Because it's just funny to think about

In thinking about the quandary posed in the previous post, a flood of follow up questions sprang to mind and I'd be remiss if I didn't share...

1. Christians often say entrants to heaven will regain lost body parts and mental faculties, restoring them to their prime. But what about people who were mentally challenged from the outset? Do they go to heaven and spend eternity retarded? Talk about a gift with strings attached. "Hey Billy! Good news, you're going to spend forever with God in heaven!" "Apples!"

2. Continuing in the same vein, what about miscarried and aborted fetuses? How would you like to spend eternity as a faulty blastocyst? Bummer. Also, assuming the mother survived the ordeal, where does a heavenly zygote reside? In a new mom or just in a box somewhere? The same problem crops up when the baby jets off to the great blue happyland but Mom goes to hell. The paperwork must be a nightmare.

3. Giving Christians the benefit of the doubt, let's say amputees and the elderly arrive in heaven all patched up. What about those people whose disabilities played a key role in their personalities and development? Will Stephen Hawking walk and talk?

4. How about all the disabled kids who persevere and credit their ailment with revitalizing their lives (e.g., "It was the best thing that could ever happen to me")? I'm not saying most of these folks would prefer to stay disabled, but doesn't it kinda diminish their achievements if, upon entry to heaven, Jesus just zaps them back to health? It would be a bit like Dorothy's situation when she's informed that she had the ability to go home all along. Why not save them the trouble of being handicapped in the first place? In addition, magically reordering someone's chromosomes and thus wiping out his Down's syndrome would fundamentally alter his status as an individual. If someone receives a brand new body and a fresh personality, they're hardly the same person (with the possible exception of Cher).

5. If the above hypothesis is wrong, wouldn't it be kinda weird to see retarded people in heaven? Is there a short bus making the rounds in heavenly Jerusalem? To the "special heaven" maybe?

6. This one is courtesy of Altoid_Junkie over at 1up.com: what if you become retarded later in life? Like what if you're a total jerkoff who tortures animals, but you get hit by a bus one day, the mean part of your brain gets damaged and you become all nice again? Do you spend eternity retarded? If retards do become smart in heaven, would you return to your asshole self?

7. Finally, what if you're in a wheelchair and the entrance to heaven looks like this:

A good topic for your next Bible study

Do retarded people go to heaven?

It's one of those fun left-field questions you can blurt out in a religious setting and just watch the ripples of consternation fan out into the room.

You see, religious folks, by their nature, don't cotton to exceptions; they're much more interested in the rule. Avoiding the gray area at all costs generally serves them well, but sometimes reality butts in and little Johnny asks Mommy an unwelcome question right before bedtime... and you get great awkward moments, like this query from GotQuestions.org.

Question: "Do mentally ill people go to heaven? Does God show mercy to those who are mentally retarded, challenged, disabled, or handicapped?"

*pops popcorn*

Answer: The Bible does not specifically say whether or not mentally ill people go to heaven. However, there is some biblical evidence that anyone who is not able to make a decision for salvation is covered by Christ’s death.

They're covered? What is this, an insurance plan? They're "covered."

Jesus H.M.O. Christ.

This is similar to how it is commonly believed that children are automatically taken to heaven when they die until they reach the point in which they are able to make a decision for or against Christ.

I've heard this line before and it always rubbed me the wrong way.

On one hand, we have the majority of the world's population, doomed by their longevity to a life absolutely brimming with poorly-supported conflicting ideologies, and on the other we have children who, having died early, mature in some celestial waiting room with evidence for the truth of the Christian faith plastered all around them. What kid, having grown up in this numinous spiritual holding room, is going to deny the existence of God? That would truly be, for lack of a better word, retarded.

But I digress.

We can postulate from this that mentally retarded people are covered by this principle as well. The Word of God does not specifically say this, however.

Translation: Uhhh, we might construe certain passages of scripture to mean-- hey, look over there!

