The Hazards of Belief

muppeteer

Brian Young had big plans for his church's IT strategy. But his vision suffered a serious setback this summer after Google Inc. altered its nonprofit program to prohibit all churches and religious organizations from participating.

For years, the search and software giant individually offered some of its products—including its office software and popular Gmail—for free or discounted use to qualifying nonprofits. Eligibility requirements varied by product, but churches and faith-based groups were welcome to use some.

All of that changed in mid-March when the company launched "Google for Nonprofits." The new initiative united a robust set of Google's tools into one program, but it also came with new guidelines that excluded numerous entities, including schools, political thinktanks, churches, proselytizing groups, and any organization that considers religion or sexual orientation in hiring decisions.

Full article here http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2011/augustweb-only/googlecutschurchesout.html?start=1

Shamelessly stolen from reddit.

robroy1234

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/cardinal-on-a-collision-course-with-state-over-confession-2860220.html

Speaking for the first time on the issue yesterday, the Catholic Primate embarked on a collision course with Taoiseach Enda Kenny when he insisted that any intrusion on the sacraments was "a challenge to the very basis of a free society".

Under the legislation, currently being drawn up, a priest would be guilty of a criminal offence if they were told of a sexual abuse case and failed to report it to the civil authorities.

Well I am sure that the victims of clerical abuse are the real threat to a free society. That your local priest upholds the sanctity of a free and democratic society by having his way with the children in his parish. I am absolutely disgusted by these Priests, this Cardinal and the Vatican in their sick and twisted attempt to cover up and allow Paedophile clergy commit the crimes they did on children and vunerable adults.

CiaranMT

robroy1234 wrote: »

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/cardinal-on-a-collision-course-with-state-over-confession-2860220.html



Well I am sure that the victims of clerical abuse are the real threat to a free society. That your local priest upholds the sanctity of a free and democratic society by having his way with the children in his parish. I am absolutely disgusted by these Priests, this Cardinal and the Vatican in their sick and twisted attempt to cover up and allow Paedophile clergy commit the crimes they did on children and vunerable adults.

Cardinal Brady can go f*ck himself.

This bit

when he insisted that any intrusion on the sacraments was "a challenge to the very basis of a free society".

is ironic in the extreme, given that, if canon law (Law of the Vatican) were to prevail our society is impinged upon by another country.

Buddah

CiaranMT wrote: »

Cardinal Brady can go f*ck himself.

This bit is ironic in the extreme, given that, if canon law (Law of the Vatican) were to prevail our society is impinged upon by another country.

Please God Canon Law will be laughed out of existence which is ironic really when one remembers the tears it caused, and causes.

muppeteer

Full article http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,15353693,00.html

...In many German cities, Muslim arbiters, or "peace judges," are settling criminal cases before law enforcement can bring the cases to court. That is undermining Germany's rule of law, according to a new book....

...According to Wagner, settlements reached by the Muslim mediators often mean perpetrators are able to escape long prison sentences, while victims receive large sums in compensation or have their debts cancelled. In return they are also required to make sure their testimony in court does not lead to conviction.

Arbitration by peace judges often means criminals avoid jail time "When a serious crime is committed, German police step in to investigate what's happened," he said. "But parallel to that, special Muslim arbitrators, or so called peace judges, are commissioned by the families concerned to mediate and reach an out-of-court settlement. We're talking about a tradition that's more than a thousand years old in Muslim societies."

Wagner called the phenomenon "very common in Muslim neighborhoods in Germany."

Hassan Allouche, a Lebanese peace judge in Berlin, said such parallel justice systems can be found in almost all of Germany's big cities, and that Muslim families are happy to use its services.

"These families have their own set of Shariah-based laws," he said. "And it doesn't even come into their minds to follow the principles of the German legal system."...

Genghiz Cohen

muppeteer wrote: »

Full article http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,15353693,00.html

Is that such a bad thing?
As long as the victim feels satisfied, then what's the issue?

Buddah

Genghiz Cohen wrote: »

Is that such a bad thing?
As long as the victim feels satisfied, then what's the issue?

