I hope you had a Happy Darwin Day! Last Sunday was Evolution Sunday, and so my Sunday school class focused on that topic, spending time clearing up misconceptions about what evolution says, and explaining why evolution is no more incompatible with religious faith than any other area of science. I highlighted that the claim that one must choose between atheism and young-earth creationism – a false antithesis if ever there was one – is a marketing strategy used by both... Read more
Apparently there is such a thing as a “lollipope” that you can buy in Rome. I had someone show this to me today, and so I asked for permission to take some pictures. Unfortunately they didn’t have their Benedict with them, or I would have shown you that one. Read more
A pun on the name of the famous Gnostic teacher Valentinus, made by a commenter on a recent post, led me to think that there ought to be Gnostic Valentines for Valentine’s Day – or should that be Valentinus Day? Here are a few I came up with: No, they are not supposed to be taken seriously. And no, that should not have been necessary to point out. Probably in every case some knowledge of ancient Gnostic texts is required in order... Read more
These horses were actually sculpted in China – read the story here. But for some reason when I was shown the photo, I thought, four horses, four horsemen, snowpocalypse (recent blizzard in New England) and it all sort of came together. Read more
The cartoon below from SMBC is right at the intersection of religion and a major science fiction trope, namely time travel. Do you think time travel is possible? If so, how would that relate to any particular set of religious beliefs? Fringe and a number of other shows have done interesting things with this. Read more
For your amusement, courtesy of The Kippah and the Collar, which also has a John Wesley one! Read more
Here is a video of the recent Cadbury Lecture delivered by Mark Goodacre at the University of Birmingham: Read more
Last night I watched the movie Super 8. The commercials for it had never grabbed my interest, and I see now that they were trying to be intriguing without being revealing. It turned out to be excellent, and like everything J. J. Abrams does, about the characters in the story above all else. It is interesting to start a movie by having it be about kids making a movie. When they actually discuss the reason for including a wife in... Read more
Several posts have come to my attention in recent days, related to the subject of liberal/progressive Christianity. Roger Olson has a post on why he doesn’t self-identify as a “liberal Christian.” He offers interesting discussion of the terminology and his own understanding, which is worth clicking through to read. Towards the end he sums up as follows: So what’s wrong with being liberal theologically in that way? I find it thin, ephemeral, light, profoundly unsatisfying. It seems to me barely... Read more
One media outlet described the man who quit his job over a form with the number 666 on it as taking Revelation literally. Fred Clark had this to say, with his characteristic combination of sarcastic wit and religious insight: No. No, no, no, 666 times no. Believers like Slonopas do not “take the book of Revelation literally” — they take the book of Revelation and cut it up into a thousand tiny pieces, placing those pieces into a hat... Read more
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