Reading Time: 3 minutes On Sunday, in one of the most vile sermons he’s ever delivered—and that’s saying a lot—Christian hate-preacher Jonathan Shelley told his congregation at Stedfast Baptist Church in Texas that we’d be “lucky” if the Holocaust really took the lives of six million Jews, that being Jesus-like meant spreading antisemitic hate, and that the biggest problem […]
Fundamentalism
Posted inLeaving Religion
I belong to me: Learning agency and consent after Christianity
Reading Time: 8 minutes OnlySky · I belong to me | Dani Ward Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about the concepts of agency and autonomy, how necessary they are for a fulfilling life…and how impossible they are when consent is ignored. I’ve been realizing with a growing sense of anger and frustration that I had no grasp of […]
Posted inCulture
Before Evangelicals and Fundamentalists Fused Together (LSP #218)
Reading Time: 7 minutes The evangelicals I knew back then thought fundamentalists were dangerous zealots and wingnuts who’d missed the entire point of Christianity in their mad dash to theological super-correctness. Meanwhile, fundamentalists thought evangelicals were lukewarm weaklings who couldn’t handle the real deal of TRUE CHRISTIANITY™ — and thus would fold and accept the Mark of the Beast the moment the Endtimes began in earnest.
Posted inUncategorized
The Worst Parent Ever
Reading Time: 4 minutes Are you a parent? If you are, then I’d like you to try a thought experiment. Imagine that your 4-year-old child struts up to you and proudly hands you a colorful drawing of, well…you’re not entirely sure WHAT it is. Then she tells you that it’s a drawing of her and you, neither of whom […]
Posted inReligion
How Al Mohler Accidentally Highlighted Evangelicals’ Idolization of Literalism
Reading Time: 10 minutes In an interview, you see, Al Mohler defended slavery as a practice. He did it for a very simple reason, and one he can’t escape any more than his tribemates can. Today, let me show you what the story’s about and how it highlights one of the most important golden calf idols of evangelicals: Biblical literalism.
Posted inHistory
Deconstructing the end of the world
Reading Time: 13 minutes Back in the 7th grade, I got invited to a weekend-long retreat put on by my church in homes scattered all over the city. It was still the mid-1980s, and the Cold War had not yet fizzled out, so we were still obsessed with whether or not the Russians were going to nuke us, a fact which preachers and […]
Posted inReligion
Episode 10: Why Smart People Believe Nonsense
Reading Time: 6 minutes Over dinner one night, I found myself explaining to someone raised outside of a devoutly religious environment that religious people are not stupid simply because they believe nonsensical things. [ iTunes | spreaker | youtube | pdf ] I’ve had this same conversation several times now, each time with a different person whose professional life has […]
Posted inReligion
Episode 7: How Christianity Teaches You to Hate Yourself
Reading Time: 9 minutes One of the great joys of living in the Bible Belt is that you can hear Christian music played overhead almost anywhere you go. One day not to long ago I had to make stops at a coffee shop, a gym, a doughnut place (I know, the irony), a fried chicken place, a clinic office, and […]
Posted inReligion
Kissing Hank’s Butt
Reading Time: 5 minutes **Originally this story appeared under a slightly different title, but I’ve altered a couple of words so people can share it with a wider audience.** This morning there was a knock at my door. When I answered the door I found a well groomed, nicely dressed couple. The man spoke first: John: “Hi! I’m John, and […]
Posted inReligion, Science
Faith and Reason Are Not Really Friends
Reading Time: 8 minutes You may not find this as fascinating as I do, but I recently came across a video put out by The Gospel Coalition, a think tank for Calvinists co-founded by Tim Keller, a Presbyterian pastor and author who herein verbalizes his own reservations about human evolution. What stands out most to me is that while […]