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Category: religion (page 18 of 36)

Scientology inquiry fails in Australia

17 March 2010 / / 1 Comment

Scientology is an evil little cult. I’m still not sure to what extent it might be more evil and more culty than other religions, but let’s just start there. Like other religions, it collects loads of money from its followers in return for a lot of fables and not much else. And like other religions, it has tax-exempt status in Australia.

The dark side of Scientology was on display recently, with allegations of blackmail, physical abuse, imprisonment of defectors, and forced abortions. South Australian senator Nick Xenophon requested an investigation into revoking the tax-free status of Scientology.

I was disappointed that the inquiry didn’t go anywhere, though I was just glad that someone was willing to raise the issue.

Labor and coalition senators this week joined forces to vote against Senator Xenophon’s motion to launch an inquiry into the tax-free status of religious groups and whether they should be subjected to a British-style public benefit test.
…
Liberal Senator Bill Heffernan, who abstained from the vote on Thursday, said he was divided on the issue.

“We need to find a solution to the despair and desperate circumstances that some families find themselves in, without embarking on what turns into a witch-hunt, with unintended consequences, against all religious organisations,” he told AAP on Friday.

He’s got one thing right: removing tax-free status from Scientology would open the way to removing it from other religions. And I might add, hopefully all. Too bad that’s not a policy that other Australian politicians have the ‘ticker’ for.

It’s been argued that the so-called ‘moderate religions’ provide cover for the ‘extreme religions’, often by making faith seem respectable. But in this case, it happens because the mantle of ‘religion’ makes lawmakers unwilling to confront even the Scientologists, if it might create conflict with other churches. And so evil organisations can escape consequences, if they just call themselves a religion.

A Scientology spokeswoman said the voting down of Senator Xenophon’s motion was a “victory for religious freedom”.

Perhaps, if we mean ‘freedom from having to pay their fair share in society’. But if ‘religious freedom’ means ‘freedom to leave the religion’, then it’s a freedom that some ex-Scientologists do not have. And this lack of religious freedom is sanctioned, endorsed, and paid for by the state.

Global Atheist Con, Day 2: Max Wallace

13 March 2010 / / Comments Off on Global Atheist Con, Day 2: Max Wallace

Max Wallace (director of ANZSA, the Australia New Zealand Secular Association) wants to make a movie. His topic is “The Delusion That We Pay For: How Taxpayers Subsidise Religions Worldwide and Why We Need a Film to Expose This”.

Through tax exemptions and privileges, we pay for the religious to be religious. Every available dollar should instead be used for education and science. Religions are on-shore tax havens for the promotion of supernaturalism. They are not held accountable for the money they make. They don’t pay for police and fire protections, property taxes, or capital gains tax. And let’s not forget their attempts to meddle in government affairs (e.g. Prop 8, though Wallace didn’t mention this explicitly).

Occasionally religions carry out terrorist activities, e.g. Aum Shinrikyo. It was tax-free. This means that the Japanese government was subsidising an organisation committed to its destruction.

He argues that the main consideration for religions is not God. It’s also not political power — it’s money, which confers political power.

According to Wallace, there are some determinations that the tax department uses to decide if a group qualifies for tax exemption under religious provisions. One is that you have to have a congregation of indeterminate size. Another is that you have to pay a stipend to a minister. In his experience, the main criteria for determining a religion is that your belief is supernatural.

It’s been said that nothing is certain except death and taxes. Religions think they can avoid death. They know they can avoid tax.

My take: I don’t have much experience in this area. But I would like to see religions pay their fair share. I did enjoy the talk — a good old rile-’em-up. Also, I’d go see that movie.

An old argument, updated

13 March 2010 / / 19 Comments

A Facebook friend wrote:

Every kind of beautiful art causes me to marvel at the artist. Even more, at the Artist who made the artist.

So I responded:

Was there an Artist who made the Artist who made the artist who made the art?

The collective opinion of his other religious friends is a resounding ‘no’.

That being the case, my next comment would be:

So if an Artist does not need a creator, why does an artist?

It’s just the old ‘Who created the Creator?’ problem. If a god doesn’t need a creator and things can just appear uncreated, then anything could just appear without needing a god to create it. But if a god does need a creator, it doesn’t fix the problem; it just extends it back a generation. That way lies Infinite Regress, and it’s turtles all the way down.

But then I suppose this friend would then say, “God doesn’t need a creator. He’s God. Duh.” Can’t argue with a definition like that.

UPDATE: I was right. Someone did end up saying exactly that.

