Emily Herx was an English teacher at a Catholic school in Indiana who was fired because she and her husband used in-vitro fertilization to get pregnant, which a local church official declared was a “grave, immoral sin”, presumably taking his cue from pope Ratzo who views IVF and other forms of ‘artificial’ procreation as immoral. [Read more…]
TIME magazine publishes an annual list of the 100 most influential people. At a dinner given for this year’s mentions, Stephen Colbert gave a speech that included the following comments aimed at the Catholic church and Cardinal Thomas Dolan who is a smug example of Catholic homophobia and sexism. (Unfortunately I have not been able to find a video of the speech.) [Read more…]
Victor Stenger has had a long career in experimental high-energy physics. He has become a prolific writer on the intersection of science and religion and I have referred to him frequently in past blog posts, especially to material in his 2007 book God: The Failed Hypothesis. Stenger is an unabashed ‘new atheist’ who thinks that science and religion are fundamentally incompatible and does not shy away from saying so bluntly. The title of his latest book (and its subtitle The Incompatibility of Science and Religion) leaves the reader with no doubt as to where he stands. The book was released this month and I have just had the pleasure of reading it. It essentially updates and expands on the arguments of that earlier one. [Read more…]
It looks like the Catholic church has decided to go all in on the issue of birth control.
Chicago’s Cardinal Francis George says that the church is willing to close its hospitals if their insurance companies are required to provide contraceptive services to all employees. [Read more…]
Vanderbilt University has stripped a Christian student group of official recognition because it had a clause that says “Criteria for officer selection will include level and quality of past involvement, personal commitment to Jesus Christ, commitment to the organization, and demonstrated leadership ability.” It was the phrase “personal commitment to Jesus Christ’ that resulted in the plug being pulled. [Read more…]
Was there an actual historical figure that corresponds to the biblical Jesus? The debate on this question has been going on for some time in academic circles but has seen a resurgence with the recent publication of Bart Ehrman’s new book Did Jesus Exist? The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth. [Read more…]
I first encountered the work of William Dembski during the time I was engaged in efforts to counter the intelligent design movement. He struck me as a smart guy who was trying to have his feet in two boats. He sought to be accepted by the scientific community by spouting sophisticated intelligent design stuff, while at the same time not alienating the fundamentalist Christian base that has no patience for anything that counters biblical orthodoxy. It is, of course an impossible task to bridge the two worlds as can been from his tortured attempts at bridging the Genesis story with evolution, that culminated in his laughable effort to explain how Adam and Eve killed the dinosaurs. [Read more…]
Charles Murray’s new book Coming Apart supposedly deals with the increasing divergence within the white community over the period 1950-2010. It compares two groups of white people in the 30-49 age range: upper middle class (defined as those with a least a bachelor’s degree and working as a manager or similar high-status professions) with working class (no more than a high school degree and those who work in blue-collar, service or low-skill jobs). [Read more…]