Motherboard: What do you think is wrong with the conversation around atheism today, the conversation that’s already been popularized by Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens.
I am an atheist, but a gentle one. I don’t feel the need to mock anyone who believes. I really disagree with the hard tone of some atheists who approach religion like a silly fairy tale. I am deeply respectful of religion, but I believe none of its supernatural aspects. So my position is perhaps unusual: I am at once very respectful and completely impious.
The problem of the man without religion is that he forgets. We all know in theory what we should do to be good. The problem is that in practice, we forget. And we forget because the modern secular world always thinks that it is enough to tell someone something once (be good, remember the poor etc.) But all religions disagree here: they insist that if anyone is to stand a chance of remembering anything, they need reminders on a daily, perhaps even hourly basis.

A Christian pastor who converted from Islam is to be put to death for leaving Islam following the ruling of an Iranian trial court, it was reported today.Youcef Nadarkhani, 34, was arrested over two years ago on charges of apostasy, and has now been put to death by an Iranian court for refusing to renounce his Christianty, according to the pastor's legal team.The father-of-two had defied a request by the Gilan provincial court, in Rasht, Iran, to repent, and now faces death by hanging.

Croatia: Forced Conversions and Genocide under the Ustaše
Not many people know about the Ustaše and its leader, Ante Pavelić. Before 1941, the organization was a radical fascist terrorist group. But when Axis powers invaded, it was given control of Croatia by the Nazis. They shared Hitler's goal of ethnic cleansing.
Their plan, which they began enacting in 1941, decreed that one third of the Serbs in Croatia would be killed. They specifically targeted the Intelligentsia, all non-catholic religious leaders, all businessmen, all master tradesmen, all figures of cultural importance such as musicians and authors, and anyone else who might have some importance. Another third of the Serbs were to be expelled to aid in ethnic cleansing. The final third would be converted to Catholicism at gunpoint.
The Ustaše were radically catholic, and their leader had personally received a blessing and audience from Pope Pius in Rome

It sounds like you lost your faith in the process of becoming a minister—or did you go back and forth for some years? How long did you serve as a minister, and how much of this time was spent riven by doubt?
I didn’t lose faith entirely during the ministerial process, although a simmering struggle between faith and doubt was clearly evident. This simmering would boil occasionally throughout my seventeen-year career, but any vacillations I experienced were easily suppressed, and faith would triumph, albeit, for non-religious reasons. Besides the money, time, and energy I had invested during the process, familial responsibilities deterred any decisions to alter course. These faithful triumphs were ephemeral and I found myself living in constant intellectual and emotional turmoil. By not repudiating my career, I could not escape the feeling I was living a lie. I continued to juggle this stressful dichotomy to the point of being totally miserable. Only recently have I succumbed to the doubt that has always undergirded my faith journey.

Shakila, 8 at the time, was drifting off to sleep when a group of men carrying AK-47s barged in through the door. She recalls them complaining, as they dragged her off into the darkness, about how their family had been dishonored and about how they had not been paid.
It turns out that Shakila, who was abducted along with her cousin as part of a traditional Afghan form of justice known as “baad,” was the payment.
Although baad (also known as baadi) is illegal under Afghan and, most religious scholars say, Islamic law, the taking of girls as payment for misdeeds committed by their elders still appears to be flourishing. Shakila, because one of her uncles had run away with the wife of a district strongman, was taken and held for about a year. It was the district leader, furious at the dishonor that had been done to him, who sent his men to abduct her.

#8 Pat Robertson ~

He’s worse than the previous two because he doesn’t even know how to lie convincingly. He swears that “the spirit of God comes mightily upon [him]” and enables him to leg press 2,000 pounds, though he is 79 years old. This claim has been thoroughly debunked by weightlifting experts, and yet he persists in claiming and not proving it.

He has claimed to be able to deflect hurricanes by praying to God, and stated that Hurricane Katrina was God’s punishment for abortion throughout America (not for Mardi Gras, which would be a little more understandable), thus showing that he did not pray for Katrina’s deflection. He believes that 9/11 and Katrina might be divinely connected.

Most recently, he denounced Haiti after the January 12, 2010 earthquake, stating that Haiti deserved what it was getting because it swore a pact with the Devil back in 1791, in order to drive out the French.

Wow, it's another disgusting story of a girl raped by a Muslim who then is blamed and put to death. In a giant bout of blaming the victim, somehow it is this girl's fault for being raped and she needs to be punished. And, her family is now under protection because they are getting others in trouble for carrying out such a heinous act. Where is the sanity?

And, closer to home, we find this charming video. To be honest, I'm not seeing much difference between what the narrator is advocating here and the behavior in Bangladesh. The narrator sounds like a rapist in waiting, and further, he'd be fully prepared to blame the girl/woman for being too provocative.

It's time for these religious [expletive deleted] to grow up and start taking responsibility for their own lives and urges. Yes, you may be attracted to a woman on the street. Deal with it and join the human race.

She was a 12-year-old girl, with fiery green eyes and defiance on her face. Her father had promised her hand to a stranger from Helmand province who didn't speak her language, was more than 30 years her senior, and already had eight children. Her father had borrowed the man's money for his poppy venture. And now it was up to her to repay that debt.
Darya, as she was called in a new book by Fariba Nawa, Opium Nation: Child Brides, Drug Lords, and One Woman's Journey Through Afghanistan, represents a growing trend in Afghanistan, a trend in which families marry off their daughters to settle debts originating from the opium trade. "Opium brides," they called them.

The issue of free speech versus blasphemy is currently subject to much debate in the atheist community. While attempts by various UK student unions to restrict the free speech of atheist groups demands a serious response, the danger faced by those who question religion in the Western world is mild compared to that faced by individuals living under theocratic governments, and none more so than those living in majority Islamic regimes. The recent arrest of Indonesian atheist Alexander Aan and the nine-month jail sentence served by Palestinian atheist Walid Husayin—both for “insulting Islam”—happened in countries on the liberal end of the Islamic religious spectrum.
In the more conservative Islamic states, things are taken altogether more seriously. It is not even necessary to declare yourself an atheist to bring down the wrath of the righteous—merely posing questions about religion can be sufficient.
One such incident currently hitting the news involves Saudi journalist Hamza Kashgiri, who is a Muslim, but one who made the fatal mistake of not showing enough deference to his religion in some Twitter posts.

The U.S. Air Force has provoked outrage by removing a Latin reference to God on one of its logos after complaints from a military atheist group.The Rapid Capabilities Office patch included a motto until several weeks ago in Latin saying: ‘Doing God’s Work with Other People’s Money’.But this was altered to ‘Doing Miracles with Other People’s Money’ after the Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers kicked up a fuss.

Women: The very image of motherly love and yes, the very object of lust which generations upon generations of pious, stupid old priests had ceaselessly reminded us. The images of bikini-clad babes sashaying down the beaches in insipid Baywatch episodes, nude, lewd naked women in porn magazines..... in whatever shape or form, the archaic Judaic-inspired monotheisms love to treat women as some kind of a wicked taboo.

If, however, the charge is true and no proof of the girl's virginity can be found, she shall be brought to the door of her father's house and there the men of her town shall stone her to death. She has done a disgraceful thing in Israel by being promiscuous while still in her father's house. You must purge the evil from among you.
-Deuteronomy 22:20-21:

Christianity is misogynistic. Misogyny is fundamental to the basic writings of Christianity. In passage after passage, women are encouraged—no, commanded—to accept an inferior role, and to be ashamed of themselves for the simple fact that they are women. Misogynistic biblical passages are so common that it’s difficult to know which to cite. From the New Testament we find "Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church. . . ." (Ephesians 5:22–23) and "These [redeemed] are they which were not defiled with women; . . ." (Revelation 14:4); and from the Old Testament we find "How then can man be justified with God? Or how can he be clean that is born of a woman?" (Job 25:4) Other relevant New Testament passages include Colossians 3:18; 1 Peter 3:7; 1 Corinthians 11:3, 11:9, and 14:34; and 1 Timothy 2:11–12 and 5:5–6. Other Old Testament passages include Numbers 5:20–22 and Leviticus 12:2–5 and 15:17–33.

A website with close ties to Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has outlined why it would be acceptable to kill all Jews and annihilate Israel.Conservative site Alef has published a doctrine detailing why the destruction of the nation and the slaughter of all its people would be legally and morally justified.It warned that the chance to remove the 'corrupting material' of Israel must not be lost - and that it would only take nine minutes to wipe it out.And it said it was a 'jurisprudential justification' for Iran's Islamic government to then take the helm.The article, written by Khamenei's strategy specialist Alireza Forghani, is now being run on most state-owned conservative sites, indicating it has the regime's support.

Don't read the Quran while on the toilet.
Any verse of the Qur'an, should be removed before entering the toilet. (1)
Don't let anyone see you pee. (No one ever saw Muhammad do it -- except for all those eyewitnesses who provided the glorious details about his peeing technique.)
Jabir (may Allah be pleased with him) states that, 'When the Messenger of Allah (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) would go to relieve himself he would go so far that no-one could see him.' We should make sure that there is complete privacy whilst relieving one's self; this is modesty that every Muslim should have. (1)
A person should be concealed from the sight of others when answering the call of nature. ... How can anybody uncover in front of other people the ‘awrah (private parts) which Allaah has placed between his legs to conceal it and commanded him to cover it? (2)
One should move and hide himself from others, as the prophet SAAWS only relieved himself when he was out of site. (2)

No Liberal and religious moderate  will call on the Muslim community to stop reacting with violence to mockery, but to accept the fact that in a pluralistic society, some people will do things to which they object, and the proper response is genuine tolerance, not barbarism, beheadings, arson, violence and riots.

"Church set on fire after carnival," from the UKPA, January 31:
An Orthodox Christian church famed for its valuable icons was set alight in southern Macedonia overnight amid religious tension between Christians and minority Muslims over a carnival in which Orthodox Christian men dressed as women in burkas and mocked the Koran.
Firefighters extinguished the fire on Monday night in the two century-old Sveti Nikola church, near the town of Struga. The church's roof was destroyed but its icons were not damaged, the fire service said.
Hours before the fire, Muslim leaders had appealed for calm among community members.
The January 13 Vevcani festival prompted angry, sometimes violent demonstrations by Muslims, who are nearly all ethnic Albanian and make up 33% of the country's 2.1 million population and accuse the majority of stoking hatred against them.

Here’s a bit of unintended humor from our nation’s highest court. Inside the court building, above where the justices sit, is a frieze depicting some great “lawgivers” of history. As The Daily Republican reports,
The 18 lawgivers looking down on the justices are divided into two friezes of ivory-colored, Spanish marble. On the south wall, to the right of incoming visitors, are figures from the pre-Christian era — Menes, Hammurabi, Moses, Solomon, Lycurgus, Solon, Draco, Confucius and Octavian (Caesar Augustus). On the north wall to the left are lawmakers of the Christian era — Napoleon Bonaparte, Marshall, William Blackstone, Hugo Grotius, Louis IX, King John, Charlemagne, Muhammad and Justinian.
Muhammad? Yes, and here’s his figure in the frieze:

When the media and others refer to a “militant atheist,” the object of that slander is usually an atheist who had the nerve to openly question religious authority or vocally express his or her views about the existence of God. Conventional wisdom quickly tells us that such conduct is shameful or, at the very least, distasteful, and therefore the brazen nonbeliever is labeled “militant.”
But this reflects a double standard, because it seems to apply only to atheists. Religious individuals and groups frequently declare, sometimes subtly and sometimes not, that you are a sinner and that you will suffer in hell for eternity if you do not adopt their supernatural beliefs, but they will almost never be labeled “militant” by the media or the public. Instead, such individuals are called “devout” and such churches are called “evangelical.”

A video showing fifteen Pakistani soldiers being lined up and shot dead by a firing squad has been released by the Taliban.
The paramilitary troops were abducted on December 23 in what the terror group described as an operation to avenge the deaths of insurgents in Pakistan.
The release of the horrific video is intended to serve as a warning to Pakistan's 600,000-member army, which has failed to break the back of the insurgents despite superior firepower and a series of offensives against their strongholds in mountain regions.

But my Church offers a further revelation: We believe that when Jesus Christ returns to earth, He will return, not to Jerusalem, or to Baghdad, but to this great nation—and His first stop will be Jackson County, Missouri. The LDS Church teaches that the Garden of Eden itself was in Missouri! Friends, it is a marvelous vision. Some Christians profess not to like this teaching. But I ask you, where would you rather the Garden of Eden be, in the great state of Missouri or in some hellhole in the Middle East?
In conclusion, I want to assure you all, lest there be any doubt, that I share your vision for this country and for the future of our world. Some say that we should focus on things like energy security, wealth inequality, epidemic disease, global climate change, nuclear proliferation, genocide, and other complex problems for which scientific knowledge, rational discussion, and secular politics are the best remedy. But you and I know that the problem we face is deeper and simpler and far more challenging. Since time immemorial humanity has been misled by Satan, the Father of Lies.

He, too, saw that the attack on The Satanic Verses was not an isolated occurrence; that, across the Muslim world, writers and journalists and artists were being accused of the same crimes - blasphemy, heresy, apostasy, and their modern-day associates, “insult” and “offence.” And he intuited that beyond this intellectual assault lay the possibility of an attack on a broader front. He quoted Heine to me. Where they burn books they will afterwards burn people. (And reminded me, with his profound sense of irony, that Heine’s line, in his play Almansor, had referred to the burning of the Qur’an.) And on September 11, 2001, he, and all of us, understood that what began with a book-burning in Bradford, Yorkshire, had now burst upon the whole world’s consciousness in the form of those tragically burning buildings. 

