Daily digest - Tuesday, 15 January 2012

Cor! Busy news day today. I have only managed to get one post out, and that was mainly copypasta. It is a good read, though.

The big news today, of course, is the European Court ruling on the four Christians that were claiming some sort of religious discrimination or wrongful dismissal, or something. Only one of them had their case upheld, and I disagree with that. Especially in light of Stephen Law's article.

One item that - for some unknown reason - didn't seem to make the news, was that the Cornwall Council General meeting voted against introducing a plan that would see the county's poorest people footing the entire bill for central Government cuts. I don't hold these people in very high regard, but the right decision was returned today. The Conservatives had better watch their backs at the local elections in May. UPDATE: BBC has a report here.

Short intro tonight. It is getting late and I plan a busy morning ahead.

Daily digest - Sunday, 13 January 2012

Some of you may have noticed that I have let loose a guest poster here. I have no idea what I have let myself in for. His name is +Mark Tonner and he will be interjecting on matters that he may claim concern him, but in reality they do not. I view this experiment as an exercise in how to deal with trolls, hostile comments and account hackers. One never knows, he might actually post something of note, but in the meantime, please feel free to engage with him at your peril. He has already apologised.

Also new today is 'Verse of the day' from BibleGateway.com, which I shall be applying to a strictly scientific process (faith) to rate on the 'Inspirationometre™'. Each days verse will be judged on its value to my understanding of the meaning of life, morality and the level of engagement it has instilled. Each grade awarded is measured against the centi-inspirationometre. The higher the measurement, the higher its value to myself (and maybe to all of God's creation).

In addition to this, I shall be enticing my local readership more, by offering a weather and tide report each day. Again, a lot of what I am putting out - especially for local matters - have a lot of relevancy to my own day-to-day life; dog walking on Long Rock beach being one of them.

Long Rock beach with St Michael's Mount in the background

Posts today include a hilarious video from The Young Turks, about how passengers dealt with a drunk man who had threatened to choke them on a flight from Reykjavik to New York, and another video by William Tapley - a Christian numerologist - who argues that God allowed the 20 children at the Sandy Hook shootings to die. Not much worth reporting on today, unfortunately.

Daily digest #1

Due to a recent addition to the family taking up a lot of my previous spare time, and a distinct bifurcation in my areas of interest, I have decided to change the way I use this blog to make it easier for the people of each discipline to browse the information contained here.

Atheism and secularism are still my raison d'être for my blogging, but my interest in local politics and current affairs is in the ascendant right now (I plan to run for either the local town council or the county council in the May elections), so I shall be producing a daily post that lists the issues that are important to me from both subjects side by side and will let my reader be the judge of what it is you wish to read and how you would like me to proceed with it. If there is anything listed below that you would like me to expand upon, please leave a message in the comments. Likewise, if there is something you feel I have missed, please bring to my attention below and I shall try my best to squeeze out a post on it.

I suppose there is a degree of laziness in this approach, but I prefer to see it as a method of sorting out the wheat from the chaff and actually giving my reader some feedback on what it is they want to see here, so please do let me know what you think.