What kind of an answer is that? "There isn't word one about the subject in our magic book, but ya know, we can pretty much eyeball this bitch"? Gee, thanks, Mr. Wizard.

Knowing the love, grace, and mercy of God, this would seem consistent with His character.

Would that be the same love, grace, and mercy that tacitly approved of the genetic errors during fetal development that allowed the mentally handicapped child to be born in the first place?

Any person who is mentally challenged to the extent that he could not be aware of his sinful state and believe in Christ for salvation, is in the same category as a child and it is not unreasonable to assume that person is saved by the grace and mercy of the same God who saves babies and small children.

But not animals. That would be unreasonable. Even though chimpanzees can beat Japanese university students in photographic memory tests. No celestial waiting room for Koko.

The question of whether the mentally handicapped go to heaven, and the laughably threadbare responses from Christians, illustrates just how bankrupt and fragile their system of belief really is.

Of the key attributes of a successful scientific theory, the ability to account for large amounts of data in an economic fashion ranks near the top. Evolution does this in spades - taking the relatively simple notion of descent with modification and turning out a workable explanation of the fantastic variety of species we see on this planet.

Religion not only fails to answer its own set of questions; it generates more by first making broad pronouncements about the nature of life and salvation, only later to stumble upon particularly problematic scenarios and hypotheticals the founders never thought to address, which, in turn, require the creation of ad hoc explanations that simply start the cycle over again.

Do retarded people go to heaven? I sure hope so. They deserve a chance to confront God and ask him point blank why he thought Trisomy 21 was such a hot idea.

Thou shalt not steal (unless it's an atheist bumper sticker)

And so my little vehicular experiment draws to a close.

You see, a couple months back I took my life into my hands by placing a somewhat provocative anti-religion bumper sticker on my car exhorting those following me to kindly close their Bibles and use their brains. The inevitable stickerjacking occurred at roughly 6:40 PM today in a Meijer parking lot. I went in to grab a few things, emerged, and voila, my pithy little punchline had vanished - raptured no doubt to a better car in the sky.

This is the thing that amazes me. I donate to secular causes, use every option available to vote theocrats out of office, and I run a blog where I regularly pound religious apologists like a gorilla fucking a cockatoo, yet it would never in a million years occur to me to peel an offensive bumper sticker off someone else's car.

Here's where I think the difference lies.

As a secular-minded liberal, I'll admit to flipping the channel away from Fox News or racing for the "off" button whenever I hear the name Glenn Beck. We're all guilty of this. Everyone prefers the comforts of like-minded company. But religious fundamentalists go one step further - they can't even stand the sight of something with which they disagree. To entertain an alternative opinion, even if only for the sake of argument, is, for them, to be somehow contaminated by it.

Anyway, to my bumper sticker thief, I say, thanks for opening my eyes to the truth of Jesus Christ. Well played, sir. Only now do I see the error of my ways. Obviously I was being way too easy on you assjackets.

What the hell is a "practicing atheist"?

In a recent post, Lexington blogger Reverend Mark Randle of Tates Creek Presbyterian Church muses on the most effective ways to respond to the "profound" questions posed by skeptics. And what does he settle on?

Why, not really responding at all, of course.

One of the saddest, yet most profound questions I have ever heard was: “what was the big deal about Jesus anyway?” This question came to me one afternoon by a friend who is a practicing atheist (or at least a theistic existentialist).

This reminds me of a great joke I heard recently at the United Atheist Church of Latter Day Nonbelievers downtown. Here goes. What's the difference between an atheist and a practicing atheist? The atheist drives a stick shift and the practicing atheist DOESN'T FUCKING EXIST.

His purpose in framing the question was obvious – the death of a teacher 2000 years surely has no impact on my life today. I understand my friend’s dilemma. On one hand, he is not interested in anything about church, Bible, God, sin, man, Jesus, etc. On the other hand, he is frustrated by the fact so many people (even people he tends to like and agree with on political, social, ethical and other issues) hold very strict convictions on these issues.

