Christian teens were left surprised & bemused when headline act Planetshakers, took stage at the Adelaide leg of the evangelical ‘Rock Across Australia Tour’ concert last night. The band, headed by the disgraced former Pastor Michael Guglielmucci, stunned the crowd with their provocative stage presence and anti-religious stance. Guglielmucci (who now uses the stage name Beelzegug) managed only one song of their planned routine, a debut single called ‘The Devil Made Me Do It!’, and announced to the crowd the re-branded band would have an album out shortly entitled ‘Terminal Illusions’. “The tills are ringing again m*ther-f**ers” screamed Beelzegug, before the controversial group was quickly pulled from the stage by concert officials, who were caught unaware by the transformed ‘Planetshakers’, previously best known for their single ‘Healer’. The father of Guglielmucci (a.k.a Beelzegug) and head of the Edge Church International, Danny Guglielmucci, issued a statement in which he claimed his son "has been battling a major addiction to the T.V soap opera Home & Away since aged six" and asked for people to pray for Michaels recovery.

I was baptized at 16 and I remember being disappointed because I didn’t feel any different. I remember sneaking onto the internet and googling “atheism”. I felt so guilty for even looking.

But I think the main change occurred when I went to college and began learning about the world. The first big thing was learning about other religions: they believed just as strongly as me, and had just as little evidence as me. What made my religion more valid than theirs? Wouldn’t I believe what they believed had I been born there?

The next big eye-opener was finally learning about evolution and the age of the Earth, which was, unfortunately, not taught at any other time during my school years. At first I tried to reconcile a looser interpretation of the Bible, or that science and religion could coexist, but eventually I realized that I just didn’t believe anymore.

Q.What excites you most about the current state of atheism, what are you optimistic about?

What excites me is the fact that I am even able to write this and put it on the internet. We still have a long way to go as far as negative stereotypes, but I feel like things are getting better in that aspect. Maybe it is because of the internet, or frustration with the current situation. But I am glad that atheists are able to have a voice.

My favorite is “Letter to a Christian Nation” by Sam Harris. It is so concise, and I wish I could give a copy to everyone I know.

I also really like Carl Sagan. I unfortunately don’t know a lot about science, not for lack of interest, but lack of education on the topic. But I think Pale Blue Dot is inspirational and it makes me want to go out and learn more about our world.

Q. How has your blog affected your life?

I have learned a lot from my blog. I often make mistakes, but it is a huge learning experience. You learn a lot about how the words you say can be interpreted by others.

I think it’s a great outlet for my thoughts and frustrations on the topic of religion, and I like to think that in some tiny way I am helping. I don’t even hope to change anyone’s mind, I just hope to make them stop and think. If just one person sees my blog and is surprised that I don’t match their negative stereotype for an atheist, then I would be happy with that.

I would say to go out and just devour information on the topic. Learn everything you can and talk to people. And, believe something based on the evidence, not because somebody else thinks it’s true, and never stop challenging that belief when new information comes along.

I try my best to be honest and considerate on my blog. In the end, it is just one person’s opinion and not everyone is going to like what I think.

But if you appreciate attempts at courteous discussion on topics such as religion and atheism, then you might like what you see at The Amiable Atheist.

Guess who is not coming to dinner?

Atheists, according to North Carolina Senator Elizabeth Dole.

Campaigning for re-election, she complained in a letter to supporters recently that her opponent, Kay Hagan, has friends who, “. . . are friends most North Carolinians would not be comfortable having over for dinner.”

(see Brother Richard’s post, Elizabeth Dole Releases an Atheist Bigoted Press Release)

Many readers will recognize the title of this blog as a version of a 1967 movie Guess Who Is Coming to Dinner? in which a young white woman (Katharine Houghton) her black fiancé (Sydney Poitier) over to meet her white parents.

The parents in this movie (Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy) were certainly not comfortable with the situation. But that was the point of the movie. Their discomfort in this case was because of a deeply rooted prejudice – a cultural history of viewing blacks as inferior creatures that good white people just did not associate with, let alone marry.

The parallels to the bigotry expressed in this movie, and the bigotry expressed by Dole's concern over people "North Carolinians would not be comfortable having over for dinner" are striking.

I want to use this instance to make clear what does and does not count as bigotry in this case.

It is not bigotry for Dole to complain about her opponent dealing with people who are pursuing policies that she is against. If one person is in favor of capital punishment, and her opponent is against capital punishment, it is not bigotry for the former to point out that the latter is collecting money from people who oppose capital punishment.

