Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal

Mann agreed to undergo the procedure at her hospital to prevent the risk of a future pregnancy exacerbating her tumor. But the hospital, Genesys Regional Medical Center in Grand Blanc, Michigan, declined on religious grounds. The case is part of a trend that some experts are calling a burgeoning public health crisis, as a greater proportion of patients rely on religious hospitals for medical care.

Sylvia Allen, an Arizona state senator, opined that church attendance should be mandatory. Constitutional questions aside, there is a centuries-long debate that goes back to the European Enlightenment: Can you be moral if you’re not religious?

This book consists largely of "interviews" of prominent Christian apologists - no secular scholars of any note, just apologists. Written in a narrative style, designed for easy, laid-back reading that is familiar to readers of apologetic literature, it is intended to build a case that the historical record of the New Testament is accurate and believable. Its case is most powerfully made to those who already accept unquestioningly the authority of the gospels.

So here in Quebec, a judge - one Stéphane Sansfaçon (Stephane NoWay) - has thrown out a Montreal Pastafarian's discrimination case and accused her of wasting the court's resources.

The State Department yesterday released the International Religious Freedom Report for 2014. In his remarks at the release of the report, Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom David Saperstein explained the purpose of the report and the most significant trends it reveals:

Many of the responses below I’ve witnessed firsthand. In the past, I’ve even been guilty of saying a few of these myself. Here are a few things not to say to someone who has been hurt by their church:

After a Twitter discussion with Randal Rauser the other day, I had exclaimed that I would prefer it if my suffering happened for "no reason" rather than for a "redemptive reason". My justification for this view is that I'd prefer it if my life were not the plaything of some divine tyrant.

Daniel Dennett has suggested that most people today do not believe in gods. Instead, they believe in belief.

To set Christianity apart from other religions, some like to use this line when witnessing to others. They will say that Christianity is not a religion in the dictionary sense that involves a system of impersonal rites, rituals and worship to an abstract impersonal deity. But rather, it involves a personal one-one-one relationship with Jesus Christ. And that’s what makes it special because you are having a personal relationship with a living being.

2010: The pope and Sayeeda Warsi are warning about 'aggressive secularism' and 'militant atheists'. Here's my secularist manifesto

Recently, the Pope went on a crime spree around the USA, leaving christ-dust on the critically ill, his holy fluids on Kim Davis and little Popemobile skid marks in his wake. “He’s so cool! He took a selfie one time!” I heard echoing across social media. “He’s the best! Did you know he tweets?” I heard the faithful cry. “He says all dogs go to Heaven!” the Papal fan club exclaimed. “He acknowledges evolution! And the Big Bang!” The scientific community celebrated.

Theology has no salvageable theory of morality. Theists complain atheists have no reason to be moral. But in fact theists have no reason to actually be moral, as in: to elevate compassion, honesty, and reasonableness above all authority, even the authority of their own gods. Unless they covertly adopt a naturalistic moral theory (and most do), they are not actually moral people. They are minions. Theists are essentially the unquestioning gestapo of whatever monster manufactured the universe.

When I read creationist literature, I assumed its authors, as fellow conservative Christians, were being just as honest with their quotations from scientific literature as they would be with the Bible. After 40 years of granting creationists this favorable assumption, it took only a few weeks of reading actual scientists’ work to see how unfounded my trust had been.

Americans have no love for atheists, so it is no wonder so many shed the term for “nicer” sounding adjectives like humanist, bright, and secular. These terms are less polarizing to many, and help people avoid uncomfortable confrontations but as David Silverman points out in his new book Fighting God, this is just atheists giving into religious demands, playing by religious rules and pandering to religious feelings.

Gov. John Kasich (R-Ohio) is warning that a move to a "totally secular society" would rob the United States of its morals and complicate the fight against Islamic terrorists.

A reflection on the importance of acknowledging that we can all be manipulated.

A few years ago, I told my mother, a Christian woman from Mississippi who had freshly aged into her 60s, that I was an atheist. She didn’t speak to me for three days straight.

Over a week after blood moon doomsday forecasts were proven wrong, eBible Fellowship leader Chris McCann says ‘the world will pass away’ on 7 October

I’ve been listening to the infuriating Frank Turek. He’s got one argument against materialism which he seems to be well known for: those damn atheists are saying you’re merely molecules in motion, and you know you’re not, so therefore atheism is false, to paraphrase.