Yeah, that does ruffle my feathers on occasion.

How does one give an answer to this question which will be both compelling and accurate?

Congratulations, Mark, you hit the 64,000 dollar question.

The compelling part is easy. Just whip up an imaginary everlasting blast furnace below the earth's crust and tell Mr Atheist the religion he's "practicing" augurs for a one-way ticket. Wink, wink, nudge, nudge. As for accuracy, well that poses a bit of a challenge, doesn't it? Especially since things that are accurate are often not terribly compelling.

Just stick with the hell thing.

I am not a very good apologist (defender of one’s faith). I enjoy reading those who are, and am persuaded by the works of several good ones. I am also convinced most people do not come to faith in Jesus Christ, which is a chief ambition of mine and I suspect most folks in this blog, by losing an argument to an arrogant Christian who knows a lot of facts.

Indeed. Facts only serve to muddy up the proceedings. I'd also stay away from formal logic and carbon dating.

What then is a good approach to speak to people who have significant questions about faith?

A free cookie never hurts.

Again, not being the expert, I am excited about a new ministry our church is implementing. Focus on the Family put together a very interesting video series several years ago entitled: “The Truth Project.” It is a very well made film which shows 12 interactive lectures focusing on the question: what is truth?

There. *wipes hands* We've finished with the truth. It's all decided and stuff.

Man, that's a load off, huh?

Enough, guys

If you've perused the philosophy section in any bookstore lately, you've probably noticed a series of books titled ________ and Philosophy. The subjects range from Radiohead to The Simpsons to The Daily Show. All well and good, I suppose. But the latest addition kinda chaps my amateur philosopher ass.

What's next, Truck Nutz™ and Philosophy?



Xine recommends:

From blogpics

Reverend Pat serves up another piping hot plate of dumbass

Ladies and gentlemen, Pat Robertson, transgender historian.

Forgive me, Pat, as I'm sure you've studied transgender issues in depth, but your analysis begs the question: If changing genders is, as you implied in your comments, a rare, embarrassing, and awkward decision, why in the world would anyone willingly undergo the procedure?

Well, there are a number of reasons. One is fairly obvious. Perhaps you're familiar with a condition known as "ambiguous genitalia." If not, here's a quick primer from the National Institutes of Health.

Normally, an infant inherits one pair of sex chromosomes -- one X from the mother and one X or one Y from the father. The male and female reproductive organs and genitals both arise from the same tissue in the fetus.

If the process that causes this fetal tissue to become "male" or "female" is disrupted, ambiguous genitalia can develop. This genitalia makes it difficult to classify the infant as male or female.

According to Patient UK, genital anomalies occur in an estimated 1 out of every 4500 births. When the results are severe enough, doctors must make do and "assign" the child a gender. Not surprisingly, they occasionally botch this little coin toss and the kid grows up haunted by conflicting impulses (much like the mindbattle that rages between my attraction to Lindsay Lohan and my horror at what monsters most assuredly lurk in her vagina).

In this case, maybe a more appropriate question for Pat would be: Why does God allow children to be born this way? Or deformed at all for that matter?

This Yahweh character must have a pretty sick sense of humor. "It's a boy!... It's a girl!... It's... umm... come here and take a gander at this... does that look like a penis to you?"

What with all the abuse, war, sex trafficking, and starvation a child potentially faces in this world (merely for the crime of being born), handing out a gender seems like the least this omnibenevolent deity could do.

Martin Luther was an asshole

In the great pantheon of asshole theologians, Germany's Martin Luther surely ranks in the top tier of dickishness. The point man for the Protestant Reformation, Luther famously nailed his 95 Theses to the door of Castle Church in Witterberg, launching a revolution that gave birth to all the bitchy little denominations that make up our grand American religious landscape. Thanks a million, Marty.