However, this is a difference in philosophies – in policy choices. It is not an attack on a person to say that their views on a specific issue are mistaken. As a matter of fact, there is not one person on the planet that I do not disagree with on at least one issue. Anybody who cannot get along with somebody they disagree with – even love and respect people who are 'wrong' on at least one thing – is going to have a sorry and lonely life.

However, in this press release, Dole does not protest any of the policies that the people Hagan is visiting are pursuing. She does not even mention what those policies are. It is sufficient for her purposes to mention that Hagan is visiting the leaders of, "the national lobby for atheists, humanists, freethinkers and other nontheistic Americans with the unique mission of protecting their civil rights." These people are to be judged solely on the criteria that the average North Carolinian would not be comfortable having them over for dinner.

I am an atheist. I would wager that Elizabeth Dole does not know the slightest thing about me. Yet, she has decided to pre-judge me. She has decided by the simple fact of my beliefs that I am somebody that she would be uncomfortable having over for dinner. She has decided that I am somebody that any North Carolinian should be uncomfortable having over for dinner.

On this matter, it is important to note that Dole is not merely describing a sociological fact that happens to be true of North Carolinians. It may be true that most North Carolinians are uncomfortable having an atheist over for dinner – just as they might be uncomfortable having a black man over for dinner. She is not just describing this as a fact. She is endorsing it. She is saying, in effect, "Vote for me, because I am not somebody who would hang out with these sorts of undesirables." She is teaching . . . promoting . . . encouraging . . . selling bigotry to anybody who reads her letter.

She is saying the same type of thing that somebody from North Carolina might have said 50 years ago when that candidate wanted his constituents to, "Vote for me, because I am not the type of person who hangs around with blacks or people who support their civil rights."

It is also interesting to note that in her letter she describes the people that Hagan will meet as "anti-religion activists". This is a rhetorical trick, much like calling those people who fought for black civil rights in the 1950s and 1960s "anti-white activists." It is a trick that bigots are fond of using in order to stir up fear, hatred, and prejudice and to ride this wave of bigotry into political office.

It may work. It may be effective – just as it was effective 50 years ago for candidates to ride the wave of anti-black bigotry into office time and time again. But this blog is not concerned with what works or does not work politically. It is concerned with what is right and what is wrong. What Elizabeth Dole is doing with this letter and the language she puts in it is as wrong as similar bigotries used 50 years ago, and it puts her in the same moral category as the hate peddlers of the last century.

Of course, I feel compelled to point out that Dole is merely acting in accordance with the national motto, "If you do not trust in God, then we do not consider you one of us."

This should be brought to the attention to the people of North Carolina. If there is anybody from North Carolina in the studio audience, I would like to recommend that you put some effort into delivering this message to people of your state.

Thing is, not only has school just started but also mum didn’t pay the wireless Internet bill because they over-charged us so I’m struggling with Internet-withdrawl right now. Sorry that I haven’t written anything but I’m planning (if I follow through with them and find the time) to write a post on some of the interesting/crazy stuff the DNC has brought to Denver and hopefully I’ll fit something in for the Carnival of the Elitist Bastards. I missed the last one.

In the meantime I actually have something awesome to say about school…

AP BIOLOGY IS AWESOME!

Considering the fact that my Chemistry teacher last year was a biology major who had never heard of punctuated equilibrium nor Stephen Jay Gould the fact that my biology teacher knows practically everything is a really really great contrast which I am absolutely thrilled about.

We collected pill bugs to study animal behaviour with on the second day and finished those up today (I was being really obsessive about isolating variables yesterday).

AP World History is also awesome (though not as awesome as AP Biology) though we haven’t exactly gotten into the material yet (we should be starting neolithic stuff tomorrow). I got a 6/6 on my first homework assignment and my teacher wrote good comments so I was really happy.

In short, AP classes actually rock… FYI…

I’ve been in my new apartment for about a week now. Still working on that whole “furniture” thing. And the other day, I did battle with a ginormous dragonfly. (It was winning for a good 15 minutes, but I eventually triumphed.)

But I found something I want more than a couch and chairs and insect repellent:

Guitar Praise!

Grab the guitar and play along with top Christian bands! Shred those riffs or blast the bass… you add a unique sound to the solid Christian rock. But watch out: if you can’t keep up, the artists will take a break and stop the music. Crank it up and try again — you’ll soon be rockin’ with the best while praising the Lord! Order the second guitar and jam with a friend!