Islamic spokesmen in the West constantly assure us that Islam respects women -- I was not too long ago in a somewhat riotous debate with the Imam Moustafa Zayed on just that topic. And so it is extremely odd that in Afghanistan, a country where virtually everyone is Muslim, most Afghan men seem to misunderstand this important principle, and treat their women shabbily. Probably they misunderstand this Qur'an passage as providing some justification for wife-beating: "Good women are obedient....As for those from whom you fear disobedience, admonish them and send them to beds apart and beat them" (4:34).

"I'm an Arab Muslim and in an Arab Muslim country," BAM told the court yesterday. "Those infidels are killing Muslims all around the world … there was a Muslim doctor just killed in Germany and when her husband wanted to defend her they attacked him as well."
The judge said he was not concerned with what happened in other countries, and that justice would be served.
He said it was never part of Islamic law, even in an Islamic state, to kill people because of their beliefs, or to take revenge....
All of the Arabian Jews in Medina wholeheartedly agreed. All zero of them.

The schools initially fired Ms Dias, 32, for being single and pregnant, Cincinnati.com reports. 

When the schools discovered that violated several federal and state anti-discrimination laws, they said she was fired because she became pregnant using artificial insemination.

That, the school said, was in direct violation of her contract.

‘She has a right to her opinion, but she doesn’t have a right to violate her (employment) contract,’ Archdiocese of Cincinnati spokesman Dan Andriacco told the website.

The contract Ms Dias signed called for employees to adhere to Catholic social teachings, including the avowal that having a child without a husband and out of wedlock is a ‘grave immoral’ act.Ms Dias is still unemployed and now has a ten-month-old daughter for which to care.
Her case against the schools is on hold in the U.S. District Course in Cincinnati as the Supreme Court rules on a similar case.

"For Somali Women, Pain of Being a Spoil of War," by Jeffrey Gettleman for the New York Times, December 28 (thanks to Bill):
MOGADISHU, Somalia — The girl’s voice dropped to a hush as she remembered the bright, sunny afternoon when she stepped out of her hut and saw her best friend buried in the sand, up to her neck.
Her friend had made the mistake of refusing to marry a Shabab commander. Now she was about to get her head bashed in, rock by rock.
“You’re next,” the Shabab warned the girl, a frail 17-year-old who was living with her brother in a squalid refugee camp.
Several months later, the men came back. Five militants burst into her hut, pinned her down and gang-raped her, she said. They claimed to be on a jihad, or holy war, and any resistance was considered a crime against Islam, punishable by death.

"She would come to school crying and telling us her dad was crazy," said Lacie Reed, 18. "He wouldn't let her wear certain things. He was always taking her phone away, checking her call history and checking her text messages."
Friends said Nona's father had installed cameras all around the home so he could watch the family's comings and goings. Others said he nailed her bedroom window shut so she could not sneak out at night and see her boyfriend.
"She couldn't date at all until she was a certain age, but when he was going to let her date she couldn't date anyone outside of their race or religion," Reed said.
Yiselle Alvarenga, 18, said Nona's mother and brother seemed to come to her aid when her father punished her.
"He would take her phone away and her mother would give it back to her and her brother would let her use his phone," Alvarenga said. "She was doing good. She was just excited that her life was going to start and she was going to have control of it."...

Hostility towards Christians in Pakistan is rife. Mrs Bibi told in the interview how one of her guards had tried been suspended after trying to strangle her. 

 Mrs Bibi, a farm worker from rural Punjab, was first detained in 2009. She is accused of defiling the name of the prophet Mohammed during an argument with Muslim co-workers. She denies the charge, but was sentenced to death after the case went to trial. She is now waiting for her appeal to be heard at Lahore's High Court

Two of Mrs Bibi's supporters have been assassinated this year, including Salman Taseer, governor of Punjab, who was shot dead by one of his own bodyguards

The Pope's Christmas Eve Homily ended by importuning his minions to give up reason, be humble, and be "made simple."
It seems to me that a deeper truth is revealed here, which should touch our hearts on this holy night: if we want to find the God who appeared as a child, then we must dismount from the high horse of our "enlightened" reason. We must set aside our false certainties, our intellectual pride, which prevents us from recognizing God's closeness. We must follow the interior path of Saint Francis—the path leading to that ultimate outward and inward simplicity which enables the heart to see. We must bend down, spiritually we must as it were go on foot, in order to pass through the portal of faith and encounter the God who is so different from our prejudices and opinions the God who conceals himself in the humility of a newborn baby.

Barbaric textbooks handed out in Saudi Arabian schools teach children how to cut off a thief's hands and feet under Sharia law, it has emerged.The shocking books, paid for and printed by the Saudi government, also tell teenagers that Jews need to be exterminated and homosexuals should be 'put to death'.Recent editions were obtained by the Institute for Gulf Affairs in Washington, D.C., which says they should raise fears in the West over the use of jihadist language.

LONDON (Reuters) - A baby at risk of becoming the victim of an "honour killing" because she was born as the result of her unmarried Muslim mother's secret affair must be adopted to keep her safe, the Court of Appeal ruled on Wednesday.
Three senior judges rejected a bid by the one-year-old girl's natural father to have her live with him and his wife.
The child's natural mother is in favour of adoption so that her own family will not find out about the birth.
Lord Justice Munby, Lady Justice Black and Lord Justice Kitchin said in a joint judgment the case involved "exceptionally difficult adoption proceedings," the Press Association reported.
The judges imposed unusually wide reporting restrictions banning the publication of all names and locations linked to the case because of the continuing dangers faced by mother and child.

With his slash-and-burn style, he described the United States as Israel’s “Shabbos goy… the non-Jew who is paid a trifling fee to turn out the lights or turn on the stove, or whatever else is needful to get around the more annoying regulations of the Sabbath. How the old buzzard must cackle when he sees the gentiles actually volunteering a bribe to do the lowly work! And lowly it is,” wrote Hitchens, “involving the tearing-up of international law and U.N. resolutions and election promises, and the further dispossession and eviction of a people to whom we gave our word…. [We] will most certainly be made to regret it. For now, though, the shame.”
He rhetorically asked Israelis, in Slate: “Without God on your side, what the hell are you doing in the greater Jerusalem area in the first place?”

While the true meaning of Christmas is often lost among the festivities, you’d expect a government tree to bear some relevance to the occasion.But no ornament can be seen with the word ‘Christmas’, ‘Jesus’, his picture or a nativity scene on the 63ft Sierra White Fir outside the U.S. Capitol.However what is easy for people to view standing near the tree's base in Washington D.C. is an ornament with the phrase: ‘I love President Obama’.

Before his illness, it was as an erudite author, essayist and sparkling, devastating speaker that this valiant horseman led the charge against the follies and lies of religion. During his illness he added another weapon to his armoury and ours – perhaps the most formidable and powerful weapon of all: his very character became an outstanding and unmistakable symbol of the honesty and dignity of atheism, as well as of the worth and dignity of the human being when not debased by the infantile babblings of religion.

 

Every day of his declining life he demonstrated the falsehood of that most squalid of Christian lies: that there are no atheists in foxholes. Hitch was in a foxhole, and he dealt with it with a courage, an honesty and a dignity that any of us would be, and should be, proud to be able to muster. And in the process, he showed himself to be even more deserving of our admiration, respect, and love.

 

Farewell, great voice. Great voice of reason, of humanity, of humour. Great voice against cant, against hypocrisy, against obscurantism and pretension, against all tyrants including God.

The commanders in South Waziristan rejected any talk of peace. They said they would negotiate with the government only if Islamic law were implemented throughout the country, the army withdraws from the region and all Taliban prisoners are released.
'Despite all their resources and atomic power, America, NATO and Pakistan cannot defeat the Taliban as our suicide bombers will use their bones as bullets, their flesh as gunpowder and their blood as fuel,' Mehsud said. 'They have no way to counter to this spirit.'
Pakistan's spy agency has been accused of aiding other militants, such as the Haqqanis and other factions in the Afghan Taliban who carry out attacks on U.S. troops across the border.

"Never be afraid of stridency"~ Hitchens
Richard Dawkins: One of my main beefs with religion is the way they label children as a "Catholic child" or a "Muslim child". I've become a bit of a bore about it.
Christopher Hitchens: You must never be afraid of that charge, any more than stridency.

Assistant DA Rhonnie Jaus, head of the child sex abuse division, said 38 individuals had been prosecuted so far with 14 abusers jailed.
Sentences varied from one month to 20 years for crimes including sex abuse, attempted kidnapping and sodomy.However 24 alleged paedophiles were not jailed. In some instances, the case against them collapsed when victims and their families backed out of giving evidence in court following pressure from the religious community, according to the assistant DA.
Authorities have another 47 cases pending.
The Orthodox Jewish organisation Agudath Israel of America, which has its headquarters in Manhattan, rules that anyone who claims to have been sexually abused by another Jew must consult rabbis first.Only then is the decision made whether to go to secular authorities.

Previous studies have demonstrated a much higher degree of religiosity in the US compared with most of Europe and the current survey, perhaps unsurprisingly, supports this finding.
“Half of Americans deem religion very important in their lives; fewer than a quarter in Spain (22%), Germany (21%), Britain (17%) and France (13%) share this view.
Moreover, Americans are far more inclined than Western Europeans to say it is necessary to believe in God in order to be moral and have good values; 53% say this is the case in the U.S., compared with just one-third in Germany, 20% in Britain, 19% in Spain and 15% in France.”
Of particular interest, however, is the demographic breakdown of the US results. For instance the results reveals major differences in US attitudes to religion based on gender (women are much more likely than men , 59% vs 41%, to consider religion as being very important, as are older compared to younger individuals (57% vs 41%).

CAIRO: An Islamic cleric residing in Europe said that women should not be close to bananas or cucumbers, in order to avoid any “sexual thoughts.”
The unnamed sheikh, who was featured in an article on el-Senousa news, was quoted saying that if women wish to eat these food items, a third party, preferably a male related to them such as their a father or husband, should cut the items into small pieces and serve.
He said that these fruits and vegetables “resemble the male penis” and hence could arouse women or “make them think of sex.”
He also added carrots and zucchini to the list of forbidden foods for women.
The sheikh was asked how to “control” women when they are out shopping for groceries and if holding these items at the market would be bad for them. The cleric answered saying this matter is between them and God.
Answering another question about what to do if women in the family like these foods, the sheikh advised the interviewer to take the food and cut it for them in a hidden place so they cannot see it.

The report warns that allowing women to drive would ‘provoke a surge in prostitution, pornography, homosexuality and divorce’.Within ten years of the ban being lifted, the report’s authors claim, there would be ‘no more virgins’ in the Islamic kingdom.And it pointed out ‘moral decline’ could already be seen in other Muslim countries where women are allowed to drive.In the report Professor Subhi described sitting in a coffee shop in an unnamed Arab state. ‘All the women were looking at me,’ he wrote. ‘One made a gesture that made it clear she was available... this is what happens when women are allowed to drive.’The astonishing report comes after Shaima Jastaniya, a 34-year-old Saudi woman, was sentenced to 10 lashes with a whip after being caught driving in Jeddah.

And everyone wants to pretend the imposition of Sharia that is following each revolution won't be a problem, and could even be an improvement. After all, there's promise after promise of "moderate" Islamic governance. One consistent trait that betrays the outwardly friendly face of the revolutions is the antisemitic rhetoric that has accompanied them. "Praise Arab Spring, Except for Anti-Semitism," by Jeffrey Goldberg for Bloomberg, November 29:
The bravery of the youth of Tunisia, Egypt, Syria and Libya can’t be denied. It isn’t pepper spray that they’ve been facing. Nor can the idealism of the Arab Spring be denied. The people of the Middle East are finally awakening to the promise of liberty.

There is another truth, however, that shouldn’t be denied. The desire of Arabs to be free of their spiteful and pitiless dictators is sometimes expressed in grotesquely anti-Jewish terms.

Nothing to see here. Repeat after me: the Muslim Brotherhood is "moderate." The Muslim Brotherhood is "largely secular," because the Obama administration's director of national intelligence said so. This is all a misunderstanding and has been taken out of context, because you don't speak Arabic, and surely there are nuances on the word "kill" to consider.
Nothing to see here. "Cairo rally: One day we'll kill all Jews," by Eldad Beck for YNet News, November 25:
A Muslim Brotherhood rally in Cairo's most prominent mosque Friday turned into a venomous anti-Israel protest, with attendants vowing to "one day kill all Jews."
Some 5,000 people joined the rally, called to promote the "battle against Jerusalem's Judaization." The event coincided with the anniversary of the United Nations' partition plan in 1947, which called for the establishment of a Jewish state.

This new-born baby may not have the easiest life as he grows up.The tot has been given the unfortunate name associated with the Muslim crusade against the west - Jihad.The Islamic term is used in the Koran to describe the religious war all followers are to wage against 'non-believers'.

He is usually revered as a gifted and sensitive orator.
But President Obama has caused outrage with his Thanksgiving speech - after neglecting to make reference to God.
The president used the festive radio address to express his gratitude to U.S. service members.

Her assailant arrived at the house when her mother left for a brief visit to the hospital.
'He had filthy clothes on as he does metal and construction work,' she told CNN in an exclusive interview.
'He closed doors and windows. I started screaming, but he shut me up by putting his hands on my mouth,' she said. After the attack, she hid what happened as long as she could. But soon she began showing the signs of morning sickness.
She received not sympathy but prosecution. But she appreciates she is lucky to get a second chance.
Many women in her position have been killed, for the shame such incidents bring on the community.
Now, if she marries her attacker she has a chance to restore her honour and to give her child a family.

The secular world practices  gender, sexual, and ethnic equality, and stands with its victims without exception. The religious community fights literally against the notion of equality.

The secular world stands in  solidarity,  rejecting  the ownership of human beings, the slavery of men, women and children.

Luke 12:47-48

 ^{47 "}And that slave, which knew his lord's will, and prepared not himself, neither did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes.

