Sunday Sermon: "Christian Circumcision" or "Jesus Hates Genital Mutilation"

There is an alarming trend in the U.S. that I think should not go unnoticed in my writings. As of my writing this, the best data available states that 79% of all males in the U.S. are circumcised. Further - although the rate of circumcision is decreasing - 55.9% of male newborns in the U.S. are circumcised each year as of 2008. Based on the assumption that 79% of males are circumcised, and the 2010 census, we can estimate that there are approximately 119,907,247 circumcised males in the U.S. at this very moment.

Multiple Independent Plagiarists: John, A Jesus for the Long-Haul

Welcome to Part 4 of my series "Multiple Independent Plagiarists" (if you want to start from Part 1, you can find it here).

As we established in Parts 1-3, Mark's gospel was far from being an eyewitness account of remembered history. It was in fact, a fictional drama set in a pseudo-historical landscape, by a Greek author who had probably never set foot in the region. From there we determined that Matthew's gospel too was not an eyewitness account, but had simply taken Mark's drama, blatantly plagiarized from it, and attempted to historicize Mark's work, in an effort to create a new religion. Finally, Luke openly admitted to having copied from other sources (namely Mark and either from Matthew or an unknown source) supposedly in an effort to create a definitive account of the life of Jesus. Unfortunately for Luke, his Gospel is only as definitive as the fictional sources used to compile it.

Now that we have had a brief refresher, we can examine the the third canonical gospel to have been written - and see if he holds up as an eyewitness of Jesus.

Addendum to "Political Reform and Compulsory Voting"

If you haven't read "Political Reform and Compulsory Voting", please go back and read that post before continuing. I'll be using that post, to present a hypothetical situation, that just sort of came to me. I'm not sure if it's a good plan or not, I just came up with it about three minutes ago, so we can work through this situation together. It will be a bonding experience.

Multiple Independent Plagiarists: Luke, the Compiler

Welcome to Part 3 of my series "Multiple Independent Plagiarists" (if you want to start from Part 1, you can find it here).

As we established in Parts 1 and 2, Mark's gospel was far from being an eyewitness account of remembered history. It was in fact, a fictional drama set in a pseudo-historical landscape, by a Greek author who had probably never set foot in the region. From there we determined that Matthew's gospel too was not an eyewitness account, but had simply taken Mark's drama, blatantly plagiarized from it, and attempted to historicize Mark's work, in an effort to create a new religion (If Joseph Smith and L. Ron Hubbard could do it in a world that was primarily literate, then just about anybody could do it in a time where access to information and fact-checking was sparse and - depending on your region - literacy rates were anywhere from 3-20%).

Now that we have that brief refresher, let's take a look at Luke - the third canonical gospel to have been written - and see if he holds up as an eyewitness of Jesus.

Political Reform and Compulsory Voting

Once upon a time in an Introduction to U.S. Politics class, my Professor was making an argument that may or may not be familiar to many people: he was arguing that voting should be compulsory. He argued that democracy only works when everyone is involved, and therefore everyone should have to vote on penalty of a fine. At the time, I was very much opposed to this idea for a variety of reasons, and truth be told I'm still very leery of the idea of making voting compulsory.

Let's face it, the current Democrat incumbent's drone policy has set new lows for dehumanizing brown people, Republicans are the gun-toting "patriotic" types who love the military beyond all reason (as Bill Maher once said "They're the religious party, worship is in their DNA"), and voting third party is about as useful as voting for Mickey Mouse. If you're seriously anti-war - or even just think that maybe wholesale slaughtering people should be a last resort and not the immediate "go to" plan every time the U.S. has a problem - you really don't have a good option when it comes time for an election. I personally refuse to cast a vote for president because I know that I have no option that does not result in the election of a war-monger, and I refuse to take any action that could be seen as an endorsement of a war-monger rising to a position of power. That said, I think that - with a couple of modifications - this whole "compulsory voting" idea could be a pretty good idea. First let's look at what's wrong, and then we'll look at how to fix it.

Multiple Independent Plagiarists: Matthew's Mighty Makeover

Welcome to the Part 2 of my series "Multiple Independent Plagiarists" (if you missed Part 1, you can find it here).

As we established in Part 1, Mark's gospel was far from being an eyewitness account of remembered history. It was in fact, a fictional drama set in a pseudo-historical landscape, by a Greek author who had probably never set foot in the region. Now that we have that brief refresher, let's move on to Matthew - the second canonical gospel to have been written - and see if he holds up as an eyewitness of Jesus.

