Did you know that each one of us has a non-denominational guardian angels that travel with us wherever we go? These same angels will help you overcome fear, doubt, and that lingering pile of money in your bank account, all thanks to Angel University. For the low price of a thousand smackeroos, you too can become a certified angel therapist. There’s no limit to your upward mobility once you learn the secrets of tricking gullible idiots out of there money, and what better way to do so than by enrolling today? Not convinced yet? Wait until you hear these powerful testimonials!

Before sleep, I call upon Archangel Jeremiel to join my magical night travels. He ushers in the dreams needed for healing, solution, and enlightenment. He keeps lower energies out and allows entrance to those for my highest good. If needed, Archangel Azreal and Archangel Jeremiel bring in passed over loved ones to generate healing. Supporting, encouraging, protecting and guiding me, Archangel Jeremiel delivers information that benefits my life’s journey. The Archangel of life review, Jeremiel will initiate past life dreams as opportunity for harmonizing ourselves and creating positive changes.

How useful! I used to have to learn things in fancy books, but now all I plan on doing is laying down in bed and waiting for one of these Archangels fellows to bring me all the information I need for my life “journey”.

The more you can focus on what it is you are grateful for, the more you can learn to ignore those things that you are not so grateful for. By tuning out these negative areas of our lives we are taking back our power from them. We are drawing our line in the sand and letting the world know that if they want to get through our wall, the way is through happiness not anger.

Just tune out your problems rather than facing them. Hey, if you’re going to embrace magical thinking, you’ve got to incorporate some kind of denial of reality in there somewhere, am I right?

At this point it would be far safer to say that it[ the power of prayer] is proven fact. rather than mere theory that prayer can and does have an enormous positive impact on our lives. Now you may have seen the results of a couple of studies on prayer that stated there was no effect at all, or worse that it even seemed to cause harm to the person who was praying. he fact of the matter is that there is a tremendous difference between cold
mechanical prayer and real, devoted and heartfelt, praying. Just as in all other areas of our lives we cannot simply go at this halfheartedly and expect dramatic results.

At Angel University, unpleasant things like facts and statistics are replaced by simple platitudes. The power of prayer found not to work? It’s because everyone in the study was a robot! If prayer didn’t work, it was obviously because the people doing the praying didn’t care enough. Silly science: when will you learn that you can’t measure intangible things like love, anger, and (more importantly) stupidity?

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I hate the way non-scientists keep arguing that “science doesn’t know everything”, or that “new research supports my [insert bullshit idea here]. The latest confused buffoon is Andrew Sullivan, who has a new section where you can ask him questions. It seems that he’s been reading the same book I have (Pinker’s “Angels of our Better Natures; Why violence has declined), but he’s come to vastly different conclusions. He seems to think that human kind become more peaceful is somehow proof that Jesus loves you.

I’m convinced that he hasn’t actually read the whole thing, especially when he states (incorrectly) that pre-state societies were less violent. Pinker showed exactly the opposite; that the creation of states actually lowered violent crimes. What we traded for was less freedom and a slightly crappier diet in exchange for fewer violent crimes. It’s obvious Andrew read the book through his “God goggles” and wants to believe that his stupid book of fairy tales has something useful to say about reality (this collective memory idea is quite embarrassing). I especially dislike his diseased notion that there is an “Arc of History [that] seems to echo the notion of a providence directed by God in some way”. I bet it seems that way when you’ve already decided that your imaginary friend is real.

Stick to what you know, Andrew. Your whole “Adam and Eve isn’t real but it is real” is probably the stupidest thing you’ve ever said, dude.

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Seriously, religious people have to be the deadliest geeks of all time. According to Steven Pinker’s new book “The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined“, their wars account for 13 of the worst 100 mass killings of all time (check out his interview with Sam Harris here). So far, followers of Lucas of Whedon have yet to do more than throw lame-ass conventions. No offence.

(via Unreasonable Faith)

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You can learn a lot from a video. Did you know that all drugs, once your brain is “on them”, will resemble a fried egg? I know this for a fact because Rachel Leah Cook smashed someone’s house up with a frying pan to prove it. Clearly, lessons abound in the digital format, so I thought it might be nice to extract some lessons of our own from this christian cartoon courtesy of NuBeat Music (a Christian music label that occasionally dabbles in videos).

#1 – God will give you directions if you’re lost.

Forget about advances in science and technology that allows us to circumnavigate the world thought GPS: God is the only navigator you’ll ever need. Just close your eyes, make a wish, and voila! God (who looks suspiciously like Santa Clause) will appear and give you the directions you so desperately need. It’s better than OnStar, people! All you need to do is surrender yourself (and a massive part of your income) to a deity that needs constant praise and approval!