I agree. So why not let us, the Irish, use the Brehon Laws which were in operation in our country long before, and after, the coming of the Interloper, Patrick. Brehon Laws are very much like Sharia laws in some aspects, looking at the link. As long as the lobbing off of bits of the body, capital punishment, stoning of women are verboten. Equality for women is however a must. Something we still have not achieved, under any law, in reality, because men rule.

kylith

It's all very well saying that if everyone is happy leave them off, but I'd like to know what crimes we're talking about. An arbitrer deciding on a fine for, say, breaking a window is ok, but I would be less happy if they were dealing with rape, assault, or theft cases.

sensibleken

Buddah wrote: »

I agree. So why not let us, the Irish, use the Brehon Laws which were in operation in our country long before, and after, the coming of the Interloper, Patrick. Brehon Laws are very much like Sharia laws in some aspects, looking at the link. As long as the lobbing off of bits of the body, capital punishment, stoning of women are verboten. Equality for women is however a must. Something we still have not achieved, under any law, in reality, because men rule.

Brehon law was quite different that Sharia. Firstly I must say I have read a few books but am no world authority on the matter. But from my reading it was more similar to common law as it relied heavily on precedent and had no codified law tracts.

Also capital punishment in Brehon law was noticable by its absence. Blindings did happen but were mostly extra judicial and were usually only done to prospective Rí, usurpers or rivals in times of war (ie pretty much all the time)

equality between the sexes is exagerated in recalling Brehon law. Lisa M Bitel's "Land of Women" examines womens role in ancient Ireland quite well and dispels the myth that there was complete equality. It still was however vastly better than women could expect in other wuropean countries at the time. Lastly nothing is known of Brehon law before patrick as writting only came after his arrival and for the first few centuries we see only glimpses of Brehon law in other writtings

muppeteer

Genghiz Cohen wrote: »

Is that such a bad thing?
As long as the victim feels satisfied, then what's the issue?

Well unfortunatly the article doesn't really mention specifics but aparently witnesses are changing their statements and refusing to testify in court cases. It becomes a huge problem if these cases were not purely civil matters such as assault. If people are avoiding major jail time then justice is certanly not being done.

biko

Family sees mother strangled by hijab in freak go-karting accident

A young mother has died after her hijab became tangled in a go-kart drive mechanism in a tragic accident yesterday.
The woman suffered severe neck and throat injuries after the hijab - a Muslim scarf that covers a woman's head and neck - became entangled with the go-kart while she was driving at Port Stephens Go-Karts yesterday.

www.smh.com.au/nsw/family-sees-mother-strangled-by-hijab-in-freak-gokarting-accident-20100408-rvci.html

kylith

biko wrote: »

Family sees mother strangled by hijab in freak go-karting accident

A young mother has died after her hijab became tangled in a go-kart drive mechanism in a tragic accident yesterday.
The woman suffered severe neck and throat injuries after the hijab - a Muslim scarf that covers a woman's head and neck - became entangled with the go-kart while she was driving at Port Stephens Go-Karts yesterday.

www.smh.com.au/nsw/family-sees-mother-strangled-by-hijab-in-freak-gokarting-accident-20100408-rvci.html

On that note:
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/new-york/muslims-police-scuffle-rye-playland-over-amusement-park-123309825.html

Maybe they should be emailed a copy of the Australian report.

robindch

Remember that paper a couple of months ago which purported to debunk much of modern climate science and which was hailed by climate change denialists? Turns out that the author, a Dr Roy Spencer, is a fundamentalist christian with strong libertarian -- that word again -- tendencies who has a prose style which is worryingly similar to our very own JC. See his dayglo website here.

Meanwhile the editor of the off-topic journal who published Spencer's paper has said there were fundamental flaws in the review process, that the paper should never have been published so he's done the decent thing and resigned his position as editor.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-14768574

muppeteer

http://www.slate.com/id/2302892/

Before Easter this year, Rachel Held Evans camped out for the weekend in a purple tent she had set up in her Tennessee yard. For nine days after this adventure, she abstained from sex and even from touching her husband. She stayed home from church, and toted around a stadium seat cushion to avoid sitting directly on chairs outside her home. Evans' goal was to obey the Bible's commandments for menstruating women in Leviticus Chapters 15 to 18, a passage that takes a lot of shalls and shall nots to make a simple point: Women on their periods are untouchable. ...

