Free Republic

The Freedom from Religion Foundation, America's largest association of atheists and agnostics, began a campaign Monday to rid all hotel rooms of Bibles distributed by The Gideons International and replaced with copies of Charles Darwin's "On the Origin of Species." The Gideons International is well known worldwide for their work with hotels but according to their website, they predominantly share Scriptures in schools and colleges, prisons and jails, hospitals, and medical offices. The group is also an association of Christian business and professional men and their wives dedicated to telling people about Jesus through sharing personally and by providing Bibles...

Let's think about this. My 15-year-old son and I were pulling out of his large public high school when we spotted a bumper sticker on the back of a student's vehicle: Apparently, this is a popular saying among "free-thinkers" (atheists, agnostics, secularists), and although "religious people are blind followers" is a standard platitude, I had not seen this particular incarnation before.  I started to laugh, but it was my son who nailed it: "Wow, that's so ridiculous, because I'm sure she goes along with whatever belief is popular right now." Bam! Good thinking, son! I would bet the farm that...

Why is the term "self-help" so often used in a derogatory manner in mainstream media? Writing in the opinion journal Aeon, journalist and social critic Elizabeth Svoboda recently sized up today’s self-help field and concluded that some cognitively based self-help books are effective – and well worth defending -- whereas New Age and positive-thinking books are the product of "woo-peddlers" who cheapen the field. I stand with the "woo peddlers." Svoboda's piece demonstrates two assumptions that make it difficult to intelligently discuss self-help therapeutics in much of today’s media. First, the author groups together two different kinds of books: metaphysical...

The American Center for Law and Justice said it plans to stand up to the Freedom From Religion Foundation, which recently called for the removal of Gideon Bibles from state-run lodgings.The group noted that the latest battle began after FFRF Co-Presidents Annie Laurie Gaylor and her husband, Dan Barker, stayed at the Holmes Student Center Hotel in DeKalb, Illinois, and discovered a Gideon Bible placed in their hotel room. "No one is making any guest open the Bible. No one is making them read it. In fact, the university is not 'providing bibles;' it is allowing a Christian group to...

She worked for the Clinton administration, became a liberal pundit for the Daily Beast and a regular Democratic contributor to Fox News. On top of that, all her friends were agnostics or atheists. So when God pursued and won her reluctant heart, she was more surprised than anyone else. "If there was one thing in which I was completely secure, it was that I would never adhere to any religion-especially to evangelical Christianity, which I held in particular contempt," writes Kirsten Powers, in a first-person account of her conversion published in Christianity Today. The daughter of archeologist parents, she attended...

For quite some time now I have stated that the same arguments that have been used in support of consensual gay marriage can also be used in support of consensual polygamy. With that in mind, I am also one of the few who has argued for some time now (long before Kim Davis appeared on the scene) against the dangers of religious sectarianism (i.e. pre-Cromwell RC times in Europe and also Cromwell using God's authority to close down the theaters, etcetera) and that the citing of scriptures in opposition to gay marriage can lead to or at least open the...

In Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species (1859) and in his later works, he referred to several "vestiges" in human anatomy that were left over from the course of evolution. These vestigial organs, Darwin argued, are evidence of evolution and represent a function that was once necessary for survival, but over time that function became either diminished or nonexistent. (snip) The Human Appendix In plant-eating vertebrates, the appendix is much larger and its main function is to help digest a largely herbivorous diet. The human appendix is a small pouch attached to the large intestine where it joins the...

 About anything. At all. If you don't know this one, first thing, you're "majoring in the minors", getting a Ph.D. in ABC. God doesn't want to take you down, He wants to love you into abundant life. He isn't like other "authorities" who can only build themselves up by tearing you down. He isn't merely supremely good, He is goodness itself. All goodness, truth, beauty, love, happiness, merely "consist" in participation in Him, in the fact that He IS those things in Himself, to an unlimited, infinite degree. Don't want to waste your time? Understand that first, that there's a God-shaped hole in your heart...

With the recent SCOTUS decision, homosexuality is a hotter topic than ever before. It seems that everyone is talking about it right now. Well, in a recent Big Think video, Bill Nye “the Science Guy” was asked about homosexual behavior in an evolutionary worldview: “If the purpose of a species is to reproduce and survive how would it make sense evolutionarily for humans to have same-sex preferences? Are humans the only ones who practice homosexuality? And if this is so, does this mean that homosexuality is the product of humans personal whim as opposed to instinct?”Bill Nye basically answered this...

... Findings from PRRI's American Values Atlas, which draws on 40,000 interviews among a random sample of Americans, provides the most in-depth portrait to date of attitudes on same-sex marriage by religious affiliation. ... All Americans [percentages]... Strongly Favor 25 Favor 29 Oppose 18 Strongly Oppose 20 White Evangelical Protestant [Baptist, Methodist, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Church of Christ]... Strongly Favor 10 Favor 18 Oppose 27 Strongly Oppose 39 White Mainline Protestant [Baptist, Methodist, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Church of Christ]... Strongly Favor 28 Favor 34 Oppose 16 Strongly Oppose 14 ...