#2 – Evil people are incompetent

Are you worried that Satan and his hoards of minions might slaughter you in the night? Don’t worry: evil is in fact completely and utterly incompetent. While you may have heard “rumors” of genocides and various holocausts throughout human history, these bumbling fools are easily out-matched through the awesome power of prayer.

#3 – Everyone finds the answer “Because the Bible told me so” 100% convincing.

Your children will never be exposed to skeptical human beings vastly more knowledgeable than they are concerning the historicity of Jesus, Moses, or any other Biblical figure. Everyone is so receptive to the idea of Jesus that any need to further educate yourself is unnecessary.

#4 – When you pray, angels with giant mullets will beat-up the demons that cause cramps.

The power of prayer can cause any miracle to happen, and while your cynical mind may wonder “why can’t they do the same thing for the poor little crippled girl”, keep in mind that the added sympathy she gets from potential converts isn’t something you can easily measure. It must certainly be part of God’s “big plan”, regardless of how cruel or random it might appear to your limited mind.

#5 – Little kids are way more effective at conversion than adults

Adults are merely chauffeurs, driving around the wisdom of 5 year old children where ever they go. You see, we begin knowing everything about the world, being infinitely wise and only slowly polluting our minds with facts, experimental evidence, and skepticism about the world. That’s why when the only grown up starts to speak, it’s because she needs to be “taught” something by someone who still wets the bed. She has so much to unlearn, and all of that starts the minute she stop thinking and starts feeling!

Well, I feel properly educated now. With my navigation, health and entire future in the hands of Santa Clause, I feel ready for the wider world. Is it finally time for me to leave the nest and start preaching the world of the Lord? If this video is anything like real life, then the answer is a resounding “Fuck Yeah!”

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Oh crazy bigoted religious people…I’m not sure they know what they want, sometimes. Take this clown, Pastor Scott Lively. Last year he came under fire for publishing a book called “The Pink Swastika“, where he claimed Nazi Germany was being run by homofascists (his word). He was laying low for a little while, but now he’s back to blaming gays for everything. This time, he believes they will bring about the end of civilization and what he hopes will be the Second Coming.

We are probably all familiar with the oft-cited fact that the collapse of numerous civilizations prior to our own were heralded by a rise in sexual immorality, especially homosexuality. That alone should alert us to the grave situation we find ourselves in today. But there is a deeper spiritual significance beneath that statistic. God has chosen rampant homosexuality to be a key warning sign for judgment of the world as a whole, and not just of individual nations.

Yeah, I remember reading all about how ancient Sumer was destroyed by sexual impropriety, and everyone knows that the Aztecs were oblitereated not by not the Spanish, but rather from all the butt-fucking they were doing on the side. History is a lot more interesting when you get to make shit up, isn’t it?

Genesis is the book of beginnings which sets the tone and lays the foundation for all of our theology. It is there in the first chapter that God establishes the “one flesh” standard for human sexuality which is lifetime, monogamous heterosexual marriage.

We must have been reading a very different version of Genesis, since in the one I read, Eve has to bang her own sons in order to propegate the species. I would hardly call that monogamy! Does he forget that his own religious forefathers like Jacob and Issac has a plurality of wives?

Homosexuality is not mentioned specifically as an aspect of the pre-flood corruption, but we can assume that a society of men and women whose thoughts “were only evil continuously” (6:5) were involved in every form of sexual perversion.

To be fair, the main reason God thought his creation had become an abomination was because they were fucking his angels and creating a race of super-giants. There’s no mention of all the cray hot sexual shenanigans they were up to, though. Hey, if my creation was getting all mixed up like that, I might be tempted to nuke that shit and start from scratch.

I have made this point before, but it bears repeating. I am 53 years old. When I was born homosexuality was illegal throughout the entire world. In the space of just half a century this tiny 1-3% of the population have made themselves a global political power with greater influence in the courtrooms and legislatures of the world than the Church of Jesus Christ. This astonishing transformation surpasses that of Darwinism, Marxism, and even Islam in its speed and breadth of reach. To my thinking, this can only have been accomplished by the god of this world (Satan 2 Cor 4:4) who knows his time is short and is making his move.

Yeah, men and women were being jailed for the “crime” of banging people they were attracted to. Eventually, to the great dismay of bigots like Scott Lively, we had to stop encarcerating our own citizens for their sexual preference. Rather than believe that society has progressed, this moron is convinced that only Satan could have expediated the gay rights movement.

