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If you haven’t seen Disney Pixar’s latest flick, Up, you must, must, must go.
What a lovely, funny, and touching film!
I won’t add any spoilers here, but I will summarize the message I got from this movie:
Get out and do stuff with your life… now!
Also, pay attention and enjoy those small, seemingly mundane moments spent with the ones you love.
Ok, enough cheese. This movie really helped emphasize to me the importance of giving this life full credit.
From an atheist’s perspective, this life is the only one we’ll probably get to live, so live it well.
And, no, that does NOT constitute doing whatever you want without any regards to moral standards or the law, you silly little Christians. It means you shouldn’t waste it pondering all the beauty and peace and happiness and love you will have AFTER you die. Make those things happen today.
And go see Up already, for cripes sake!
 Holy weight loss!!!
I’m surprised no one thought of this before.
The Bible is not only a historical and scientific document, but it now is also a holy diet guide.
Pastor and “personal trainer” Ron Williams from the Foundation Church in Midvale, Utah, “used to think overweight people were maybe lazy couch potatoes.” But lo and behold, we can relax and pop open another box of delicious Pringles, as long as we commit to healing our souls… and BE MORE LIKE JESUS (How original)!!!
How does he get all these insane ideas from the Bible? Well, it was easy and, let’s be honest, obvious:
Jesus ate bread and fish!!!… a balanced mix of carbs and proteins.
Jesus was also seen wandering carrying a really heavy cross on his back once, so I’m glad to announce you can order your complete “Jesus Diet Kit” right here, starting soon!!!
If you’re LDS or any flavor of Christian for that matter, could you please explain this to me, from the perspective of a loving father in heaven?
31 children, between the ages of 1 and 5, died in a fire at a day care facility in Mexico today.
Is this just one of the trials we have to face in order to be brought closer to god?
I can already hear those who will thank their “loving” god for saving the kids who just happened to have been picked up that day and avoided this horrific, painful death.
Religion undeniably elicits a great number of emotions on those involved in any way with its tenets.
Happiness or sadness, hopefulness or despair, love or anger, tolerance or intolerance, materialize as we apply our understanding of spiritual teachings to our lives.
In the LDS Church, however, feelings are not only a consequence of spiritual experiences, but an important tool in understanding and confirming of belief, as taught from the very beginnings of conversion.
But, behold, I say unto you, that you must study it out in your mind; then you must ask me if it be right, and if it is right I will cause that your bosom shall burn within you; therefore, you shall feel that it is right. – D&C 9:8
LDS missionaries fail to see, among other things, the contradictory nature of the above statement when they freely advise their prospects to ponder and pray over the truth of the teachings they receive, for if one GENUINELY AND HONESTLY “studies” these teachings out in their minds, one is bound to uncover the thin layer of perceived holiness and perfection covering the beastly historical and controversial past of the LDS Church.
Most, however, will not heed the first part of this advice, and will only engage in the second part. Those who are conversion bound will receive, or at least perceive to receive, said physical confirmation by the well-known burning of one’s bosom, or something similar. I call them conversion bound for the simple fact that one would not engage in prayer directed to a god in which one did not already believe.
Cognitive dissonance is an uncomfortable feeling caused by holding two contradictory ideas simultaneously.
 So what to do if you find yourself kneeling in your closet, shamefully whispering supplications to an imaginary being, asking for confirmation of the truth about your preconceived belief in him and/or some church?
Here are some simple steps you can take prior to taking the plunge into supernatural belief and mythical thinking:
- The first thing I recommend you do is try to remember what you ate that day. It’s possible that you dipped that bean and cheese burrito one too many times in the sour cream and instead of the hand of the Lord massaging your innards, all you might really need is a good book (may I suggest something in the lines of critical thinking) and a few minutes on the porcelain throne.
- Try to remember a time when you were only a small child and had to sleep alone in your room (the older you are, the harder this exercise will be). You had just watched a scary movie on tv or your older sibling kept telling you scary tales about the abandoned house down the street, and as you lay there in the dark, you couldn’t take your eyes away from the dark, ghoulish shape hanging from the end of your bed. You could bet your entire weekly allowance on it being a ghost or a killer vampire. You shouted for your parents to come save you from the creature’s slow, deadly approach, only to find out the shape came from the damp towel you forgot to hang in the bathroom. This is a simple form of confirmation bias, but one which plays an important role in religious beliefs.
- As you’re speaking your prayer (speaking allegedly increases the strength of the signal), ask to receive your confirmation by a burning on somebody else’s bosom (your sleeping and un-forewarned spouse is a good victim). Immediately following your inquiry, unassumingly ask the person if they have had any unusual feelings in the last few minutes. Don’t be surprised if the answer to this question is yes, as you should know that people feel many things throughout the day. To control for this, you can pray several times for an extended period of time (say two weeks) at random intervals. However, it’s been observed that the main feeling this method generates is annoyance and/or anger.
- If your spouse is sick and tired of your asking him/her how they’re feeling, it may be time to move things to the next level. This next method may seem a bit radical, but we are talking about your eternal salvation here and I’m sure you would rather not leave anything to pure chance or “gut feeling.” Since God has not given us the option of how to receive confirmation, we’re pretty much bound to the burning of the bosom. But fortunately, like many scriptural things, he did leave it open for interpretation. As you’re finishing your prayer asking for confirmation, ask for a literal burning of your bosom. Outside of some small cases of spontaneous combustion, this may be a pretty good indication of divine intervention (especially if it can be repeated consistently). I would, however, strongly advise in specifying the size, length, and degree of the burn to avoid a trip to the ER every time.
