Tag Archives: fundamentalism

Religious Terror Attack in Australia had US connection

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In May of 2021, a man named Gareth Train began a correspondence with an American called Donald Day. Day is a premillennialist, a Christian sect that believes that Jesus will physically return to earth, ushering the end time. Day’s correspondence fed Train and his wife Stacey conspiratorial beliefs, including claims that the government is run by Satan and his minions.

When police were called last December the Train property for a routine welfare check on Gareth’s brother Nathan, two of the officers were gunned down in an ambush, with two other officers forced to flee for help. Nathan and Gareth then lit a grass fire in an effort to smoke the officers out, which prompted a neighbor, Alan Dare, to investigate. He was also shot and killed. The two men then posted an online video of themselves, claiming that “devils and demons” had attempted to kill them, but that they had struck first.

What followed was a tense six hour siege which ended with the death of all three suspects. In all, half a dozen people lost their lives, and all because of unhinged conspiracy theories. Now, police in the US have arrested Day for his connection in the shooting.

Premillennialism is mainly an American invention, and ever since the Covid-19, religious groups have been getting more extreme. The toxic combination of Q Anon, MAGA supporters, and the slow decline of religion has created dangerously primed groups of believers that think the end times are just around the corner. When the stakes are risen so high, you can count on things turning violent.

Australia is has enacted strict gun control laws after a massacre that occurred in 1996. When 35 people were slaughtered, the government decided that it was time to enact stricter gun control laws. The results were a dramatic decrease in not only mass shootings, but also in accidental gun deaths as well. The conclusion from this three decades of reform is clear:

Removing large numbers of rapid-firing firearms from civilians may be an effective way of reducing mass shootings, firearm homicides and firearm suicides.

Following this tragedy, there may be more gun reforms on the way. Over 80% of Aussies think that gun laws are still too lenient. It’s almost as though the country wants to do something to stop these kinds of shootings. Isn’t that weird, America?

Day was arrested by the FBI as a result of his involvement in the shootings. How the rest of this plays out remains to be seen.

Taliban refuses to let women be rescued from Earthquake

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A few days ago, a terrible earthquake rocked Afghanistan. It measured 6.3 on the Richter scale, which did a tremendous amount of damage in a country already devastated by war.

Since the country is now run by the Taliban, rescue efforts were almost non existent, with the fundamentalist organization showing up to the effected areas hours after the quake.

“For two to three hours after the earthquake, there was no information or accurate news,” said Rashid Azimi, a local aid coordinator not connected to the Taliban government, adding that it was the local residents themselves who cried for help when no one else was available to support rescue efforts.

The quake happened during the afternoon, when the men were off tending to their daily chores. This meant that the majority of victims were almost exclusively women and children, who are forced to stay inside the home and away from the prying eyes of others. To make matters worse, when people attempted to help those trapped under the rubble, they were greeted by armed Taliban soldiers that forbade them from helping, since strange men are not allowed to touch any women:

According to Maryam, it was not difficult for the local people to save the women, but some armed Taliban were there who were not allowing them to go near the women…the Taliban did not allow women to visit these areas for the first two or three days of the earthquake so that men and women could not gather there.

So to recap, the corrupt and pathetic Afghani theocratic government was not only terribly slow to react to a disaster, they also actively prevented women and children from being saved, and they hurriedly buried the bodies without ceremony so that the whole incident could be quickly forgotten.

The reaction from Western governments has been mixed. While there are attempts to help the victims, it’s believed that any aid sent to the country would most likely be appropriated by the Taliban, and its doubtful that any would make their way to those in need. The country is already under heavy sanctions, which has aggravated the situation. The truth is that very little can be done, so long as religious tyrants continue to exert their theocratic control. I don’t foresee this changing anytime soon.

Bangladeshi atheist blogger on the run

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Islam has to be the most insecure faith in the world. Ever since it’s invention, a strange mixture of religious plagiarism and local superstition, believers have had a murderous hatred of anyone that choose to abandon it. Christianity has long since abandoned the physical component of crusades, but Islam simply cannot transition away from this tradition. Any threat made against someone must be taken seriously. Salman Rushdie learned recently that one must always remain vigilant, as the murderous intent of the faithful never fades.