Multiple Independent Plagiarists: Mark, the Playwright.

Perhaps my favorite claims from Biblical apologists, is that the gospels are four, independent, eyewitness accounts that all agree with each other perfectly. Of course if you point out all the obvious contradictions in the gospels (for example, when the one, two, three, or five or more women went to Jesus' tomb, were they greeted by one young man who was seated inside the tomb, one angel who was standing outside the tomb, two men who were standing inside the tomb, or two angels who were seated inside the tomb?) they typically backpedal pretty quickly and assert that there are "differences" (being very careful never to say the word "contradictions") but the stories are reliable in that they all tell a more or less similar story, just from different points of view. They further tend to argue that these differences actually increase the reliability of the gospel story because the slight discrepancies prove that the gospel authors were independent eyewitnesses who didn't collaborate or conspire with each other in writing their testimony.

This is a lovely story, but does it hold up to scrutiny?

House M.D. on Near-Death Experiences

House (talking about himself and visions he had): "The patient was technically dead for over a minute."
Wilson: "Do you think he was dead? Do you think those experiences were real?"
House: "Define real. They were real experiences. What they meant... Personally, I choose to believe that the white light people sometimes see, visions, this patient saw: they're all just chemical reactions that take place when the brain shuts down."
Foreman: "You choose to believe that?"
House: "There's no conclusive science. My choice has no practical relevance to my life, I choose the outcome I find more comforting."
Cameron: "You find it more comforting to believe that this is it?"
House: "I find it more comforting to believe that this isn't simply a test."
~ House MD, Season 1, Episode 21

Sunday Sermon: But What About HITLER?!?

Perhaps my favorite rebuttal offered by Christians or other theists is the Reductio ad Hitlerum in which the Christian attempts to discredit atheism and evolution by claiming "But Hitler was an atheist! And so were Stalin and Mao! Therefore atheism and evolution leads to wanton murder and genocide!"

If these claims are accurate, they clearly paint a very bleak picture of atheism. After all, Hitler is responsible for the deaths of 20,946,000 people, Stalin for 51,755,000 deaths, and Mao for 56,218,000 deaths. That said, these allegations, are problematic on a couple of levels.

Sunday Sermon: What About Islam?

It is not at all uncommon - especially on websites that criticize Christianity - to see some commenter or other make a snide little remark to the effect of "You atheists never have any problem attacking Christianity because you know that we won't kill you for it, but are any of you brave enough to attack the homophobic and womon-abusing Islamic religion?"

Sunday Sermon: What Might Have Been

There are a fairly standard set of objections that are used against Christianity. Just to name a few: Christianity is notoriously homophobic, has outdated views on sexuality and reproduction, has a long history of wanton murder, horrendously intolerant of other points of view, and insistent that people were born as broken, wicked, evil people, who deserve to burn forever unless they bow to Jesus.

All of these are blatant problems that typically drive people away from Christianity. Even many Christians have adopted the "New Covenant" doctrine to allow them to casually discard the Old Testament whenever it becomes inconvenient, simply by claiming that Jesus changed the verse in question. This argument typically doesn't hold up when arguing against non-christians, as non-christians realize that the Old Testament seems to not apply, only for those verses where the Christian in question doesn't want that particular verse to apply (i.e. homosexuality is still a sin, but dietary restrictions on eating shellfish don't apply, even though they're in the same book).

Bearing this in mind, I would like this post to be a mixture of a brief history lesson, and some wishful thinking. You see, Christianity didn't have to be this way. In the early to mid second century, Marcion of Sinope was heading up the Marcionite church, which, for a few years, was a real contender to become the dominant Christian faith.

Sunday Sermon: An Atheist in the Courtroom

I've been encountering the same logically flawed objection to atheism a lot lately, and I feel the need to at least attempt to put this objection to bed. The objection usually runs as follows:

"How can you be sure that there is no god? Do you have any proof that there is no god?"

This is an attempt at reversing the long-time atheist argument that "claims require supporting evidence", by saying that an atheists denial of the existence of deities is a also claim that must be supported by evidence. While this may initially seem like a decent argument, it's logic is actually terribly flawed.

