Dale Tuggy shared this image on his blog, along with some thoughts on it: Tuggy’s comment on it is worth sharing: This argument kills with 8th-graders. But any adults should be unimpressed. I’ll wager that any adult can think of many written reports that are important evidence for all kinds of claims! Dear would-be Jesus de-bunker: kindly reflect on this fact. 0% of historians believe Batman is a real guy. And rounding up (to account for a very, very few... Read more
Several calls for papers came to my attention recently. One is a repeat of a call for contributions to a new journal of science fiction studies which I mentioned here previously. The second is a call for papers for a celebration of Star Trek connected with the fourth annual Pop Culture Colloquium at DePaul University in Chicago. I'm not sure if I'll propose a paper or round table, but I definitely should drive up and attend! Another is about proto-posthumanisms,... Read more
Jim Linville shared the poster above, which is a great opportunity for students of religion at any level to present their research at an academic conference. And answering the question “What Would Jim Do?”, here’s an academic conference LOLcat to accompany the call for papers: Read more
The call for papers for the 2016 Society of Biblical Literature annual meeting is now available online. Having joined the Digital Humanities program unit, let me highlight its call for papers here. DIGITAL HUMANITIES IN BIBLICAL, EARLY JEWISH, AND CHRISTIAN STUDIES A panel will be organized on the publication of collected essays by our group in the new series Digital Biblical Studies (Brill). A joined session will focus on Digital Humanities and Christian Apocrypha ; another session will focus on... Read more
I recently learned that there is an album in Norwegian featuring songs the lyrics of which are poems about the life of Christ. The vocalist is Morten Harket- perhaps known to some of you as the lead singer of A-ha. The video above is one of the tracks, a “Hymn to Joseph.” Read more
Readers of this blog have presumably heard the news about a small number of parents in Greenville, Virginia who complained and threatened to pull their children out from school because children were learning about world religions, and one activity involved trying to imitate the calligraphy in which the Arabic statement of faith was written on the worksheet. I want to address any such parents in Virginia that might be listening, and anyone else who thought the response in question was appropriate. I... Read more
I was disturbed to see Charisma News appealing recently to outright falsehoods in its efforts to encourage readers to keep accepting the virgin birth as though it were a historical fact that is supported by evidence. Here are the claims they make: A physician and world-class historian documented it Modern archaeology affirms it An agnostic professor of mythology is convinced Old Testament prophets predicted it centuries in advance The earliest Christians believed it universally They pretend... Read more
I’ve seen Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens. For the most part, I love what J. J. Abrams has accomplished. Have you seen it yet? If not, you won’t want to read further. There are some major spoilers. It is only a minor spoiler to mention the fact that, when the introductory text rolls at the start of the film, we learn that Luke Skywalker has gone missing. Only later do we learn the backstory to that. He had begun... Read more
This Existential Comics gets at one of the biggest challenges that encounter with extraterrestrials could offer to terrestrial faiths. Some have presumed that either the presence of belief in incarnations of God on their world would be a biggie, at least for Christians. Others have presumed the opposite, the apparent lack of such revelations specific to their world. But what if they don’t even understand our questions and the assumptions that they take for granted at the most basic level? Read more
This is a photo of the most massive Star Wars spoiler I have ever come across. Seriously, have you ever come across a bigger Star Wars spoiler than this one? Read more
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