So let's survey the philosophical damage. Bear in mind this is the guy behind all of Protestantism.

To kick off the festivities, check out this colorful nugget from Luther's back catalogue.

But since the devil's bride, Reason, that pretty whore, comes in and thinks she's wise, and what she says, what she thinks, is from the Holy Spirit, who can help us, then? Not judges, not doctors, no king or emperor, because [reason] is the Devil's greatest whore.

Having engaged in reasonable intercourse many times, this is certainly disturbing news. Better get myself tested. In fact, if you attended public school you might want to do the same.

I am afraid that the schools will prove the very gates of hell, unless they diligently labor in explaining the Holy Scriptures and engraving them in the heart of the youth.

This is a rare example of a Luther prophecy that actually came true, albeit only for middle school boys' locker rooms.

Moving along, here's a line that could inform the national debate on marriage.

I cannot forbid a person to marry several wives, for it does not contradict Scripture.

Oww, not sure that's gonna play in Peoria. Mormons should dig it though. Score one for Mitt Romney's clan of anti-historical, fraud-worshipping magical BVD salesmen.

How about childbirth? Any tender words for the mothers out there?

Even though they grow weary and wear themselves out with child-bearing, it does not matter; let them go on bearing children till they die, that is what they are there for.

The word and works of God is quite clear, that women were made either to be wives or prostitutes.

Just fantastic. Guy is a regular forerunner to Dr. Spock, eh?

Sticking with his pronouncements on the fairer sex...

...women and girls begin to bare themselves behind and in front, and there is nobody to punish and hold in check, and besides, God’s word is mocked.

I'm gonna have to go ahead and disagree with Martin on this one. If God created the female form, why not put both its frontal and rearward glory on display for all to behold? Kate Beckinsale specifically.

In addition to his coin slot allergy, Luther wasn't exactly smitten with the Jews.

In sum, they are the devil's children, damned to Hell.

Their synagogues ... should be set on fire.

Their homes should be broken down and destroyed.

Their rabbis must be forbidden under threat of death to teach any more.

Well played, Heir Asshole.

If you'd like a more detailed account of Luther's anti-Semitism, I recommend a little bathroom reader he penned called On the Jews and Their Lies (only $5.95 on Amazon). Makes a great stocking stuffer for the aspiring Holocaust Museum shooter in the family.

Predictably, Marty wasn't terribly keen on doctors either.

Idiots, the lame, the blind, the dumb, are men in whom the devils have established themselves: and all the physicians who heal these infirmities, as though they proceeded from natural causes, are ignorant blockheads.

Luther added, "That said, my prostate feels like a fucking football..."

It probably won't surprise you to learn that Marty wasn't exactly a celebrated prophet of science either. In one of his famed "table talks," he had this to say about his contemporary Copernicus.

People gave ear to an upstart astrologer who strove to show that the earth revolves, not the heavens or the firmament, the sun and the moon....This fool wishes to reverse the entire science of astronomy; but sacred scripture tells us that Joshua commanded the sun to stand still, and not the earth.

Bravo, sir. Truly, the wisdom of the church enriches the soul. By the way, in addition to scientists, you might also want to steer clear of Curious George.

Snakes and monkeys are subjected to the demon more than other animals. Satan lives in them and possesses them. He uses them to deceive men and to injure them.

On the subject of governments and democracy, Luther deftly transferred his dickishness into a model for today's conservatism.

An earthly kingdom cannot exist without inequality of persons.

As to the common people, ... one has to be hard with them and see that they do their work and that under the threat of the sword and the law they comply with the observance of piety, just as you chain up wild beasts.

Yes we can't! Yes we can't! God, this guy was such an asshole.

A few interesting biographical notes are worth mentioning as well.

