At the end of his oil spill speech last week, Obama got into some god talk – quite a lot of it, as a matter of fact. He told us about that pretty custom, “The Blessing of the Fleet.” He explained that what’s so pretty about it is not that it works, because it doesn’t, but that we have goddy company while we drown or choke on oil.

For as a priest and former fisherman once said of the tradition, “The blessing is not that God has promised to remove all obstacles and dangers. The blessing is that He is with us always,” a blessing that’s granted “even in the midst of the storm.”

The blessing is that he is … Read the rest

One more thing about Mooney and the jollification at the AAAS last week. Mooney keeps talking about dialogue between religion and science, bringing religion and science together. But what actually happened at the jollification, and what Mooney asked about there, was religious people and scientists talking. That’s a different thing. Obviously religious people and scientists can talk any time, and it’s unexceptionable that they do. But the fact that religious people and scientists talk to each other doesn’t mean that religion and science are somehow getting closer together, or even having a dialogue.

Oh don’t be silly, you may say; that’s what they mean – by “bringing religion and science together” they mean religious people and scientists talking to each … Read the rest

Is this true?

A London council was at the centre of a religious row last night after it announced it had dumped Christian prayer in favour of poetry readings at the start of council meetings…The vast majority of councils choose to start meetings with Christian Prayers while a handful of other local authorities begin with other faiths.

Is that true? Most councils start meetings with prayers?

It sounds crazy. Anybody know the facts?… Read the rest

The Texas Taliban Republican Party really is a hoot. Their new platform wants to set up an Inquisition, take the suffrage away from women and Nigras, send Jews to Iceland to do sumpin about that there volcano –

Okay, I’m lying. No all the platform wants to do is, for instance,

restrict citizenship to children born in the United States whose parents are citizens

That’s all – it just wants to repeal the 14th Amendment, that’s all. You know – the one that was passed in the wake of the Civil War, that undid the infamous three fifths rule in the Constitution and the equally infamous Dred Scott decision. And you know what else that particular red-hot idea would … Read the rest

When “education” consists of nothing but studying one book, then not much is learned.

For thousands of years the way that ultra-orthodox Jewish children are taught has changed little and is based almost entirely on study of the Torah – the Jewish Bible.

But now a group of leading secular Israelis wants to force the ultra-orthodox, or Haredi, education system to modernise and adopt standard subjects like maths, science and English.

The reason, they say, is that thousands of Haredi students are unable or unwilling to participate in wider Israeli society and are becoming an increasing economic burden.

“Participate in wider Israeli society” looks a lot like “get a paying job.” The BBC is apparently reluctant to spell that … Read the rest