Raleigh, N.C. — A resolution filed by Republican lawmakers would allow North Carolina to declare an official religion, in violation of the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Bill of Rights, and seeks to nullify any federal ruling against Christian prayer by public bodies statewide.

The resolution grew out of a dispute between the American Civil Liberties Union and the Rowan County Board of Commissioners. In a federal lawsuit filed last month, the ACLU says the board has opened 97 percent of its meetings since 2007 with explicitly Christian prayers.

Overtly Christian prayers at government meetings are not rare in North Carolina. Since the Republican takeover in 2011, the state Senate chaplain has offered an explicitly Christian invocation virtually every day of session, despite the fact that some senators are not Christian.

(via Gerry Canavan)

Parents in Dietrich, Idaho, aren’t very happy with the way science teacher Tim McDaniel is teaching their children human anatomy.

That is to say, they’re unhappy that he is teaching them human anatomy at all.

In a formal complaint made against the 18-year Dietrich School veteran by at least four parents, McDaniel is chided for using the word “vagina” during a tenth-grade biology class on the human reproductive system.

Among other complaints submitted to the school: McDaniel explained the biology of an orgasm, taught students about STDs and birth control, and showed a clip from An Inconvenient Truth, which led to a discussion about climate change.

“I teach straight out of the textbook, I don’t include anything that the textbook doesn’t mention,” McDaniel told the Twin Falls Times-News. “But I give every student the option not attend this class when I teach on the reproductive system if they don’t feel comfortable with the material.”

I have completed my letter of Actus formalis defectionis ab Ecclesia catholica and will be sending it to the Bishop of my former Diocese tomorrow. I was unaware that one could even formally defect from the church until I came across this post from Emptv.com a few weeks ago.

This letter won’t make me any less Catholic than I was yesterday, however it annoyed me that the church still considers me one of theirs and uses baptism records as statistics to claim how many adherents they still have. I’ll keep you posted if I get a response.

April 14, 2010

Bishop George W. Coleman
c/o The Diocese of Fall River
47 Underwood St., PO Box 2577
Fall River, MA 02722

Dear Bishop Coleman,

I am writing to inform you of my defection from the Roman Catholic Church. I was born an atheist and then baptized into the Catholic Church as an infant which of course made it impossible for me to give my consent. My mother was a Catholic and mistakenly believed that it was her duty to raise me with her religion.

Soon after receiving the Sacrament of Confirmation, my faith in Catholicism and religion in general began to fade. My childhood belief in God and the supernatural was replaced by a love of science which piqued and satisfied my curiosity about the world in a way that religion had never done for me. My love of literature led me to explore the writings of atheist and humanist authors such as Mark Twain, Robert G. Ingersoll, Bertrand Russell and Kurt Vonnegut. Their thoughtful words on the human experience taught me to think whereas priests had only taught me to believe.

I have been an atheist now since the early 1990s and my convictions of a world devoid of superstition, demons, and deities grows stronger with each passing day. I have, however, neglected to officially sever my ties from the Church. The Church’s position against women’s reproductive rights, its political opposition to allowing homosexuals to find happiness in marriage even outside of the Church, and the aiding and harboring of predatory priests who sexually abuse children has made me realize that I cannot in good conscience remain silent while still being counted as a participant of an organization whose ideals I find reprehensible and morally wrong. Therefore, I consciously and freely state that I am defecting from the Roman Catholic Church and wish that my name be removed from church records. I was born in 1974 and baptized at:

St. Andrew the Apostle (formerly Saint Joseph’s)
19 Kilmer Ave
Taunton, MA 02780

I would greatly appreciate it if you could send me written notification that you have complied with this request. I am fully aware of the consequences of my separation from the Church and accept them. I have found more love and comfort amongst family and friends than I ever could find kneeling in abject servitude to an ancient delusion. As an atheist, I have been able to find this love and happiness without the fear that myself or any of my loved ones could possibly spend an afterlife in eternal torment because they didn’t follow certain rules designed to keep people fearful and ignorant. Letting go of the belief of a deity has helped me keep an open mind and treat people of all different races, religions, genders and sexual orientations with the respect that is deserved and required for us to live harmoniously together. I no longer live for the good of a god, but only for the good of mankind.

Sincerely,

Christopher D. Cole

P.S. I do wish to thank the Diocese and St. Joseph’s Church in Taunton, MA for the lovely bible that they gave to me after my confirmation. I read it from beginning to end as was suggested. The monstrosities contained in that book by a “loving” God upon his followers helped hasten my departure from the Church more expediently than any atheistic book ever could.