Martin Luther reportedly credited his decision to become a monk to a thunderstorm. Evidently lightning struck close by the young Luther and, being a rather well-known chickenshit, he screamed, "Help! Saint Anna! I will become a monk!" Just think, if it had happened today, Luther might have joined the Church of Holy Fucking Shit, Did You See That?!

On the topic of shit, I've saved the best for last. Here's a section from Jim Dawson's seminal work Who Cut the Cheese?

Martin Luther claimed to have been first visited by the Holy Spirit while he was taking a shit. During his many table talks, as his rambling speeches were being transcribed by monks, he waxed scatalogical as he scolded sinners, railed against his adversaries (he referred to Governor Ferneze of Malta as Furzesel - the German word for "fart-ass"), and recounted his encounters with Satan. "The only portion of the human anatomy which the pope has had to leave uncontrolled is the hind end," Luther said, implying that the Devil had seized this nether region for his own.

According to Luther, the Devil expressed his scorn for mankind by baring his bunghole and shitting or farting. ... Luther also made wood-cut sketches of small demons being forcefully expelled from the Devil's asshole like fart-blasted dingleberries.

Soooo..... yeah.

Oh, almost forgot. He also thought the pope was the Antichrist. This was the closest thing to a reasonable opinion he ever held.

In summary, Martin Luther was an anti-heliocentrist, primate-cursing, holy-fart-blowing, reason-denying, anti-Semitic, woman-hating, polygamy-supporting, Luddite asshole.

More mouth farts from Pastor John Hagee

Whenever I grow complacent about the army of ignorance that actually exists in this country, I flip on a little Hagee magic and suddenly everything becomes clear again.

In this installment, the bovine minister hacks up yet another hateful carcass of homophobia and unreason. Listen closely at the end as Hagee launches into a binary fit and begins separating the holy wheat from the satanic chaff.

(Bonus: The joke up front about the whiteness of his audience.)

Then Pastor Hagee belched up a half-digested but still living manatee, who squirmed around onstage for a few minutes before Hagee unhinged his jaw and stuffed it back inside like a sanitation worker cramming a gray mattress into a trash compactor.

But anywho... the goats and sheep thing. I realize this is a reference to scripture, but why those two things? What did goats ever do to earn the shitty spot in this simile?

Here's the verse.

Matthew 25:31-33

When the Son of Man comes in his glory and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his throne of glory; and all the nations will be gathered before him and he will separate them from one another, just as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, and he will put the sheep on his right hand and the goats on his left.

One area Nigerian Dwarf goat was overhead to say, "Oh I see how it is. Just because I don't have a nice coat of wool, you throw me under the bus, is that it? Well, fuck you too, pal."

I loled

Via Pharyngula:

Ick-thus

Ichthus - Kentucky's annual rain dance and mud appreciation convention - is underway in Wilmore. The Christian music event, billed as "America's oldest and longest-running" festival, boasts more than 111 bands this year, three of them vaguely tolerable under the right medicinal conditions.

One act that arrives like fucking clockwork every year is the infamous monsoon-style rain. Amusing, sure, but one wonders why the ever-attentive Christian audience never reads any divine significance into the consistently shitty weather, as they are wont to do. You'd think the same crowd that whips out the imprecatory prayers whenever pro-choice groups convene or Disney World plans another "Gay Day" might detect some godly disapproval in the 90 mph wind shear.

Ah, sex worship, drugs umbrellas, and rock'n'roll clean lyrics. Come for the imitation rock. Stay for the non-topless women.

Thomas Aquinas was an asshole

Hello and welcome to a new segment on the Sanity Project. Occasionally, when I run across a particular theologian, saint, whatever, I'm struck by a sudden flash of insight (some might call it a revelation), which usually takes the form of "Heyyyyyyy, hold up. [Insert thinker here] was a fuckin' asshole!"

I chose to begin with one of the most venerated assholes in all Christian history: St. Thomas Aquinas.