 ⁴⁸But he that knew not, and did commit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes. For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required: and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more." ~ Jesus Christ

The religious community preaches as a matter of doctrine, dominion over everyone and  everything.

^{Genesis 1:27.....}So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male...

 ^{28 ...}replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

Which life  is  the religious truly seeking power in?

The secular world supports the use of contraceptives as a means of birth control, and to slow the spread of STD's such as the deadly AIDS virus.

The religious community adamantly forbids the use birth control, even in the case of AIDS, which it views as the "work of the Lord,"  thus  ensuring the poorest people on earth will have the most children and  the shortest lives.

Support for stoning

 In hadith

Sahih Bukhari, Volume 3, Book 50: Conditions, Number 885:  A bedouin came to Allah's Apostle and said, "O Allah's apostle! I ask you by Allah to judge My case according to Allah's Laws." His opponent, who was more learned than he, said, "Yes, judge between us according to Allah's Laws, and allow me to speak." Allah's Apostle said, "Speak." He (i .e. the bedouin or the other man) said, "My son was working as a laborer for this (man) and he committed illegal sexual intercourse with his wife. The people told me that it was obligatory that my son should be stoned to death, so in lieu of that I ransomed my son by paying one hundred sheep and a slave girl. Then I asked the religious scholars about it, and they informed me that my son must be lashed one hundred lashes, and be exiled for one year, and the wife of this (man) must be stoned to death." Allah's Apostle said, "By Him in Whose Hands my soul is, I will judge between you according to Allah's Laws. The slave-girl and the sheep are to be returned to you, your son is to receive a hundred lashes and be exiled for one year. You, Unais, go to the wife of this (man) and if she confesses her guilt, stone her to death." Unais went to that woman next morning and she confessed. Allah's Apostle ordered that she be stoned to death.

A survey carried out by the Indonesia Survey Institute found that 43% of Indonesians support Rajam or stoning for adulterers.

A survey conducted by the Pew Research Center found relatively widespread popular support for stoning as a punishment for adultery in Egypt (82% of respondents in favor of the punishment), Jordan (70% in favor), Indonesia (42% in favor), Pakistan (82% favor) and Nigeria (56% in favor).

As a matter of principal, which is more important, defending gender equality and human rights where needed, or defending the rights of the religious to practice this barbarism?

I find it strange, those who can easily point out  the obvious offensiveness and   absurdity of Fred Phelps' (Westboro  Baptist Church) literal  preaching of the Bible, and by the same token,  view any and all criticism of Islam as equally offensive.

Religious moderates are, in large part, responsible for the religious conflict in our world, because their beliefs provide the context in which scriptural literalism and religious violence can never be adequately opposed. ~ Sam Harris

 There is no middle ground, you must choose  principals or promises.

Police said that Ortega had become 'obsessed' with Obama and that God had given him a personal mission to attack the White House.'He hates the president, he hates Washington, he hates society,' another official told the Washington Post.Gunfire was heard between the White House and the Washington Monument on Friday evening. An abandoned car with an assault rifle with a scope and nine spent shell casings were later discovered by police inside.

Didn’t Jesus preach nonviolence and “loving one’s enemies”? The anti-Muslim ideologues use this idea to assault the religion of Islam with. For example, the Catholic apologist Robert Spencer compares Islam to Christianity by juxtaposing carefully selected quotes from Jesus to Islamic texts. In his book The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades), Spencer includes a “Muhammad vs Jesus” section. He cites the following sayings of Jesus in the Bible:
“Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you”
“If anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also”
“Blessed are the peacemakers”
“Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy”
“But love your enemies, and do good”These “peaceful” verses of the Bible are compared to select violent-sounding Quranic verses. The violent verses of the Bible “don’t count” and are craftily excluded from the comparison (“that’s just the Old Testament!”). To tighten the noose, peaceful verses of the Quran are also excluded from the heavily biased analysis: these “don’t count” since they are supposedly from when Muhammad was still in Mecca.

Jordan: Muslim cuts sister's throat to cleanse family honor
It is no accident or coincidence that Muslims commit 91 percent of honor killings worldwide. A manual of Islamic law certified as a reliable guide to Sunni orthodoxy by Al-Azhar University, the most respected authority in Sunni Islam, says that "retaliation is obligatory against anyone who kills a human being purely intentionally and without right." However, "not subject to retaliation" is "a father or mother (or their fathers or mothers) for killing their offspring, or offspring's offspring." ('Umdat al-Salik o1.1-2). In other words, someone who kills his child incurs no legal penalty under Islamic law.
Syria in 2009 scrapped a law limiting the length of sentences for honor killings, but "the new law says a man can still benefit from extenuating circumstances in crimes of passion or honour 'provided he serves a prison term of no less than two years in the case of killing.'" And in 2003 the Jordanian Parliament voted down on Islamic grounds a provision designed to stiffen penalties for honor killings. Al-Jazeera reported that "Islamists and conservatives said the laws violated religious traditions and would destroy families and values."

Mohammad Shafia 'spoke to second wife about "treacherous" daughters'

Both standing trial in Ontario with son, charged with first degree murder
Gruesome video footage of submerged car where they were found is shown

Afghani father felt 'ashamed' that eldest daughter had married Pakistani boy
Shafia, 58, had seven children in total with wife Tooba Yahya, 41

Officials told the BBC that religious leaders had been issuing fatwas - edicts - asking for reports on anyone who was 'involved in adultery'.Earlier this year horrific video footage emerged of Taliban insurgents stoning a couple to death for alleged adultery in northern Afghanistan.
It took place in the district of Dashte Archi, in Kunduz, and was met with outrage in the West.
However, a Taliban spokesman defended the practice, saying: ‘Anyone who knows about Islam knows that stoning is in the Koran, and that it is Islamic law.
'There are people who call it inhuman - but in doing so they insult the Prophet. They want to bring foreign thinking to this country.'

The Holocaust was caused by Christian fundamentalism:

    History is currently being distorted by the millions of Christians who lie to have us believe that the Holocaust was not a Christian deed.  Through subterfuge and concealment, many of today’s Church leaders and faithful Christians have camouflaged the Christianity of Adolf Hitler and have attempted to mark him an atheist, a pagan cult worshipper, or a false Christian in order to place his misdeeds on those with out Jesus.  However, from the earliest formation of the Nazi party and throughout the period of conquest and growth, Hitler expressed his Christian support to the German citizenry and soldiers. Those who would make Hitler an atheist should turn their eyes to history books before they address their pews and chat rooms.

    Considering that Christianity has thus far been incapable of producing an unbiased, educated follower which speaks the truth, (I haven’t encountered any), I have been forced to dispel the myth by writing this essay.  It is not until I bring up his speeches, my personal info on the Nazi regime and their tactics that a Christian will begin to question what their clergy told them. (I am the offspring of a German soldier.  My Opa served under Hitler in WW2 and my father was raised during the time of the Nazi regime.  This is important information to take into consideration for I am privy to some info that most Americans do not know.  It is common for American media and education institutions to lie to their citizens concerning Nazi Germany.)  So, in presenting this information I must break it into four parts: 1) Facts about Hitler and his involvement with the Church.  2) How the Church was the catalyst for anti- Semitism.  3) Facts concerning how the Nazi regime drilled these beliefs into Germanic society.  4) Quotes Hitler made which prove he had a disdain for atheism/occultism, upheld his Christian faith, and hated Jews due to his Christianity.

Hitler’s involvement with the Church:

a) Hitler was baptized as Roman Catholic during infancy in Austria.

b) As Hitler approached boyhood he attended a monastery school.  (On his way to school young Adolf daily observed a stone arch which was carved with the monastery’s coat of arms bearing a swastika.)

c) Hitler was a communicant and an altar boy in the Catholic Church.

d) As a young man he was confirmed as a “soldier of Christ.”  His most ardent goal at the time was to become a priest.  Hitler writes of his love for the church and clergy: “I had excellent opportunity to intoxicate myself with the solemn splendor of the brilliant church festivals.  As was only natural, the abbot seemed to me, as the village priest had once seemed to my father, the highest and most desirable ideal.”  -Adolf Hitler (Mein Kampf)

e) Hitler was NEVER excommunicated nor condemned by his church.  Matter of fact the Church felt he was JUST and “avenging for God” in attacking the Jews for they deemed the Semites the killers of Jesus.

f) Hitler, Franco and Mussolini were given VETO power over whom the pope could appoint as a bishop in Germany, Spain and Italy.  In turn they surtaxed the Catholics and gave the money to the Vatican.  Hitler wrote a speech in which he talks about this alliance, this is an excerpt: “The fact that the Vatican is concluding a treaty with the new Germany means the acknowledgement of the National Socialist state by the Catholic Church.  This treaty shows the whole world clearly and unequivocally that the assertion that National Socialism [Nazism] is hostile to religion is a lie.”  Adolf Hitler, 22 July 1933, writing to the Nazi Party

g) Hitler worked CLOSELY with Pope Pius in converting Germanic society and supporting the church.  The Church absorbed Nazi ideals and preached them as part of their sermons in turn Hitler placed Catholic teachings in public education.  This photo depicts Hitler with Archbishop Cesare Orsenigo, the papal nuncio in Berlin.  It was taken On April 20, 1939, when Orsenigo celebrated Hitler’s birthday.  The celebrations were initiated by Pacelli (Pope Pius XII) and became a tradition.

Each April 20, Cardinal Bertram of Berlin was to send “warmest congratulations to the Fuhrer in the name of the bishops and the dioceses in Germany with “fervent prayers which the Catholics of Germany are sending to heaven on their altars.”  (If you would like to know more about the secret dealings of Hitler and the Pope I recommend you get a book titled: Hitler’s Pope: The Secret History of Pius XII, by John Cornwell)

h) Due to Hitler’s involvement with the Church he began enacting doctrines of the Church as law.  He outlawed all abortion, raged a death war on all homosexuals, and demanded corporal punishment in schools and home.  Many times Hitler addressed the church and promised that Germany would implement its teachings: “The National Socialist State professes its allegiance to positive Christianity.  It will be its honest endeavor to protect both the great Christian Confessions in their rights, to secure them from interference with their doctrines (Lehren), and in their duties to constitute a harmony with the views and the exigencies of the State of today.”  –Adolf Hitler, on 26 June 1934, to Catholic bishops to assure them that he would take action against the new pagan propaganda “Providence has caused me to be Catholic, and I know therefore how to handle this Church.”  -Adolf Hitler, reportedly to have said in Berlin in 1936 on the enmity of the Catholic Church to National Socialism

How Christianity was the catalyst of the Holocaust:

Hitler’s anti-Semitism grew out of his Christian education.  Austria and Germany were majorly Christian during his time and they held the belief that Jews were an inferior status to Aryan Christians.  The Christians blamed the Jews for the killing of Jesus.  Jewish hatred did not actually spring from Hitler, it came from the preaching of Catholic priests and Protestant ministers throughout Germany for hundreds of years.  The Protestant leader, Martin Luther, himself, held a livid hatred for Jews and their Jewish religion.  In his book, “On the Jews and their Lies,” Luther set the standard for Jewish hatred in Protestant Germany up until World War 2.  Hitler expressed a great admiration for Martin Luther constantly quoting his works and beliefs.

Now, you must remember before Hitler rose to Chancellor of Germany the country was in a deep economic depression due to the Versailles treaty.  The Versailles treaty demanded that Germans made financial reparations for the previous war and Germany simply was not self sufficient enough in order to pay the debt. Hitler was the leader that raised Germany out of the depression and brought them back to a world recognized power.  Due to his annulment of the financial woes of the Germanic people he became their redeemer and they anointed him as the leader of the German Reich Christian Church in 1933.  This placed him in power of the German Christian Socialist movement which legislates their political and religious agendas. It united all denominations, mainly the Protestant/Catholic and Lutheran people to instill faith in a national Christianity.

How the Nazi Regime converted the people:

a) In the 1920s, Hitler’s German Workers’ Party (pre Nazi term) adopted a “Programme” with twenty-five points (the Nazi version of a constitution).  In point twenty-four, their intent clearly demonstrates, from the very beginning, their stand in favor of a “positive” Christianity: “We demand liberty for all religious denominations in the State, so far as they are not a danger to it and do not militate against the morality and moral sense of the German race.  The Party, as such, stands for positive Christianity, but does not bind itself in the matter of creed to any particular confession...”

b) The Nazi regime started a youth movement which preached its agenda to impressionable children.  Hitler backed up the notion that all people need faith and religious education: “By helping to raise man above the level of bestial vegetation, faith contributes in reality to the securing and safeguarding of his existence.  Take away from present-day mankind its education-based, religious- dogmatic principles-- or, practically speaking, ethical-moral principles-- by abolishing this religious education, but without replacing it by an equivalent, and the result will be a grave shock to the foundations of their existence.”  – Adolf Hitler (Mein Kampf)

c) The Nazi regime began to control schools insisting that Christianity was taught.

d) The Nazi regime included anti-Semitic Christian writings in textbooks and they were not removed from Christian doctrines until 1961.

e) The Nazi regime having full blown power over the people began to forcibly convert all its military.

f) The Nazi regime forced the German soldiers to wear religious symbols such as the swastika and they placed religious sayings on military gear.  An example here is this German army belt buckle (I believe my Opa had one) which reads “Gott Mit Uns”.  For those of you who do not speak German it is translated as “God With Us”.

g) The German troops were often forced to get sprinkled with holy water and listen to a sermon by a Catholic priest before going out on a maneuver.

h) The Nazis created a secret service called the “SS Reich” that would act as spies on the dealings of other citizens.  If anyone was suspected of heresy (Going not only against the Socialist party but CHURCH DOCTRINE) they would be prosecuted.

