This is depressing

A comparison of peoples’ views in 34 countries finds that the United States ranks near the bottom when it comes to public acceptance of evolution. Only Turkey ranked lower.

Bush's fundamentalism

For the first time in modern American history, a president’s religion has become a decisive factor in his foreign and domestic policies.

A Muslim perspective: “And with an avowed born-again Christian at the helm of affairs in
America who claims to be appointed to that position by God and to be dictated by what he claims to be divine communication, one shudders to think of what more brutalities are in store for the world if Christian fundamentalism is allowed to remain unchallenged.”

Undo the damage

Scientific American asks voters in Kansas to redeem their state by going to the polls August 1 and turning out the Board of Ed members who “inflicted embarassing creationist nonsense on your home’s science curriculum.”

The National Center for Science Education is watching next week’s primary, too.

Murdering your own soul

“Try to make real to yourself the psychology of a man who would kill a
man’s pet, cook it, and then serve it to him for lunch — and no doubt
get a good laugh out of it.”

Evangelical Blindness

Martin Accad, academic dean of the Arab Baptist Theological Seminary in Lebanon, was teaching at Fuller Seminary in Pasadena, Ca. when Israel bombed the airport in Beirut and is now unable to return home. In response to this earlier piece by David Gushee in Christianity Today, he rips the “childish wishes” of Christians that the U.S. will be able to broker the peace.

“When did the U.S. ever use anything other than its veto power at the United Nations, precisely in order to prevent policies and resolutions that might potentially have been helpful to my people?…. I think that some pseudo-biblically motivated Christians with decision power, who believe that apocalyptic destruction is a precursor to global salvation, are presently working toward provoking a Middle Eastern conflict of regional significance….”

UPDATE: Gushee responds in an open letter: “My sympathy for Israel—which is indeed deep, a mix of all kinds of factors, some rational, some emotional—does not extend to support for what has clearly become a massive and disproportionate military offensive.”

Faith-based faith-based initiatives

General Accounting Office says Bush administration takes it on faith that churches will spend their government funding responsibly.

Holy Government Handouts, Batman!

God in the House

“It wasn’t our idea, it was God’s.”

Not everyone believes that writing discrimination into the U.S. Constitution reflects biblical principles. The Clergy for Fairness has organized clergy members and religious leaders around the country who strongly oppose the Federal Marriage Amendment.

I call bullshit

Says who?

Children, my ass. This analysis suggests that attitudes towards gay marriage are far more related to views towards gays themselves than on beliefs about gender roles.

But which churches?

Since 2004, the IRS has investigated more than 200 churches and nonprofit organizations. Federal law prohibits the IRS from releasing the names of those under investigation, but the agency said it has more than 100 cases pending and 40 of them are churches.

Two days before the 2004 presidential election, the Rev. George F. Regas, former rector of All Saints Church in Pasadena, delivered a guest sermon that picturedJesus in a debate with George W. Bush and John Kerry. Although Regas didn’t endorse a candidate, he said Jesus would have told Bush that hispre-emptive war policy “has led to disaster.”

The church drewnational attention when the Rev. Ed Bacon, rector of All Saints, disclosed the IRS investigation and later said the agency believed the church had violated federal tax code barring tax-exempt organizations from intervening in political campaigns and elections.

Mark your calendar

Mary Magdalene’s skull will be paraded through the streets of Saint-Maximin-la-Sainte-Baume on her feast day which takes place each year on July 22nd.