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A Catholic church in San Francisco was defaced with spray-painted graffiti depictions of swastikas overnight, police said Sunday. A Most Holy Redeemer Church employee reported the incident at about 6:30 a.m. at 100 Diamond St., Lt. Neville Gittens said. The employee told police that when he left the night before, the church had not been defaced, Gittens said. Police are investigating the vandalism as a hate crime.

A well-known California atheist says he and 17 others, plus atheist and humanist organizations, will file suit Tuesday in D.C.'s District Court to strip all references to God and religion from President-elect Barack Obama's January inauguration ceremony. Michael Newdow, of Sacramento, Calif., says he wants to remove the phrase "so help me God" from the oath of office, plus axe the invocation prayer from Pastor Rick Warren, already under fire from the left for his opposition to gay marriage. According to Newdow, any reference to God or religion violates the Constitution. "Equality is important to me," Newdow told The Examiner....

Someone tell me again about how the Religion of Peace is tolerant of other religions. Christians who went to observe their Christmas at Nazareth, the birthplace of Jesus, were greeting with a giant banner announcing that Allah has no son right in front of the Basilica of the Annunciation in Nazareth. Just wait to see what will happen if the gain control of all of the west bank holy sites. Read the full story below:

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The U.N. General Assembly split over the issue of gay rights on Thursday after a European-drafted statement calling for decriminalization of homosexuality prompted an Arab-backed one opposing it. Diplomats said a joint statement initiated by France and the Netherlands gathered 66 signatures in the 192-nation assembly after it was read out by Argentina at a plenary session. A rival statement, read out by Syria, gathered some 60.

It is the discovery of three almost invisible drawings on the back of Leonardo da Vinci's Virgin and Child With Saint Anne in the Louvre museum in Paris that has the French art world screaming "Sacre bleu!" Reminiscent of Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code, the mysterious sketches were found by experts looking into restoring the sixteenth-century masterpiece. They were detected when a curator noticed that some of the gray marks behind Virgin and Child With Saint Anne resembled a horse's head. An infrared photo confirmed his suspicion and revealed two other sketches: a human skull and the infant Jesus with...

Question: I recently was in a situation at work where a coworker made transphobic statements about a customer (out of earshot, thank God). He said things like, "That person isn't really a woman," and went on to mention how proud he was of himself for being able to "tell." What are the best ways to react to such comments? I'm a queer white woman who's out, and I wanted to engage my coworker in conversation as a peer so that our work relationship can continue to be positive, and so that we can have the kind of dialogue that eventually...

Just saw on Greta's show--a clip of Letterman getting big laughs out of Sarah Palin's church being torched by "Joe the Arsonist". I'm posting this in chat, I have already searched youtube for it and nothing yet, have also visited Gretawire.com and not seen it posted. If anyone sees it, please ping.

Because "public life" now entails virtually every part of our lives, erasing references to God entirely from public life means virtually eliminating them from America. Imagine, if you will, a gala birthday party given in your honor. The guests will sing, dance, give presents, eat, drink, and have the merriest of times. The hitch: your name will not be mentioned, the gifts will not be for you, the celebrants won't be thinking about you, and everyone would sort of prefer that you not come. That's all that will be left of Christmas if various groups have their way. All across...

Leading social conservatives blasted Newsweek for its current cover story, "The Religious Case for Gay Marriage," which they said misinterprets both biblical scripture and their own political movement. “It doesn’t surprise me. Newsweek has been so far in the tank on the homosexual issue, for so long, they need scuba gear and breathing apparatus,” said Richard Land, who heads the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission. “I don’t think it’s going to change the minds of anyone who takes biblical teachings seriously.” Tony Perkins, president of the socially conservative Family Research Council, agreed, calling Newsweek’s cover story “yet...

OLYMPIA, Wash. - A controversial anti-religion placard was reported missing from the state Capitol Friday - then later found - and now the sign's sponsor wants the State Patrol to provide special protection for it when it is returned. The uproar came as several other groups clamored for permission to post their own holiday displays at the state Capitol. The anti-religion sign, posted by the Freedom From Religion Foundation in Madison, Wis., was reported missing Friday morning then was turned over to a Seattle radio station by an unidentified man at about 10 a.m. Annie Laurie Gaylor, a spokesman for...

December 05, 2008, 1:40 p.m. Enough with the Oogedy-BoogedyReligion, politics, and us. By Shannen W. Coffin Kathleen Parker’s war on religion in the Re-public-an square entered a new phase today. In her syndicated column, she nobly attempted to explain her use of the term “oogedy-boogedy� to describe religious conservatives. It’s not that she is “anti-God.� It’s just that God really shouldn’t be mentioned in polite company. Religion can inform our values (gee, thanks). But reason, not religion, should inform our public debates. I hadn’t realized religion and reason were mutually exclusive. It seems Pope Benedict hasn’t gotten the memo,...