Missionary chats: What finally did it?

5 March 2010 / / 49 Comments

I was talking to one of the Elders. Smart guy. He was aware of the difficulty of trying to believe something that doesn’t mesh. I think lots of missionaries feel that way.

Let’s say your faith is like a building, and you find a problem with the doctrine. You don’t want to trash the whole building, so you build around the problem. But after doing this for a long while, the structure begins to look rather byzantine and arcane. And haphazard. He called it ‘Spiritual Jenga’, which I quite liked.

He asked me, “So what was it that finally did it for you?”

I explained that it was a cumulative process. I became aware of cracks in the plaster, then more and more structural problems until the whole thing came down, despite my best efforts.

“But was there one thing?” he asked.

Well, there was, but it was going to sound stupid.

“Go ahead,” he said.

It was the Tower of Babel.

I’m a linguist, and the idea that all human language diversity came about in the last X-thousand years is not really plausible. The Babel story is clearly a legend to explain the diversity of languages. Lots of cultures have these myths.

But if you’re a Latter-day Saint, you can’t excuse it by saying it’s figurative. According to the Book of Mormon, the Brother of Jared was a real person who was there at the time, and got his family and friends out. The Book of Ether follows their exploits to the New World. You can’t dismiss it. You have to take it as literally as anything in the Book of Mormon.

Well, that pushed the by-now-rickety Spiritual Jenga tower over like a big clumsy housecat. It was a clear and irreconcilable case of Something Not Fitting. It was wrong, and I could see that it was wrong, and there was no way around it.

And even if you’re not a Mormon, you’re not off the hook. Is the Tower of Babel literal or figurative? If it’s literal, where’s the evidence? If it’s figurative, how do you know that? After all, it’s presented as factually as anything in the Bible. What else is figurative? Moses and the Red Sea? Walking on water? The resurrection? If you don’t believe in those things literally, then you have a lot in common with this atheist.

So that was it.

How about you?

Theologians of the week

28 February 2010 / / 7 Comments

Here are some stories of faith from the news this week. I won’t say they’re heart-warming, but they will raise your temperature.

• Miss Beverly Hills 2010 Lauren Ashley reminded us that yes, the Bible really does say that gay men should be killed.

“The Bible says that marriage is between a man and a woman. In Leviticus it says, ‘If man lies with mankind as he would lie with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination. They shall surely be put to death and their blood shall be upon them.’ The Bible is pretty black and white.”

By Jove, she’s right. Of course, Deuteronomy says that you should kill anyone not of your religion. Wonder why she didn’t mention that?

Well, even though she didn’t take it all the way, you must admire her courage in not soft-pedaling her holy book.

• Evangelical Christians in Haiti attack a vodou ceremony, and the vodou leader is not pleased.

Some of the fresh converts have said they did so because they believed God caused the earthquake.

“It will be war – open war,” Max Beauvoir, supreme head of Haitian voodoo, said in an interview at his home and temple outside the capital.

“It’s unfortunate that at this moment where everybody’s suffering, that they have to go into war. But if that is what they need, I think that is what they’ll get.”

…
“I would like to see each one of them tied up in ropes and thrown in the sea, and I hope the best of them will be able to catch a plane and run away and leave in peace,” the voodoo priest said. “Because this is what we need right now — peace.”

Which is more notable: the Haitians Christians for their commitment to religious tolerance? or Mr Beauvoir for his dedication to the cause of peace?

• A Christian couple in California is up for murder for killing their daughter, who challenged their god-given authority by mispronouncing words from a book she was reading.

Kevin and Elizabeth Schatz, the Paradise couple accused of murdering their 7-year-old adopted daughter during a discipline session last Saturday morning were arraigned in court Tuesday. The couple is also charged with the torture of their 11-year-old adopted daughter, who remains in critical condition at a Sacramento hospital, and a misdemeanor count of cruelty to a child for signs of bruising discovered on their 10-year-old biological son.
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Butte County District Attorney Mike Ramsey said both girls sustained extensive bruising and whip-like marks on their bodies that were consistent with a 15-inch length of rubber or flexible plastic tubing – commonly found in toilet tanks.

