Religion

The latest ApostAZ podcast is now available: Episode 011 Atheism and Feces-Free Thought in Phoenix! Go to meetup.com/phoenix-atheists for group events! Shyness, Group News,Election Post-Mortem, Email from Shawn of Tough Questions Podcasts, Winter Solstice, Musings on Rhetorical Debate Styles, Ridiculous Marriage Amendment.My comments: Duane Gish was vice president of the Institute for Creation Research. Nice listener email on the FLDS members pretending to be truck stop hookers–I like the listener feedback. Obama opposes same-sex marriage. On proving a negative, please see this and/or this.

Good: Washington joins Oregon in allowing doctor-assisted suicide, South Dakota rejects further abortion limits, Michigan allows medical marijuana and stem cell research, California rejects further abortion limits, Colorado rejects the definition of person as beginning at conception. Bad: California, Arizona, and Florida ban gay marriage with constitutional amendments, Arkansas bans gay couples from adopting children. (Results at CNN.) UPDATE: Ed Brayton notes at Dispatches from the Culture Wars that the California result on gay marriage was evidently due to religious bigotry: In California, exit polls showed that those who attended church regularly voted against marriage equality 83-17%. Those who attended church only occasionally voted for marriage equality 60-40%. Those who do not attend church at all voted for marriage equality 86-14%.The same was true in Arizona, where exit polling found that: Protestants generally supported the measure but that Catholics were fairly evenly divided. Nonreligious voters were solidly against it. … Proposition 102 had slight leads among Whites and among Hispanics. … The youngest voters were split for and against, with support for Proposition 102 increasing among voters in older age groups. Voters age 65 or over were solidly for the amendment.Prop. 102 will ultimately be overturned as the older generation dies off. ...

ApostAZ podcast #10 is out: Episode 010 Atheism and Dogma-Free Thought in Phoenix! Go to meetup.com/phoenix-atheists for group events! Quiverfull, Innocence, Over-population, Which Came First, Religion or Ignorance? (Some of David’s artwork: http://www.flickr.com/photos/davidbessent/), Fear and Dogma, Ignosticism, Priming the Gish Gallop.There’s some discussion of what the legal standards should be for government prevention of abuses by separatist religious groups like Warren Jeffs’ FLDS group. It’s a tough problem, especially when various child protective agencies themselves have a poor reputation and cause harm themselves. In the FLDS case in Texas, the state raided the FLDS compound on the basis of a hoaxed complaint, adult women were taken and held as minors, and the Texas CPS repeatedly misrepresented the facts to try to justify its actions (links are to several of numerous blog posts by economist David Friedman, who blogged the FLDS situation in detail). ...

Daniel Zubairi, one of McCain’s state leaders for Maryland, stepped forward to publicly criticize a person who was criticizing Obama and claiming that he’s tainted because of a Muslim background. CNN wanted to put Zubairi on air, but the McCain campaign said no. (Via Daily Kos.)

Good news! (Via Pharyngula.) Historical Comments Reed (2008-10-24): Those 'None' are better labeled as 'unaffiliated.' But striking nonetheless.Details from the original article: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/25/us/25cnd-religion.html (may require registration)

This is no doubt not a representative cross-section of McCain and Palin supporters, but it’s a disturbingly ugly set of them. It’s fortunate that most of the worst comments are from the older generation–I hope that younger people are less likely to hold such views. McCain has shot down such remarks from supporters when they’ve been made in his presence, to his credit. (And yes, this is from Aljazeera.) UPDATE: Here are more bigoted McCain and Palin supporters in Johnstown, Pennsylvania: UPDATE (October 20, 2008): Sarah Palin says if she heard such bigoted comments she’d shut them down: “What we have heard through some mainstream media is that folks have hollered out some atrocious and unacceptable things like kill him,’ " Palin said, referring to a Washington Post story two weeks ago about angry supporters at a Palin rally in Florida. “If I ever were to hear that standing up there at the podium with the mike, I would call them out on that, and I would tell these people, no, that’s unacceptable."She goes on to break with McCain by supporting a U.S. Constitutional amendment to oppose gay marriage and claim that “Faith in God in general has been mocked through this campaign, and that breaks my heart and that is unfair for others who share a faith in God and choose to worship our Lord in whatever private manner that they deem fit." UPDATE (October 21, 2008): And here’s another video, from Bethlehem, Pennsylvania (same link provided by Hume’s Ghost in the first comment), of McCain and Palin supporters entering Lehigh University (the school where intelligent design advocate Michael Behe is a professor): UPDATE (October 22, 2008): And be sure to check out this woman’s reasons for voting for McCain, at the Secular Web. UPDATE: And more videos of McCain supporters heckling early voters (most of whom were from an Obama rally) in West Virginia. UPDATE (April 10, 2026): Google seems to think that this calling out of bigoted and ignorant statements from 18 years ago itself constitutes “dangerous or derogatory content” in 2026, which is absurd. These videos are hosted on YouTube, Google’s platform, so if they have a problem with the content they should take down the videos. UPDATE (April 13, 2026): My request for a review was unsuccessful. Here’s the policy that Google claims is being violated by this 18-year-old blog post in 2026 (a time when the rhetoric has become far, far, worse, including from the president of the United States): “We do not allow content that:incites hatred against, promotes discrimination of, or disparages an individual or group on the basis of their race or ethnic origin, religion, disability, age, nationality, veteran status, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, or other characteristic that is associated with systemic discrimination or marginalization.harasses, intimidates, or bullies an individual or group of individuals.threatens or advocates for harm to oneself or others.relates to a current, major health crisis and contradicts authoritative, scientific consensus.exploits others through extortion."It is absolutely absurd to think that the content of this blog post does any of these things. ...