Updated Wednesday with attorney's comments. ST. LOUIS • A group of Satan worshippers are suing Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon and Attorney General Chris Koster, taking issue with state abortion restrictions they say violate their religious beliefs. The suit also says the law violates the establishment clause, intended to prohibit governmental endorsement of religion. The suit was filed Tuesday in federal court in St. Louis on behalf of The Satanic Temple and a woman identified as Mary Doe, who lives in Missouri. It says that she is a member of The Satanic Temple, which is “an association of politically aware Satanists,...

For those who don't have much familiarity with the dispute between Protestants and Catholics over the doctrine of the papacy, I want to post two introductory articles on the subject today and tomorrow. The first article, this one, will be about the Biblical evidence, and tomorrow's article will be about the early post-Biblical evidence. Roman Catholicism claims the papacy as its foundation. According to the Catholic Church, the doctrine of the papacy was understood and universally accepted as early as the time of Peter: "At open variance with this clear doctrine of Holy Scripture as it has been ever understood...

Was The Papacy Established By Christ? (Part 2) Because neither the apostolic nor the earliest post-apostolic Christians refer to a jurisdictional primacy of the bishop of Rome, Catholics often cite references to any type of primacy of the Roman church. But a non-jurisdictional primacy of the Roman church doesn't prove a jurisdictional primacy of the Roman bishop. Even Peter himself isn't referred to as having papal authority among the early post-apostolic sources. Terence Smith explains: "there is an astonishing lack of reference to Peter among ecclesiastical authors of the first half of the second century. He is barely mentioned...

Jimmy Carter severed his ties with the Southern Baptist Convention, but apparently is still a Baptist (Maranatha Baptist Church). Josh Duggar and the Duggar family are Independent Baptist. Some will say that neither of them go to the right Baptist church or the correct one and thus neither of them are truly Baptist, just as some Methodists will say that other Methodists don't go to the right Methodist church and thus truly aren't Methodist. Some Jewish people may say that other Jews, (although quite orthodox in their beliefs) aren't quite Orthodox enough and thus aren't truly Jewish when it comes...

Just 3 percent of Americans consider themselves atheists, but there’s one city in which a much larger portion of the population — a stunning one in 10 residents — identify as nonbelievers: Seattle.In fact, according to the Seattle Sun Times, the city has the highest rate of atheists among the nation’s largest metro areas.Overall, the percentage of unaffiliated residents in Seattle — those individuals who either don’t believe in a higher power or are unaffiliated with a faith — is 37 percent, compared to about 23 percent nationally, according to recently released Pew Research Center data.And the total percentage...

I am not equation homosexuality or heterosexuality with pedophilia, nor am I saying that Josh Duggar ever committed homosexual acts at any point in time in any way, shape. form or fashion. The point of this thread is like all of the others threads that I have written, and it is not meant to bash Josh Duggar. The point is to look at this situation and use it as a catalyst to continue on with other threads that I have started that deal with the following: "What constitutes salvation?" "Who is truly saved?" "Do we go by Arminianism or Calvinism?"...

Seminary president Danny Akin joins celebrity atheists Bill Maher and Penn & Teller in speaking out for people who don’t believe in God.A Southern Baptist seminary president has added his blessing to a campaign advocating for atheists. Danny Akin, president of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, N.C., affirmed Openly Secular, a campaign fighting discrimination against people based upon their non-belief, in a two-minute video message posted online. “You are probably wondering immediately: why would I be doing a video at the site of Openly Secular?” Akin said in the video. “The reason is that though we do disagree...

In the fourth part of our series on the Soul, Its Burdens, and the Path to Restoration, after we finish our discussion on how God transforms and influences the mind, we discuss how God can (and does) touch and influence the will and the emotions, and restore them to where they can act and/or react from a newly reapportioned disposition. (The program can be accessed by clicking on the "Source" link, or by clicking HERE.

Will the last true Christian in America please turn out the lights on the way out? A recent study on religion and America that has received much attention has been interpreted by some to indicate that Christianity is on its virtual deathbed. But as the saying goes, “The good news is the bad news is wrong.” The study comes from the respected Pew Research Center: “America’s Changing Religious Landscape” (5/12/15). The subtitle is: “Christians Decline Sharply as Share of Population; Unaffiliated and Other Faiths Continue to Grow.” They note that as recently as 2007, nearly eight in 10 Americans identify...

Cuban President Raul Castro has said he was so impressed by a Vatican audience with Pope Francis that he might return to the faith he was born into. Mr Castro praised the pontiff's wisdom, adding: "I will resume praying and turn to the Church again if the Pope continues in this vein." He thanked the Pope for brokering a rapprochement between Cuba and the US. The communist leader had stopped at the Vatican after attending Russia's World War Two Victory Day in Moscow. The Catholic Church has maintained ties with Havana since the 1959 revolution. The Pope will visit Cuba...