I don’t get these guys. Don’t they want the “End Times” to begin soon? Isn’t this good news? Remember how jubilant Harold Camping and his army of dumbass followers were when they though that Jesus was going to rain down fire and brimstone? They were positively BEAMING with excitement at the thought of 99.9% of all humanity being slaughtered by a dude with a sword in his mouth. You’d think that anything that actually speeds up the process would be welcomed. But no, these douchebags are never going to be happy unless we all fuck each other the way they want us to, and with an extremely limited amount of partners.

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I don’t expect celebrities to be beacons of rational and coherent thought, especially when their claim to fame is a terrible song and an equally terrible TV show. Billy Ray Cyrus was recently interviewed by GQ, and he claims that Hollywood has destroyed his perfect family life. He believes the root of all of this evil has something to do with a freeway sign they would pass by on their way to the Hannah Montana studio that said:

ADOPT-A-HIGHWAY
ATHEISTS UNITED

Just before moving out to Los Angeles, the whole family had been baptized together by their pastor at the People’s Church in Franklin, Tennessee. “It was Tish’s idea,” he remembers. “She said, ‘We’re going to be under attack, and we have to be strong in our faith and we’re all going to be baptized…” And there, driving to work each day in the City of Angels, was this sign. “A physical sign. It could have easily said ‘You will now be attacked by Satan.’ ‘Entering this industry, you are now on the highway to darkness…”

Yes, the evil influence of Satan has finally compelled atheists around the world to pick up trash and to keep their highways clean! Mighty is the Dark Lord!

I’m going to go out on a limb here, but perhaps the reason his life sucks right now has more to do with the fact that he cheated on his wife while she was pregnant, and he pimped out his daughter to the Disney corporation. Of course, that would require him to admit his own mistakes, so it’s easier to blame a bunch of trash picking atheists for all your fucking problems.

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What’s got me riled up today? It could be this recent survey by the Pew forum on Religion and Public life found that over two thirds of the adult population of the US believes in angels. And when I say angels, I don’t mean dudes like Metatron that only show up when a deranged father is about to kill his youngest son. No, I’m talking about the kinds that are all over the place, supposedly protecting people. I guess some of them just suck at their jobs more than others.

The article in question goes on to list a number of random, lucky circumstances that the people involved have attributed to “miracles”. This one in particular seemed to jump out in terms of stupidity:

He [Hipp] was riding with his wife Penny when he got in a terrible accident.

“Shot the motorcycle up five feet in the air, and catapulted me about 20 feet over in the grass. But Penny was lying in the asphalt,” said Hipp. “By the time I get to her, she has no feeling from the waist down.”

At the hospital, the doctor delivered some terrible news.

“He said, ‘I don’t know if your wife will ever walk again. Her spine seems to be very mangled,’” Hipp said.

Hipp began to pray, then took a leap of faith.

“I probably shouldn’t have done it,” said Hipp. “It wasn’t advisable to do it, but I wanted to see my wife walk.”

He pulled her out of the bed.

“Something supernatural happened when I pulled her off that bed and her foot hit the floor, something happened. She said it was like fire started in her feet, went all the way up her legs, up her back, up her spine, and God healed her,” he said.

This idiot is lucky he didn’t make things worse. The doctors weren’t sure if she could walk, and yet Einstein here (who had already sent her in the hospital in the first place) made her stand up because a fucking voice in his head told him to do it. Would he have thought it was a miracle if his actions had actually prevented her from ever walking again? What about all the people who are stuck in a wheelchair for the rest of their lives? Did their gaurdian angels fail them, or is it simply that some people are just lucky, and others aren’t?

Wait, it gets even lamer than the motorcycle story. Apparently, angels don’t just protect people: they also act as messengers for even the most banal moments:

Years ago, before the age of cell phones, Sue was on her way to a Friday night Bible study. She was going to pick up a young woman in her 20s who just moved into town. The woman lived in a nice area where many rich singles lived. Unfortunately, Sue was running late.

“I said a prayer saying, ‘Please reassure her I’m coming,’” Werner recalled. The woman later recounted that she thought Werner forgot about her. The woman was about to leave but something interesting happened.

“Just at that moment, a brand new, super shiny silver Corvette pulled up with a very tall good looking man got out, walked straight up to her and said, ‘Don’t worry, she’s coming. She’ll be here in a few moments,’” Werner said.

The woman later described that the man and the car simply vanished just as Werner pulled up.

“He didn’t come up and try to pick her up or say ‘Hey, can I help you?’ He didn’t. How did he know I’d be there in a few moments and I was?” Werner asked.

Wow, how inspired! I’m totally convinced now, and it’s a miracle; I’ve lost all desire to make fun of these obviously incorrect fools. Hallelujah!