The Door Christian Fellowship, a creepily cultish Pentecostal Christian sect that’s an offshoot of Aimee Semple McPherson’s Foursquare Gospel Church, is putting on a “hell house” in Chandler. They’re calling it “Hell 101," and, as usual, they are advertising it in a deceptive manner that attempts to hide the fact that it’s religious propaganda. I say “as usual” because not only have they put on such “hell houses” for years around Halloween, they’re also known for advertising events such as Christian rock concerts while conveniently forgetting to mention the “Christian” part. Such deception has long been associated with Aimee Semple McPherson (1890-1944), who was a fraudulent faith healer, alcohol Prohibitionist, and anti-evolutionist who later in life faked her own abduction in order to run off with her lover, Kenneth G. Ormiston, who had been an engineer for her radio station KFSG in Los Angeles. After disappearing for 35 days, she stumbled out of the desert in Agua Prieta, Sonora, Mexico, just south of the border from Douglas, Arizona, and told a phony story of kidnapping which quickly fell apart when witnesses came forth who had seen her at a resort in Carmel-by-the-Sea, California. She ended up dying of an accidental drug overdose from taking too many Seconol sleeping pills, but her Foursquare Gospel Church still exists today with over two million members, mostly outside of the U.S. (Interestingly, as a teenager McPherson was an agnostic who defended evolution in letters to the newspaper.) The Potter’s House, The Door, Victory Chapel, and other Foursquare Gospel spinoff churches are Pentecostal churches that engage in faith healing, speaking in tongues, being slain in the spirit, and other activities of anthropological interest. They can be very hardcore in the pushiness of their evangelism, and engage in cult-like conversion techniques such as separating people from groups they come with, pairing them off with someone of the same approximate age and sex, and bombarding them with rehearsed questions designed to push someone to a conclusion that they need to accept Jesus and join their group. (The Wikipedia page on The Potter’s House describes this particular sect’s origins in Prescott, Arizona in 1970, originally officially affiliated with the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel. The Wikipedia biography of its founder, Wayman O. Mitchell, is also of interest. The sect’s origins trace back to Los Angeles, as does the Pentecostal movement in general.) “Hell 101”’s website calls it “Final Destination III,” and describes the hell house as “a twist on a haunted house style attraction that was described by Phoenix Arizona NBC News Affiliate Channel 12 as ‘scary, horrifying, suspenseful, sick….’ NBC 12 News had a live video feed from our annual event where hundreds waited up to two hours in line to have the hell-scared out of them.” Their FAQ has the question “If I quit because I was scared or anything else can I get a refund?” The “anything else” would include feeling defrauded by having paid money for a haunted house, but getting instead Christian propaganda. The answer: “There are no refunds if you get scared, cry, feel angry, get sick, hate it, love it or just want to run!!! Our job is to confront your senses and that we do!" A Christian hell house can be quite entertaining, so long as you know what to expect and are prepared to exercise your right to walk away at the end when the attempts at conversion go into overdrive (they may suggest that the doors are locked and that you may not leave). George Ratliff’s documentary film “Hell House” is a great way to get a preview, and shows some of the unintentional comedy that can be produced when a bunch of ignorant people try to put together a scary haunted house designed to persuade you that you’re going to hell unless you believe the way they do. That documentary also shows how ineffectual some atheists can be in their confrontation of Christians, and I highly recommend that anyone planning to visit one of these hell houses for any reason give it a watch before going. A “hell house” usually follows a common script template which the churches purchase and customize. They go through a writing, casting, and production process similar to a high school stage production. The “hell house” script typically guides a group of visitors through a series of rooms, each of which contains a brief performance by actors portraying some scene that argues for certain practices, beliefs, or actions as likely to terminate with eternity in hell, though that latter point may initially be somewhat subtle. (By the end, it is anything but.) I attended a hell house at a Potter’s House church in Tucson in 1990, from which the flyer image was obtained. (Also see this PDF of an Arizona Daily Star newspaper story about that particular hell house, which got in trouble with the local fire department for fire code violations.) That hell house followed a female character from scene to scene which included a car crash caused by teenage drinking (featuring an actual wrecked car and empty beer cans), a band of demons playing AC/DC’s “Highway to Hell” (suggesting that at least some rock music is demonic in origin and consequences), and the ever-popular hanging nun in hell (Catholicism is regarded by this sect as ruled by Satan) and young woman on a stretcher with a pool of blood between her legs shrieking that she’s killed her own baby (the anti-abortion segment). At the end, there’s a high-pressure call to Jesus which provides an opportunity to argue with someone who may be something like a street preacher in their skill of providing pre-programmed responses to common objections they’ve heard many times but is unlikely to have actually thought deeply about. If you do choose to visit one of these, I advise not getting involved in such a discussion if you’re somebody who is likely to blow up, call people stupid, or otherwise lose your cool–that’s just going to be seen as confirming evidence that you’re under the control of the devil and anything you say can be dismissed without consideration. UPDATE (October 31, 2008): New Times has a review of The Door’s “Final Destination III” hell house. ...

