The slow death of a religious sect.

July 14, 2010 By fatemeh 37 Comments

News came out on Tuesday that the Church of England (CofE, what Americans would call the Episcopal Church) have decided to go ahead and ordain women bishops. To a secular person, that doesn’t seem like a big deal – gender discrimination is, after all, illegal in Great Britain – but to many in the Church, this seems to be a herald of doom. Some high-ranking “traditionalists” are even threatening to convert to Catholicism:

Bishop Broadhurst, who is the chairman of the Forward in Faith organisation, declined to say whether he would leave the Church of England, because he said he needed time to talk to the priests under his pastoral care.

“My organisation has 1,000 priests and about 8,000 lay people in it. None of those priests are happy,” he said.

“Now people have to decide whether they will knuckle under – if they do, that is not a very happy situation for them or the Church – or whether they’ll go, or whether they’ll just defy it, and I can see that happening with many people.”

Part of me finds it hard to suppress a little soupçon of glee over this; as an atheist it confirms some of my opinions of religion in general so very nicely – particularly that some people simply use religion as a cloak for bigotry and that their bigotry is far more important to them than any faith they might profess. Most of me, however, finds it deeply sad that the laws of my country still permit exemptions from anti-discrimination legislation on religious grounds, effectively allowing organisations like the CofE to remain decades behind the rest of society in their attitudes towards equality and fairness.

Background story from the BBC.
Main story from the BBC.

Filed Under: Articles, Christianity, Faith, Fundamentalism, Persecution, Religion 37 Comments

Religious Enforcement in Texas

March 8, 2010 By vorjack 102 Comments

by VorJack
Jesus Holding Gun
Saudi Arabia has its mutaween, self-appointed religious police who enforce Sharia law. It looks like Texas is starting to develop its own Christian version.

The Texas Observer has an article about the organization based in Amarillo, Texas, called “Repent Amarillo.” It looks to be a conservative Christian militant group dedicated to harassing and shutting down organizations that the group and its leader, David Grisham, consider sinful. The article focuses on the largely successful attempts to shut down a swingers club.

For the past year, this Bible Belt city of 200,000 has been consumed by a culture clash between Repent Amarillo and their targets, a list that includes everything from gay bars to liberal churches. For the Route 66 swingers, Grisham’s “special forces” have been a near-constant presence. Jobs have been lost, families estranged, assault charges filed and businesses shuttered. So far, no public official has stood up to defend these businesses, which operate legally. To the contrary, Repent Amarillo has managed to turn the city’s own laws and employees into an effective weapon. Amarillo, it turns out, doesn’t have the stomach to stick up for gays, swingers, strippers or even Unitarians. Absent a peacekeeper, the conflict might end up being settled the old-fashioned way, frontier-style. “This will not end until somebody gets hurt, either us or them,” one swinger warns.

[...]

Repent has made it clear that its crusade won’t end with the swingers. Last January, community theater group Avenue 10 was set to open Bent, a play about the persecution of homosexuals during Nazi Germany. The day before opening night, the fire marshal, police and code enforcers showed up, tipped off by a Repent associate, according to Sirc Michaels, co-founder of the theater. Avenue 10 didn’t have the right permit for holding events, and the space was shut down.

What’s next for Repent? They’ve posted a “Warfare Map” on the group’s Web site. The map includes establishments like gay bars, strip clubs and porn shops, but also the Wildcat Bluff Nature Center. Repent believes the 600-acre prairie park’s Walmart-funded “Earth Circle,” used for lectures, is a Mecca for witches and pagans. Also on the list are The 806 coffeehouse (a hangout for artists and counterculture types), the Islamic Center of Amarillo (“Allah is a false god”), and “compromised churches” like Polk Street Methodist (gay-friendly).

Filed Under: Current Events, Persecution 102 Comments

Atheist Politician Threatened With Lawsuit

December 15, 2009 By Daniel Florien 60 Comments

Ashville, NC City Councilman Cecil Bothwell is an atheist. That bothers some other people, like bigot H.K. Edgerton:

“My father was a Baptist minister. I’m a Christian man. I have problems with people who don’t believe in God,” said Edgerton, a former local NAACP president and founder of Southern Heritage 411, an organization that promotes the interests of black southerners.

