Reading Time: 5 minutes OnlySky · Disestablish It For Its Own Good – The Church Of England And Gay Marriage | Daniel James Sharp I followed with amusement the recent fracas over same-sex marriage in the Church of England. For half a decade, the Church has been debating its doctrines relating to sexuality, and the thought of gentle Anglicans […]
First Amendment
Why the Kennedy v. Bremerton SCOTUS ruling empowers secular defenders of religious liberty
Reading Time: 3 minutes As the recent Supreme Court ruling Kennedy v. Bremerton allows football coaches to kneel with students in prayer on the fifty-yard line, it also opens the door for more teachers, coaches, and other public officials to practice their religion in public. This seems like an unhappy entanglement between religion and the state, but could secular […]
How a Pennsylvania school board turned a proposal for an ‘After School Satan Club’ into a witch hunt
Reading Time: 5 minutes The school board meeting that took place in York County, Pennsylvania this past Tuesday, April 19th, had the feel of a puritan village witch trial. National media coverage reported on the school board’s ultimate 8 to 1 vote against allowing the formation of one of The Satanic Temple’s “After School Satan Clubs” in their district, […]
Religious Rivals Unite in Celebration Over Today’s Supreme Court First Amendment Ruling
Reading Time: 3 minutes This is from the American Humanist Association: Today, the American Humanist Association (AHA) celebrates this morning’s Supreme Court’s ruling, Uzuegbunam v. Preczewski, alongside typical opponent, Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF). This ruling upheld (8-1) a critical remedy in First Amendment cases. “Today’s ruling is a victory for the rule of law itself,” Monica Miller, AHA’s Legal Director […]
Trump Is Ripping up the Constitution and His Supporters Don’t Care
Reading Time: 9 minutes It’s hard not to be obsessed with politic at the moment; it is all-consuming, it is everywhere. I have argued over the Consitution with Trump cultists here many times and they appear to obsess over it. The drool over their own justification of the document. When it is convenient. When it is less convenient, they […]
Slavery Is Alive and Well in America's Christian "Rehab" Chicken Plants
Reading Time: 4 minutes A Christian “rehab” center provides forced labor for the chicken industry.
A Letter to a Believer
Reading Time: 8 minutes It was more than ten years ago that two court cases made it to the Supreme Court. They dealt with the display of religious messages, like the Ten Commandments, in publicly-owned facilities. An elderly cousin of mine was horrified by those decisions, claiming that they violated the Constitution. He disparaged the SCOTUS justices as know-nothing […]
The Lord’s Prayer advert HAS NOT BEEN BANNED in cinemas
Reading Time: 7 minutes I just want to set the record straight since this is being mis-reported all over the media. I sent a complaint to the BBC and they changed their website headline, though still report it incorrectly on the TV news.
Here is how the BBC report it, having changed “ban” to “snub” and “refusal”:
Maybe it Works Better in German
Reading Time: < 1 minute In an homage to a mock-German sign that I remember from the early personal computer days, this is a stern demand (in a very stern font) that people keep their meddling hands off the First Amendment.
Religion in Public Schools: What Does the First Amendment Allow?
Reading Time: 4 minutes What do you do when faced with a law that seems to be ignorant of the First Amendment? Here is a brief primer on how religious freedom applies in public schools.