The October 4, 2008 issue of The Economist has an interesting article, “Sons of heaven," about Christianity in China, which reports that the official estimate of 21 million Chinese Christians (16 million Protestants, 5 million Catholics) is probably a vast underestimate. The Centre for the Study of Global Christianity estimates that the number is 70 million, while the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, former Communist Party official turned Christian Zhao Xiao, and the China Aid Association all think the number may be as high as 130 million. This is compared to membership in the Chinese Communist Party of 74 million. The reason for the underestimate is that many Christians in China are unaffiliated with any official church. The government doesn’t allow more than 25 people to meet in a gathering without official permission, so Christians in China have formed thousands of “house churches,” similar to the way Pentecostalism has grown through small groups across South Korea. Just as private meetings in homes were how Christianity spread in Rome, the result has been a proliferation of more and more smaller groups in China. These house churches tend to be unaffiliated with any denomination, with “no fixed liturgy or tradition,” and run by recent converts who themselves are not expert on Christianity. The article points out that in China, Christianity is not associated with tradition and ritual, but with modernity, business and the market economy (where it’s seen as a necessary check on the market to provide ethics in business), and science. Six of the 30 leaders of the student protests at Tiananmen Square became Christians, and the article states that “One Confucian Chinese says with a rueful smile that most of the pretty girls at university were Christians–and would date only other Christians." Christianity has spread in China as a result of rural Christians migrating to the cities, and students who travel to the United States and become Christians and then return home. I look forward to seeing a similar article in the future about the spread of atheism, skepticism, and pro-science groups in the United States through Meetup groups and student groups. ...

An article at Time magazine suggests that those following the “prosperity theology” of some Pentecostal ministers are more likely than average to have obtained mortgages they cannot afford, leading to foreclosure: Has the so-called Prosperity gospel turned its followers into some of the most willing participants – and hence, victims – of the current financial crisis? That’s what a scholar of the fast-growing brand of Pentecostal Christianity believes. While researching a book on black televangelism, says Jonathan Walton, a religion professor at the University of California at Riverside, he realized that Prosperity’s central promise – that God will “make a way” for poor people to enjoy the better things in life – had developed an additional, dangerous expression during the subprime-lending boom. Walton says that this encouraged congregants who got dicey mortgages to believe “God caused the bank to ignore my credit score and blessed me with my first house.” The results, he says, “were disastrous, because they pretty much turned parishioners into prey for greedy brokers."Yet another case of religious trust being exploited to victimize those who have it. (Via Dispatches from the Culture Wars.) ...

Dustin Chalker, stationed at Ft. Riley, Kansas, has filed a lawsuit about being forced to attend Christian proselytization events in the military, including a presentation which claimed that Christianity and creationism give life meaning, while evolution and atheism remove hope. The complaint describes this event, which took place at a U.S. military base in England, delivered by Chaplain Christian Biscotti (!) and was approved by Lt. Gen. Rod Bishop (!) who spoke afterward: Another slide titled “Contrasting Theories of Hope, Ultimate Theories Explaining Our Existence,” has two columns, the first titled “Chance,” and the second “Design,” comparing Charles Darwin, creationism, and religion are also part of a chart comparing the former Soviet Union to the United States, concluding that “Naturalism/Evolution/Atheism” leads to people being “in bondage” and having “no hope,” while theism leads to “People of Freedom” and “People of hope/destiny.” After several more slides like these, the presentation continues with a slide titled “Christian’s Message,” and a slide with an image of a man looking upwards with his hands outstretched and the caption “Please open up both of your hands to receive this powerful tool."This lawsuit, like that of Jeremy Hall, was filed by the Military Religious Freedom Foundation. Chaplain Biscotti is a real person, currently stationed at the Joint Warfare Centre in Stavanger, Norway. (Via Dispatches from the Culture Wars.) UPDATE (October 18, 2008): Jeremy Hall has withdrawn his lawsuit on the grounds that he will soon be out of the military and suspects the case will be dismissed for lack of standing once he’s out. Chalker’s case continues. UPDATE (January 7, 2009): Chalker’s suit has been updated and expanded to add further examples of “the noxiously unconstitutional pattern and practice of fundamentalist Christian oppression” in the military, including the Air Force sponsoring “Team Faith” motocross stunt shows, promoting attempts to convert Muslims in Iraq and Afghanistan to Christianity, and the Army’s 2008 manual on suicide prevention, which promotes “religiosity” as a necessary component. ...