Indeed, he has such a problem with it Edgerton is threatening to file a lawsuit, claiming Bothwell isn’t qualified to hold office because of his atheism, citing the unconstitutional North Carolina Constitution that “disqualifies officeholders ‘who shall deny the being of Almighty God.’”

Bothwell’s response: “The question of whether or not God exists is not particularly interesting to me, and it’s certainly not relevant to public office.”

There was a time when people like Edgerton were denied office because of the color of their skin. Edgerton is fighting for the same bigotry — denying office to someone because of their religion, or lack there of. It’s shameful.

Filed Under: Atheism, Persecution, Politics 60 Comments

Islam Is of the Devil?

August 28, 2009 By Daniel Florien 114 Comments

islam-is-of-the-devilWhen I was in high school, I would often wear Christian t-shirts. Some were what I would now consider offensive — I remember one said “no Jesus no peace” which is a ridiculous assertion, and another one where people were roasting over a grill with some kind of warning about hell.

Hmm, I wonder why I didn’t make many friends?

Thankfully I didn’t attend a church quite as bad as the Dove World Outreach Center in Gainsville, FL which has been sending their students to school with t-shirts that read “ISLAM IS OF THE DEVIL” in large print on back:

More children from the Dove World Outreach Center arrived Tuesday at area public schools with shirts bearing the message “Islam is of the Devil” and were sent home for violation of the school district’s dress code when they declined to change clothes or cover the anti-Muslim statement on their clothing.

What if a Muslim students started wearing shirts that said “Christianity is of the Devil”? Christians would be having conniptions about how they are being persecuted and how they would fear for their poor little fundie kid’s lives. I see now that the school district staff attorney had the same exact thought, which makes me like him already.

On Monday, a 10-year-old fifth-grader at Talbot Elementary was sent home because of the shirt. On Tuesday, two Eastside High students and one Gainesville High student were sent home and a student at Westwood Middle had to change clothes because of the shirt, according to members of the Dove congregation.

Dove Senior Pastor Terry Jones said no local company “had the guts” to print the shirts. Dove member Wayne Sapp said he then ordered the shirts over the Internet from a company that allows individuals to design their own shirts. His daughter, Faith Sapp, 10, was the Talbot Elementary student sent home Monday. She said she was allowed to wear the shirt to school on Tuesday – with the Gospel message on the front visible but the anti-Islam message on the back covered.

Wayne Sapp’s daughter, Emily Sapp, 15, was the student sent home from Gainesville High on Tuesday. Both Faith and Emily Sapp said it was their decision, not that of their parents, to wear the shirts to school in order to promote their Christian beliefs. Emily Sapp said the “Islam is of the Devil” statement was aimed at the religion’s beliefs, not its members….

Jones said that, to him, spreading the church’s message was “even more important than education itself.”

This pastor sent his 10 year old daughter with this shirt on. I think that says all I want to know about him.

Do you think these types of t-shirts should be allowed in public schools?

I don’t.

Filed Under: Christianity, Fundamentalism, Islam, Oh the Stupidity!, Parenting, Persecution 114 Comments

The Murder of Marwa El-Sherbini

August 27, 2009 By Daniel Florien 117 Comments

Marwa El-SherbiniI somehow missed this story a couple months ago, and I figure if I missed it, at least some others did.

Marwa Ali El-Sherbini moved to Germany in 2005. In Aug 2008, a man (Alex W.) shouted abuse at Marwa at a public playground, calling her a terrorist and a slut because she was wearing a head scarf. The police arrived and Alex was charged with defamation. During his trial Alex said that “people like her” were not real humans.

Later in an appeal court, Alex W. attacked Marwa and stabbed her at least 16 times. When her husband tried to protect her, the man stabbed the husband 16 times. There were no security personnel there, and when a policeman finally came, he misidentified the attacker and shot Marwa’s husband instead of Alex.

Marwa died at the scene and her husband was critically injured. Marwa was three months pregnant.

Some of the mourners didn’t help the problem with this, though:

“There is no god but God and the Germans are the enemies of God,” chanted the mourners, while others carried banners condemning racism.

It’s a sad tale of religious intolerance and racism. It didn’t get very much attention in the West, but it should have — this kind of behavior is despicable.

Filed Under: Islam, Persecution, Religion 117 Comments
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