Nobody is sure exactly how or why the Prince Philip cult movement began, though there are various theories. One idea is that villagers may have seen his picture along with the Queen’s on the walls of British colonial outposts when Vanuatu was still known as New Hebrides, a colony administered jointly by Britain and France. …
Continue reading ‘Part 2. Prince Philip: God to the Vanuatu tribes! How and why?’ »
The Vanuatu tribes are mourning the death of their ‘god’: the late Prince Philip (of all people). For years two villages on the Vanuatuan island of Tanna (in the Pacific) have revered the Duke as a god-like spiritual figure. “The connection between the people on the island of Tanna and the English people is very …
Continue reading ‘Prince Philip: God to the Vanuatu tribes! Part1’ »
“The only mystery in life is why the kamikaze pilots wore crash helmets.” – Al McGuire My comment: I was brought up to believe that they were not crash helmets, but head-dresses you wore in deference to the Emperor. Death was clearly nothing to these poor, wretched pilots. Just shows the danger of cults and …
An 8-year-old Oklahoma girl has been expelled from school for telling another girl she had a crush on her. Delanie Shelton says officials at the Rejoice Christian Schools told her daughter Chloe that just expressing same-sex attraction was a violation of the Bible. Shelton said Chloe had been “ripped away” from teachers and friends, …
Remember how, at the beginning of the pandemic, everyone used to chirp “we’re all in this together!”? You don’t hear much of that any more because it’s embarrassingly obvious we’re not. Watching wealthy people, who have the means to shield from the virus, being vaccinated before many essential workers is infuriating. Even worse is the …
More than 100 prominent evangelical Christian pastors and church leaders have condemned the “perversion” of Christian nationalism and its role in the insurrection at the Capitol on 6 January. In an open letter, the leaders said they were speaking out because they did not want to be “quiet accomplices in this ongoing sin”, and called …
Studies have shown that attending church frequently does not make white christians less racist. In fact, the data suggests that the opposite is true. The connection between holding more racist views and white christian identity is actually stronger among white evangelicals who attend church frequently than it is among those who attend less frequently. My …
It is well documented that less religious nations tend to be more prosperous. This is most true of the advanced democracies, but also usually holds elsewhere – see how officially atheistic China outperforms more pious India. The trend tends to hold up within countries too: the most irreligious US states are better off than the …
Prior to the election in swing states where lots of evangelicals vote, $140,000 worth of billboards contrasted biblical quotes with those of President Donald Trump. One had an image of Jesus on the left with the phrase, “Turn the other cheek,” while on the right was a photo of Trump saying, “I’d like to punch …
Conservation easements grant write-offs to multiple partners, each buying a share in a tract of land. This is a way the very rich avoid paying their fair share of tax, saving $2 in taxes for every $1 paid for the tax shelter, according to a Senate report. It costs about $10.6 billion of tax revenue …
Continue reading ‘Easements as tax breaks for the wealthy’ »
Four years ago, according to the Pew Research Center, 52% of Catholics voted for Trump, compared with 44% for Hillary Clinton. And with Biden himself being Catholic, you might expect a change in proportion of Catholic voting. But now this Catholic vote has got a whole lot more interesting. Recently, Pope Francis travelled to Assisi …
The Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (Cares) Act, the 2 trillion dollar bill passed last March, granted forgivable loans to “qualifying businesses and non- profits”. The Small Business Administration, which administered part of the Act, declared (but tried to keep it secret) that houses of worship and religious private schools qualified under the Act, …
In 2012 Amy Coney Barrett told a class at the University of Notre Dame that a “legal career is but a means to an end……and that end is building the Kingdom of God.” As one Senator said of Barrett in 2017, she has “a long history of believing that religious beliefs should prevail.” Does she …
The Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (Cares) Act, the 2 trillion dollar bill passed last March, granted forgivable loans to “qualifying businesses and non- profits”. The Small Business Administration, which administered part of the Act, declared ( but tried to keep it quiet) that houses of worship and religious private schools qualified under the …
Late last week Tahir Naseem, an American citizen, was murdered while standing trial for blasphemy in a Pakistani court. Naseem was a former member of the persecuted Ahmadi minority, and was lured to Pakistan in 2018 to be detained on charges of blasphemy. Coupled with the continued detention of Nigerian humanist Mubarak Bala since April …
Continue reading ‘“Blasphemy, a way to control the people, and their thought’ »