Here is a sample of how diversity is being celebrated this December: · Elementary school students in Plainfield, Illinois are decorating a “Holiday” tree that represents 18 countries. · A “Holiday Revelry” will be performed at the Framingham Civic League in Massachusetts; it is a “multicultural” event that includes “PAC Sword Dancers” and “traditional” Christmas songs such as “Pat-A-Pan.” · “Winter Traditions” will be celebrated at the Fort Collins Museum in Colorado. They include “Celebrations of Light” that highlight “traditions, cultures and celebrations from across the world.” · At a high school in Ocean City, Maryland, the annual “Winter Concert”...

A filmmaker who recently released an independent project about a formula that turns all heterosexuals into "gays" now has announced he's working on "The Princess Diana Bible" in which "God" ordains homosexuality as the better lifestyle. "There are many different versions of the Bible; I don't see why we can't have one," stated Max Mitchell in a statement on a website for his new project. The "gay Bible," produced by the New Mexico-based Revision Studios, states God instructs "it is better to be gay than straight." Mitchell said he developed the idea for the "Bible" from his new movie project,...

OLYMPIA, Wash. -- An atheist group has unveiled an anti-religion placard in the state Capitol, joining a Christian Nativity scene and "holiday tree" on display during December. The atheists' sign was installed Monday by Washington members of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, a national group based in Madison, Wis. With a nod to the winter solstice - the year's shortest day, occurring in late December - the placard reads, in part, "There is only our natural world. Religion is but myth and superstition that hardens hearts and enslaves minds."

But we are Semites ourselves!" That is what an urbane Egyptian journalist will likely reply to the charge that the Egyptian media is rife with anti-Semitism. But there are few places where Jews are blamed for so many of the world's ills, from carcinogenic pesticides to the war in Iraq. More distressing is that much of the pointing is being done by Egypt's self-described liberals -- the pro-democratic and anti-Islamist crowd on which the country's hopes for a more tolerant future supposedly rest. The most recent episode began on Oct. 2, when the Anti-Defamation League issued a press release reporting...

It’s a national turning point. A figurative call to arms for the queer community. The cross-country response to the passage of California’s Proposition 8 and other anti-gay ballot initiatives is among the greatest and loudest rallying cries for equality ever heard from the LGBT community. Journalist Rex Wockner is calling it “Stonewall 2.0” Others are talking about a new wave of inspiration and the death of a “passive era” of LGBT lobbying and advocacy. Writer Andrew Sullivan says groups like the Human Rights Campaign are becoming increasingly irrelevant in the face of the need to adapt to new realities and...

The right-wing just won't let go of their "Barack Obama is not a U.S. citizen" bit of nonsense. Today the Christiantist site World Net Daily is asking their readers to FedEx letters to the Supreme Court demanding they hold a hearing on the subject. They also want letters sent to Republican members of Congress saying, "Please hold congressional hearings to investigate whether Barack Obama meets the basic constitutional requirements for the highest office of the land." They are also demanding that the members of the Electoral College prove Obama's citizenship before their December 15th vote that will officially make him...

MUSLIM prisoners have launched a reign of terror inside a top security British jail. The fanatics are forcing fellow inmates to convert to Islam or face punishment beatings. One man who stood up to the thugs was branded with a lump of hot metal, according to a prison source.

Rancho Cucamonga, CA (AP) -- Atheists and agnostics now have a San Bernardino County billboard embracing Godlessness. The "Imagine No Religion" billboard in Rancho Cucamonga was put up by the Freedom From Religion Foundation, which advocates separation of church and state. The 12,000-member Madison, Wis.-based group now has billboards in nine states that include such messages as "Reasons Greetings" and "Beware of Dogma."

If a Martian had attended last week's UN conference on religious tolerance hosted by Saudi Arabia, one of the world's most oppressive states, he would have been a very puzzled alien. On the one hand, he would have seen Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah promoting tolerance. On the other, if our visiting Martian had taken the time to land his space ship in Saudi Arabia, he would have experienced something quite different. Let's say that after settling into his hotel in Riyadh, Marvin went to the nearest public park wearing his best religious regalia, set up his portable shrine, prayed and...