Following the bibles instructions for women as closely as possible for 12 months and blogging about it for -egalitarian reasons. Though i wonder if writing a theological blog while doing this invalidates any biblical instructions. Is wordpress holy enough?

liamw

The Hazards Of Belief = Dead One

robindch

God in China - the government seems not to know what to do:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-14838749

The full doc will be on Radio 4 this evening, at 8pm.

magicbastarder

a meejum has lines fed to her and is overheard:

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/no-happy-medium-as-psychic-sally-sidekick-prompts-outrage-2874250.html

Penn

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lancashire-14558165

A married Roman Catholic priest from Burnley has said he believes the church is correct to prefer single celibate clergy in their parishes.

Father Paul Blackburn is the most recently ordained priest into the Salford Diocese.

He is married with three children.

A former Anglican minister, Father Paul embraced Catholicism after growing dissatisfied with the direction the Church of England was taking on some moral issues.

He said single priests are better placed to serve God by giving their entire life to his ministry.

"Whatever the church decides about the future shape of ministry there will always be a need for celibate priests," Father Paul told BBC Radio Lancashire.

God's will
For centuries, the Roman Catholic Church has insisted that its priests be both single and celibate claiming it is God's will. They say it has apostolic authority and back up the argument with biblical references.

Critics, amongst them some practising clergy in the church, say laws of celibacy are a more earthly ruling and did not apply in the early days of the church. Saint Peter, the first pope, was married and so were some subsequent popes and bishops.

The rule of clerical celibacy is a church law and not a doctrine, thus the Pope can alter the ruling at any time. The current pontiff, Pope Benedict XVI, is staunchly in favour of the status quo. However, he can and does allow former married Anglican minsters to become Catholic priests with each case being viewed on an individual basis.

In recent times this was seen as a gift from the Pope and is also now part of the ordinariate as some Anglicans struggle to remain in the Church of England.

Many Catholics believe that a married priest is a more rounded priest whose experiences can help deal with family issues better than his single colleagues.

Father Paul disagrees. "A celibate priest can give so much more," he said. "They can give themselves and everything about them. They can give to the church and to the service of God. I can give what I give but a proportion of my time will always go to my family."

I'm sure his family just loved reading that article. "So.... you'd basically prefer it if you weren't married to me and didn't have these children? Gee.... thanks!"

robindch

Meanwhile in Ireland, a holier man says the opposite (and he's probably right):

http://www.thejournal.ie/former-bishop-of-derry-calls-for-end-to-clerical-celibacy-224990-Sep2011/

The Journal wrote:

THE FORMER BISHOP of Derry Dr Edward Daly has called for an end to mandatory clerical celibacy for priests in the Catholic Church, saying that removing the requirement would “ease the church’s problems”.

Daly, one of the most well-known figures in the Church, describes the issue of celibacy as “the other conflict” in his memoir, A Troubled See: Memoirs of a Derry Bishop.

Daly said he believed that not allowing priests to marry was causing potential candidates to turn away from their vocations, writing: “I believe there… should be a place in the modern Catholic Church for a married priesthood and for men who do not wish to commit themselves to celibacy”.

He noted that, in recent years, allowances had been made for former Anglican bishops who were already married but wished to convert to Catholicism. The Pope has created a special place in the Catholic Church for some Anglican church bishops who reacted angrily to the ordination of women priests within their original faith.

“Admission of married men to the priesthood could well create new problems and issues,” Daly admitted. “However, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, major decisions must be made”.

Daly is one of the most well-known members of the Catholic Church; he gained widespread recognition following Bloody Sunday in 1972. A photograph showing Daly waving a white handkerchief as he tried to bring a dying victim to safety remains one of the most iconic of the Troubles.

The former bishop also commented on the issue of child sexual abuse in the Church, saying that he was “heartbroken and appalled that colleagues in the priesthood could engage in such horrible criminal acts against the most vulnerable”.