Thomas Aquinas lived in the 13th century, a time of enlightenment and widespread social progress. Just kidding, people were wallowing in their own feces to please the invisible ghost dad in the sky. No surprise there. Aquinas, a Roman Catholic priest, didn't help matters much either, though he remains a model for those wishing to enter the priesthood. Let's explore some of this medieval asshole's brilliant thoughts, shall we?

On women, Aquinas wrote:

As regards the individual nature, woman is defective and misbegotten, for the active power of the male seed tends to the production of a perfect likeness in the masculine sex; while the production of a woman comes from defect in the active power.

Tough to get laid with that pick-up line, huh Tommy? No wonder this asshole became a priest.

So how do nonbelievers fare in Aquinas' ideal society?

If forgers and malefactors are put to death by the secular power, there is much more reason for excommunicating and even putting to death one convicted of heresy.

Sounds perfectly reasonable. Putting heretics to death disposes of any need for costly inquisitions and torture regimes. Let God sort 'em out, am I right Aquiman?

Moving on to the Jews.

Since the Jews are the slaves of the Church, she can dispose of their possessions.

Damn, this guy's wisdom ages like a fine wine. Drink it in, folks. Wait, here comes another gem.

That the saints may enjoy their beatitude and the grace of God more abundantly they are permitted to see the punishment of the damned in hell.

It just wouldn't be heaven without a healthy dose of schadenfreude. Jaysus! If assigned to dredge up a more cruel, inhumane quote from the annals of philosophy, I'm not sure I could.

Surely this saintly sage offered some great scientific insight into the cosmos.

If... the motion of the earth were circular, it would be violent and contrary to nature, and could not be eternal, since ... nothing violent is eternal .... It follows, therefore, that the earth is not moved with a circular motion.

It follows, therefore, that Aquinas was a cluelass asshole with all the reason and intuition of a wet merkin.

But let's not jump to conclusions. Perhaps this decorated church father entreated us to regard animals with respect commensurate with their status as conscious beings, like the Jain philosopher Mahavira did a few thousand years before.

...according to the Divine ordinance the life of animals and plants is preserved not for themselves but for man. Hence, as Augustine says 'by a most just ordinance of the Creator, both their life and their death are subject to our use.'"

Nope, still working the asshole angle.

Come on, give me one nugget of truth, man. Something.

We can't have full knowledge all at once. We must start by believing; then afterwards we may be led on to master the evidence for ourselves.

No, no, no, no, no. Knowledge begins with doubt, with testing, with experimentation - not faith. If facts required faith, they wouldn't be facts.

In summary, Thomas Aquinas was a misogynistic, anti-Semitic, heretic-hating, vengeful, speciesist, geocentric-theory-advancing asshole.

Vituperative Ball Sack

Hey kiddies, enjoying your summer vacation?!

Well, get ready for the annual summer indoctrinationfest known as Vacation Bible School (or VBS to all the cool kids). Because if there are two things the youngins love, it's intense studies of Iron Age goatherder prophecy and more "school." Christ, why don't they just call it Vacation Dentist Injection?

This year's VBS themes in Lexington seem to focus on environmental activities.

Via the Herald-Leader:

Popular themes this year include the bayou-centered "Crocodile Dock," which takes kids on a fictional trip through the swamp; "Boomerang Express," which uses the vastness of the Australian Outback to explain God's love; and "SonRock Kids Camp," which focuses on outdoor adventures.

Touring the swamps for Jesus. Awesome! Creedence Christwater Revival. And outdoor adventures are always fun, but I wonder about "Boomerang Express." Is the Australian Outback really an ideal showcase of Yahweh's benevolence? A desolate, unforgiving, godforsaken land populated with baby-eating dingos and that psychotic dude from Wolf Creek.

"See children, God's love is like several thousand square kilometers of punishing terrain full of scorpions, thorny devils, and sweltering 120 degree death. Hallelujah!"

Come to think of it, maybe it is apropos.