Beirut does not feel like a conservative place. The girls wear shorts up to here and hair down to there. Cocktails are consumed by the gallon, and there is a rumbustious, if incestuous, arts scene. But this week, the limits of Lebanon's liberal attitude to art were tested by images of Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of the militant Shia group Hezbollah, and a smiling Barbie doll. Some photographs, featuring Barbie dolls and a garish Middle Eastern mishmash of political and religious iconography, were removed from a high-profile exhibition of work by the Lebanese artist Jocelyne Saab by the gallery over...

The national advocacy group In God We Trust today blasted the atheist American Humanist Association for its ad campaign mocking the Christmas holiday and American's who believe in God. The ad campaign asks, "Why believe in a god? Just be good for goodness sake," and will be targeted at New York and Washington commuters. "These ads are a deliberate attack on American traditions, beliefs and customs by a United Nation's affiliated group that espouses a radical anti-American agenda and is funded by an zealot who believes that the U.S. is a backwards nation full of imbeciles," says In God We...

70% of black church going californians who voted this cycle voted for prop 8. As they overwhelmingly supported America's first chance to elect a person of color and strike a death blow to racism, they also went out of their way to misuse their votes (no doubt at the behest of their immoral and hateful pastors and clergy) to isolate and punish a small minority of citizens, and to deny them basic civil rights...

A reader writes: I love to see you grapple with trying to explain this woman and her thought processes. You are Tcs2 missing something obvious though. She believes in the literal truth of the Bible. She believes it informs on matters of science, biology, evolution, physics, cosmology, etc. So if there are multiple creation versions in the Bible what do you do, make up your own reality. If there are contradictions in it, ignore them. Just like you ignore inconvenient facts about day-to-day life. If you BELIEVE the bible is the literal inerrant word of God what do you do?...

As the mighty tide swept the land on Tuesday night, I was transfixed. As the pundits pondered red states and blue states, projections and exit polls, I was swept with emotion. Not because America was "electing its first Black president." That comes a little late in the day. It was because America was electing the right President. Our long national nightmare is ending. America will not soon again start a war based on lies and propaganda. We will not torture. We will restore the rights of freedom of speech, freedom of privacy, and habeas corpus. We will enter at last...

The prominent atheist is stepping down from his post at Oxford University to write a book aimed at youngsters in which he will warn them against believing in "anti-scientific" fairytales. Prof Hawkins said: "The book I write next year will be a children's book on how to think about the world, science thinking contrasted with mythical thinking. "I haven't read Harry Potter, I have read Pullman who is the other leading children's author that one might mention and I love his books. I don't know what to think about magic and fairy tales." Prof Dawkins said he wanted to look...

Thursday’s Chronicle ran “The Coolest Costumes” article, featuring of all things, “The Fundamentalist” outfit, complete with “dark eye make-up”.  (Guess the King James Bible for beating people over the head is sold separately?)  Move over Middle Eastern-Jihadi-Terrorist costumes, nothing says “scary” like a woman dressed as a schoolmarm with a beehive.

In a worrying sign of how much anti-Semitism is creeping back into mainstream American culture, students at a suburban St. Louis middle school last week held what they called “Hit a Jew Day.” At least 10 of the school’s 35 Jewish students were publicly struck by classmates. The racially motivated incident was a perversion of an unofficial “Hug a Friend Day” held earlier in the month. The students involved in the incident are expected to be suspended and forced to attend counseling. The Associated Press reported that Jewish leaders are concerned that the incident is indicative of a rebirth of...

SAN FRANCISCO - A girl in pigtails bounds into the kitchen after school and asks her mother to guess what she learned that day. "I learned how a prince married a prince, and I can marry a princess," she exclaims to her mortified mom. This television advertisement for a ballot initiative that would ban same-sex marriage in California urges voters to "protect children" by approving the measure. There's not a word about education in Proposition 8, but what public schools will be required to teach about same-sex marriage has emerged as the central issue in the campaign. The measure's supporters...

London buses may soon be plastered with ads proclaiming “There’s probably no God,” if a British atheist group has its way. The slogan is the brainchild of the British Humanist Association (BHA), an atheist organization that seeks to promote a world without religion where people are “free to live good lives on the basis of reason, experience and shared human values.” Among the campaign’s supporters is well-known atheist activist Richard Dawkins, who promised to match BHA’s goal of raising $9,000 for the ads, according to BBC. But the group has now raised $59,000 on its own. “Religion is accustomed to...

'Silhouette City' Captures Essence of Christian Right as Supremacist Political Movement By Bruce Wilson It is the mark of a truly outstanding documentary that it can survive the test of a fast-changing political and religious landscape and remain relevant and even transcendent. There have been many superb documentaries in the last few years about religion and politics, but my own personal opinion is that Michael W. Wilson's Silhouette City stands above the pack, and for one overriding reason - Wilson's deep understanding of the dynamic in which the militant, militia-movement grounded Christian right of the 1980's has morphed into a...