Quotes from Hitler:

    Hitler’s speeches and proclamations, even more clearly, reveal his faith and feelings toward a Christianized Germany.  Nazism presents an embarrassment to Christianity and demonstrates the danger of their faith So they try to pin him on other theistic views.  The following words from Hitler show his disdain for atheism, and pagan cults, and reveal the strength of his Christian feelings:

    “National Socialism is not a cult-movement-- a movement for worship; it is exclusively a ‘volkic’ political doctrine based upon racial principles.  In its purpose there is no mystic cult, only the care and leadership of a people defined by a common blood-relationship... We will not allow mystically- minded occult folk with a passion for exploring the secrets of the world beyond to steal into our Movement.  Such folk are not National Socialists, but something else-- in any case something which has nothing to do with us.  At the head of our programme there stand no secret surmisings but clear-cut perception and straightforward profession of belief.  But since we set as the central point of this perception and of this profession of belief the maintenance and hence the security for the future of a being formed by God, we thus serve the maintenance of a divine work and fulfill a divine will-- not in the secret twilight of a new house of worship, but openly before the face of the Lord…  Our worship is exclusively the cultivation of the natural, and for that reason, because natural, therefore God-willed.  Our humility is the unconditional submission before the divine laws of existence so far as they are known to us men.”  -Adolf Hitler, in Nuremberg on 6 Sept.1938.  [Christians have always accused Hitler of believing in pagan cult mythology. What is written here clearly expresses his stand against cults.]

    “We were convinced that the people needs and requires this faith.  We have therefore undertaken the fight against the atheistic movement, and that not merely with a few theoretical declarations: we have stamped it out.” -Adolf Hitler, in a speech in Berlin on 24 Oct. 1933 [This statement clearly refutes modern Christians who claim Hitler as favoring atheism.  Hitler wanted to form a society in which ALL people worshipped Jesus and considered any questioning of such to be heresy.  The Holocaust was like a modern inquisition, killing all who did not accept Jesus. Though more Jews were killed then any other it should be noted that MANY ARYAN pagans and atheists were murdered for their non-belief in Christ.]

    Here Hitler uses the Bible and his Christianity in order to attack the Jews and uphold his anti-Semitism:

    "My feelings as a Christian points me to my Lord and Savior as a fighter.  It points me to the man who once in loneliness, surrounded by a few followers, recognized these Jews for what they were and summoned men to fight against them and who, God’s truth!  was greatest not as a sufferer but as a fighter.  In boundless love as a Christian and as a man I read through the passage which tells us how the Lord at last rose in His might and seized the scourge to drive out of the Temple the brood of vipers and adders.  How terrific was His fight for the world against the Jewish poison.  To-day, after two thousand years, with deepest emotion I recognize more profoundly than ever before the fact that it was for this that He had to shed His blood upon the Cross.  As a Christian I have no duty to allow my self to be cheated, but I have the duty to be a fighter for truth and justice…  And if there is anything which could demonstrate that we are acting rightly it is the distress that daily grows . For as a Christian I have also a duty to my own people."  –Adolf Hitler, in a speech on 12 April 1922 (Norman H. Baynes, ed.  The Speeches of Adolf Hitler, April 1922-August 1939, Vol. 1 of 2, pp. 19-20, Oxford University Press, 1942)

    "Christianity could not content itself with building up its own altar; it was absolutely forced to undertake the destruction of the heathen altars.  Only from this fanatical intolerance could its apodictic faith take form; this intolerance is, in fact, its absolute presupposition." -Adolf Hitler Mein Kampf (It is quite obvious here that Hitler is referring to destructing the Judaism alters on which Christianity was founded.)

    "The personification of the devil as the symbol of all evil assumes the living shape of the Jew."  -Adolf Hitler Mein Kampf (The idea of the devil and the Jew came out of medieval anti-Jewish beliefs based on interpretations from the Bible. Martin Luther, and teachers after him, continued this “tradition” up until the 20th century.)

    "With satanic joy in his face, the black-haired Jewish youth lurks in wait for the unsuspecting girl whom he defiles with his blood, thus stealing her from her people." -Adolf Hitler Mein Kampf (It is common in war for one race to rape another so that they can “defile” the race and assimilate their own.  Hitler speaks about this very tactic here.)     

    “The best characterization is provided by the product of this religious education, the Jew himself.  His life is only of this world, and his spirit is inwardly as alien to true Christianity as his nature two thousand years previous was to the great founder of the new doctrine.  Of course, the latter made no secret of his attitude toward the Jewish people, and when necessary he even took the whip to drive from the temple of the Lord this adversary of all humanity, who then as always saw in religion nothing but an instrument for his business existence.  In return, Christ was nailed to the cross, while our present- day party Christians debase themselves to begging for Jewish votes at elections and later try to arrange political swindles with atheistic Jewish parties-- and this against their own nation.”–Adolf Hitler (Mein Kampf)

    "…the fall of man in paradise has always been followed by his expulsion."  -Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf (See Genesis Chapter 3 where humankind is cast from Eden for their sins.  Hitler compares this to the need to exterminate the Jews for their sin against Christ.)

    “Hence today I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord.”  –Adolf Hitler (Mein Kampf)

    “The anti-Semitism of the new movement [Christian Social movement] was based on religious ideas instead of racial knowledge.”  –Adolf Hitler Mein Kampf (This quote is very interesting for it disperses the idea that Hitler raged war due to being an Aryan supremacist. He states quite clearly that he has a problem with Jews for their belief not race.  That is why many German Jews died in WW2 regardless of their Aryan nationality.)

“Only in the steady and constant application of force lies the very first prerequisite for success.  This persistence, however, can always and only arise from a definite spiritual conviction. Any violence which does not spring from a firm, spiritual base, will be wavering and uncertain.”  –Adolf Hitler Mein Kampf (Here Hitler is admitting that his war against the Jews were so successful because of his strong Christian Spirituality.)

Quotes from Other Nazis about Hitler and Religion:

    "Around 1937, when Hitler heard that at the instigation of the party and the SS vast numbers of his followers had left the church because it was obstinately opposing his plans, he nevertheless ordered his chief associates, above all Goering and Gobbels, to remain members of the church. He too would remain a member of the Catholic Church, he said, although he had no real attachment to it. And in fact he remained in the church until his suicide."  (Inside the Third Reich by Albert Speer page 95-96)

This entire article was ripped from: http://www.evilbible.com/hitler_was_christian.htm

All of the essays from "The Church of Theists Suck" were written by Charlotte and most were previously posted in her own "Theists Suck" website which is no longer in existence.  She gave permission to freely copy and distribute her essays, they are not copyrighted.

A 12-year-old Christian girl was kidnapped and repeatedly raped for eight months in Pakistan by a man who then falsified marriage documents with her, it was claimed today.
The girl was lured on a shopping trip in Lahore by a friend, before she was driven 120 miles to Tandianwalla and raped by the friend's uncle in January this year.
Two days later, she was forced to sign papers consenting to marriage with the man and beaten for refusing to convert from Christianity to Islam.

The first thing to say, when reviewing the question of what America should do about those of its citizens who advocate the murder of random numbers of its civilians, is that it is flat-out astonishing to see the debate being conducted at all. Faced with jeering, sniggering, vicious saboteurs who hide from the daylight and pop up on blogs and cheap CDs, calmly awarding religious permission for the capricious taking of life, what do we imagine Vladimir Putin would do? Or the police and security forces of the People’s Republic of China? Or Israel or Saudi Arabia? To ask the question is to answer it.

HOUSTON — Christopher Hitchens, probably the country’s most famous unbeliever, received the Freethinker of the Year Award at the annual convention of the Atheist Alliance of America here on Saturday. Mr. Hitchens was flattered by the honor, he said a few days beforehand, but also a little abashed. “I think being an atheist is something you are, not something you do,” he explained, adding: “I’m not sure we need to be honored. We don’t need positive reinforcement. On the other hand, we do need to stick up for ourselves, especially in a place like Texas, where they have laws, I think, that if you don’t believe in Jesus Christ you can’t run for sheriff.”

Mr Dawkins, a former Oxford professor who found fame as an evolutionary biologist before becoming a vocal opponent of religion, is a longstanding critic of all faith schools.
But he has said that Islamic schools are worse than others, as their teaching is more likely to be influenced by a religious agenda.
Talking to the Times Educational Supplement, he described a trip he made to an 'utterly deplorable' Muslim school in Leicester.
According to the Daily Telegraph, he said: 'Every person I met believes if there is any disagreement between the Koran and science, then the Koran wins.
'It's just utterly deplorable. These are now British children who are having their minds stuffed with alien rubbish.'

Journalist, Best selling Author and Atheist Christopher Hitchens debates the question Does God Exist? with Author & Ph.D  William Lane Craig..Incredibly entertaining and enlightening...

The debate between William Lane Craig and Christopher Hitchens hosted on 4th April, 2009 from the Christian Biola University.

Christopher Eric Hitchens (born 13 April 1949) is an English-American author and journalist whose books, essays, and journalistic career span more than four decades. He has been a columnist and literary critic at The Atlantic, Vanity Fair, Slate, World Affairs, The Nation, Free Inquiry, and became a media fellow at the Hoover Institution in September 2008. He is a staple of talk shows and lecture circuits and in 2005 he was voted the world's fifth top public intellectual in a Prospect/Foreign Policy poll.

Identified as a champion of the "New Atheism" movement, Hitchens describes himself as an antitheist and a believer in the philosophical values of the Enlightenment. Hitchens says that a person "could be an atheist and wish that belief in god were correct," but that "an antitheist, a term I'm trying to get into circulation, is someone who is relieved that there's no evidence for such an assertion." He argues that the concept of god or a supreme being is a totalitarian belief that destroys individual freedom, and that free expression and scientific discovery should replace religion as a means of teaching ethics and defining human civilization. He wrote at length on atheism and the nature of religion in his 2007 book God Is Not Great.

William Lane Craig (born August 23, 1949) is an American analytic philosopher and theologian. He is known for his work on the philosophy of time and philosophy of religion, specifically the existence of God and defense of Christian theism. He has made major contributions to the philosophy of religion and his defense of the Kalām cosmological argument is the most widely discussed argument for the existence of God in contemporary Western philosophy. He has authored or edited over 30 books including The KalamCosmological Argument (1979), Theism, Atheism and Big Bang Cosmology (co-authored withQuentin Smith) (1993), Time and Eternity: Exploring God's Relationship to Time (2001), and Einstein, Relativity and Absolute Simultaneity (co-edited withQuentin Smith) (2007).

Craig has debated with prominent intellectuals such as Anthony Flew, A C Grayling, Daniel Dennett, Lawrence Krauss, Victor Stenger, Peter Atkins, and Christopher Hitchens, to name but a few. Craig maintains that science and faith are connected and that the physical sciences are more open to the idea of a creator than they have been in recent history. Sam Harris, a prominent atheist, described Craig as "the one Christian apologist who seems to have put the fear of God into many of my fellow atheists"

Citizen Enemies: Anwar al-Awlaki granted  religious permission to shoot at will.

By Christopher Hitchens

Posted Monday, Oct. 3, 2011, at 1:49 PM ET

Probably because it mainly provides the kind of short-term cinematic satisfaction that characterizes the Hellfire terminus, the flashy ending of al-Qaida’s main media star has only led to the reopening of some pressing questions about the nature of the jihadi menace. It has also forced us to confront the idea of words as weapons, and the relationship between ideas and actions, in a world of conscienceless criminal violence that operates without employing any code or precedent of its own.

To phrase the essence of the problem succinctly, you are perhaps more likely, as a reader of this column, to be blown up at work or play, or on the way to work or play, by a “homegrown” or “lone-wolf” or “self-starter” fanatic using whatever explosive or incendiary tools may lie to hand, than you are to die at the hands of al-Qaida or the Shabab or any of their shifting surrogates. In the same way, it is at least as likely that a local operative will emerge from the American suburbs to commit one random and unpredictable act as it is that—as sometimes has happened—a fanatic will leave our shores and take himself to Somalia or Yemen or Afghanistan. And so we have the figures of Maj. Nidal Hasan, unsheathing his weapon at Fort Hood to yell “God Is Great!” or Faisal Shahzad rigging his SUV to explode in Times Square or, at one more remove, Farouk Abdulmutallab stuffing his underwear with combustibles and (rather too easily, given his record) boarding a flight to Detroit.

It doesn’t seem strictly accurate to use the “lone wolf” designation in all these cases, because a potent influence on the loner can be a homegrown counselor or adviser, who speaks the vernacular and has also lived in “the belly of the beast.” In the recent past, Anwar al-Awlaki has been the classic and most successful instance. His evolving contact with Hasan, for example, seemingly walking him through all of the stages that lead up to the granting of religious permission to shoot at will, was quite systematic. There were times when Awlaki was working under our very noses, propagandizing in Virginia and elsewhere from the context of an existing mosque (and so far getting into the swing of things that he attracted FBI notice by transporting ladies of the night across state lines, which is how we might have come to know him).

But he had not himself, at that stage, fully pupated himself into a committed Salafi jihadist. So now we have the phenomenon of an American citizen, able to whisper directly into the ears of people living here, but until recently being able to do so from a geographical location where our laws cannot reach him. There is no precedent, however remote, for a legal and moral challenge of this kind, let alone for a political or military one.

Since this dilemma will be with us for some time, may I recommend a recent booklet that offers the most background to the emergence of this fascinating and frustrating enemy. Called As American as Apple Pie: How Anwar al Awlaki Became the Face of Western Jihad, it is published by the International Center for the Study of Radicalisation and Political Violence. (Its author, I should proudly make haste to add, is my son.) The booklet explores the tradition of English-speaking Salafi agitators working in the West, a tradition that is longer and more ramified than many people think, but I find myself more absorbed by the aspect represented by the late Samir Khan, a Pakistani-American who until he died in the same Hellfire attack was the editor of Awlaki’s glossy magazine Inspire. Some will remember this unique online publication for its jeering, upbeat reports on the extreme cheapness of the print-cartridge bombs that were loaded from Yemen onto planes bound for our shores (the manufacturer of these bullets may also have died in the same attack), or the upbeat cover story on how to make bombs on your own mama’s kitchen table. While other martyrdom tactics were being used on faraway battlefields, said Khan not long ago, and even while Osama Bin Laden was being removed from the chessboard, the idea of homegrown attacks on U.S. soil was moving “into fifth gear.”

