 2008 at 12:35 pm

I would have thought this news item would appear on RD website:
"Pope cancels trip to Rome university after protests"
SEE HERE:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2008-01-16-pope-visit_N.htm

7. Huckabee Wants A 'Faith-based' Constitution

Comment #111933 by gtcc on January 16, 2008 at 3:22 am

It appears that Huckabee probably will not get the nomination - BUT!!! Latter day saint Mitt Romney is a mormon - Is not that worse??? At least Huckabee is kind of honest about being a bible thumper.

It seems absurd arguing about which of the clowns will become president, one is as bad as the other.

If Hillary wins, we will have Deepak Chopra running the world, now that is a scary thought!

8. Are the 'New Atheists' avoiding the 'real arguments'?

Comment #104991 by gtcc on December 30, 2007 at 9:35 am

How sad it is that Humans have not yet got past all this!

We are still sitting around arguing with silly old men wearing dunces caps & swinging incense - who think that idiotic stories are true. Jesus, Moses, the 3 little pigs, the big bad wolf & little virgin red riding hood - or were the pigs virgins? - what a lot of rubbish!

To have a universities offering degrees in nonsense
(theology)is beyond madness.

How very very sad. What a waste of time!

9. Pope's exorcist squads will wage war on Satan

Comment #104980 by gtcc on December 30, 2007 at 9:08 am

Has the photo been been altered or does the pope really have such a devil face?

Ted Haggard deals with the devil by just saying:
"get ye behind me satan"
....and lo, the angel of the lord came upon him!

===

I wonder if this pope will re-introduce the "Banquet of Chestnuts" which pope Alexander VI made famous in 1501.
Those parties sounded like great fun!

10. Beyond Belief 07: Enlightenment 2.0

Comment #101738 by gtcc on December 20, 2007 at 9:01 pm

Have mercy on Scott Atran - he works for the French you know!!!

I understand that, at the start of WW2 the French had a larger army and could match the Germans tank for tank - but they were over run in a few days due to gross misunderstanding of the situation and almost nonexistent communication between French HQ and the various units.

So, in the unfortunate event of a future conflict, let us hope that we do not have to rely on French intelligence(or lack thereof)

Hitler started in a beer hall - so it wasn't the nazis but a few drunks in a pub that caused WW2 - just as it is a couple of soccer players that caused 9/11 - not Islam!!!

IS HE NUTS?

11. If you don't have religion, where do you find your sense of community?

Comment #101667 by gtcc on December 20, 2007 at 5:47 pm

Atheism's biggest challenge is not proving the Bible wrong – That horse has been flogged to death! Most rational people know in their hearts, tacitly or otherwise, that it is a lot on nonsense.

The church provides something that people need and something which Atheism does not provide. The church satisfies many community needs, in many cases free of charge, or at minimal cost. Until Atheism can match churches in this respect, atheism is destined to attract very few followers.

Many people at times find themselves in unfortunate situations in life and frequently the church offers help at those times.

I never had much interest in religion but I have "used" the church several times in my life. As a teenager the local church ran an auxiliary "guild" for teenagers that met every Friday night offering interesting entertainment, games, talks etc. Apart from a 1 or 2 minute prayer to start off the evening the rest was non-religious (and the prayer could easily be avoided by arriving 5 mins late.)

I found no better and easier place to meet girls. Spectator Sport never interested me, it seemed absurd to watch some tattooed fellow chase after and kick a ball. My preference was for the opposite sex, preferably donned in that marvellous invention of the '60's – the mini skirt! During the '60's, in spite of the mini skirt causing droughts, hell fire and damnation, young ladies still pitched up at the church guild in the fashion of the day, Thank god! (the following year when the long "maxi" skirt became fashionable the drought was followed by floods in South Africa – scientific proof that that rainfall is inversely proportional the hemline of the skirt!)

Then my attendance suddenly ceased when I met a girl not associated with this "guild" – whom I finally married (she looked more smashing in a pink Bikini) – we planned to honeymoon on a cruise ship which sailed to the Seychelles. While I thought that it would be a great idea to ask the Chinese captain to marry us on the high seas my mother-in-law would not have it so to keep the peace we married in the local Anglican church. I was obliged to attend church for 3 Sundays before that and give the preacher a hefty tip. Thereafter I have never attended another church service.

25 years later I went through a marriage break up which I found unbearably traumatic.
We had emigrated to New Zealand just prior to the break up. Being in a new country I had acquaintances but no long term friends, no family and a need to talk a need for comfort and a need for company.

It's easy to scoff and ridicule lonely people but loneliness is awful and those experiencing loneliness often don't know how to correct it.

The catholic church ran a group for widowed/divorced/separated people. I joined this group, the fees were minimal. A cross section of people attended this group with occupations ranging from school teachers to lawyers to accountants to truck drivers to the unemployed. A mid week meeting was held that commenced with a few seconds of prayer followed by a useful group discussion about coping with loneliness and depression and similar topics. Apart from the short prayer to start none of the discussions invoked religion and one was not required to be catholic to join the group.
Best of all, the group held social parties, barbeques, theatre visits and the like every Friday and Saturday evening at private homes plus week end social events. It was wonderful to be able to meet others socially. None of these events invoked religion in any way and I never met anyone there who even brought up the subject conversationally. During that traumatic time in my life, this group was, dare I say (strictly in the Einsteinian sense) a "godsend" to me.

I confess that I had twinges of guilt at making use of the church but was so in need of some kind of psychological distraction and comfort that I justify my actions by telling myself that the catholic church has got where it has over the past 1700 years by perpetrating some very horrible dastardly acts. The murder of the Hypatia, and the Arians, the crusades, Queen Mary's rule, the inquisition and the beatings and abuse dished out to my brother who attended a catholic school – so if one steals from a murderer or criminal – it's not a crime!

But in fairness to the church, Atheism offers nothing even remotely like this. Sure, the church does it for the same reasons that breakfast cereal manufacturers put plastic toys in corn flake packages – to sell more of their product. Nonetheless these are services which no one else offers.

As Ted Haggard said to RD – many Americans think of his church services as rock concerts – he was right! They are rock concerts! – where else can a young person get a great evenings entertainment and meet others all for small donation?

If similar inexpensive services such as companionship, comfort, succour, entertainment, were offered by some "god-unrelated" (I don't want to use the word Atheistic) organisation it would have the additional advantage that people would not have to bluff that they are "believers" – as I had to. Closet Atheists could "come out"
– it would be a winner!

12. THE FOUR HORSEMEN - Available Now on DVD!

Comment #101501 by gtcc on December 20, 2007 at 12:58 pm

I have never smoked (OK - at 13 we used to go behind the bushes, 3 little 13 year old boys and 15 year old Pamela – who showed us what to do with cigarettes long before Bill Clinton did it with cigars! – and she had a few other tricks up her, …um, …sleeve!)
..anyway – I feel that "Atheists" (I wish we could find another term for "Atheist") should be "squeaky clean" when it comes to things like smoking during TV discussions. It just gives the wrong impression. I do find smoking very irritating and I wonder what kind of personality disorder makes a person roll up dried leaves in paper, put the thing in the mouth and set fire to it! Its just Nuts!

Creates a bad and distracting image and it was a bad idea to smoke at such a time.