When Atheists act like FundamentalistsOctober 7, 2008 On his blog, “Ssnot! - God Snot, Where God’s Not!�, Tatarize writes:  So I am apparently retarded. I watched something called the Shroud of Turin which was get this, about the Shroud of Turin and completely bogus nonsense.The argument went like this,The Shroud of Turin carbon dates to the 1360s. The Shroud of Turin was first seen around 1325. However, there were other fake shrouds which purported to be the burial cloths of Christ which dated back to the 11th century. So the Shroud of Turin dates back to the 11th century. There’s...

Republican vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin is once again coming under attack because of her Christian faith. A recent Los Angeles Times story claimed that as mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, Sarah Palin espoused young-earth creationism. The report prompted liberal Internet columnist Robert Paul Reyes to brand Palin a "religious fanatic" with a "Neanderthal faith" who "thinks that 'The Flinstones' is a reality show." Reyes suggests that during tonight's vice-presidential debate, Palin should be questioned about her reported belief that God created the earth 6,000 years ago and that dinosaurs and men coexisted. Mark Looy is co-founder of the creation apologetics ministry...

America is "dumb" because it remains the most religious country in the western world. This according to Bill Maher, who made such a statement on the September 30 edition of "The View." Appearing to promote his new documentary "Religulous," Maher continued his soapbox rants against organized religion. Elisabeth Hasselbeck set up Maher noting his comparison of President Bush to Osama Bin Laden, and noted that many presidents such as John F. Kennedy, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln, spoke publicly of a higher power. Maher likewise replied "of course, it’s, it’s a religious country, unlike every other civilized western democracy...

Bill Maher's Anti-Religion Movie “Religion is detrimental to the progress of society.” That’s my favorite quote from Bill Maher’s often brilliant, but often unfocused “documentary,” called “Religulous.” It opens in early October right after its debut at the Toronto Film Festival. The articulate, quick-witted comedian sets out in this film — which was supposed to have been released last Easter — to prove that line is true. Directed by Larry Charles, the man who put "Borat" together so skillfully, "Religulous" is blatant about Maher’s feelings: religion is bad. All religions are bad. They are ruining everything. If you go for...

A Rome priest is fighting for his life after being stabbed in the neck and stomach by a deranged man who had just watched the film The Da Vinci Code... Eyewitnesses said that Marco Luzi, 25, asked to see Father Canio Canistri, 68, parish priest at the church of Santa Marcella in the San Saba district on the Aventine Hill, and then attacked him with a knife hidden in a cloth. An elderly parishioner who came to the priest's aid is also in serious condition. A Peruvian childminder and a policeman were also injured as the assailant fled through a...

A GRIEVING family from Sheffield have been told they can't bury their stepfather on a Saturday - because he was not Muslim. Retired steel erector Harold "Charlie" Lemaire, from Woodseats, died last week aged 75 from pneumonia. His stepdaughter Jean Maltby, from Greenhill, wanted the funeral to be held this Saturday so family who live outside the city - including her brother Stephen, now living in Dorset, and relatives from the Isle of Man - could attend. But when her funeral director called City Road Cemetery to arrange a memorial service in the chapel followed by burial, he was told...

Half of all Americans believe they are protected by guardian angels, one-fifth say they've heard God speak to them, one-quarter say they have witnessed miraculous healings, 16 percent say they've received one and 8 percent say they pray in tongues, according to a survey released Thursday by Baylor University. The wide-ranging survey of 1,648 adults, who were asked 350 questions on their religious practices last fall, reveals a significant majority who are comfortable with the supernatural.

Lord Robert Winston has renewed his attack on atheist writers such as Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett and Christopher Hitchens, whose arguments he said were "dangerous", "irresponsible" and "very divisive". The science populariser and fertility expert said...

The DUmmies are suddenly microanalying the finer points of religion. No, they haven't suddenly decided to become theologians. Their whole purpose is to dig up dirt, any dirt, on Sarah Palin. So far all their dirt digging expeditions have yielded nothing. However, this time they think they have found dirt that they desperately hope will stick as you can see in this DUmmie THREAD titled, "CNN:Palin was Catholic UNTIL she got SAVED!" Yeah, they think because she "rejected" Catholicism while a child, that is somehow going to cost her the Catholic vote. So let us now watch the DUmmies...