Sunday Sermon: The Invention of the Gods

For just a little while today, let's go on a trip. Close your eyes… actually on second thought, ignore that, You're reading a blog post. It won't work if you close your eyes. Regardless, imagine for a moment that you are alone, walking through the savannah. It is a beautiful spring day in the middle of Africa. The year is 150,000 BCE.

Schrödinger's Freedom of Speech

There is a fairly well-known thought experiment known as Schrödinger's Cat. The basic idea of the thought experiment is that, if one were to accept a certain interpretation of quantum mechanics, it would follow that a cat placed into a box, would at some point be simultaneously alive and dead. I'm not a physicist (although I try to stay somewhat informed as a layperson), so if you want to know more about Schrödinger's and his cat, pray to Google, for she is a wise and benevolent deity.

Anyways, I didn't start this post to talk about physicists and their hypothetical cats, but to talk about freedom of speech. It occurred to me last night during a conversation with a friend, that I simultaneously do, and do not, agree with the concept of free speech (hence the title of this post). Allow me to explain.

The Bible: Just the Good Stuff Translation

It is not at all uncommon for Christians to have to "cherry pick" their Bibles in order to avoid the horrendous immorality, logical inconsistency or impossibility, historical inaccuracy, and/or outright contradictions that makes up so much of the book. On a few occasions, I've even said "If you will go into your own Bible, take a permanent marker, black out that verse, and tell me that that verse is false and not the word of Yhwh, I will no longer hold that verse against you in debate." To date, I've found not one Christian who was so sure of what Yhwh meant, that they were willing to black out a verse to improve their Bible.

So, in the spirit of fair play, I've decided to redact the Bible in advance. In my new translation, I've removed every immoral teaching, implausibility, falsehood, etc, and kept only the good stuff. By using my new translation of the Bible, no Christian will ever again have to be embarrassed by the content of the Bible, undertake embarrassing mental gymnastics to explain how it "isn't really that bad", or have to explain how they're a Christian who "doesn't really believe in that verse".

Let's call this new translation:
"The Bible: Just the Good Stuff Translation (JGST)"

Sunday Sermon: "In Money We Trust" or "Peter, The First TV Evangelist"

I recently found a new candidate for "Most petty reason why someone gets killed in the Bible". My favorite part about this new passage - as opposed to my previous "most petty reason" in Numbers 15:32-36 - is that my this passage is from the New Testament, after "gentle Jesus, meek and mild" comes along. The passage I'm referring to is Acts 5:1-11.

In this passage a man named Ananias has sold a piece of his land, and with his wife's approval, kept some of the money for himself and brought the rest to the apostles. A select few translations claim that Ananias told the apostles that he had brought the full amount that he had gotten from the land, though most translations make no mention of this (presumably because Yhwh forgot where he left the "power of tongues" and hash't been able to figure out how to produce a faithful translation into English without it). Regardless, I think the story makes more sense with that claim included.

Sunday Sermon: WWYD

This will be a sermon not only for Christians, but for Muslims, Jews, Hindus… If you are a member of a theist religion, this one is for you (although deists, agnostics, atheists, and ignostics are more than welcome to come along for the ride).

If you would be so kind, take a moment to think about the following scenario: Imagine that you are the one true god for a day. All power in the universe is yours, to do as you will. What do you do?

Sunday Sermon: On Conversion

One of the scariest things for any Christian, is to question their faith. The absolute scariest thing for any Christian, is to reject it and walk away from it. As with most religions, the vast majority of Christianity's adherents were introduced to the religion virtually from birth, and grew up believing that it is true. As a result, to question it is to admit that you are uncertain about some of your most core beliefs about how the world works, and to reject it is to admit that the most fundamental part of your worldview - something that you have based your life on for years - is simply incorrect.

On Scepticism

It is not uncommon for discussions (or shouting matches, whichever the case may be) between creationists and scientists (yes, the two are mutually exclusive) to be characterized by both parties having a substantial amount of skepticism of the other party's position. That said, the character or degree of the skepticism of these parties is very much different, and I think that degree of difference merits being discussed.

Where is the Graveyard of Dead Gods?

"Memorial Service" by H. L. Mencken. Published 1922.