Updated May 26, 2011

A year later, I received a response. (Click letter enlargenify it)

After a few months of not getting a reply, I thought they may have just thrown the letter out. I didn’t really care if I received a response or not because you don’t need permission from any organization or individual to stop believing in a religion. The letter was just a form of protest against a group that I had been indoctrinated into before I was mature enough to give my consent. Also, the Catholic Church is a powerful organization that lobbies its archaic positions politically and I wanted to do everything within my power to make sure I am not supporting them in any way. Formally defecting was the least I could do to have a note of protest put in my baptismal records.

The paragraph in the letter about the indelible seal was completely expected and is illustrative of how childish the Catholic Church was and remains. That some adults feel that pouring water over an infant’s head while muttering incantations makes a person a part of an organization for life no matter what this person is taught or ends up believing just reinforces my opinion of the church’s deceitful and bullying nature. A person’s faith should be what they believe, not about that time they bathed in front of a congregation.

From the NZHerald:

A pizza company has upset people over an advertising campaign that compares its limited-edition hot cross buns to Jesus.

Hell Pizza has put billboards around Auckland’s CBD that advertise its hot cross buns with the tagline: “For a limited time. A bit like Jesus.”

Anglican Church media officer Lloyd Ashton said the campaign was disrespectful to many religions and the people who followed them.

“They [the billboards] join a long line of advertising that’s in questionable taste that slings off [at] things that lots of people hold precious.

“It’s disrespectful to what a lot of people hold very dear.”

Mr Ashton said he was tired of advertising agencies using blasphemy and religious controversy to sell products.

(via J-Walk)

A Dublin church group plans to gather pump-side Saturday and pray for the gas prices to drop.

It’s an effort started by the Beacon of Light Christian Center in Dublin.

“I believe if we come together and pray as a community we can really make something happen,” says the church’s pastor, Marshall Mabry.

Mabry says he can remember when gas jumped from under $1 to $1.50 and says, now, with prices reaching almost $4, he says he plans to ask God for help.

(via The Consumerist)

The pastor and seven members of a small church in central Wisconsin have been charged with using wooden rods to spank infants as young as 2 months old for “being emotional, grumpy or crying,” the Dane County Sheriff’s office said.

The Aleitheia Bible Church, in the town of Black Earth, was started in 2006 with a donation in the range of $500,000-$600,000 from Bob and Lori Wick of nearby Mazomanie, according to a news release from the sheriff’s office.

“During interviews with detectives, Phil expressed his belief that the Bible dictates the use of a rod over a hand to punish children. He stated that children only a few months old are ‘worthy’ of the rod and that by ‘one and a half months,’ a child is old enough to be spanked,” according to the sheriff’s office release.

“Throughout the investigation, the church members were open with detectives about their ‘Spare the rod, spoil the child’ philosophy. They described using wooden dowels and wooden spoons on the bare skin of children, starting as young as 2 months old,” the sheriff’s office said.

“If you spank early and it is done right, then kids will be happy and obedient,” Philip Caminiti said, according to the criminal complaint.

VATICAN CITY – Pope Benedict XVI has made a sweeping exoneration of the Jewish people for the death of Jesus Christ, tackling one of the most controversial issues in Christianity in a new book.

In “Jesus of Nazareth-Part II” excerpts released Wednesday, Benedict explains biblically and theologically why there is no basis in Scripture for the argument that the Jewish people as a whole were responsible for Jesus’ death.

Interpretations to the contrary have been used for centuries to justify the persecution of Jews.

The Rev. Grant Storms, the Christian fundamentalist known for his bullhorn protests of the Southern Decadence festival in the French Quarter, was arrested on a charge of masturbating at a Metairie park Friday afternoon.

Storms, 53, of 2304 Green Acres Road in Metairie, was taken into custody at Lafreniere Park after two women reported seeing him masturbating in the driver’s seat of his van, which was parked near the carousel and playground, a Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office report said.

The first woman told deputies she was taking her children to the playground and parked next to the van at about noon. As she was walking around her own vehicle, she noticed the van windows were down and the occupant was “looking at the playground area that contained children playing, with his zipper down…,” the report said. The woman noted that he was masturbating and quickly ushered her children out of her car.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (CNN) – The Catholic Church in Philadelphia will investigate as many as 37 priests identified in a grand jury report as remaining in “active ministry with credible allegations of child sexual abuse,” Cardinal Justin Rigali, archbishop of Philadelphia, said Wednesday.

“Sexual abuse of children is a crime. It is always wrong and gravely evil,” Rigali said in a news release. “The grand jury report makes clear that for as much as the archdiocese has done to address child sexual abuse, there is still much to do.”

He also announced that three priests were placed on administrative leave pending a review.