Atheism / Secularism

Local /Cornwall

How to make the UK a secular state By RobertCallan316 posted on January 11, 2013 02:58AM GMT "There's not many things that I can say that I'm not proud of being a British citizen. This country has done me well as a 19 year old atheist  but the one thing that deeply saddens me is that we are not a secular state, and still have bishops of the church of England having a say in issues that should be kept separate from them. What can the British people who believe this to be wrong do to try and put a stop to this so we can truly say that we promote reasonable thinking and in the UK?" There are some good answers in the comments section. Here's mine; "I particularly like comments #1, #2 and #5, but the crux of the matter is, what are you prepared to do about it? It is all well and good saying what you want and demanding it from your political representatives, but there is no substitution for becoming the leading voice in the field you wish to influence. Obviously, we cannot all do that, but it is not for the lack of opportunity. Myself, I will be running for councillor in either my local or county elections in May this year. I have no idea how successful my campaign will be, but I am sure that in getting the word out to people I know I am making a bigger impact on the electorate than any party political wonk that you could hope to have represent you. You appear to know what you want, make a stand and explain your position to the largest number of people that will listen. It's hard work, but imagine the satisfaction of garnering even a minority share of the vote. It will make it all worthwhile" Famous Christians - Martin Luther Rosa Rubicondior is one of my favourite bloggers. She consistently turns out well-researched and concise posts on biblical criticism. This post is the second of her - what I presume will be a recurring theme - 'Famous Christians'. The first post in the series confronted theist's claims that Hitler was an atheist, by quoting a number of his clearly Christian/Catholic line of thinking.

New supermarket will pay £250,000 for Penzance's improvements "Am I reading this correctly? Penzance businesses are being asked to part with an extra 1- 2% on top of their business rates? Or is it taken from that they already pay? Apropo the £249,500 from Sainsbury's; 1. On what will the £130,000 be spent on town improvements? 2. What 'events' will benefit from the £25,000? 3. Who or what will be marketed and promoted with another £25,000? 4. What will a £49,500 town centre co-ordinator do, and how will this person be selected? 5. Notwithstanding its name, what will be the objects and methodology of a Business Improvement District (BID)? It's great seeing these sort of numbers coming towards Penzance town centre, but what do they all mean exactly. At present they seem like nothing more than sound-bites." Call to restrict numbers of second homes "Like Mr Wallis, I have no particular objection to second/holiday homes but feel that with the housing waiting list being at the level it is, there is a need to balance the books. Homes lying empty for the majority of the year - whilst not immoral by any means - is not conducive to a thriving community. By making second/holiday home owners apply for some sort of planning permission, the council has the opportunity to have some control over how housing needs are managed. Private homes that are occupied are not affected at all. If a second/holiday home is found to be empty for the greater part of the year, owners should - at least - be encouraged to rent it out on a more regular basis so that the communities in which these properties exist don't wither and die in the quieter times of the year. Perhaps the council could offer owners an incentive to rent out their properties for a 12 month period, so that in the short term, at least, people will have somewhere to call home. Housing is perhaps the biggest challenge facing Cornwall, and from where I sit it appears to be an almost insurmountable problem in the short-term. The council must outline a definitive, coherent, sustainable and environmentally-conscious plan for the next 20-30 years if the problem is to be faced at all." Town gets tough on dog mess in parks "As a new owner of an English Springer Spaniel puppy, the issue regarding dog fouling on parks and pavements has become all the more real to me of late. Laws have been in place since 16 July 2010 to deal with the problem, but little seems to be done to enforce them." See my whole post

Miscellaneous

I have other interests beyond these two main subjects, of course, so I shall place funny, interesting or sometimes downright weird links here.

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One of my bug-bears about my local council, is their apparent indifference to a rugged policy for dealing with the housing crisis we are facing. What with Cornwall's idyllic coast and countryside, I don't think we are doing enough to encourage investment in green technologies on any level. 

I particularly like the idea of 'container villages' (I shall write a more in-depth post about this sometime in the future), but for now here is a link to what can done with the humble shipping container.

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The grammar Nazi in me runs deep, and I am always drawn to posts that explain an unknown area of the subject that, hitherto, I was unaware of.

This article by the Oxford University Press explains 'suppletion', where the future, present and past tenses of verbs can take on quite different forms from one another.

A good case in point (as the cartoon above shows. You may need to click to embiggen to see it in better detail.) is why is the past tense of 'go', 'went' rather than 'goed'?

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What do you think of the new approach? Is there anything you would like me to approach with more consideration? What else on this site do you think needs changing? Leave a comment below to let me know.

n.b. I am working on a new site that will further delineate between my increasingly diverse interests, but for the time being this blog will have to suffice. I'll let you know more when the roll-out date approaches.

