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Posted in Censorship, Faith, Government, Human Rights, Law, Morality, Religion on Mar 14th, 2009
A new proposal from Islamic states was circulated amongst Geneva diplomats last week as they attended the current session of the UN Human Rights Council. It is entitled “Combating defamation of religions,” and mentions only Islam. If adopted it would define any questioning of Islamic dogma as a human rights violation, which would intimidate dissenting [...]
There are some things that you just know would never be allowed today if we had only known then, what we know now. If somebody today had invented alcohol or tobacco, you know they would never get passed for general public consumption, and would only be allowed to be developed for secret military purposes. Their [...]
Posted in Existential, Faith, Health, Humanity, Religion on Feb 22nd, 2009
It has happened. My wife confirmed it. I have officially become a grumpy old man.
My defence is simply that I was listening to the local news on the television and wanted to exercise my right to challenge the officialdom that has thought it wise to spend £300,000 on a new multi-faith space at my local [...]
Posted in Censorship, Faith, Government, Human Rights, Humanity, Morality, Religion, Society, Terrorism on Feb 15th, 2009
As the debate about the British Government’s refusal to allow Dutch MP, Geert Wilders, into the UK to attend a showing of his controversial film ‘Fitna’ has raged, I have wanted to write, but found myself unable to do so. It has taken time for the dust to settle in my head. Part [...]
Posted in Faith, Health, Human Rights, Morality, Relationships on Feb 5th, 2009
Community nurse Caroline Petrie, a Christian nurse from Weston-super-Mare, has been suspended for offering to pray for an elderly patient’s recovery. She asked the patient if she wanted prayer after she had dressed the patient’s wounds. The patient complained to the North Somerset Primary Care Trust. The nurse was suspended, without pay, on [...]
Posted in Education, Faith, Humanity, Religion on Jan 5th, 2009
My holiday reading was Godless: How An Evangelical Preacher Became One of America’s Leading Atheists by Dan Barker. I had travelled a similar journey (albeit in a less publicised way). Having made the change from being an evangelical leader, preacher, counsellor, and author (for over 30 years) to an unashamed, blogging atheist, I thought it [...]
According to a report published by Theos (the self proclaimed theology think tank) today, 34% of people believe that the statement “Jesus was born to a virgin called Mary” to be historically accurate, and 52% believe that the birth of Jesus is significant to them.
Theos are, of course, delighting in these figures, using them as [...]
Posted in Faith, Humanity, Psychology, Religion, Society on Dec 11th, 2008
People sometimes ask me how I am coping with life now that I am no longer a Christian believer, and certainly no longer a card-carrying evangelical charismatic. Don’t I miss the sense of togetherness, or the joy and hope of the Christmas season?
The answer, of course, is that, in many ways, my life is much [...]
Posted in Faith, Government, Human Rights, Religion on Nov 19th, 2008
How would you feel if, before every day at work, you were expected to participate in a collective act of talking to an unknown, unseen, mythical being, and if this time-consuming act never ever resulted in any demonstrable, substantive change in anything? Personally, I might think it was a waste of time.
If, over time, this [...]
Posted in Faith, Humanity, Morality, Relationships, Religion on Nov 10th, 2008
Yes, it’s musterbation again! No, no, no, NOT masturbation, but MUSTerbation! I’ve written about MUSTerbation before (though judging from my blog search stats, thousands of people think masturbation is spelt with a ‘must’.)
Quite simply, MUSTerbation is when human beings decide that something has to be done or stopped at all costs. It is [...]
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