In a rhetorical way, this mirrors Bin Laden’s obsessive distinction between operations against India, say, or Iraq, and spectacular assaults on “the far enemy” or the prestige and security of the United States. To his last days, he argued even with his own lieutenants for a renewal of the second type of warfare. But it also raises a much less grand image: that of the pathetic amateur and misfit who can commit perhaps one limited act of vicious spite against his neighbors or co-workers or even passers-by.

I think it is important to watch for symptoms of sheer degeneracy like this—picknose wannabe murderers lurking in their parents’ basement—because there is evidence that such things (like the use of small children to carry suicide bombs) arouse revulsion even among those who otherwise wish us ill. It also dramatically reduces the caliber of recruit. On the other hand, and too little remarked, such tactics do something that is worth the price of a good deal of high explosive. They annihilate trust and confidence. Do you really want, next to you at boot camp, a man who prostrates himself five times a day? Should one say anything about the man with the beard in the next seat? Is a mosque in town the next development you truly welcome in the spirit of “inclusiveness” and “diversity”?

Slow and sidelong cultural erosions of this kind can do incalculable harm. And they can also be horribly and cheaply self-replicating: Some people will “overreact” to a specter of Islamism however slight, and this will offend the man who is only trying to meet his prayer obligations, and then a whole machinery of supposed grievance and redress clanks into action. Meanwhile, those who orchestrate this little carnival of mayhem and social corrosion are able to do so from areas that are beyond our legal jurisdiction but within our military reach, and to taunt us while doing so.

As we engage with the horrible idea that our government claims the right to add its own citizens to a death list that is compiled by methods and standards unknown, we must concede that no government on earth faces such a temptation to invoke what I suppose we could call a doctrine of pre-emptive self-defense. Those who share my alarm at the prospect of this, and of the ways in which it could be abused, are under a heavy obligation to say what they would do instead.

From Slate: http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/fighting_words/2011/10/anwar_al_awlaki_when_is_it_acceptable_to_kill_a_u_s_citizen_susp.single.html

A Muslim woman disemboweled her daughter as a sacrifice to God after she became convinced the four-year-old was possessed by spirits, the Old Bailey heard.Shayma Ali, 36, stabbed the girl up to 40 times and took out her liver while Koranic verses played in the background.When police arrived at their east London home, Ali was heard chanting: 'I seek refuge in God from the curse of Satan'.

Sam Harris is an American non-fiction author, and CEO of Project Reason. He received a Ph.D. in neuroscience from UCLA, and is a graduate in philosophy from Stanford University. He has studied both Eastern and Western religious traditions, along with a variety of contemplative disciplines, for twenty years. He is a proponent of scientific skepticism and is the author of The End of Faith (2004), which won the 2005 PEN/Martha Albrand Award, Letter to a Christian Nation (2006), a rejoinder to criticism of his first book, and The Moral Landscape (2010).

Full speech, Q&A (an additional 20 minutes), live transcript, et al, are available properly from here: http://fora.tv/2007/07/04/Clash_Between_Faith_and_Reason#fullprogram

Copyright presumed to be Aspen Institute 2007

Atefeh Rajabi Sahaaleh (Persian: عاطفه رجبی سهاله; – 1988 - August 15, 2004) was a 16-year-old Mazandarani Iranian schoolgirl from the town of Neka, Iran who was executed a week after being sentenced to death by Haji Rezai, head of Neka's court on charges of adulteryand "crimes against chastity". Rezai, who served as the prosecutor, judge and witness also carried out the execution of the teenager himself by placing the noose round Atefeh's neck before she was hoisted on a crane to her death telling her “This will teach you to disobey!”^[1][2]

After the execution of Atefeh, Iranian media reported that Judge Rezai and several militia members including Captain Zabihi and Captain Molai were arrested by the Intelligence Ministry. Inside sources informed the media that in addition to the confession of his rape of Atefeh, Judge Rezai who served as judge, jury and executioner, also confessed to torturing her during interrogations to extract names of others she had relations with.^[3]He also confessed to covering up what he and the militia members had done to Atefeh, by speeding up the verdict of execution. Judge Rezai insisted that the verdict and the execution were fully in compliance with the laws of Islam, permitted and sanctioned by the religious authorities.^[3]No charges have been made against Rezai.

The execution is controversial because as a signatory of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Iran promised not to execute anyone under the age of 18. Atefah's father had passed her birth certificate to the civil authorities, lawyers involved, journalists and Judge Rezai himself but according to a witness, "the judge just looked at her body, because of the developed physique ... declared her as 22."^[1]Pursuant to continual complaints filed by Atefeh's family, and very heavy international pressure about her execution and the way the judge mishandled the case, the Supreme Court of Iranissued an order to free Atefeh, but only after it already knew she was dead.^[3]

Excerpt from wikipedia

Debate between renowned journalist and author Christopher Hitchens and Dr. Barry Brummett (Chair, Department of Communication Studies, University of Texas at Austin) on the resolution "Religion has been a positive force in culture," June 4, 2011. Organized by the Department of English Language and Literature, University of Waterloo (http://www.english.uwaterloo.ca/), as part of the Literature, Rhetoric, and Values Conference, 3-5 June 2011.

Moderated by Jian Ghomeshi, an award-winning broadcaster, writer, musician and producer. He is the host and co-creator of the national daily talk program, Q, on CBC Radio One and CBC TV (http://www.cbc.ca/q/). Since its inception in 2007, Q has garnered the largest audience of any cultural affairs program in Canada and has become the highest-rated show in its morning time slot in CBC history.

In Part 1, Jian Ghomeshi introduces the two debaters. (3 minute introduction, not included, I could not embed)

Preliminary video-editing by Ken Cooper. Final edits by MetaMedia Productions, Waterloo, Ontario.

The Department gratefully acknowledges the support of a Social Sciences and Humanities Council Aid to Conferences Grant for the Conference on Literature, Rhetoric, and Values.

In Defense of Endless War

As 9/11 showed, civilization has enemies with which peace is neither possible nor desirable.

By Christopher Hitchens ~ Posted Monday, Sept. 19, 2011, at 2:19 PM ET Slate.com

A continuous and repetitive thread in the commentary on the decade since 9/11—one might almost call it an endless and open-ended theme—was the plaintive observation that the struggle against al-Qaida and its surrogates is somehow a "war without end." (This is variously rendered as "perpetual war" or "endless war," just as anti-war articles about the commitment to Iraq used to relentlessly stress the idea that there was "no end in sight.")

I find it rather hard to see the force of this objection, or indeed this description. Was there ever a time when we involved ourselves in combat, or found ourselves involved, with any certain advance knowledge about the timeline and duration of hostilities? Are there two kinds of war, one of them term-limited? A bit like that other tempting but misleading separation of categories—between "wars of choice" and "wars of necessity"—this proves upon closer scrutiny to be a distinction without much difference.

In order even to aspire to such a nebulous timeline, there would first have to be consensus on when the war actually started. For example, I would say that hostilities between the United States and Saddam Hussein began in the early 1990s, if only at a relatively low level, after he had violated all the conditions of the cease-fire that had allowed him to retain power in 1991, and after he had begun regularly firing upon the planes that patrolled and enforced the cease-fire and the "no-fly" zones. For more than a decade, the only response to this was more air patrols and a reliance on a crumbling regime of sanctions. That really was a case of "no end in sight." But something tells me that this is not the sort of example that my opponents have in mind.

Then again, one might ask how long we have been at war with al-Qaida or its equivalents. Since the attack on the World Trade Center in 1993? Since the destruction of the U.S. embassies in Africa? Since the near-sinking of the USS Colein Aden harbor in 2000? Even to invite these questions is to arouse the unnerving suspicion that there was quite a long period during which al-Qaidawas at war with us, but we did not understand that we were at war with it. It was precisely that queasy feeling that was beginning to creep over some of us a while before the events of a decade ago dispelled most doubts. And it would have been just as true to say "no end in sight" on Sept. 12, 2001, as it would be to say it today—more true, if anything. So once again, those who want to set the clock must be crystal clear about when they think the confrontation started running.

Attitudes toward length are often a good clue to attitudes toward outcome. During the Bosnian conflict, those of us who favored using force to lift the siege of Sarajevo were accused of advocating a tactic that would "lengthen" the war. Even in the trivial sense of being true by definition (anything that denied Gen. Ratko Mladica cheap, easy, and swift victory over civilians was necessarily war-prolonging to some extent), this wasn't true in any serious way. The relatively brief bombardment of Serbian artillery positions had the effect of exposing the hollowness of Mladic's military strength: Within an amazingly short time, Slobodan Milosevic himself was at Dayton asking for terms. One might phrase it like this: Intervention slightly lengthened hostilities in the short term, but drastically shortened them in the long term. (Milosevic later misinterpreted the Dayton agreementsas lenience and tried to repeat his Bosnian tactics in Kosovo. But even if this could be construed as war-prolonging, it also led to the eventual defeat of his army and overthrow of his regime, and thus to a conclusive finish.)

Arguments about duration are often of great historical significance, going far beyond the battles of mere hindsight. For instance, the conventional wisdom among historians holds that United States military intervention in Europe in 1917 had the salutary effect of persuading the German high command that, with another fresh and well-equipped force deployed against it, it could not hope to prevail against the British and French alliance. But another explanation of the same events shows the war on the Western Front actually being prolonged. Before President Woodrow Wilson abandoned neutrality and committed American forces in strength, the Germans had been fighting with exceptional success. Their prowess had led to calls, especially in London, for a negotiated peace. But the arrival of a new ally dissipated all such talk and compelled the Germans to fight until the bitter end. Not only that, but when peace terms were finally discussed, the French were allowed and enabled to press their most vindictive economic and territorial claims against Germany. That the Versailles Treaty led to the rise of Nazism and thus to the "Second" World War, or rather Part 2 of the first one, is a conclusion that few historians now dispute. So short-war advocates should know to beware of what they ask for.

A final objection to the dogma of brief engagements is more commonsensical. On the whole, perhaps it is best not to tell your opponent in advance of the date when you plan to withdraw your forces. Many American generals, we understand, were critical of the president's original decision to announce a deadline for the endgame in Afghanistan. Certainly, there seem to be upsetting signs of Afghan national army units, in particular, basing their calculations on who can be counted on to be still present as the months go by. Difficult to blame people for consulting their own self-interest in this blunt way.

Human history seems to register many more years of conflict than of tranquillity. In one sense, then, it is fatuous to whine that war is endless. We do have certain permanent enemies—the totalitarian state; the nihilist/terrorist cell—with which "peace" is neither possible nor desirable. Acknowledging this, and preparing for it, might give us some advantages in a war that seems destined to last as long as civilization is willing to defend itself.

Original article: http://www.slate.com/id/2304120/

A couple have been accused of allowing their 12-year-old daughter to be raped by a veteran preacher they invited into their home.They are also alleged to have allowed an incestuous relationship between two of their children in what authorities have called a 'tragic abuse of children'.Investigators believe Jerry and Christina Ham's religious beliefs may have played a part in allowing the alleged sexual abuse

...the country on 9/11 had been attacked in a particularly odious way (air piracy used to maximize civilian casualties) by a particularly odious group (a secretive and homicidal gang: part multinational corporation, part crime family) that was sworn to a medieval cult of death, a racist hatred of Jews, a religious frenzy against Hindus, Christians, Shia Muslims, and "unbelievers," and the restoration of a long-vanished and despotic empire.

So, although the official tone of this month's pious commemorations will stress the victims and their families (to the pathetically masochistic extent of continuing to forbid much of the graphic footage of the actual atrocities, lest "feelings" and susceptibilities be wounded), it is quite probable that those who accept the conventional "narrative" are, at least globally, in a minority.

 The Great Sam Harris. Ph.D  Neuroscience making too much sense. Sam Harris (born 1967) is an American neuroscientist and best-selling author. He is the author of The Moral Landscape, and The End of Faith, which won the 2005 PEN/Martha Albrand Award for First Nonfiction

It is time we acknowledged that no real foundation exists within the canons of Christianity, Islam, Judaism, or any of our other faiths for religious tolerance and religious diversity....Sam Harris

This may not be a popular article, but it needs to be asked. Unfortunately, the Westboro Baptist Church, the Taliban, Warren Jeffs, the Bachmanns are all interpreting their Holy Books correctly. The moderates fail to  condemn the source of religious hatred. As not to upset this malevolent God? Where are our priorities?

Today we learned  the  cold blooded  murderers of apostates, non-Muslims or just the wrong kind of Muslims is approved by an entire population. These  killers are  not considered  criminals and are made heroes . Not in the  tribal area in Pakistan, but in Indonesia, a Nation of 280 million people.

Not sure yet?

MULTAN, Pakistan, — On April 14, two men entered Asma Firdous' home, cut off six of her fingers, slashed her arms and lips and then sliced off her nose. Before leaving the house, the men locked their 28-year-old victim inside.

Pakistan is the world's third-most dangerous country for women, after Afghanistan and the Democratic Republic of Congo, based on a survey conducted by the Thomson Reuters Foundation.In its 2010 report, the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan says almost 800 women were victims of "religious honor killings" -- murders aimed at preserving the honor of male relatives -- and 2,900 women reported raped -- almost eight a day.

Consequently the Democratic Republic of Congo is 90% Christian.

• It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should be tortured (Augustine) or killed (Aquinas). Martin Luther and John Calvin advocated the wholesale murder of heretics, apostates, Jews, and witches. You are, of course, free to interpret the Bible differently—though isn't it amazing that you have succeeded in discerning the true teachings of Christianity, while the most influential thinkers in the history of your faith failed?