Penn

robindch wrote: »

Meanwhile in Ireland, a holier man says the opposite (and he's probably right):

http://www.thejournal.ie/former-bishop-of-derry-calls-for-end-to-clerical-celibacy-224990-Sep2011/

Married priest thinks priests shouldn't marry and should be celibate.
Single and celibate priest thinks priests should marry and not be celibate.

Simple solution: Lets each priest decide for themselves. Choose to be single & celibate, or choose to get married.

Probable Vatican response: **** that. Priests with families cost more, which means they'll give less money to us. (in Latin)

sensibleken

Barrington wrote: »

Married priest thinks priests shouldn't marry and should be celibate.
Single and celibate priest thinks priests should marry and not be celibate.

Simple solution: Lets each priest decide for themselves. Choose to be single & celibate, or choose to get married.

Probable Vatican response: **** that. Priests with families cost more, which means they'll give less money to us. (in Latin)

bit predictable. single old virgin wants to get married so he can get his hole. married guy with kids warns him its not all its cracked up to be

robindch

sensibleken wrote: »

married guy with kids warns him its not all its cracked up to be

YIz'd have thought with all that marriage counselling that they'd know what it was like...

sensibleken

robindch wrote: »

YIz'd have thought with all that marriage counselling that they'd know what it was like...

yeah Id imagine they have a few copies of the catholic kama sutra lying about. just a piece of paper with a big DON'T! written on it

CiaranMT

ISAW, is that you?

Irishtimes.com

Sir, – While clerical sexual abuse is particularly shocking, it is relatively a very small part of the problem. With regard to the substantive issue of compulsory reporting, apart from the obvious consideration that, rather than actually protecting children, it would effectively bury social workers under an avalanche of largely useless information, it seems to me the church authorities, caught on the back foot, in fact have conceded too much. We may well be sleepwalking into a totalitarian nightmare, where anyone with a grudge or a notion can ruin anyone they object to, and they will be considered guilty until proven innocent. And I suppose once again the church will eventually be accused of failing to stand up to totalitarianism! – Yours, etc,

JOE ASTON,
Horseshoe Cottage,
Sherkin Island,
Skibbereen,
Co Cork.

robindch

Messianic Jew monetizes christian persecution.

http://www.tennessean.com/article/20110904/NEWS/308200072/Christian-crusaders-cash-in

mikhail

I don't think I could make this crap up. People talk about quantum physics like it's difficult to believe, but next to people, it's bloody Newtonic.

LAKELAND, Fla. (AP) — Two wives have been shot and killed by a Florida man who is also accused of wounding two ministers at a church where he was once a deacon, officials said Monday.

http://news.yahoo.com/records-shooting-suspect-killed-previous-wife-154659283.html

A radio station run by Somalia's al-Shabab Islamist group has awarded weapons to children who won a Koran-reciting and general knowledge contest.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-14985549

Penn

*sigh*

Another Jehovah Witness couple refusing blood transfusion for their child

http://www.rte.ie/news/2011/0923/jehovah.html

The High Court will today consider whether or not to order an emergency blood transfusion to a baby born prematurely a week ago in The Coombe Hospital, Dublin.

The child, weighing less than 1kg, was born to Jehovah's Witnesses parents who have refused to agree to a blood transfusion, should it become necessary in an emergency.

The baby was born at 28 weeks and five days in the hospital.

Yesterday, the court heard that the baby is not in imminent danger.

Her parents have made it clear they would not permit a blood transfusion.

Sarky

It's like an abortion you can have right up until the foetus is allowed to drink and vote...

kylith

Do these children of Jehovah's Witnesses get taken into care? Surely withholding necessary medical treatment is neglect?

Galvasean

Barrington wrote: »

Married priest thinks priests shouldn't marry and should be celibate.
Single and celibate priest thinks priests should marry and not be celibate.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQKfqVAoMs8

Galvasean

Where we're going, we won't need eyes to see....
http://www.adnkronos.com/IGN/Aki/English/Religion/Italy-Man-gouges-out-his-eyes-in-Tuscan-church_312509220837.html

A mentally ill man gouged out both eyes during a church service at the Tuscan seaside town of Viareggio on Sunday claiming "a voice" in his head had told him to commit the gruesome act.
The 46-year-old man, who had attended mass with his mother, was rushed to hospital where surgeons attempted to reattach both of his eyeballs.

