Faith – Scripturient

Christofascists Make Their Move in Oklahoma

The MAGA pseudo-Christians in the USA have recently been making bold moves toward implementing their oppressive theocracy and making Gilead a reality in their states. Louisiana required one of the two biblical Ten Commandments to be posted in every classroom (albeit without identifying which of the two even though they have significant differences). Now Oklahoma has decreed that “all schools must incorporate the Bible and the Ten Commandments in curriculums.” No one is surprised that when ranking education in the 50 states, these are always … click below for more ↓

Donald Trump and the Art of Victimhood

Persecution. It’s a deeply-ingrained core component of the myth of Christian history, and well-weaponized in modern times by rightwing politicians who depend on the support from both the faithful and the pseudo-Christian Talibangelists. We’re under attack, they claim, justifying their own attacks on other faiths and non-believers. They use the imagined threat of persecution against Christians to justify book banning and book burning, forced prayer in schools, cuts to education, closing libraries, cuts to healthcare, bans on same-sex marriage, and restrictions on women’s reproductive rights. … click below for more ↓

The Rise of the New Fascists and Their Threat to Democracy

I wonder if this was how my father felt in England, watching the rise of fascism in Europe in the 1920s and ’30s. By the time of my father’s 20th birthday, Mussolini had already secured his one-party-state in Italy; Hitler was elected and appointed chancellor. He would do the same in Germany within six months. While these two tightened their authoritarian hold on their nations, Stalin in the USSR would begin his Great Purge, and Franco would join the coup that led him to fascist … click below for more ↓

Making Gilead a Reality

American Talibangelists recently took a giant step towards creating Gilead in the USA when the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos were due the same legal protection as real children (although children there have less protection because Repugnicans care little about actual children than embryos). It extended the the legal definition of a human life to start at conception.* This 131-page ruling includes 41 references to god, flipping the bird to even lip service to the separation of state and church. And so the … click below for more ↓

How Low Can You Go?

A Gallup poll released last summer suggested Americans are finally waking up to reality, although clearly they still have a long way to go. An article about this hopeful change in American thinking on Gallup’s website was titled, Belief in Five Spiritual Entities Edges Down to New Lows. Exciting as that headline seems, the figures showing belief in the supernatural are still way too high for a supposedly modern, advanced nation. And never forget that the Talibangelists still have a chokehold on US politics and … click below for more ↓

Musings on Atheism, Belief, and Statues

The website godchecker.com lists roughly 4,000 “weird and wonderful Gods, Supreme Beings, Demons, Spirits and Fabulous Beasts” which have been worshipped since the beginning of recorded history. Many are still being worshipped. It’s quite an amusing and exhaustive collection of deities, demons, and demigods like saints. All gods and demons are, at least to me, weird, albeit not wonderful except as expressions of our limitless imaginations. Ditto with the rest of the supernatural baggage that comes with deities: reincarnation, ghosts, angels, an afterlife, souls, saints, … click below for more ↓

Musings on the Post-Xmas Days

I am glad to have reached the first week in January of 2024 without telling a lot of people to simply fuck off and leave me alone during the past month. The urge is, I’m afraid, great and growing stronger every year. The Xmas season does that to me, beginning as it does in early September, when Canadian Tire and other box stores start putting Xmas lights and decorations on display for sale. The selling season continues through the late fall when suddenly every radio … click below for more ↓

Why Jesus Won’t Answer Your Prayers

Christians pray to Jesus, but get no reply. They pray to Jesus for parking spaces closer to the mall, to win the lottery, to make their boss disappear, to lose weight, to restore Donald Trump to his lost presidency, for their kids to win the little league game, for better business sales, and other really important stuff. And yet nothing ever happens. But would you respond if someone called you by another name? If your name was, say, Bob, or Sara, would you respond if … click below for more ↓

That Fake War on Xmas

In my part of Canada the “war on Xmas” begins in September when some local box stores start putting Xmas ornaments and decorations out, sometimes just after Labour Day. By mid-October there are whole store sections dedicated to pushing gaudy, offshore-made, increasingly tacky lights and displays. Then the canned Xmas music starts infecting shoppers through tinny ceiling speakers. Xmas tree lots spring up in mall parking lots. It’s a cultural virus being spread among us. The Resistance (aka me) comes forward to bravely ignore these … click below for more ↓

Biblical Commandments the Pseudo-Christians Avoid

The Talibangelists (aka the Christofascists) like those on the Supreme Court of the US (SCOTUS) or in the anti-abortion movement like to pretend they base their decisions, their politics, their morality, their education, their lives on their bible. But as we’ve seen so many times; they don’t like to follow everything in their bible. Christofascists only quote very selective passages that confirm their existing beliefs and can be used to promote their totalitarian ideology. There are too many inconvenient biblical commandments that would get in … click below for more ↓

The Talibangelists Are Winning

I imagine what I’m feeling now about the rise of the extremist, pseudo-Christian right (aka the Talibangelists, aka Christofascists) in the USA, Canada, and in other democracies is what my English father must have felt watching the events in Germany from 1934 on. He would have seen photographs and newsreels showing the brownshirts, the SS, the rallies of eager followers raising their arms in salute, the adoring crowds lining the streets to wave as their fuhrer drove by. My father would have read with a … click below for more ↓

Are Secular Nations Happier?

Are less-religious or more secular nations happier than religious ones? Studies suggest yes. Personally, I would certainly be happier in a more secular nation if it meant fewer angry, nasty, fanatic believers like the Westboro Baptist congregation (see picture, right), or the faux-faith anti-mask/anti-vaccine, pro-disease protestors,* or any of the frothing anti-choice, anti-abortion protestors who appear around medical clinics. I suspect many among us would also live much more happily without their disruptive, often vicious, pseudo-religious behaviour. But as a democratic, liberal society we are … click below for more ↓

We’re Doomed. Doomed, I tell you.

While walking our dog recently, we encountered another couple “our age” (somewhere between 65 and 90) also walking their dog. While the two pets sniffed and frolicked, we chatted with them (at a safe distance, of course). And, as might be expected during a lengthy pandemic, one of the first questions we asked them was, “Have you had your shot yet?” Shockingly, they both answered, “No! And we’re not going to get one.” My first thought when I heard this, “We’re doomed.” These are people … click below for more ↓

The Serpent Gets a Bad Rap

Why doesn’t anyone ever think of the serpent as humankind’s liberator instead of some villain who got us kicked out of Eden? Why does Eve take the blame for listening to the serpent instead of being considered another hero for taking a bold step to ensure our collective freedom? Okay, I know the whole Genesis-Eden-Adam-and-Eve story is an allegory, and not meant to be taken as fact. But the story pervades Western culture (our literature and art are full of it) so that even a … click below for more ↓