• Letter to a Christian Nation (2006), pages 11-12 ^{Sam Harris}

• Religious moderates are, in large part, responsible for the religious conflict in our world, because their beliefs provide the context in which scriptural literalism and religious violence can never be adequately opposed. ^{Sam Harris}

Is co-existence possible or desirable?

The most powerful and compelling speech I have ever heard on these  important subjects:

Defamation of religion is an issue that has been repeatedly addressed by some member states of the United Nations (UN) since 1999. Several non-binding resolutions have been voted on and accepted by the UN condemning "defamation of religion." The motions, sponsored on behalf of the Organization of the Islamic Conference^[1], aim to prohibit expression that would, "fuel discrimination, extremism and misperception leading to polarization and fragmentation with dangerous unintended and unforeseen consequences.""If you are a religious apologist invited to debate Christopher Hitchens, decline!" ~ Richard Dawkins

Reporting on the capture of the mass-murdering General Ratko Mladic by the Serbian government on Memorial Day, the New York Times summarized the newly created political situation like this: “Critical questions remain about precisely who protected Mr. Mladic. The pro-Western government of President Boris Tadic says it will investigate, a politically delicate examination that could lead to former government officials and perhaps even to religious authorities, since Mr. Mladic said after his arrest that he had been visited over the years by many priests.”

Pursuing the front-page story to an inside page, we see that the Times’ reporters, Doreen Carvajal and Steven Erlanger, stayed with that theme: “Government authorities, including President Tadic, have vowed to investigate the protective network, especially to determine if some of the loyalists included government operatives, high officials or perhaps even Serbian Orthodox priests.”

The words emphasized in both of the above extracts are italicized not in the original but by me. We can thus criticize Carvajal and Erlanger for three different kinds of reportorial lapse. The first is to use the same significant phrase twice in the same article without clarifying it by the repetition. The second is to make the strong assumption (“perhaps even”) that priestly participation in a career of criminal violence would be an occasion for shock as well as—not quite the same thing—surprise. The third is to be so unaware of the recent history of the Balkans as to believe that membership in the Serbian Orthodox clergy would make it less likely—rather than more so—that the person would be involved in gross violations of human rights.

Did I just say “the recent history of the Balkans”? It would be nearer the truth to say that the entire history of the region is one long confessional feud that when allied to ultra-toxic nationalism was strong enough to drag the entire modern world into a catastrophic war in the summer of 1914. It nearly did the same to post-Cold War southern and Adriatic Europe after 1990, and it was only halted at a terrible cost in blood. The clerical element of this nightmare was obscured by the media’s habit of referring to the three contending parties as “the Serbs,” “the Croats,” and “the Muslims.” You can see at a glance that there is a lack of symmetry in that already sketchy and subjective picture.

In the 1990s, the nationalists of “Greater Serbia,” who sought to remove non-Serb populations from their soil and from the soil of neighboring republics, were overwhelmingly Eastern Orthodox Christian and held together by religious imagery and propaganda. Meanwhile, “the Croats” was another collective noun for the Roman Catholics of Croatia and Western Herzegovina who also wanted a “pure” religious state of their own. During the 1940s, they had actually enjoyed possession of such a state in the form of a Nazi protectorate run by an extreme Catholic fascist party named the Ustashe. Serbian memory of this period is extremely traumatic, not least because the Ustashe program included forced conversion of the heretical Orthodox as well as cruel collective punishment for those who declined it. (Not to look for any shallow exculpation, but it seems that General Mladic’s father was one of the Serbs who fell victim to this Crusader-type program.)

In contrast to certain media stereotypes, the Muslim leadership in Bosnia was strikingly secular in outlook. This was especially true of the multi-ethnic and multi-religious city of Sarajevo, which became the target of Mladic’s special wrath. There were some sectarian atrocities committed by Bosnian government forces and by some Islamist “volunteers” who briefly entered the country looking for a jihadi opening, but observers tended to agree that the Bosnian side was the least culpable and also that the more religious a party or militia was, the more likely it was to act in a barbaric manner—which makes the same point in a different way. Secularists were also targeted within their “own” communities. The only decent joke I heard during those bad years (and I apologize to those readers of FI who may have heard me tell it already) came from the Croatian intellectual unbeliever Zarkho Puhovski. “If you are a Croat and you say you are an atheist,” he told me, “the first question you face is ‘How can you prove you are not a Serb?’” Puhovski was partly Jewish, which in a region with that particular history brought special problems.

When the Serbian ethno-fascists were asked to justify their claim to Kosovo, a province where Serbs are a very small minority, they replied that Kosovo was Serbian because it contained their holy places and was Serbia’s “Jerusalem.” Right away you know what’s coming: civilians will be killed and deported to protect the integrity of boneyards and relics and caves. And the Kosovo war, bad as it was, could easily have been very much worse. Right now, the only thing preventing the revival of inter-communal bloodletting is the horribly fresh memory of the last time and a somewhat insipid attachment to a tenuous future prosperity that depends on keeping local atavism in check. Religion nearly destroyed the economy and society of former Yugoslavia and did deep and lasting damage to its people and culture. But in the journal of record for American liberalism, the profound connection between faith and fanaticism is treated as if it were a startling exception rather than a grim rule.

By Christopher Hitchens~ is a columnist for Vanity Fair. His memoir Hitch-22 is newly published in paperback by Twelve.

August 4, 2011 Free Inquiry / Council for Secular Humanism

 “Atheist” is a term that should not even exist. We do not, after all, have a name for a person who does not believe in Zeus or Thor. In fact, we are all “atheists” with respect to Zeus and Thor and the thousands of other dead gods that now lie upon the scrapheap of mythology.

A politician who seriously invokes Poseidon in a campaign speech will have thereby announced the end of his political career. Why is this so? Did someone around the time of Constantine discover that the pagan gods do not actually exist, while the biblical God does?  Of course not. There are thousands of gods that were once worshipped with absolute conviction by men and women like ourselves, and yet we all now agree that they are rightly dead. An “atheist” is simply someone who thinks that the God of Abraham should be buried with the rest of these imaginary friends. I am quite sure that we need only use words like “reason,” “common sense,” “evidence,” and “intellectual honesty” to do the job.

So many Gods have passed into oblivion, yet the sky-god of Abraham demands fresh sacrifices. Wars are still waged, crimes committed, and science undone out of deference to an invisible being who is believed to have created the entire cosmos, fine-tuned the constants of nature, blanketed the earth with 20,000 distinct species of grasshopper, and yet still remains so provincial a creature as to concern himself with what consenting adults do for pleasure in the privacy of their bedrooms. Incompatible beliefs about this God long ago shattered our world into separate moral communities—Christians, Muslims, Jews, etc.—and these divisions remain a continuous source of human violence.

And yet, while the religious divisions in our world are self-evident, many people still imagine that religious conflict is always caused by a lack of education, by poverty, or by politics. Yet the September 11th hijackers were college-educated, middle-class, and had no discernible experience of political oppression. They did, however, spend a remarkable amount of time at their local mosques talking about the depravity of infidels and about the pleasures that await martyrs in Paradise.

How many more architects and mechanical engineers must hit the wall at 400 miles an hour before we admit to ourselves that jihadist violence is not merely a matter of education, poverty, or politics? The truth, astonishingly enough, is that in the year 2006 a person can have sufficient intellectual and material resources to build a nuclear bomb and still believe that he will get 72 virgins in Paradise. Western secularists, liberals, and moderates have been very slow to understand this. The cause of their confusion is simple: They don’t know what it is like to really believe in God.

The United States now stands alone in the developed world as a country that conducts its national discourse under the shadow of religious literalism. Eighty-three percent of the U.S. population believes that Jesus literally rose from the dead; 53% believe that the universe is 6,000 years old. This is embarrassing. Add to this comedy of false certainties the fact that 44% of Americans are confident that Jesus will return to Earth sometime in the next 50 years and you will glimpse the terrible liability of this sort of thinking.

Nearly half of the American population is eagerly anticipating the end of the world. This dewy-eyed nihilism provides absolutely no incentive to build a sustainable civilization. Many of these people are lunatics, but they are not the lunatic fringe. Some of them can actually get Karl Rove on the phone whenever they want.

While Muslim extremists now fly planes into our buildings, saw the heads off journalists and aid-workers, and riot by the tens of thousands over cartoons, several recent polls reveal that atheists are now the most reviled minority in the United States. A majority of Americans say they would refuse to vote for an atheist even if he were a “well-qualified candidate” from their own political party. Atheism, therefore, is a perfect impediment to holding elected office in this country (while being a woman, black, Muslim, Jewish, or gay is not). Most Americans also say that of all the unsavory alternatives on offer, they would be least likely to allow their child to marry an atheist. These declarations of prejudice might be enough to make some atheists angry. But they are not what makes me angry.

As an atheist, I am angry that we live in a society in which the plain truth cannot be spoken without offending 90% of the population. The plain truth is this: There is no good reason to believe in a personal God; there is no good reason to believe that the Bible, the Koran, or any other book was dictated by an omniscient being; we do not, in any important sense, get our morality from religion; the Bible and the Koran are not, even remotely, the best sources of guidance we have for living in the 21st century; and the belief in God and in the divine provenance of scripture is getting a lot of people killed unnecessarily.

Against these plain truths religious people have erected a grotesque edifice of myths, obfuscations, half-truths, and wishful thinking. 

 ****By  Sam Harris (born 1967) is an American neuroscientist and best-selling author. He is the author of The Moral Landscape, and The End of Faith which won the 2005 PEN/Martha Albrand Award for First Nonfiction****

Sam Harris(born 1967) is an American neuroscientist and best-selling author. He is the author of The Moral Landscape, and The End of Faithwhich won the 2005 PEN/Martha Albrand Award for First Nonfiction.

The so called "God" of the Bible makes Osama Bin Laden look like a Boy Scout. This God, according to the Bible, is directly responsible for many mass-murders, rapes, pillage, plunder, slavery, child abuse and killing, not to mention the killing of unborn children.

It always amazes me how many times this God orders the killing of innocent people even after the Ten Commandments said "Thou shall not kill". For example, God kills 70,000 innocent people because David ordered a census of the people (1 Chronicles 21). God also orders the destruction of 60 cities so that the Israelites can live there. He orders the killing of all the men, women, and children of each city, and the looting of all of value (Deuteronomy 3). He orders another attack and the killing of "all the living creatures of the city: men and women, young, and old, as well as oxen sheep, and asses" (Joshua 6). In Judges 21, He orders the murder of all the people of Jabesh-gilead, except for the virgin girls who were taken to be forcibly raped and married. When they wanted more virgins, God told them to hide alongside the road and when they saw a girl they liked, kidnap her and forcibly rape her and make her your wife! Just about every other page in the Old Testament has God killing somebody! In 2 Kings 10:18-27, God orders the murder of all the worshipers of a different god in their very own church! In total God kills 371,186 people directly and orders another 1,862,265 people murdered.

Text courtesy of the (evil bible. com)

Over at Truthdig, the celebrated journalist Chris Hedges has discovered that Christopher Hitchens and I are actually racists with a fondness for genocide. He has broken this story before—many times, in fact—but in his most recent essay he blames “secular fundamentalists” like me and Hitch for the recent terrorist atrocities in Norway.

Very nice.

Hedges begins, measured as always:

The gravest threat we face from terrorism, as the killings in Norway by Anders Behring Breivik underscore, comes not from the Islamic world but the radical Christian right and the secular fundamentalists who propagate the bigoted, hateful caricatures of observant Muslims and those defined as our internal enemies. The caricature and fear are spread as diligently by the Christian right as they are by atheists such as Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens. Our religious and secular fundamentalists all peddle the same racist filth and intolerance that infected Breivik. This filth has poisoned and degraded our civil discourse. The looming economic and environmental collapse will provide sparks and tinder to transform this coarse language of fundamentalist hatred into, I fear, the murderous rampages experienced by Norway. I worry more about the Anders Breiviks than the Mohammed Attas.

The editors at Truthdig have invited me to respond to this phantasmagoria. There is, however, almost no charge worth answering in Hedges’ writing—there never is. Which is more absurd, the idea of “secular fundamentalism” or the notion that its edicts pose a greater threat of terrorism than the doctrine of Islam? Do such assertions even require sentences to refute?

However, Hedges’ latest attack is so vicious and gratuitous that some reply seemed necessary. To minimize the amount of time I would need to spend today cleaning this man’s vomit, I decided to adapt a few pieces I had already written. But then I just got angry…

I sent the following to Truthdig:

****

After my first book was published, the journalist Chris Hedges seemed to make a career out of misrepresenting its contents—asserting, among other calumnies, that somewhere in its pages I call for an immediate, nuclear first strike on the entire Muslim world. Hedges spread this lie so sedulously that I could have spent years writing letters to the editor. Even if I had been willing to squander my time in this way, such letters are generally pointless, as few people read them. In the end, I decided to create a page on my website addressing such controversies, so that I can then forget all about them. The result has been less than satisfying. Several years have passed, and I still meet people at public talks and in comment threads who believe that I support the outright murder of hundreds of millions of innocent people.