This method of discipline is favoured by Michael Pearl of the ‘No Greater Joy‘ ministry. From the Pearl link:

This is a practical look at spanking children. Parents must understand that spanking is just one element in God’s child training program. It is essential, but is not the whole—only a part. Nor is it the most important part. Important yes, but not all-important.
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What instrument would I use?
As a rule, do not use your hand. Hands are for loving and helping. If an adult swings his or her hand fast enough to cause pain to the surface of the skin, there is a danger of damaging bones and joints. The most painful nerves are just under the surface of the skin. A swift swat with a light, flexible instrument will sting without bruising or causing internal damage. Many people are using a section of ¼ inch plumber’s supply line as a spanking instrument. It will fit in your purse or hang around you neck. You can buy them for under $1.00 at Home Depot or any hardware store. They come cheaper by the dozen and can be widely distributed in every room and vehicle. Just the high profile of their accessibility keeps the kids in line.

Pearl (and the Schatz’s) is only following the biblical doctrine that if you train a child up in the way they should go, they will not depart from it. Also, that children need to submit to ‘the rod’ — after all, they won’t die (unless they do), and you’ll save their soul from hell. If a parent needs to give their children regular thrashings so they’ll continue in the religion of their parents — well, this simply shows the difficulty of raising godly children in these secular times.

If you’re interested in NGJ Ministries, why not check out their Facebook group?

• Also in parenting news, a Baltimore mom is on the stand for starving her one-year-old for not saying ‘amen’ at a mealtime prayer. You wouldn’t think a child that age would be saying much at all, but it took a perceptive religious leader to notice that the child had an evil spirit.

Ramkissoon told the tale of her son’s excruciating death from the witness stand on Wednesday, at the trial of the woman she says told her not to feed the boy. Queen Antoinette was the leader of a small religious cult, according to police and prosecutors, and she faces murder charges alongside her daughter, Trevia Williams, and another follower, Marcus A. Cobbs.

Many parents have let their children die for lack of medical treatment due to their religion, but this story stands out for the mother’s unquestioning faith that her baby could be raised back to life, New Testament-style.

Javon died in either December 2006 or January 2007; Ramkissoon isn’t sure of the exact date. His body was hidden in a suitcase for more than a year and has since been buried. But even now, she maintains her faith in his resurrection.

“I still believe that my son is coming back,” Ramkissoon said. “I have no problem saying what really happened because I believe he’s coming back.

“Queen said God told her he would come back. I believe it. I choose to believe it,” she said. “Even now, despite everything, I choose to believe it for my reasons.”

Later, she acknowledged that her faith makes her sound crazy. “I don’t have a problem sounding crazy in court,” she said.

Even though the sunk-cost fallacy virtually ensures that the mother will never break free of her delusion, she makes the list for her devotion and unquestioning faith in her religious leader and the healing power of the resurrection.

We’ll be back with even more stories of faith in the near future.

Universities don’t take religions seriously!

27 February 2010 / / 4 Comments

I teach at a university. I try to teach students to think well. That means I teach about critical thinking skills, using evidence to support claims, and controlling for bias. (And I hope I don’t forget to exercise those skills myself.)

There are also many people at the university whose job is to teach students to think badly. These are mainly religious groups that regularly encourage reliance on unseen spiritual beings, emotional reasoning, and not challenging deeply-held beliefs.

Dallin H. Oaks is a Mormon apostle. He spoke to Harvard grads recently, and tried to encourage them to think badly. Let’s see how he did this.

1. Insulting secular Americans

Elder Oaks acknowledged that LDS doctrines and values are not widely understood by those not of the LDS faith, and said that his disappointment with that “is only slightly reduced” by research that shows “that on the subject of religion Americans in general are ‘deeply religious’ but ‘profoundly ignorant.'”

By ‘ignorant’, he apparently means ‘someone who has failed to study and/or agree with Mormon doctrine’.

If people are ignorant about religion, doesn’t that mean that churches haven’t done a good enough job teaching it? Sorry, Mr Oaks. Teaching religion is your job. Don’t expect universities to reaffirm your preconceptions.

2. Denouncing universities for not promoting superstition

Elder Oaks said the higher education system was partly to blame for prevailing ignorance about many aspects of Christianity and other religions.

“Many factors contribute to our people’s predominant shallowness on the subject of religion, but one of them is surely higher education’s general hostility or indifference to religion,” he said. “Despite most colleges’ and universities’ founding purpose to produce clergymen and to educate in the truths taught in their chapels, most have now abandoned their role of teaching religion.

I think univerties have pumped out quite enough clergymen, don’t you?

“With but few exceptions, colleges and universities have become value-free places where attitudes toward religion are neutral at best. Some faculty and administrators are powerful contributors to the forces that are driving religion to the margins of American society. Students and other religious people who believe in the living reality of God and moral absolutes are being marginalized.“

Universities aren’t positive enough about religion? That’s the best news I’ve heard all week. Universities should marginalise bronze-age mythologies as much as possible. Why should the people wearing the clown-shoes be taken seriously?