Norwich: Godless capital of England and Wales, Census shows

Source: BBC News

Norwich has the highest proportion of the population in England and Wales reporting no religion, at 42.5%, according to the census.

It is not the first time an area in the east of England has taken the title.

In 2009, a survey by think tank Theos suggested it was the most non-religious region of the UK, with almost half of those surveyed saying they believed the theory of evolution made God obsolete, and more than 80% disagreeing with creationism and intelligent design.

Andrew Copson, from the British Humanist Association, which ran a campaign to persuade people to tick the "no religion" box last year, says it's not easy to know exactly why Norwich stands out.

"We know that it tends to be more young people, whites and males that say they are non-religious," he says. "Norfolk also has a lot of free churches, and we know they tend to die out more quickly than other churches - so that might be a factor."

Norwich does have two cathedrals and is said to have more standing medieval churches - 32 - than any city north of the Alps.

Keith Morris, editor of Network Norfolk, which reports on the Norwich and Norfolk Christian community, says his experience contradicts the census findings.

"In the last year we have reported on a number of new church congregations, including those serving mainly Chinese and African residents in Norwich itself, " he says.

Other posts on the UK Census 2011;

• UK Census 2011: 'No religion' rises from 15 to 25% of the population

An invitation to #TeamJesus to define what they mean by 'an atheistic worldview'

For as long as I have been writing/commenting/blogging about atheism, I have been confronted by an utterly bewildering phenomenon, namely the insistence by theists that atheism - despite being the lack of a belief in the existence of a god or gods - forms the basis of (or in its totality) a 'world view'.

I encourage people to forward this to their theistic-leaning friends and family, and share on whatever social networks you are subscribed to (I'll post it to r/atheism, but if you want to post it to another subreddit, I thank you), to try and elucidate just what it is theists think constitutes an 'atheist world view'.

If you would like to leave a comment, please be as specific as you can.

Thank you in advance.

UK Census 2011: 'No religion' rises from 15 to 25% of the population

Despite the controversial wording of the 'religion' question in the UK Census in 2011, the number of people stating that they had 'no religion' rose 10% from 15% to 25% of the population according to figures released today.

Conversely, the Christian population of England and Wales has fallen by four million to 33.2 million in the past decade, despite the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, saying English cathedral congregations have grown in recent years.

Mapping the atheist blogosphere.

The number of atheist bloggers appears to be on the rise, but there is little in the way of promotion or support; often leaving beginners with a feeling of failure and/or burnout.

Over at Cryptonaut in Exile, CdogZilla has collected the names and locations of a number of atheist bloggers and plotted them on Google Maps.

Blogging can be a lonely, frustrating and daunting task, so any help to support someone's burgeoning blogging experience is something that has my whole-hearted support.

A great many of you will be familiar with The Atheist Blogroll, and it has certainly brought some traffic my way, but I think the visualisation afforded by utilising Google Maps adds a different dimension to blog promotion that cannot be overstated.

Atheism - and more importantly the allied political movement of secularism - is indeed on the rise. We should be mindful to promote good sources of information, opinion and general competence in our positions if we are to be taken seriously, and this map can be a significant aid to rallying local support like no other I have encountered.

Add your atheist blog to the project here.

Can you recommend any other support efforts for the promotion of atheist bloggers? Let me know in the comments below.

I don't quite know why I haven't posted about this before, but better late than never.

Quick thought. Is God unchanging?

Notwithstanding the fact that I do not believe in the existence of God, the Christian will make many claims about His nature all the same, but even a cursory glance at these claims leads one to the conclusion that these claims are contradictory, rendering the existence of the Christian God utterly redundant.

Apart from the 'omnis' - presence, benevolence and knowing - the claim that He is also unchanging is prevalent within Christian thought. Indeed, what use an omni-God that requires the utility of changing His mind? That would entail that those matters on which His mind has been changed were, in some manner, incorrect or ill-conceived. So it is, then, that such an omni-God must be unchanging.