In an apparent attempt to become the most tedious person on Earth, Hedges has attacked me again on this point, and the editors at Truthdig have invited me to respond. I suppose it is worth a try. To begin, I’d like to simply cite the text that has been on my website for years, so that readers can appreciate just how unscrupulous and incorrigible Hedges is:

The journalist Chris Hedges has repeatedly claimed (in print, in public lectures, on the radio, and on television) that I advocate a nuclear first-strike on the Muslim world. His remarks, which have been recycled continuously in interviews and blog-posts, generally take the following form:

“I mean, Sam Harris, at the end of his first book, asks us to consider a nuclear first strike on the Arab world.” (Q&A at Harvard Divinity School, March 20, 2008)

“Harris, echoing the blood lust of [Christopher] Hitchens, calls, in his book ‘The End of Faith,’ for a nuclear first strike against the Islamic world.” (“The Dangerous Atheism of Christopher Hitchens and Sam Harris,” AlterNet, March 22, 2008)

“And you have in Sam Harris’ book, ‘The End of Faith,’ a call for us to consider a nuclear first strike against the Arab world. This isn’t rational. This is insane.” (“The Tavis Smiley Show,” April 15, 2008)

“Sam Harris, in his book ‘The End of Faith,’ asks us to consider carrying out a nuclear first-strike on the Arab world. That’s not a rational option—that’s insanity.” (“A Conversation with Chris Hedges,” Free Inquiry, August/September 2008)

Wherever they appear, Hedges’ comments seem calculated to leave the impression that I want the U.S. government to start killing Muslims by the millions. Below I present the only passage I have ever written on the subject of preventative nuclear war and the only passage that Hedges could be referring to in my work (“The End of Faith,” pages 128-129). I have taken the liberty of emphasizing some of the words that Hedges chose to ignore:

It should be of particular concern to us that the beliefs of Muslims pose a special problem for nuclear deterrence. There is little possibility of our having a cold war with an Islamist regime armed with long-range nuclear weapons. A cold war requires that the parties be mutually deterred by the threat of death. Notions of martyrdom and jihad run roughshod over the logic that allowed the United States and the Soviet Union to pass half a century perched, more or less stably, on the brink of Armageddon. What will we do if an Islamist regime, which grows dewy-eyed at the mere mention of paradise, ever acquires long-range nuclear weaponry? If history is any guide, we will not be sure about where the offending warheads are or what their state of readiness is, and so we will be unable to rely on targeted, conventional weapons to destroy them. In such a situation, the only thing likely to ensure our survival may be a nuclear first strike of our own. Needless to say, this would be an unthinkable crime—as it would kill tens of millions of innocent civilians in a single day—but it may be the only course of action available to us, given what Islamists believe. How would such an unconscionable act of self-defense be perceived by the rest of the Muslim world? It would likely be seen as the first incursion of a genocidal crusade. The horrible irony here is that seeing could make it so: this very perception could plunge us into a state of hot war with any Muslim state that had the capacity to pose a nuclear threat of its own. All of this is perfectly insane, of course: I have just described a plausible scenario in which much of the world’s population could be annihilated on account of religious ideas that belong on the same shelf with Batman, the philosopher’s stone, and unicorns. That it would be a horrible absurdity for so many of us to die for the sake of myth does not mean, however, that it could not happen. Indeed, given the immunity to all reasonable intrusions that faith enjoys in our discourse, a catastrophe of this sort seems increasingly likely. We must come to terms with the possibility that men who are every bit as zealous to die as the nineteen hijackers may one day get their hands on long-range nuclear weaponry. The Muslim world in particular must anticipate this possibility and find some way to prevent it. Given the steady proliferation of technology, it is safe to say that time is not on our side.

I will let the reader judge whether this award-winning journalist has represented my views fairly.

I hope Truthdig readers appreciate the irony here. In his latest fever dream of an essay, Hedges declares that Christopher Hitchens and I (along with our pals on the Christian right) are incapable of “nuance.” Amazing. Nuance is really what one hopes Hedges would discover once in his life—if for no other reason than it would leave him with nothing left to say.

I don’t think I have ever met anyone so determined to live as a Freudian case study: To read any page of Hedges’ is to witness the full catastrophe of public self-deception. He rages (and rages) about the anger and intolerance of others; he accuses his opponents of being “immune to critiques based on reason, fact and logic” in prose so bloated with emotion and insult, and so barren of argument, that every essay reads like a hoax text meant to embarrass the humanities. A person with this little self-awareness should be given a mirror—or an intervention—never a blog.

An editorial (rather than psychoanalytic) note: Hedges claims that I “abrogate the right to exterminate all who do not conform” to my rigid view of the world. I’m afraid this is true. I do, as it turns out, abrogate that right. But Hedges surely means to say that I “arrogate” it. Advice for future skirmishes, Chris: When you are going to insult your opponents by calling them “ignoramuses” who “cannot afford complexity,” or disparage them for being incapable of “intellectual and scientific rigor,” it is best to know the meanings of the words you use. Not all the words, perhaps—just those you grope for when calling someone a genocidal maniac.

Leaving no canard unemployed, Hedges accuses me of being a racist—again. In truth, he has raised the ante somewhat: My criticism of Islam is now “racist filth.” It is tempting to own up to this charge just to see the uncomprehending look on his face: “You know, after a lot of additional study and soul-searching, I realized that you are right: My contention that the doctrines of martyrdom and jihad are integral to Islam, and dangerous, is really nothing more than racist filth. Sorry about that.”

However, the response I offered years ago still seems in order:

Some critics of my work have claimed that my critique of Islam is “racist.” This charge is almost too silly to merit a response. But, as prominent writers can sometimes be this silly, here goes:

My analysis of religion in general, and of Islam in particular, focuses on what I consider to be bad ideas, held for bad reasons, leading to bad behavior. My antipathy toward Islam—which is, in truth, difficult to exaggerate—applies to ideas, not to people, and certainly not to the color of a person’s skin. My criticism of the logical and behavioral consequences of certain ideas (e.g. martyrdom, jihad, honor, etc.) impugns white converts to Islam—like Adam Gadahn—every bit as much as Arabs like Ayman al-Zawahiri. I am also in the habit of making invidious comparisons between Islam and other religions, like Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism. Must I point out that most Hindus, Buddhists, and Jains are not white like me? One would hope there would be no such need—but the work of writers like Chris Hedges suggests that the need is pressing.

As I regularly emphasize when discussing Islam, no one is suffering under the doctrine of Islam more than Muslims are—particularly Muslim women. Those who object to any attack upon the religion of Islam as “racist” or as a symptom of “Islamophobia” display a nauseating insensitivity to the subjugation of women throughout the Muslim world. At this moment, millions of women and girls have been abandoned to illiteracy, forced marriage, and lives of slavery and abuse under the guise of “multiculturalism” and “religious sensitivity.” This is a crime to which every apologist for Islam is now an accomplice.

I have participated in many debates over the years and engaged many of my critics. In fact, I once debated Hedges at a benefit for Truthdig. You can watch our exchange here. I am happy to say that these encounters are usually very pleasant—for even when they grow prickly on the stage, the exchange in the green room is generally quite warm. My meeting with Hedges was a notable exception. In fact, Hedges is the one person I have told event organizers that I will not appear with again for any reason—which is a pity, because his inability to present or follow an argument makes everything one says sound incisive. The man is not only wrong in his convictions, but dishonest—and determined to remain so. I trust this is a consequence of his most conspicuous quality as a person: sanctimony. There is a main vein of sanctimony in this universe, and it appears to run directly through the brain of Chris Hedges. He has staked his claim to it and will follow it wherever it leads. The results can be seen weekly on this page. And I’m sorry to say that this is why I stopped writing for Truthdig years ago.

Christian Terrorism and Islamophobia: by   Sam Harris

At certain points near the extremity of human evil it becomes difficult, and perhaps pointless, to make ethical distinctions. However, I cannot shake the feeling that detonating a large bomb in the center of a peaceful city with the intent of killing vast numbers of innocent people was the lesser of Anders Behring Breivik’s transgressions last week. It seems to me that it required greater malice, and even less humanity, to have intended this atrocity to be a mere diversion, so that he could then commit nearly one hundred separate murders on the tiny Island of Utoya later in the day.

And just when one thought the human mind could grow no more depraved, one learns details like the following:

After killing several people on one part of the island, he went to the other, and, dressed in his police uniform, calmly convinced the children huddled there that he meant to save them. When they emerged into the open, he fired again and again. (“For Young Campers, Island Turned Into Fatal Trap.” The New York Times, July 23, 2011)

Other unsettling facts will surely surface in the coming weeks. Some might even be vaguely exculpatory. Is Breivik mentally ill? Judging from his behavior, it is difficult to imagine a definition of “sanity” that could contain him.

It has been widely reported that Breivik is a “Christian fundamentalist.” Having read parts of his 1500-page manifesto (2083: A European Declaration of Independence), I must say that I have my doubts. These do not appear to be the ruminations of an especially committed Christian:

 

I’m not going to pretend I’m a very religious person as that would be a lie. I’ve always been very pragmatic and influenced by my secular surroundings and environment. In the past, I remember I used to think;

“Religion is a crutch for weak people. What is the point in believing in a higher power if you have confidence in yourself!? Pathetic.”

Perhaps this is true for many cases. Religion is a crutch for many weak people and many embrace religion for self serving reasons as a source for drawing mental strength (to feed their weak emotional state f example during illness, death, poverty etc.). Since I am not a hypocrite, I’ll say directly that this is my agenda as well. However, I have not yet felt the need to ask God for strength, yet… But I’m pretty sure I will pray to God as I’m rushing through my city, guns blazing, with 100 armed system protectors pursuing me with the intention to stop and/or kill. I know there is a 80%+ chance I am going to die during the operation as I have no intention to surrender to them until I have completed all three primary objectives AND the bonus mission. When I initiate (providing I haven’t been apprehended before then), there is a 70% chance that I will complete the first objective, 40% for the second, 20% for the third and less than 5% chance that I will be able to complete the bonus mission. It is likely that I will pray to God for strength at one point during that operation, as I think most people in that situation would….If praying will act as an additional mental boost/soothing it is the pragmatical thing to do. I guess I will find out… If there is a God I will be allowed to enter heaven as all other martyrs for the Church in the past. (p. 1344)

As I have only read parts of this document, I cannot say whether signs of a deeper religious motive appear elsewhere in it. Nevertheless, the above passages would seem to undermine any claim that Breivik is a Christian fundamentalist in the usual sense. What cannot be doubted, however, is that Breivik’s explicit goal was to punish European liberals for their timidity in the face of Islam.

I have written a fair amount about the threat that Islam poses to open societies, but I am happy to say that Breivik appears never to have heard of me. He has, however, digested the opinions of many writers who share my general concerns—Theodore Dalrymple, Robert D. Kaplan, Lee Harris, Ibn Warraq, Bernard Lewis, Andrew Bostom, Robert Spencer, Walid Shoebat, Daniel Pipes, Bat Ye’or, Mark Steyn, Samuel Huntington, et al. He even singles out my friend and colleague Ayaan Hirsi Ali for special praise, repeatedly quoting a blogger who thinks she deserves a Nobel Peace Prize. With a friend like Breivik, one will never want for enemies.

One can only hope that the horror and outrage provoked by Breivik’s behavior will temper the growing enthusiasm for right-wing, racist nationalism in Europe. However, one now fears the swing of another pendulum: We are bound to hear a lot of deluded talk about the dangers of “Islamophobia” and about the need to address the threat of “terrorism” in purely generic terms.

The emergence of “Christian” terrorism in Europe does absolutely nothing to diminish or simplify the problem of Islam—its repression of women, its hostility toward free speech, and its all-too-facile and frequent resort to threats and violence. Islam remains the most retrograde and ill-behaved religion on earth. And the final irony of Breivik’s despicable life is that he has made that truth even more difficult to speak about.

By Sam Harris / The blog

An 8 year-old boy was hanged by militants in Afghanistan's Helmand province after the boy's father -- a police officer in the southern city of Gereshk -- refused to comply with militants' demands to provide them with a police vehicle, officials said.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai condemned the hanging, saying "this action is not permitted in any culture or any religions," according to a statement Sunday, which provided details of the incident.

Karzai said he has ordered local authorities to root out the militants and arrest them "as soon as possible."

The boy was kidnapped Friday. It was unclear when he was killed.

 Philosophy is questions that may never be answered. Religion is answers that may never be questioned.

Neuroscientist David Eagleman says many very reasonable things and says them well. Unfortunately, on the subject of religion he appears to make a conscious effort to play the good cop to the bad cop of “the new atheism.” This posture will win him many friends, but it is intellectually dishonest. When one reads between the lines—or even when one just reads the lines—it becomes clear that what Eagleman is saying is every bit as deflationary as anything Dawkins, Dennett, Hitchens or I say about the cherished doctrines of the faithful. ~ Sam Harris

KABUL – In any other country, the sight of a group of women holding colorful placards, marching and protesting is commonplace.
But not in Afghanistan.
In fact, a women’s protest on the streets of Kabul on Thursday was the first of its kind.
On a hot, muggy day, about 30 women of all ages mustered up the courage to speak up against the age-old indignity of sexual harassment by men.
With banners that read "This street also belongs to me" and "We won't stand insults anymore,” they marched with a confident stride from Kabul University to the Afghan Human Rights Institute.

Women in Afghanistan face intimidation and sexual assault on a daily basis. In the most extreme cases, schoolgirls have been terrorized by men throwing acid at them as they walked to school.

Baby-faced children aim AK-47 rifles as they train for war on British troops. They are being taught about combat even if they can barely hold the lethal weapons.Shocking video shows toddlers as young as five being trained as 'martyrs' at a secret al-Qaeda camp. They are learning how to blow up buildings and mount roadside bomb attacks.British commanders in Afghanistan say Taliban fighters are increasingly using children as suicide bombers and as human shields during battles.

The film is written and directed by Matthew Chapman, an outspoken atheist who says it's Hollywood’s first offering to feature an openly atheist hero in a story about religious conflict. His mission is to help create a more positive image for atheism, which he says is often misunderstood and maligned, for audiences who may otherwise not be exposed to it.
“My hope was to make an emotional appeal,” says. He hopes it’s a “Brokeback Mountain” moment for nonbelievers.
Nominated for best drama at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival, "The Ledge" stars Terrence Howard, Liv Tyler, Charlie Hunnam and Patrick Wilson. Despite the all-star cast, one big question around the film is simply whether American audiences will go to an atheist-themed move.
The film is also available via the website SundanceNow.