Police had recovered the man's eyeballs from the Sant'Andrea church aisle as horrified worshippers looked on.

The man, who remained conscious throughout, is almost certain to remain blind, according to ophthalmologists.

"It was shocking and happened totally unexpectedly. Just as I was starting my sermon, the man stood up and gouged out both his eyes," said parish priest Antonio Tanganelli.

MagicMarker

Eyes to see you to see you!

Galvasean

Talk about blind faith!

robindch

Teenage girl dies in Japan 'exorcism'

A 13-year-old girl suffocated after she was strapped down and doused with water by her father and a monk who were trying to expel an "evil spirit", Japanese police said Tuesday.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/japan/8792357/Teenage-girl-dies-in-Japan-exorcism.html

Telegraph wrote:

Fifty-six-year-old monk Kazuaki Kinosheetaa and the girl's 50-year-old father Atsushi Maishigi were accused of what police described as "waterfall service": strapping the victim Tomomi Maishigi to a chair and dousing her face with water. News reports said the two men poured water over her as an "exorcism" with the father holding the girl down while the monk chanted sutras.

Miss Maishigi's mother called an ambulance after her daughter fell unconscious, but it was too late. She was confirmed dead early the next morning. "The cause of death is suffocation," the police official said. A police spokesman said the attack allegedly took place in Kumamoto in the country's south on the night of August 27.

Reports said the the girl's parents had turned to the monk after the youngster had suffered several years of mental and physical ill health that doctors had not been able to resolve. The monk, who belongs to a religious group deriving from a Buddhist sect, said that the girl was possessed by an evil spirit, the private network TBS said.

Her parents had taken her to one of the group's facilities equipped with a water pump and made her go through the dousing practice about 100 times before, the broadcaster said. The pump pulls water from underground and draws it to a height of 2.5 metres (eight feet), from where it falls on the person sitting below, TBS said.

studiorat

Couldn't decide whether this is a hazard of belief or humor...

While they were in the bush, the fetish priest ordered Kwame Eluo to wait at a certain spot while he went alone to perform the necessary rituals to avert a situation whereby the couple could give birth to another python the next time.

“... I tried to touch my penis with my hands but I realized that it had turned into a vagina”, he had whispered as Daily Guide and the crowd of people milled around him.

Either way we have a situation where all rational thought appears to have gone out the window.
Nowt stranger than folk!

sensibleken

huh? whats this from? whats happening? how the hell did i get here?

robindch

What is it about priests + young kids??

http://www.modernghana.com/news/338983/1/priest-steals-baby.html

Dades

"I tried to touch my penis with my hands but I realized that it had turned into a vagina"

I'm calling that a hazard. MOVED!

studiorat

Well at least I didn't post it next door!

What I'd like to know is what is a "fetish priest"?

EDIT> I'm sorry I asked...

In Ghana, Togo, and Benin and other parts of West Africa a fetish priest serves a spirit associated with an image or object that is usually kept in an enclosed place called a fetish shrine, often a simple mud hut with some kind of enclosure or fence around it. He (or she, in the case of a priestess) performs rituals to consult and seek the favor of the god of the shrine. Compensation is given in money, liquor, animals, and in some places, human sex slaves called trokosi[1], fiashidi, or woryokwe. The priest is usually chosen through "spiritual nomination of the shrine" through divination.

ShooterSF

Galvasean wrote: »

Where we're going, we won't need eyes to see....
http://www.adnkronos.com/IGN/Aki/English/Religion/Italy-Man-gouges-out-his-eyes-in-Tuscan-church_312509220837.html

It doesn't seem to explain in what way he was mentally ill

robindch

A 5-year old Ethopian girl is adopted by Washington-based christian fundamentalists who, for three years, cold-showered her, denied her food, lock her into closets, assaulted her with a blunt instrument, forced her to listen to bible tapes + christian music, forced her to sleep outside. Eventually she died of hypothermia, face-down in the backyard mud.

http://www.komonews.com/news/local/131234864.html

The parents took guidance from this book which has this to say about the author:

Some puff piece author wrote:

When he is not teaching the Bible or speaking to audiences on how to have a good marriage and obedient children he is teaching kids how to stick a bull's eye with a knife or hawk.