They’ll “stop the music”?

That’s hardcore right there.

I wonder what other features it’ll have. Maybe the software doesn’t start up on Sunday mornings…

In true third-rate Christian-product fashion, the game isn’t even something you are meant to play on a TV. It’s for your computer.

So grab a friend and rock out on your desktop.

But even if that game falls flat, this one will surely make up for it:

Dance Praise 2 — the ReMix!

Also for your computer…

Turn Your Computer into a Dance Arcade with Top Christian Hits! Get ready for hours of family fun with music worth listening to! Simply plug in the interactive dance pad into the USB port of your computer and start movin’ and groovin’ to over 50 Christian songs from your favorite artists!

You can even grab nine of your friends and buy a Dance Praise Party pack for only $2495.00.

I didn’t realize there was anything wrong (or non-Christian) with Dance Dance Revolution, but clearly, I was mistaken.

Someone come visit me and bring the Christian games over. We’ll party it up!

(via Boing Boing)

• Micrographia, Robert Hooke
  
• The Origin of the Species, Charles Darwin (Only read it halfway) *
  
• Never at Rest, Richard Westfall
  
• Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman, Richard Feynman (I've read his other book, The Pleasure of Finding Things Out)
  
• Tesla: Man Out of Time, Margaret Cheney
  
• The Devil's Doctor, Philip Ball (I have his other book, H2O)
  
• The Making of the Atomic Bomb, Richard Rhodes
  
• Lonely Hearts of the Cosmos, Dennis Overbye
  
• Physics for Entertainment, Yakov Perelman
  
• 1-2-3 Infinity, George Gamow
  
• The Elegant Universe, Brian Greene (I have this, just haven't read it)
  
• Warmth Disperses, Time Passes, Hans Christian von Bayer
  
• Alice in Quantumland, Robert Gilmore
  
• Where Does the Weirdness Go? David Lindley
  
• A Short History of Nearly Everything, Bill Bryson
  
• A Force of Nature, Richard Rhodes
  
• Black Holes and Time Warps, Kip Thorne
  
• A Brief History of Time, Stephen Hawking
  
• Universal Foam, Sidney Perkowitz
  
• Vermeer's Camera, Philip Steadman
  
• The Code Book, Simon Singh
  
• The Elements of Murder, John Emsley
  
• Soul Made Flesh, Carl Zimmer
  
• Time's Arrow, Martin Amis
  
• The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments, George Johnson
  
• Einstein's Dreams, Alan Lightman
  
• Godel, Escher, Bach, Douglas Hofstadter (I have this, just haven't read it)
  
• The Curious Life of Robert Hooke, Lisa Jardine
  
• A Matter of Degrees, Gino Segre
  
• The Physics of Star Trek, Lawrence Krauss (I've read his other book, Atom)
  
• E=mc<2>, David Bodanis
  
• Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea, Charles Seife
  
• Absolute Zero: The Conquest of Cold, Tom Shachtman
  
• A Madman Dreams of Turing Machines, Janna Levin
  
• Warped Passages, Lisa Randall
  
• Apollo's Fire, Michael Sims
  
• Flatland, Edward Abbott
  
• Fermat's Last Theorem, Amir Aczel
  
• Stiff, Mary Roach
  
• Astroturf, M.G. Lord
  
• The Periodic Table, Primo Levi
  
• Longitude, Dava Sobel
  
• The First Three Minutes, Steven Weinberg *
  
• The Mummy Congress, Heather Pringle
  
• The Accelerating Universe, Mario Livio
  
• Math and the Mona Lisa, Bulent Atalay
  
• This is Your Brain on Music, Daniel Levitin
  
• The Executioner's Current, Richard Moran
  
• Krakatoa, Simon Winchester
  
• Pythagorus' Trousers, Margaret Wertheim
  
• Neuromancer, William Gibson
  
• The Physics of Superheroes, James Kakalios
  
• The Strange Case of the Broad Street Pump, Sandra Hempel
  
• Another Day in the Frontal Lobe, Katrina Firlik
  
• Einstein's Clocks and Poincare's Maps, Peter Galison
  
• The Demon-Haunted World, Carl Sagan
  
• The Blind Watchmaker, Richard Dawkins
  
• The Language Instinct, Steven Pinker (I have his other book, How the Mind Works)
  
• An Instance of the Fingerpost, Iain Pears
  
• Consilience, E.O. Wilson (I've only read this halfway)
  