Look folks, the world would be a weird place if there were NO coincidences or strange occurrences happening at all. I know that these experiences can be overwhelming, especially if you’ve been fed stupid ideas like “angels exists” and “God is a bearded old man who loves you”, but you have to stop looking to the supernatural for explanations about the real world. Every time you do, the rest of us feel embarrassed for humanity.

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What better way to show your love than by submitting to your husbands? Rev Angus MacLeay, a member of the General Synod of the Church of England recently sent out a pamphlet in time for Valentine’s Day with the not-so-subtle message that the Bible specifically outlines the need for women to be subservient to their superior male counterparts. MacLeay, who is fighting against all the reforms in his church, is a hopeless romantic:

Wives are to submit to their husbands in everything in recognition of the fact that husbands are head of the family as Christ is head of the church. This is the way God has ordered their relationships with each other and Christian marriage cannot function well without it.

It would seem that women should remain silent….if their questions could legitimately be answered by their husbands at home

Not every woman listening to his sermon was impressed by his loving respect of the Bible:

One disenchanted female parishioner said she was “disgusted” by the sermon.
“How can they talk that way in the 21st century?” she said. “No wonder the Church is losing touch if this is the kind of gobbledegook they want us to believe it”.

Gobbledegook? Is this how modern women feel about the Bible? What sacrilege! The word of God is quite clear about the role of women in society, and the fact that some seemed disgusted by the sermon only goes to show what little attention people actually pay to their own holy scriptures. God doesn’t mince words when it comes to the ladies:

A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I don’t permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner”
(I Timothy 2:11-14).

…[F]or man did not come from woman, but woman from man; neither was man created for woman, but woman for man. For this reason, and because of the angels, the woman ought to have a sign of authority on her head” (I Corinthians 11:3-10).

What’s wrong ladies? Can’t stomach the fact that God’s infallible word makes you a second class citizen? If you want to be a good Christian, don’t you think it’s time you put aside all the influence of modern society and live according to the word of the Lord? Or, you could join the rest of us who recognize that the inherent misogyny of the Bible is further proof of it’s entirely terrestrial origins.

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I think overly sensitive Christians need to re-examine what they define as hate speech. Political hopeful William J. Kelly is trying to make a mountain out of a molehill, saying that a sign erected by the Freedom from Religion Foundation in the Illinois Capital Building is hate speech:

At the time of the winter solstice, let reason prevail. There are no gods, no devils, no angels, no heaven or hell. There is only our natural world. Religion is just a myth and superstition that hardens hearts and enslaves minds.

Kelly thinks this is dispariging toward Christianity and other religions in general, and is suing Jesse White, the Secretary of State for Illinois (who is responsible for enforcing the state’s property laws). It’s becoming quite clear, however, that this is a politically motivated action rather than an honest concern about “hate speech”. He’s hoping to rally Christians around him, and I’m sure he’ll have plenty of success; after all, the recent confidence  previously silent atheists are displaying scares the hell out of them, and some people are looking for any excuse to fight the progress we’ve been making.

So what we can gather from this lawsuit is that anytime you suggest that religion is merely a superstition, you are effectively committing a hate crime. Is Kelly unaware of the concept of freedom of speech or is he merely afraid of it? Why do religions fear dissension so much? Do they correctly see that once people are exposed to the fact that religions are merely the product of superstition and ignorance that they might abandon them? If they get to remove the sign from the Capitol Building, does that mean we get to expunge “In God We Trust” from their money too?

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I think fingerprinting people is kind of paranoid and ridiculous, but I never thought anyone would be against it on religious grounds. Guess I’m an idiot. Pam McLaurin is an evangelical Christian who takes her book of Revelation pretty fucking seriously. She thinks that by having her fingerprints in a database, she’ll be cursed and marked for eternal damnation. She filed a lawsuit against Texas Education Agency (who will fire her is she doesn’t comply to their policy), citing religious discrimination. Check out one of the passages she put in the brief:

He causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand and on their foreheads, and that no one may buy or sell except one who has the mark or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.… Then a third angel followed them saying with a loud voice — if anyone worships the beast and his image and receives his mark on his forehead or on his hand he himself shall also drink of the wine of the wrath of God.… He shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb.

It’s some pretty scary shit when you think about it. Has not one really considered the possibility that St. John was totally batshit crazy when he wrote it? Actually, Thomas Jefferson sure thought so, as did Martin Luther. I have to shake my head in disbelief that some people can take the insane rantings of a lunatic seriously (and when I say some, I mean millions of people). Fuck, I need to go grab a drink (or twelve).

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