Government employees and Communist members banned from fasting during Ramadan Officials in China's turbulent north-western region of Xinjiang are tightening restrictions on Muslim practices including mass prayers during Ramadan, according to government notices. Government employees and Communist party members are banned from fasting, wearing veils or growing beards, said circulars posted on several official websites. Other measures - which appear to vary area to area - include forcing restaurants to maintain their usual opening hours instead of shifting them in light of dawn-to-dusk fasting. Religious controls are usually stricter during Ramadan but experts say this year's are noticeably stronger and...

UPDATED: Three people are accused in connection with a vandalism spree at St. Paul the Apostle Catholic Church and School in Davenport that left dozens of broken windows, a damaged statue of the Virgin Mary and spray-painted vulgarities

An Italian museum has defied Pope Benedict by refusing to remove a statue of a crucified green frog clutching a beer mug and an egg. The Vatican had condemned the modern art sculpture as blasphemous. The board of the Museion museum in the northern city of Bolzano voted it was a work of art, however. The board decreed it would stay in place for the remainder of an exhibition. The wooden sculpture by the late German artist Martin Kippenberger depicts a frog about 1 metre 30 cm (4 feet) high nailed to brown cross and holding a beer mug in...

What 'culture war'? At the conventions, they'll try to stir up red-blue divisions. But most Americans hold un-partisan views. By Dick Meyer August 27, 2008 As the nation's attention reluctantly turns to the political parties' conventions, with their scripted suspense and stage-managed sentiment, it is important to keep in mind that these are phony representations of American political life. But the slick video profiles, the teary appearance of a beloved party elder -- these are not what is most phony about the conventions. This gathering of America's civic tribes -- and the reporters who love them -- in separate cities...

Have you ever had this happen: You are minding your own business, teaching your life science course, it's early in the term. A student, on the way out after class (never at the beginning of class, rarely during class) mentions something about "carbon dating." This usually happens around the time of year you are doing an overview of the main points of the course, but before you've gotten to the "evolution module"... The student is talking about C14 dating and how it "has problems." But you are a life science teacher and can't think of a single point in your...

DHP Review: Religulous Posted by Dirty Harry on Thursday, August 21st, 2008 While more entertaining and better paced, director Larry Charles‘ Religulous can’t help but remind of Morgan Spurlock’s dreadful Where In The World Is Osama bin Laden?, especially at the end where both films are undone by their attempts to close on serious points the preceding 90 minutes of antics simply can’t sustain. It’s surprising Charles let this one get away from him. After all, he also directed Borat, and one of the few saving graces of that humiliation-fest was that it never lost sight of the fact that...

This is the Apocalypse of St. Bill the Stoned. Though funny, smart and often profane, Religulous doesn't want to send you out of the theater with a smile on your lips. The final moments of the film aren't laugh out loud funny, but a parade of images of death and destruction. This, Bill Maher says, is what humanity is in for if it doesn't get rid of the nuerological disorder that is religion. You probably know my bias going into this film. I believe that religion is not just irrational but anti-rational, a Bronze Age worldview that should have been...

The Democratic National Convention's Aug. 24 interfaith service in Denver is supposed to be about unity. But to a Washington, D.C., coalition that supports nontheistic views, it's about division. The Secular Coalition Group, a lobbying organization for church-and-state separation, is pushing to get an atheist on the speaker list, and contends the service is divisive because it alienates nonreligious Democrats at a time when the party needs to unite to support the presumptive nominee, Sen. Barack Obama. "We can all hold different beliefs," said the group's executive director, Lori Lipman Brown, "but we can still come together as patriotic Americans."...

The Rev. Robert Jones went to the Capitol last Wednesday hoping to make his voice heard. What he got instead was a swear-word laden rebuke from Democratic Sen. Pat Wiggins, who interrupted Jones' testimony to say: "Excuse me, but I think your arguments are bull----." The exchange left Jones, the senior pastor at Oak Park United Methodist Church, stunned and offended. "It is a slap in the face," he said in an interview. The outburst occurred as Jones, 46, testified at an informational hearing on how California will cut global warming emissions. Jones, who is African American, said he went...

Hot on the heels of Simple Jack (the fake, controversy-baiting trailer from Tropic Thunder that was eventually yanked) comes the trailer for Teresa: The Making of a Saint, an NC-17 Mother Teresa biopic starring Transformers actress (and parrot lover) Megan Fox. But wait! Could this, too, be a fake trailer, what with its cast made up of Hollywood heavyweights like "Sir Ben Queensly"? Indeed, it's just the latest in Hollywood's brand-new obsession with fake ads for real movies, this one designed to draw buzz for the Vanity Fair-set roman à clef How to Lose Friends and Alienate People, starring Fox...