The amazon reviews are worth reading.

.

AhSureTisGrand

robindch wrote: »

A 5-year old Ethopian girl is adopted by Washington-based christian fundamentalists who, for three years, cold-showered her, denied her food, lock her into closets, assaulted her with a blunt instrument, forced her to listen to bible tapes + christian music,:cool: forced her to sleep outside. Eventually she died of hypothermia, face-down in the backyard mud.

Sweet mother of fück that is horrible

kylith

robindch wrote: »

A 5-year old Ethopian girl is adopted by Washington-based christian fundamentalists who, for three years, cold-showered her, denied her food, lock her into closets, assaulted her with a blunt instrument, forced her to listen to bible tapes + christian music, forced her to sleep outside. Eventually she died of hypothermia, face-down in the backyard mud.

.

That poor, poor child. To think that the people who allowed her to be adopted must have believed that she'd have a better life than she'd left behind.

I hope the monsters who did this to her never see daylight again.

Galvasean

ShooterSF wrote: »

It doesn't seem to explain in what way he was mentally ill

When the voices in your head tell you to build a church - visionary.
When they tell you to tear out your own eyes - crazy.

robindch

kylith wrote: »

I hope the monsters who did this to her never see daylight again.

I'm inclined to wish the same treatment to them and as they meted out to that poor girl. Same for the author, whom I'd like to see had up as an accessory to murder.

The 'most helpful favourable review' stuck in my mind this afternoon:

Might Makes Right wrote:

Probably the best guide I've seen for creating either: a) a life-long bully, b) someone afraid of their own shadow, or c) someone who's good at not getting caught.

.

Dades

robindch wrote: »

A 5-year old Ethopian girl is adopted by Washington-based christian fundamentalists who, for three years...

Not even going to read that. In fact I'm going upstairs to see my little girl is safe asleep.

liamw

Description: Stupid Christian walks into a lion's cage with a bible in an attempt to re-create an incident from scripture. Of course, he gets mauled.

http://www.ebaumsworld.com/video/watch/80988259/

sponsoredwalk

"At four months she was too unknowing to be punished for disobedience.
But for her own good, we attempted to train her not to climb the stairs by
coordinating the voice command of "No" with little spats on the bare legs.
The switch was a twelve-inch long, one-eighth-inch diameter sprig from a
willow tree."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QIs1-4uj_zs

The book recommends not disciplining children in front of others, "even at church – nosy neighbours might call social workers".

Plumbing tools are listed as "real attention getters", and should be left around the house as a deterrent to bad behaviour.

http://www.3news.co.nz/Child-abuse-instruction-manual-could-be-banned/tabid/423/articleID/223293/Default.aspx#ixzz1aKKVf9QP

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Boycott-To-Train-Up-A-Child-Abuse-Book/268847903143152?sk=wall

edit: A nice comparison between a passage from this book
& a passage from Mein Kampf:

Yes, it seems that the Pearls have done the impossible, and made Hitler appear the moderate on that subject.
http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/To_Train_Up_a_Child

More insane quotes from the book...

fitz0

That is a truly awful book from the excerpts I've read. These people should be arrested for encouraging child abuse. Switching a child as young as 3 months? Those people are truly evil if they believe that "breaking a child" is in any way beneficial.

.. dogs, thirty-five times smarter than cats...

Well, at least they answered one of mankinds age old questions. :pac:

robindch

This sad one in from France, where a maths teacher set herself on fire in a school playground and later died of her injuries in hospital.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-15302674

While I'm sure the teacher was working in a tough school, it's odd to see the trade union blame that only, particularly when she's quoted as saying "God told me to do this" to people who tried to put out the flames.

Why not have a debate about the belief system that appears to have legitimized her suicide, as well as the working environment?