• Wonderful Life, Stephen J. Gould
  
• Teaching a Stone to Talk, Annie Dillard
  
• Fire in the Brain, Ronald K. Siegel
  
• The Life of a Cell, Lewis Thomas
  
• Coming of Age in the Milky Way, Timothy Ferris (I've read his other book, The Whole Shebang)
  
• Storm World, Chris Mooney *
  
• The Carbon Age, Eric Roston
  
• The Black Hole Wars, Leonard Susskind
  
• Copenhagen, Michael Frayn
  
• From the Earth to the Moon, Jules Verne
  
• Gut Symmetries, Jeanette Winterson
  
• Chaos, James Gleick *
  
• Innumeracy, John Allen Paulos
  
• The Physics of NASCAR, Diandra Leslie-Pelecky
  
• Subtle is the Lord, Abraham Pais
  

The Secular Coalition for America has finally gone public with its new “Secular Values Voter” website.

You might ask: What exactly is a Secular Values Voter?

Secular Values Voters share a commitment to:

Protect our community and our secular government. The U.S. Constitution, the source of our civil rights, establishes a secular government - a unique and intentional construction of our founders. The Constitution provides for a strict separation of church and state, prohibits religious tests for public office, and guarantees equal protection for all Americans under the law. We must challenge claims that our “rights are derived from God,” we are a “Christian nation” and other theocratic fallacies that subvert our system of government.

Campaigns based on issues, not religion. Americans draw their values from a variety of sources, not just faith or religion. As far as voters are concerned, it is important to remember — as clearly demonstrated by the current president — that the prominence of the candidate’s religious credentials has no relationship to the quality of their performance in office. Secular values voters want to know the candidates’ stances on issues that affect the everyday lives of real Americans.

An end to faith-based initiatives. Government funding of religious organizations in the Bush administration has enabled tax-supported proselytism, hiring discrimination, and mediocre social service programs. It’s time to end charitable choice. The American tradition is to allow individuals to voluntarily provide financial support to religious organizations.

A secular military that both defends and reflects our diversity of belief. A growing culture of religious intolerance and proselytizing is developing within our military that jeopardizes the freedoms and safety of non-religious service members, tolerance of the beliefs of non-evangelical Christians, and our standing in the international community. Officers, chaplains, and all members of the military must not be permitted to put their perceived religious obligations above their duty to our secular government.

Public policy based on reason and science. Evidence, rather than faith, must be the driver of public policy decisions. Currently, in policies involving health, education, social services and the environment, religious beliefs have been allowed to trump reason and science. Only with a politically active and vocal secular community can this dangerous trend be reversed.

It’s nice to see the Secular Coalition working to take back the word “values” from the Religious Right. We have as much (if not more) reason to use it.

There’s also a place on the site to see where Barack Obama and John McCain stand on issues that matter to non-theistic voters.

said the anonymous police officer in Denver to the Code Pink protester before he literally knocked her off her feet (via):

It's a very nice letter to Nature. I especially like the last line.

We were perplexed by your Editorial on the work of the Templeton Foundation ('Templeton's legacy' Nature 454, 253-254; 2008). Surely science is about finding material explanations of the world -- explanations that can inspire those spooky feelings of awe, wonder and reverence in the hyper-evolved human brain.

Religion, on the other hand, is about humans thinking that awe, wonder and reverence are the clue to understanding a God-built Universe. (The same is true of religion's poor cousin, 'spirituality', which you slip into your Editorial rather as a creationist uses 'intelligent design'.) There is a fundamental conflict here, one that can never be reconciled until all religions cease making claims about the nature of reality.

The scientific study of religion is indeed full of big questions that need to be addressed, such as why belief in religion is negatively correlated with an acceptance of evolution. One could consider psychological studies of why humans are superstitious and believe impossible things, and comparative sociological studies of religion using materialist explanations of the rise and fall of the world's belief systems.

Perhaps the Templeton Foundation is thinking of funding such research. The outcome of such work, we predict, will not bring science and religion (or 'spirituality') any closer to one another. You suggest that science may bring about "advances in theological thinking". In reality, the only contribution that science can make to the ideas of religion is atheism.

I know, I know. Mocking the people who post on Rapture Ready feels like hanging round the special needs kids and laughing at them.

But still. This is the most comically ironic thread that I’ve followed to its source, from the reliably hilarious Fundies Say the Darnedest Things, for - well - a few days at least.

There’s a Rapture Ready thread on the topic Are Skull Shirts Evil?