With this in mind, why would God do any of the following?

Create a new covenant with humanity?.

The New Testament is touted as just such an enterprise, but it suggests that the old covenant with the Jews was not sufficient. If this be the case, why did the old covenant not encompass humanity as a whole? God's chosen people would have no need to have carried out the numerous and heinous genocides that are rampant in the Old Testament, as all of humanity would have been seen as allies - regardless of their sinful nature. Are we all not sinners regardless of whether or not one is a Christian or  Jew?

Change the Ten Commandments?

The Old Testament has no fewer than three different versions of the Ten Commandments. Each of them differ. The ones espoused by modern day Christians reflect the original tablets given to Moses, but in another part of the Bible these commandments are slightly different. More worrying still, after these original commandments had been set in stone and smashed by Moses in a fit of pique regarding the construction of a golden calf, God once again called upon Moses to receive another set.

It is this set of commandments that were placed in the Ark of The Covenant and are the only ones that have the biblical subtitle of 'Ten Commandments' in our oldest manuscripts. However, they are quite distinct from those commandments first given to Moses as can be seen here. If God is unchanging, why would His commandments display so much diversity?

Is slavery still permissible?

Given that if God is genuinely unchangeable, the new covenant is clearly a forgery (or perhaps the work of Satan?), and the old covenant as set forth in the Old Testament is still in force to this day. The Old Testament gives clear instructions on how slaves are to be treated in the 613 Mosaic laws allegedly shared with him at the same time as he received the initial Ten Commandments and that would mean that Christians could conceivably still practice slavery without bruising their morality: God wants us to treat slaves in a certain way.

It could be argued that, just as the Ten Commandments were rewritten, the other Mosaic laws were also rewritten at a latter date. Just that these updated laws were not added to today's scripture. But there still lies the problem that if the Bible be an accurate account of the times of Moses then God would still have to have changed his mind with regard to slavery. This does not instil much confidence in the claim that he is unchanging.

Final word on Atheism+ - Part 2

Still blogging on my phone, I'm afraid. I wonder just how many parts this post will consume. Onwards regardless.

Notwithstanding the considerable abuse of rational and sceptical atheists thus far, a post I have just read by Greta Christina gave me some hope. She has always been one of the more responsible voices in gender and sex equality, in addition to her atheism. And it is with that in mind that her comments on Atheism+ were not lost on me. If she feels that there is benefit in incorporating non atheistic - but allied - issues to atheism, then I wish her and her co-pilots all the best. By her own admission, though, it is a monumental task that to my mind suggests that the abandonment of compartmentalism is a realistic way forward.

Atheism+ appears to be a genuine attempt to rally like minded people to become activists on all issues that have a common egalitarian goal. This in itself is nothing to be sniffed at, but in doing so, the activists that work 24/7 across the globe to promote equality for atheists, are being asked to take on even more responsibility. This, in effect - and if each atheistplusser subscribes to the same selfless goal for all - means that all arguments for positions under its banner are compromised. Certainly, a possible weight of numbers may make up for this dilution, but I fail to see that the divisiveness it has engendered is anything worthwhile spending any time on.

If Atheism+ were nothing more than an umbrella under which differing activists could organise, I would have no problem with it, but I foresee two major flaws.

The first is that if an umbrella group is all Atheism+ is, then why name it after one aspect of the group: especially if it excludes those that we may wish to bring to our way of thinking - namely theists? Also, in spreading each person's involvement across numerous disciplines and issues, the gravitas of each individual's efforts is compromised by introducing ideas each might have less experience with, further diluting their message's value. Would it not simply be better to form a similar minded group that allowed each specialist activist to continue their work to the best of their ability, in an environment where there work can be shared amongst people that share the same egalitarian goals? We could call it Equality+, because that is the common goal, right?