3. Elevating scripture and revelation as superior to empirical knowledge.

Elder Oaks said he chose “three clusters of truths to present as fundamental premises of the faith of Latter-day Saints.” Those clusters are:

  • The nature of God, including the role of the three members of the Godhead, and the corollary truth that there are moral absolutes.
  • The purpose of life.
  • The three-fold sources of truth about man and the universe: science, the scriptures and continuing revelation, and how we can know them.

Notice how religion takes up two of the three top spots?

I understand Oaks wanting to spread the word about how great his religion is — a religion whose members view him as an incontestable authority, by the way. He’s supposed to promote his religion. It’s part of the business. But Oaks is barking up the wrong tree if he expects universities to accommodate religions when religions add nothing to the store of human knowledge. All they offer is big stories, and when you challenge the story-tellers to offer evidence, they take refuge in uncertainty, and teach poor reasoning as a protective device. And, it would seem, holler loudly about how educated people just don’t take them seriously.

Religion makes no contribution to these places of science that we call universities. But as Matthew Cobb and Jerry Coyne point out, science can contribute something to religious thought: atheism.

Back in your closets

20 February 2010 / / 4 Comments

Sometimes I look at what’s going on in America and I shake my head. I suppose that’s why those bobble-head dolls are so popular there. If you had to all that head-shaking yourself, your neck would break, so it’s nice to have a machine to do it for you.

It seems that having prayer meetings at coffee shops is now a popular and ostentatious way for religious believers to flaunt their holiness.

If I saw that going on, I’d introduce them to Matthew:

6:5 And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.

6:6 But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.

Christians interpreting their scriptures selectively? Shocked I am! Shocked, I tells ya!

Deluded people belong in one of two places: a mental hospital or a church. No need to pester the rest of us with their bizarre and aberrant hobby.

Does this mean god doesn’t come with Flash?

18 February 2010 / / 6 Comments

I think the iPad looks cool, but I wouldn’t exactly say it’s proof of God.

On the other hand, who am I to argue with an expert?

Sure, we were as surprised as you are! But trust us, everyone who tested the sleek gadget saw the same version of God. I guess you’d call it an epiphany or something. There is a God. Don’t worry. When you get one, you’ll understand.
…
For this reason alone, we give the iPad four out of five stars. Yes, this next generation device has a highly responsive user interface and a gorgeous display screen. But, no one is really sure how to live, or if there’s even a reason for living any more. We look forward to seeing if Apple addresses this bug in later versions.

I’m not sure about her conclusions, but I was rather surprised to learn that Hinduism is Bluetooth ready.

Be sure to tell her. She’ll be surprised.

15 February 2010 / / 5 Comments

Another great devotional

14 February 2010 / / 4 Comments

I’m here at BYU-Idaho with M. Russell Ballard, a Mormon apostle. Elder Ballard, I was wondering if you could give me some words of wisdom that would help me in my mortal probation.

“I want to try to pull this together, not to frighten you but to wake you up,” Elder Ballard said. “We’ve got to be so solidly anchored in our testimonies of the gospel of Jesus Christ that, regardless of what may come next, we will not waffle; we will stand firm in our belief; we won’t question the doctrines that are part of our belief.”

Not question doctrines or beliefs. Got it.

I do have one question though, and that’s the LDS stand on gay marriage. Why is it so important for us to fuck around with the marital status of other people?

“It’s a pretty simple answer,” Elder Ballard responded. “God created this world and He put Adam here and He gave Adam a helpmate whom he called Eve. They had a charge and a responsibility to multiply and replenish the earth. It is a marvelous and glorious experience to bring forth children and have a family, and that is done between a husband and a wife who are married.”

Um. Do you have an answer that doesn’t involve fictional beings?

“I’m telling you what the Savior said would be the signs of the acceleration towards that day when He shall come,” he said. “We could stay here for a couple of hours talking about all of the prophecies of what will occur in the last days. We’re in the last days — you can quote me on that. And it is moving more rapidly.”

Wow, thanks, Elder Ballard! For a moment there, I was thinking calmly and rationally. Now I’m so scared, I’m ready to believe anything if it just makes the fear go away.

By the way, how long has it been the Last Days? Are we now in the ‘lasty-last days’? Don’t look at me like that, Elder Ballard, I’m just kidding.

So in summary, Don’t question, and be very afraid. That’s all for now. Keep praying, paying, and obeying!

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