Honesty: The Muslim World’s Scarcest Resource? ~ by Sam Harris

The Congressmen rejected this description of the Qur’an as “absurd, ridiculous and untrue”—the result of taking certain passages “out of context.” When Maher asked how jihadists can justify their actions by reading these same passages in context, Ellison claimed that jihadists do nothing of the sort. Rather, they think in terms of “political grievances,” not religious doctrine, and those who oppose them have the true doctrine of Islam on their side.

It is not my purpose to defend the House hearing on American Muslims (which I did not get a chance to watch). But it is growing increasingly disconcerting to see moderate Muslims reflexively lie about the tenets of their faith. Of course, it’s hard to know whether Ellison was actually lying or is merely unaware of the contents of the Qur’an. But I have witnessed too many of these exchanges with Muslim apologists, both in public and private, to ignore the general trend. Who will reform Islam if moderate Muslims refuse to speak honestly about the very doctrines in need of reform?

Here is the section of The End of Faith that Maher was referring to, in which I provide five pages of quotations from the Qur’an. Please know that these are not the only passages of this kind in the text. I simply broke off the litany of sacred hatred once I felt I had proved my point. Even worse passages appear later in the book (in chapters 8 and 9, for instance).

(from The End of Faith, pp. 117-123)

Open the Koran, which is perfect in its every syllable, and simply read it with the eyes of faith. You will see how little compassion need be wasted on those whom God himself is in the process of “mocking,” “cursing,” “shaming,” “punishing,” “scourging,” “judging,” “burning,” “annihilating,” “not forgiving,” and “not reprieving.” God, who is infinitely wise, has cursed the infidels with their doubts. He prolongs their life and prosperity so that they may continue heaping sin upon sin and all the more richly deserve the torments that await them beyond the grave. In this light, the people who died on September 11 were nothing more than fuel for the eternal fires of God’s justice. To convey the relentlessness with which unbelievers are vilified in the text of the Koran, I provide a long compilation of quotations below, in order of their appearance in the text. This is what the Creator of the universe apparently has on his mind (when he is not fussing with gravitational constants and atomic weights):

“It is the same whether or not you forewarn them [the unbelievers], they will have no faith” (2:6). “God will mock them and keep them long in sin, blundering blindly along” (2:15). A fire “whose fuel is men and stones” awaits them (2:24). They will be “rewarded with disgrace in this world and with grievous punishment on the Day of Resurrection” (2:85). “God’s curse be upon the infidels!” (2:89). “They have incurred God’s most inexorable wrath. An ignominious punishment awaits [them]” (2:90). “God is the enemy of the unbelievers” (2:98). “The unbelievers among the People of the Book [Christians and Jews], and the pagans, resent that any blessing should have been sent down to you from your Lord” (2:105). “They shall be held up to shame in this world and sternly punished in the hereafter” (2:114). “Those to whom We [God] have given the Book, and who read it as it ought to be read, truly believe in it; those that deny it shall assuredly be lost” (2:122). “[We] shall let them live awhile, and then shall drag them to the scourge of the Fire. Evil shall be their fate” (2:126). “The East and the West are God’s. He guides whom He will to a straight path” (2:142). “Do not say that those slain in the cause of God are dead. They are alive, but you are not aware of them” (2:154). “But the infidels who die unbelievers shall incur the curse of God, the angels, and all men. Under it they shall remain for ever; their punishment shall not be lightened, nor shall they be reprieved” (2:162). “They shall sigh with remorse, but shall never come out of the Fire” (2:168). “The unbelievers are like beasts which, call out to them as one may, can hear nothing but a shout and a cry. Deaf, dumb, and blind, they understand nothing” (2:172). “Theirs shall be a woeful punishment” (2:175). “How steadfastly they seek the Fire! That is because God has revealed the Book with truth; those that disagree about it are in extreme schism” (2:176). “Slay them wherever you find them. Drive them out of the places from which they drove you. Idolatry is worse than carnage. . . . [I]f they attack you put them to the sword. Thus shall the unbelievers be rewarded: but if they desist, God is forgiving and merciful. Fight against them until idolatry is no more and God’s religion reigns supreme. But if they desist, fight none except the evil-doers”(2:190–93). “Fighting is obligatory for you, much as you dislike it. But you may hate a thing although it is good for you, and love a thing although it is bad for you. God knows, but you know not” (2:216). “They will not cease to fight against you until they force you to renounce your faith—if they are able. But whoever of you recants and dies an unbeliever, his works shall come to nothing in this world and in the world to come. Such men shall be the tenants of Hell, wherein they shall abide forever. Those that have embraced the Faith, and those that have fled their land and fought for the cause of God, may hope for God’s mercy” (2:217–18). “God does not guide the evil-doers” (2:258). “God does not guide the unbelievers” (2:264). “The evil-doers shall have none to help them” (2:270). “God gives guidance to whom He will” (2:272).

“Those that deny God’s revelations shall be sternly punished; God is mighty and capable of revenge” (3:5). “As for the unbelievers, neither their riches nor their children will in the least save them from God’s judgment. They shall become fuel for the Fire” (3:10). “Say to the unbelievers: ‘You shall be overthrown and driven into Hell—an evil resting place!’” (3:12). “The only true faith in God’s sight is Islam. . . . He that denies God’s revelations should know that swift is God’s reckoning” (3:19). “Let the believers not make friends with infidels in preference to the faithful—he that does this has nothing to hope for from God—except in self-defense” (3:28). “Believers, do not make friends with any but your own people. They will spare no pains to corrupt you. They desire nothing but your ruin. Their hatred is evident from what they utter with their mouths, but greater is the hatred which their breasts conceal” (3:118). “If you have suffered a defeat, so did the enemy. We alternate these vicissitudes among mankind so that God may know the true believers and choose martyrs from among you (God does not love the evil-doers); and that God may test the faithful and annihilate the infidels” (3:140). “Believers, if you yield to the infidels they will drag you back to unbelief and you will return headlong to perdition. . . . We will put terror into the hearts of the unbelievers. . . . The Fire shall be their home” (3:149–51). “Believers, do not follow the example of the infidels, who say of their brothers when they meet death abroad or in battle: ‘Had they stayed with us they would not have died, nor would they have been killed.’ God will cause them to regret their words. . . . If you should die or be slain in the cause of God, God’s forgiveness and His mercy would surely be better than all the riches they amass” (3:156). “Never think that those who were slain in the cause of God are dead. They are alive, and well provided for by their Lord; pleased with His gifts and rejoicing that those they left behind, who have not yet joined them, have nothing to fear or to regret; rejoicing in God’s grace and bounty. God will not deny the faithful their reward” (3:169). “Let not the unbelievers think that We prolong their days for their own good. We give them respite only so that they may commit more grievous sins. Shameful punishment awaits them” (3:178). “Those that suffered persecution for My sake and fought and were slain: I shall forgive them their sins and admit them to gardens watered by running streams, as a reward from God; God holds the richest recompense. Do not be deceived by the fortunes of the unbelievers in the land. Their prosperity is brief. Hell shall be their home, a dismal resting place” (3:195–96).

“God has cursed them in their unbelief” (4:46). “God will not forgive those who serve other gods besides Him; but He will forgive whom He will for other sins. He that serves other gods besides God is guilty of a heinous sin. . . . Consider those to whom a portion of the Scriptures was given. They believe in idols and false gods and say of the infidels: ‘These are better guided than the believers’” (4:50–51). “Those that deny Our revelation We will burn in fire. No sooner will their skins be consumed than We shall give them other skins, so that they may truly taste the scourge. God is mighty and wise” (4:55–56).

“Believers, do not seek the friendship of the infidels and those who were given the Book before you, who have made of your religion a jest and a pastime” (5:57). “That which is revealed to you from your Lord will surely increase the wickedness and unbelief of many among them. We have stirred among them enmity and hatred, which will endure till the Day of Resurrection” (5:65). “God does not guide the unbelievers” (5:67). “That which is revealed to you from your Lord will surely increase the wickedness and unbelief of many among them. But do not grieve for the unbelievers” (5:69). “You see many among them making friends with unbelievers. Evil is that to which their souls prompt them. They have incurred the wrath of God and shall endure eternal torment. . . . You will find that the most implacable of men in their enmity to the faithful are the Jews and the pagans, and that the nearest in affection to them are those who say: ‘We are Christians’” (5:80–82). “[T]hose that disbelieve and deny Our revelations shall become the inmates of Hell” (5:86).

“[T]hey deny the truth when it is declared to them: but they shall learn the consequences of their scorn” (6:5). “We had made them more powerful in the land than yourselves [the Meccans], sent down for them abundant water from the sky and gave them rivers that rolled at their feet. Yet because they sinned We destroyed them all and raised up other generations after them. If We sent down to you a Book inscribed on real parchment and they touched it with their own hands, the unbelievers would still assert: ‘This is but plain sorcery.’ They ask: ‘Why has no angel been sent down to him [Muhammad]?’ If We had sent down an angel, their fate would have been sealed and they would have never been reprieved” (6:5–8). “Who is more wicked than the man who invents falsehoods about God or denies His revelations?” (6:21). “Some of them listen to you. But We have cast veils over their hearts and made them hard of hearing lest they understand your words. They will believe in none of Our signs, even if they see them one and all. When they come to argue with you the unbelievers say: ‘This is nothing but old fictitious tales.’ They forbid it and depart from it. They ruin none but themselves, though they do not perceive it. If you could see them when they are set before the Fire! They will say: ‘Would that we could return! Then we would not deny the revelations of our Lord and would be true believers’ (6:23–27). “But if they were sent back, they would return to that which they have been forbidden. They are liars all” (6:29). “Had God pleased He would have given them guidance, one and all” (6:35). “Deaf and dumb are those that deny Our revelations: they blunder about in darkness. God confounds whom He will, and guides to a straight path whom He pleases.” (6:39) “[T]heir hearts were hardened, and Satan made their deeds seem fair to them. And when they had clean forgotten Our admonition We granted them all that they desired; but just as they were rejoicing in what they were given, We suddenly smote them and they were plunged into utter despair. Thus were the evil-doers annihilated. Praise be to God, Lord of the Universe!” (6:43–45). “[T]hose that deny Our revelations shall be punished for their misdeeds” (6:49). “Such are those that are damned by their own sins. They shall drink scalding water and be sternly punished for their unbelief” (6:70). “Could you but see the wrongdoers when death overwhelms them! With hands out-stretched, the angels will say: ‘Yield up your souls. You shall be rewarded with the scourge of shame this day, for you have said of God what is untrue and scorned His revelations” (6:93). “Avoid the pagans. Had God pleased, they would not have worshipped idols. . . . We will turn away their hearts and eyes from the Truth since they refused to believe in it at first. We will let them blunder about in their wrongdoing. If We sent the angels down to them, and caused the dead to speak to them, . . . and ranged all things in front of them, they would still not believe, unless God willed otherwise. . . . Thus have We assigned for every prophet an enemy: the devils among men and jinn, who inspire each other with vain and varnished false- hoods. But had your Lord pleased, they would not have done so. Therefore leave them to their own inventions, so that the hearts of those who have no faith in the life to come may be inclined to what they say and, being pleased, persist in their sinful ways” (6:107–12). “The devils will teach their votaries to argue with you. If you obey them you shall yourselves become idolaters. . . . God will humiliate the transgressors and mete out to them a grievous punishment for their scheming” (6:121–25). “If God wills to guide a man, He opens his bosom to Islam. But if he pleases to confound him, He makes his bosom small and narrow as though he were climbing up to heaven. Thus shall God lay the scourge on the unbelievers” (6:125).

Yes, the Bible contains its own sadistic lunacy—but the above quotations can be fairly said to convey the central message of the Qur’an—and of Islam at nearly every moment in its history. The Qur’an does not contain anything like a Sermon on the Mount. Nor is it a vast and self-contradictory book like the Old Testament, in which whole sections (like Leviticus and Deuteronomy) can be easily ignored and forgotten. The result is a unified message of triumphalism, otherworldliness, and religious hatred that has become a problem for the entire world. And the world still waits for moderate Muslims to speak honestly about it.

Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins discuss Who Says Science has Nothing to Say About Morality? Taped at The Sheldonian Theatre University of Oxford April 12th 2011 by ClearStory Ltd. Registered in England and Wales: Number 7467 151 Registered Office: 3/4 Great Marlborough St, London W1V 2AR

My favorite Sam Harris speech. It's from 05, but certainly relevant today. This is a good one. The religious community may find it inflammatory. But if  my religious  friends do here on Newsvine, I would love to hear why. Regardless, I hope  eveyone's chimes in with an opinion. I'm not trying to change minds, I'm just convinced if I enjoy Sam Harris' speeches, you just might too.

A great speech by Neuroscientist and best selling  Author of The End of Faith,  Sam Harris. Please watch and tell me what you think. I think Mr. Harris is dead on!

  I'm on the left, especially when it comes to  equality. So is Hitchens.  People all over the world have it very, very hard. I never want to forget, take for granted or feel entitled to the fortunes and freedoms I have, that many fought and died for.

the effects of jihad in recruiting brave Americans to the side of resistance.

If one were really cynical, it might be tempting to say: let the Islamists try to run the show and prove to the world that they are not up to the job. But as Iran has demonstrated, that would be irresponsible and cruel because it would condemn countless people to be used up in an experiment in failure. Moreover, theocratic systems do not blame themselves when their countries slide into civil war, poverty, and stagnation. Instead, they blame the machinations of Jews and Crusaders and export their uneducated but brainwashed young zealots to spread violence elsewhere.

Join famous atheist and prolific author Christopher Hitchens and the accomplished and controversial scholar Tariq Ramadan as they debate one of the most pertinent questions of our modern age.