Evil? Can clothes be intrinsically evil? This could explain several of life’s mysteries.

Why, for instance, do the top buttons on the most expensive blouse I’ve ever owned pop open whenever I’m in a public place? Why does one in every pair of socks disappear in the washing machine. How can labels scratch weals in your skin, despite feeling as soft as toilet paper when you touch them? How can things that looked stunning on a hanger in the store make the wearer look like a dumpier and more taste-challenged version of the Hunchback of Notre Dame?

Realising that evil may indeed live in the hearts of garments can explain so much. I had previously had to rely on the working assumption that some clothes were under an RPG curse. But now, I’ve seen the truth. They are just innately bad. Probably manifestations of lesser demons or something.

However, reading Rapture Ready with attention, it seems that it’s not clothes in general, just clothes with skull motifs, that are evil. Regular member scapegoat says

It’s part of the “Culture of Death” our world is embracing. Homosexuality, abortion, etc….

RDY4HIM says:

…. From what I can tell, it is directly associated with the kids embracing the spirit of death. They obsess over it. Some are actually suicidal, some practice self-injury, but most are extremely depressed. They see death as a way out and look forward to it because they have no hope. These are the kids that I minister to on-line through Facebook.
….. there is a really cool line of clothing out at Mardel’s and maybe other Christian stores called NOTW (Not of this World). The look is very similar to the skulls and crossbones attire but with crosses instead. They have hoodies, t-shirts, shoes, jewelry, you name it. Very cool, and an awesome way for our kids ti witness. My daughter will definitely be getting some for her b-day.

Lucky, lucky girl…. What an awesome b-day that will be. (It’s not as if a cross has anything to do with death or anything.)

Lucky suicidal kids who get ministered to on Facebook, too. (Yet another reason for avoiding facebook like a biblical plague of boils.)

Some posters say it’s just a fashion, even “cute” in pink (Is there anything on earth that some people don’t think is cute in pink?) But most are predictably aghast - satan’s trickery, EMO death cult and all the rest of it.

Culture of Death, indeed. Let me get this straight:

Rapture enthusiasts = people for whom mass human extinction can’t come soon enough. I think that defines a death cult.

These are the members of a death cult, who see some clothes as evil because - wait for it - their decoration represents a death cult.

So they suggest that their fellow Rapture Xians replace death symbol A (skull) with death symbol B (a cross)

I bet that is sooo cuuuute in pink

What’s the most embarrassing song on your iPod?

I have all sorts of inexplicable things on mine.

The Promiseland Podcast for Christian children, for example. Because I’m a masochist.

And just because it’s a small sample, here’s what I found in my K section:

K’s Choice
K7
Kansas
Kanye West
Kathy Griffin
Katie Melua
KC & the Sunshine Band
Keane
Kelis
Kelly Clarkson
Kevin Little
Kid Rock
The Killers
The Klein Four Group
Kris Kross
KT Tunstall

There. I have thoroughly humiliated myself for the day. Kris Kross?! What is wrong with me…

Ok. Your turn.

I wear my company logo on my work shirt.  I’m aware that when I’m in public wearing this shirt, my attitude and actions will reflect back on my company. If I go out after work, get roaring drunk and start making passes at random strangers on the street, I shouldn’t be surprised if my boss gets a call the next day.

When I was in the Army Security Agency we were constantly reminded that we represented the United States and the Army even though we seldom wore uniforms.  We were expected to live up to the traditions of the military and the country we represented.

Chuck Colson, that fine example of Christian honesty, wrote recently, “There are 1.9 billion Christians in the world today.  You cannot judge Jesus Christ by the behavior of any one of them or any group of them, for that matter.”

No, we can’t judge Jesus.  We can’t even determine from historical evidence if he really existed.  But what we can do, Chuck, is judge your religion based on the behavior of its followers.

I get tired of hearing all the excuses put forth by Christians.  “We can’t live up to the standards in the Bible, we’re sinful and imperfect.”  Bullshit.  You can’t live up to those standards because they’re unrealistic, absurd and idealistic.  They are the projected concepts of goat herders who lived thousands of years ago.

Still, if you want to belong to that club, there’s no getting around the fact that the merits of that club will be judged by the behaviors and attitudes of its members.  There’s no reason that non-believers shouldn’t evaluate the claims made by Christianity, Islam, Scientology and the rest by looking at that religion’s believers and the way they conduct themselves in society.

Just because your religion gives you a pass in your holy book for failing to live up to the standards of that group doesn’t mean the rest of us are going to.