Where is the grave-yard of dead gods? What lingering mourner waters their mounds? There was a day when Jupiter was the king of the gods, and any man who doubted his puissance was ipso facto a barbarian and an ignoramus. But where in all the world is there a man who worships Jupiter to-day? And what of Huitzilopochtli? In one year - and it is no more than five hundred years ago - 50,000 youths and maidens were slain in sacrifice to him. Today, if he is remembered at all, it is only by some vagrant savage in the depths of the Mexican forest. Huitzilopochtli, like many other gods, had no human father; his mother was a virtuous widow; he was born of an apparently innocent flirtation that she carried on with the sun. When he frowned, his father, the sun, stood still. When he roared with rage, earthquakes engulfed whole cities. When he thirsted he was watered with 10,000 gallons of human blood. But today [in 1922] Huitzilopochtli is as magnificently forgotten as Allen G. Thurman. Once the peer of Allah, Buddha, and Wotan, he is now the peer of General Coxey, Richmond P. Hobson, Nan Petterson, Alton B. Parker, Adelina Patti, General Weyler, and Tom Sharkey.

Sunday Sermon: Christianity - An Abusive Relationship

It is quite common for Christians to maintain that Yhwh is a benevolent deity, who loves humans to such an extent that he wants a special, personal relationship with each one of them. While I'll admit that - at first glance - the idea of being held in such high regard by an omnipotent being seems absolutely wonderful, I would argue that this relationship is not all that it's cracked up to be, and is actually outright harmful. To illustrate, let's take a moment to consider the following scenario:

Sunday Sermon: Faith Even Smaller Than Mustard Seeds

As an Anti-theist (technically I'm an Ignostic, but I can scarily imagine a deity - as the term is commonly understood - or religious faith that I would not be strongly opposed to people believing) it is very easy to pick on the Old Testament when dealing with Christianity. Even many Christians deny the Old Testament, choosing instead to claim that "Jesus changed all that". Frankly, as Yhwh is the supreme being in both testaments, I doubt that a Christian could reasonably deny the Old Testament without committing blasphemy.

That said, for this Sunday Sermon, I will set aside my objections to the rejection of the Old Testament, and assume that Jesus really did change many of the Old Testament teachings. Instead I will focus solely on the New Testament. What's more - to sidestep some Christians' objections to the writings of Paul - I will focus solely on the words of Jesus, as reported in the Gospels.

David Hume on "Intelligent Design"

I am currently reading David Hume's (1711-1776) book, "An Enquiry concerning Human Understanding. In Chapter 11 (pages 135-139) of his book, he makes an argument (put into the mouth of a friend of his) regarding just how much a rational argument could support, regarding the existence and character of a deity. Because the argument sounds very much like a counter to today's "Intelligent Design" crowd who want the creation of the universe by a deity to be taught as a valid scientific theory, I would like to relate the argument for you.

Sunday Sermon: "Just an Animal".

I encountered a fellow recently who - in the course of conversation - routinely said "If man is just an animal... [we would have no reason to be moral... we would be purely driven by instinct... etc etc]." If you've heard a claim that starts with "If man is just an animal..." that claim was probably made in this conversation. He built on this argument by claiming that - since humans are not as he claimed we would be if we were "just an animal" - we must therefore have a god-given, immortal soul that makes us unlike everything else in the universe. I'd like to take a moment to take issue with that claim.

Christopher Hitchens on Miracles

Christopher Hitchens destroys the claims of biblical miracles in less than 3 1/2 minutes.

Sunday Sermon: Self-Falsifying Prophecy.

According to Christianity, Jesus supposedly fulfilled some 330 prophecies in his lifetime. According to ChristanAnswers.net, the odds of someone fulfilling even eight of these prophecies are only 1 in 10^17. (For the purposes of this argument, I will take ChristanAnswers.net at their word and assume that the figures are accurate.) At face value, these odds are rather impressive and I won't deny that... of course these odds are only impressive if these prophecies were actually about Jesus, and they were actually fulfilled by him. So let's take a look at some of these prophecies shall we?

Sunday Sermon: Challenging Perfection.

A central tenet of Christianity is the claim that Yhwh is a perfect being. If he is perfect, then it should follow that he is unchanging, as having to change one's policy indicates that there must have been some flaw in the previous policy that made it inadequate, and required the change. In fact, Yhwh himself tells us that he doesn't change in Malachi 3:6.

Since Yhwh is unchanging, he wouldn't declare that he has enemies whom he hates, and whom he will do ill to (Hosea 9:15; Leviticus 20:23) but declare that his followers must love and do good to those who hate them (Matthew 5:44), right?