The second, following on from the first, is in diluting atheism into shared and worthy goals, we ignore the fact that if theism is compromised and diluted, race, sex, gender and other social justice issues will begin to crumble. I don't wish to say that atheism should form the backbone of a wider movement with similar goals, but that the goals we strive for in atheism have clear benefits for our brothers and sisters in other areas of equality. There is, to my mind, a clear benefit to specialisation in our fields: it gives our voices the weight of authority our goals deserve.

They are secular issues.

They are social justice issues.

They are each issues worth our attention.

Speaking as an atheist who is a secular activist, I see real value in what I understand FtB's initial goal was - giving a voice to those that feel they lacked one - but my observations of a number of those that have aligned themselves with the burgeoning Atheism+ movement (but by no means all of them) have been divisive and ill-considered.

I am sure, if feminism hasn't deliberately set out on a wedge strategy to piggy back on atheism's successes, that few would disagree with me if they are to be honest.

We do have a common goal, but Atheism+ is not a constructive strategy (such as it is). We all want to work towards equality, and we don't want people who undermine our shared goals to subvert us from our causes, but if we are to be an effective force to be reckoned with, dividing ourselves against ourselves is hardly a constructive path. Is it?

We are all responsible for calling out trolls and bigots on our respective platforms, and we need to be more vigilant, but blindly blocking and harassing people for asking relevant questions (in what is, for all intents and purposes, a sceptical community) is nothing short of activism suicide.

Remind me. Where does it say something about divided houses falling?

Part 3 to come. Oh dear. This is becoming an epic.

Your thoughts so far?

My final word on Atheism+ - Part 1

Let me make this very clear from the outset. I fully support the egalitarian principles that share atheism's and secularism's struggle for parity with those groups that wish to silence our perceived threat to the status quo. This includes gender and sexual identity, as well as all the other egalitarian principles put forward by Atheism+.

That said, in the year or so that has lead up to its inception, I have become increasingly frustrated at how atheism has taken a back seat in the atheism movement. Sure, if I genuinely support the statement made in my opening paragraph, I will continue to identify with those same egalitarian goals: and I do.

What I don't want to do, is to put my name to a group that - to my mind, and other reasonable and sceptical atheists - has co-opted the ongoing successes in our movement in order to wedge strategize a different agenda: hence diluting the hard work done by hundreds of atheist activists over a protracted period of time and undermining the credibility of the movement as a whole.

My personal forays into support for feminism (or at the very least gender and sexual identity equality) have been met with considerable vitriol, despite my support. The skeptic in me, though, does not allow me to permit people to call me a misogynist (I do not hate women) without some form of questioning or rebuttal. And so it was one day, on Google+, I commented on Ophelia Benson's withdrawal from TAM 2012. (Sorry, but I can't form links: I am blogging from my phone)

From the outset, I was enraged that the behavior of a few rotten types had lead to speakers pulling out from what should have been one of the year's top-draw events, but upon further inspection it appears that the threats claimed were not what I would recognise as a threat: not even a couched threat at that. Indeed, Ophelia herself did not deem them sufficiently threatening to inform the police, and she proceeded to dress me down for holding my own - commonly held - opinion. Maybe I do suffer from the miasma of privilege, but in isolating it to my being white, middle-class, straight and male, am I not also a victim of the heinous behavior of race, class, gender identity and sex discrimination of which I am accused? I was genuinely upset that the actions of the few were undermining the good work done by so many, and wanted to highlight that this sort of behavior should not be permitted. Quite how my support for feminists at this stage turned into a red flag event for my misogyny, I am afraid my accusers will have to elucidate. If this be a reasonable justification to be railed against in what would become Atheism+, so be it. Whilst my own experience of the debate was mystifying, my scepticism was aroused.