- Lastly, if you do pray and you do indeed receive a (non-literal) burning of your bosom, you might want to consider the possibility that Satan is simply fucking with you.
I just spent a lovely evening with my wife at the movies.
Despite my reservations after being highly disappointed with The DaVinci Code, the movie, we decided to check out Angels and Demons (I read and enjoyed both books).
I was pleasantly surprised with this one, but I’m still thinking the bar was just set too low after the first movie.
Unlike the book, the film uses every opportunity to highlight the ongoing battle between religion and science, especially its historical bouts with the Catholic Church. Unfortunately, both disciplines seem to lose out at the end of this movie, a move that seems to be a cheap attempt at pleasing both sides of the argument.
On one side, you find a high-ranked CERN particle physicist questioning whether her work is ethical a la post-Einstein-nuclear bomb and a Cardinal who admits the Church was built by flawed men and pleads with Langdon to go easy on them when he writes his book.
I also couldn’t help but cringe at some of the lines delivered in the beginning of the movie about the Large Hadron Collider and dark matter… and I’m no physicist by any stretch of the imagination. Those guys must really be having a day with this one.
Langdon, on the other hand, stood his ground nicely (better even than the scientist) when questioned about his religious convictions and may have saved science in the end from being completely diminished in the film.
I’ll go ahead and recommend the movie, especially if you haven’t read the book. At the very least it is another avenue to raise discussion about a real issue we face today.
News like this really reinforce in me the desire for my wife and my children to disassociate themselves from the LDS church.
“I have this deep sense of failure for not being at Lisa’s bedside when she died,” Ms. Langbehn said. “How I get over that I don’t know, or if I ever do.”
I’m sorry I’ve been away for a few days, but I was busy getting ready for my first Marathon this past weekend.
It was all said and done on Saturday, so now I’m back (recovering).
Not much is going on these days, so I’ll leave you with this article I’ve been following recently:
It’s the story about a 13-year-old boy who was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma, one of the most treatable forms of cancer, and whose family has denied medical care due to their religious beliefs.
It’s a sad story so far, but it promises a happy ending, since a Minnesota judge ruled the child will be evaluated for continued treatment (if it’s not too late) against the parent’s (and the child’s) wishes.
On my son’s first day in Primary, I was sitting in the back listening when the introductory subject about “faith” was quickly raised to welcome the new group.
In trying to explain to these young children, the teacher (understandably) opted for a very simplistic explanation of the word, in which she stated “Faith is believing in something you can’t see.”
That description might suffice for a 4-year-old, but rational adults ought to look at the real meaning of what the word “faith” means and its implications in our decision making.
Believers quite often state that scientists and skeptics use faith in coming to certain conclusions or better, that it takes just as much faith to believe certain scientific statements as it does religious ones.
Mitchel Kahle of Hawaii Citizens for the Separation of State and Church wrote a nice, short answer to this question.
The essence of faith is belief in a proposition without substantive evidence or logical justification. The simple statement “I believe…” encapsulates the basic meaning of faith.
If a proposition is supported by facts and logic, then it qualifies as a statement of knowledge, as opposed to a belief. Unlike faith, knowledge is considered universal. It would be silly to state, “I have faith that the ocean is salty,” when it is common knowledge that the ocean is salty. If one has proof for a proposition, faith is irrelevant.
To say “I believe in vampires” is a statement of pure faith, since there is absolutely no evidence or justification for such belief. In this case, one could hardly argue that faith qualifies as virtue. An argument from faith is an admission that the claimant lacks any form of tangible proof.
he continues:
“I believe there is life on other planets,” is a statement of faith, but one of high probability. There is currently no direct evidence that life exists apart from the Earth. But among other things, the sheer size of the universe and vast number of galaxies known to contain similar suns and planets justifies belief in extraterrestrial life.
In the absence of evidence, beliefs may be justified, if not proven, by the use of well-reasoned logic. A belief that is not logically defensible, however, should be considered false until proven otherwise.
…
Faith is a vice, if one fails to recognize that his or her beliefs could be wrong. Faith can be a virtue, however, if the believer remains open to all possibilities. In the former case, as history proves, faith is an impediment to human progress. In the latter, it may well be a catalyst to discovery or a precursor of knowledge.
The President of the United States has signed into law today the designation of the first Thursday of May as National Day of Prayer.
“Let us remember those who came before us, and let us each give thanks for the courage and compassion shown by so many in this country and around the world.
On this day of unity and prayer, let us also honor the service and sacrifice of the men and women of the United States Armed Forces. We celebrate their commitment to uphold our highest ideals, and we recognize that it is because of them that we continue to live in a Nation where people of all faiths can worship or not worship according to the dictates of their conscience.
Let us also use this day to come together in a moment of peace and goodwill. Our world grows smaller by the day, and our varied beliefs can bring us together to feed the hungry and comfort the afflicted; to make peace where there is strife; and to lift up those who have fallen on hard times.”
Boy, it sounds like we could have instead called it many other things other than Prayer.
Maybe National Day of Gratitude? National Day of Freedom Recognition? Heck, even National Day of Reflection would have been better.
“I call upon Americans to pray in more thanksgiving for our freedoms and blessings and to ask for God’s continued guidance, grace, and protection for this land that we love.”
No, thanks. I would rather choose to do something more productive on that day. Anything that might actually yield real results, like spraying my house for bugs.
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