Sunday Sermon: The Devil is in the Footnotes.

The vast majority of (English-Language) Bibles are full to the brim with footnotes. In some instances these footnotes are more or less irrelevant. For instance, anyone who's ever sat through the never ending stream of "sermon on the mount" sermons knows that "Raca" is an aramaic expression of contempt, that doesn't translate directly to any word in english (Matthew 5:22). In this instance, the footnote is more an explanation of a foreign word, that doesn't effect the flow of the story.

In other instances, however, the footnotes have some substantial influence on the story. Consider Mark 1:40-44, in the typical telling of the story, a man has leprosy and asks Jesus to heal him. Jesus is "moved with compassion", heals him, and tells him not to tell anyone about it, but to go straight to the priests so they can declare that he is "clean". If you read this version of the story you tend to get the image of "gentle Jesus, meek and mild" who sees a sick man, pities him enough to heal him, and is humble enough to ask that he not going around singing Jesus' praises.

Sunday Sermon: The Bible As A Source of [Im]Morality

Christians love to claim that the Bible is an infallible source of morality. In this post I intend to demonstrate that the Bible (and, by extension, the deity who supposedly wrote it) is contradictory and imperfect, and therefore cannot be used as an infallible source of morality. 

The Contradiction:

Consider the case of "the woman taken in adultery" vs the case of "the man who picked up sticks".
In the latter instance the Hebrews find a man gathering sticks on a Saturday (the Sabbath). They're unsure if gathering sticks constitutes a violation of the Sabbath or not, so they take him to Moses and ask Moses to get Yhwh to clarify the law for them. Yhwh instructs the Hebrews to stone the man to death for breaking the Sabbath.
In the former instance, the Pharisees bring Jesus a woman who was caught in adultery, and remind him that the "law of Moses" tells them that the woman must be stoned to death. The Pharisees then ask Jesus what he says her punishment should be, to which Jesus responds "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone". Because Judeo-Christian morality holds that all have sinned, the woman is not stoned to death.

Why I Talk About Religion

I was asked recently why I spend so much time talking about religion (esp. christianity). I was asked "Why don't you just let people believe whatever they want to believe?" Honestly, that strikes me as a fair question. After all, at first glance, whether or not someone believes in some sort of deity seems like a fairly trivial, and personal issue that shouldn't concern anyone else. My answer: "What people believe, affects what they think, which affects how they act." Let me try to illustrate this for you.

According to the Bible:
1) You and I deserve to burn because our great, great (X number of times great) grandmother wanted a piece of fruit.
2) One ancient tribe of semitic nomads is superior to all other people who don't belong to that tribe.
3) Enslaving other people, and beating one's slaves is perfectly, morally permissible.
4) Women are essentially stupid creatures who were created to be subservient to men, who are to take orders from men without question, and who should essentially be nothing more than the property of their husbands.
5) (My most personal objection) My girlfriend should be put to death for who she is. To wit, a bisexual womon.

I could go on, but I think I've made my point. Further, these biblical beliefs effect people's actions. There are hundreds of thousands of people who not only believe that they are worthless without their deity to give meaning to their lives, but believe that everyone's lives are meaningless if they don't worship that same deity. There are people who claim that natural disasters are their deity's way of punishing societies who are accepting of gay people. There are people who hold that other people should be barred from certain aspects of society based on nothing more than their ancestry, skin tone, or who they're attracted to. There are even people (an astounding number of people, I might add) who seem to think that they cannot possibly have a moral code without their deity, never stopping to realize how hideous and immoral their deity's moral code is. As absurd as these beliefs are, there are thousands upon thousands of people who honestly believe that these "principles" are, and should be, binding upon all of humanity.

In light of this, I will be continuing to point out the moral obscenities of a book that many believe to be the infallible word of a flawless deity, until christianity as we know it is nothing more than a fringe cult that is taken less seriously than scientology.

That being said, if you want to follow a principle of "love your neighbor as yourself", or select a few choice gems of scripture and live your life according to those few gems, then please, by all means continue. But always remember that you don't need a god in order to live your life that way. In fact, according to the Bible, your god hasn't spent his OWN existence living according to those principles.

To sum up, in the words of the great, late, Christopher Hitchens: “In the ordinary moral universe, the good will do the best they can, the worst will do the worst they can, but if you want to make good people do wicked things, you’ll need religion.”