Not long after, my friend Justin Vacula was singled out for what has become the unofficial 'free thought' position of what I shall call non-slut-shaming. Like me, Justin had been politely supporting feminist issues, and like me, had also received a dressing down for his scepticism of the behavioral and logical positions of his interlocutors. Again, like myself, Justin kept a civil tone and concentrated on the subject at hand, rather than resorting to ad hominem attacks (I think I have, just once, called one of my interlocutors a moron. Not because she was female, but because out of the hundreds that had seen the offending blog post, she was the only person to twist the satirical nature of the article around - in true creationist style - to support her artificially generated vitriol against me). Justin - probably because of his wider renown and greater dedication - did not fare as easily as I did. What would go on to become the burgeoning supporters of Atheism+ (predominantly FtB bloggers) began to eschew some truly bizarre behavior and language at Justin: for merely asking people for clarifications and explanations. Off the top of my head now, sexist pig, misogynist and vacuous shitbag troll are just a taste of what he has had to put up with for politely doing what he has done from the outset of his atheist and sceptical activism.

Another incident involved Surly Amy. Justin posted a blog with an image derived from Amy's Surlyramics site. Some days later, he received a DMCA take-down notice claiming copyright infringement. 'Fair Use' issues aside, it turns out the named plaintiff was Amy herself. The notice was later retracted and as far as I am aware may not have been Amy at all, but one of her fangenda types. If it was Amy, her decision not to continue down this path was a wise one, but if it was made by someone other than Amy, this is considered a serious offence and I hope that the culprit is brought to justice.

Recently, Justin made an error of judgement in posting Surly Amy's address, despite it already being in the public domain. It was a poor decision which he has retracted and apologized for, but this is not enough for some apparently. Yesterday, Justin posted a video explaining the actions of an unnamed feminist that had published his address and had written to his parents informing them what a frightful character their son is. If this were not enough, this same feminist has started a state-wide campaign against him with the express aim of ruining his career. He/she claims to be an experienced journalist, but as a trained journalist myself, I know that he/she is much more likely to damage their own reputation and highlight Justin's activism. Seriously, has this 'experienced' journalist never heard of the Streisland effect?

So much for my final word on Atheism+. Blogging by phone is tiresome, and I have other things to attend to today.so I shall have to change the title of this post to reflect the fact that this is part 1.

Your thoughts so far?

Justin Vacula gets doc-bombed by feminist (atheist)

Why don't we just call it what it is: Feminism minus atheism.

YouTube

Dissecting the Christian cliché of having a 'God-shaped hole in your heart'.

So. I have a God-shaped hole in my heart?


That is a verifiable claim.


Perhaps I should be volunteering to the University of Christian Cardiology to isolate the physical properties of the Christian God?


Two immediate problems spring to mind;

• There is no University of Christian Cardiology
• Were such an entity to exist, I feel they would rather pluck their eyes out than offer the wider scientific community the opportunity to search for God shaped entities in reality 

Of course, it may be the case that I am simply equivocating the theological definition of 'heart'. If this be the case, what is the Christian definition of the word 'heart'?

Pastor Hagee? I call for YOU to leave America

To the American Christian reading this blog, if the idea of your Constitution protecting the rights of its citizens to believe as they wish offends you? Move.


There are plenty of planes leaving every hour where you can get a transfer to Iran or Pakistan where you can see for yourself why a secular constitution is necessary for the good of all of its citizens, not just those that subscribe to the majority. Get on one. Your country is embarrassed by you. It doesn't need you. And you'll miss the freedom America can rightly boast about that you appear to think is so offensive. I promise you.


Your coins say 'In God we trust', in strict violation of the Constitution you claim to hold so dear.


America may well be a nation of predominantly Christian people, but this is a nominal demarcation of demographics alone and has no constitutional, legal or moral standing.


Your Government has not officially recognised another god. It hasn't even officially recognised the Christian God, lest it be ruled unconstitutional. And in calling for Congress to outlaw one particular religion, you tacitly state that you re in favour of a constitutional amendment outlawing all religion; including your own.


Over 30 million non-Christians - a sizeable, increasingly powerful and vocal minority don't care about the Christian.

At a Texas High School, Saying ‘Atheist’ Could Disrupt the Learning Process

At a Texas High School, Saying ‘Atheist’ Could Disrupt the Learning Process

My response is as follows:

Hi.

I have just seen your principal's notes on a Secular Student Alliance flyer.

I should like to ask him how, exactly, educating people in the meaning of a word that is a fundamental precept to the greater proportion of the events attendees, to others that may have a skewed misrepresentation of the term, constitutes a disruption to the education process?

Kind regards,

Mr Tris Stock

I can't honestly say I am expecting a response. Maybe you will have better luck. Remember to keep your response civil and to the point.

"The children's children cannot be held accountable for the misdeeds of their forefathers."

You would hardly credit it, but I found this statement in the Catholic Encyclopaedia whilst reading up on religious freedom!


Whilst there is no precise heading for religious freedom, my search did come up with an article on religious tolerance. Not so much with how Catholics should be treated, but more how they should treat others.


It is a bit of a tortuous read, as many things are in Catholic writings, but there are some notable doozies that should get the attention of even the most fundamentalist papists; the title of this post being just one.

Dr Peter Saunders and his double entendres

It is scary to think that certain medical professionals are so dishonest and manipulative, but Dr Peter Saunders has posted a blog with the title '20 questions atheists struggle to answer', and then post another blog saying;

Last week I put together a list of twenty questions that, in my experience, atheists either won’t or can’t answer and invited coherent responses.

Surely, if atheists won't or can't answer his propositions, it is just outright hypocrisy to then use the rest of the post to list all those that did bother to answer him. Whether or not he accepts these answers as coherent is a matter for, either him to judge his own interpretation of coherence, or for others to do it on his behalf. From my perspective, his judgement is in serious question, so his understanding of coherence is itself, incoherent.

What are you doing to effect the absolute separation of church and state?

I hadn't considered the full impact of the numbers of percentage of people that state non-religious views too much before know, but looking at the data collated in this Flash graphic - and thanks to the fragmentary nature of Christianity -  this non-religious group accounts for a good proportion of the population even in the most pious states.


Indeed, as a bloc, the non-religious constitute similar figures to Catholics and are often the second largest group in total.

The Amazing Meeting 2012

Source: AmazingMeeting

I just wish I had the funds to attend one of these type meetings.


May I just suggest that Cornwall is a beautiful county with numerous locations that would suit large scale conventions of this type.


I have, of course added the dates to the Secular Atheist Calendar.

Faith-healing Oregon accused - True Scotsmen?

Source: The Register-Guard

Six Creswell siblings became wards of the state Monday as their parents await trial in connection with the death of their teenage son, who died in December after the couple allegedly chose prayer over medical care for his undisclosed treatable ailment. 

Brandi and Russel Bellew face second-degree manslaughter charges in the death of 16-year-old Austin Sprout. But they may continue to care for their remaining children under a state-supervised “in-home safety plan,” Lane County Circuit Juvenile Court Judge Eveleen Henry also ruled in a brief afternoon hearing.

I don't think 'evil' is a word that has any functional use outside of theology. That said - with whatever knowledge of theology I have gleaned over the decades - when I look at the actions of some God-fearing people I do not see the virtuous, pious and good, I see evil in the most basic understanding of the term from a theological perspective.

Sign the petition to let Paradise Valley High School accept secular student group

The Secular Student Alliance is a club that is currently fighting to be accepted as a legitimate club at Paradise Valley High School in Phoenix, AZ. 


PVHS administration has required SSA's advocates to acquire signatures of those students who are okay with it's presence on campus.


Please add your name to the petition on the link below.



Allow The Secular Student Alliance At Paradise Valley High School Petition | GoPetition