Rushdie is not the only target of Islamic ire. The perpetual and disturbing harassment of atheist blogger Asad Noor has forced the Bangladeshi man to flee to India after a number of threats to his life were made. He was being harassed not only by locals, but also by his own religious government, who appears to want to put him behind bars for blasphemy:

The local police raided the blogger’s house in Amtali village in the southern Barguna district in the dead of night on 14-15 July 2020, hounding his parents when they couldn’t find him. Police raided their house again on 16 July. On 18 July in the early morning, the police raided the house again and detained Asad’s father, Tofazzal Hossain, his mother, Rabeya Begum, two younger sisters (one was minor), and two other relatives, without any formal charge or warrant. The local police kept the family members in detention for 40 hours before releasing them in the night of 19 July.

Noor now lives anonymously in India, no doubt looking over his shoulder in fear every day, wondering when some brainwashed maniac will strike either him or one of his family members. Muslim believers are upset that he has not only abandoned the faith, but dares to encourage others to do so. Two of his fellow countrymen, Bijoy Hossain Tanil and Farhan Choudhury, living in comfort in both Paris and the UK, have gained notoriety after they released (and subsequently deleted) social media videos calling on his execution. Since both live in countries which allow freedom of expression, they have not been jailed, though I would not be surprised if authorities now have them in their sites.

Personally, I believe that religiously motivated threats should be taken as seriously as school shootings. In fact, I would not be opposed to the deportation of anyone who encourage the murder of others, especially if these threats are religiously motivated. Keep in mind that religions are often also political organizations, and a call to action is akin to a declaration of war. People take religion as seriously as they take their patriotic duty, and so, despite being a free speech purist, I believe an exception must be made in the case of religion, where words carry with them the power to activate the zealotry of their flock.

The West cannot afford to remain complacent on the threat to civilization that Islam poses. So long as Muslim fundamentalists continue to threaten people, or openly attack them at peaceful venues, they will continue to be a threat to the values and ideals of a free and open society.

 

Lifewise Academy is a walking lawsuit

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If there’s one thing you have to give Evangelicals (and believe me, it’s only this one thing), you would have to admire their hustle. When it comes to shoving their religion down our throats, they are on a whole other level.

Take Lifewise Academy. Because of a law in Ohio called the “Released Time” which allows students to substitute their secular schooling for bouts of fundamentalist religious teachings, they have been allowed to operate with impunity for decades.

The rules of this “Release Time” are simple: so long as they are privately funded, and done outside of school property, they are allowed to bus children away off site to fill their little minds with whatever nonsense they want, so long as parents “consent” to it.

There are similar laws in other states, such as Illinois, and it’s clear that these are attempts by religious organizations to use public funding to promote their faiths. That’s why the law was successfully challenged in the 40’s Illinois by a woman named Vashti McCollum, whose son had been forced to attend one of these special classes, with predictable results:

James – the only student in his class not participating in the religion class – was subsequently pressured by his teachers to conform, and his parents were pressured by school officials to permit him to join the religion classes to help James “get along.” The McCollums were angered at their son’s ostracism by his teachers, which included James’s being forced to sit alone in a hallway while the other pupils attended religion classes.

Sounds about right. Despite any assurance from these organizers that non-believers are not pressured or subjected to these views, we all know that this is untrue. There is no doubt that because it is promoted by schools that is violates the Establishment Clause of the Constitution. Not only that, but they espouse a political view of the world that can only be described as Christian Nationalism.

 

Who wants to fund a monument to ignorance?

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Remember last year when I put up Bible Stories on Kickstarter? I remember being nervous that I would have to live down the embarrassment of failing to attract enough potential buyers for the book. That’s why I tried to come up with a conservative estimate of how many people would buy it. Luckily, it ended up being a huge success (after an initial moment of sheer panic when we moved the campaign to Indiegogo). Unfortunately, funding is proving elusive to these clowns, who decided the best place to seek a million and a half dollars worth of funding for a Biblical themed animal reserve would be online. Called Hidden Ark, the only thing that seems to evade detection is any real interest on the part of the online community, but I digress.

The project – which has already begun – looks like the kind of epic boondoggle that is likely to lead to many bankruptcies, broken dreams, and a gigantic piece of construction slowly rotting in the sun. It could be that their sales pitch, mainly that donating to their stupid cause somehow proves God is real, isn’t striking the right chord online. Let’s face it: the Internet is dominated by non-believers. Sure, religious folks like to post up their garbage, but the problem is their nonsense gets drowned out in the sea of other similar bullshit. How can you tell whether Jesus, Zoroaster, or Buddha are the real deal if each one makes the same baseless claims?

After 2 weeks of solid campaigning, they’ve managed to wrangle an incredible $214 through 14 backers. With only 47 days to go, it means they only need to average around 31K a day in to achieve their goal. So doable! All they need to do is prove the story of Noah’s Ark – a tale ripped from the ancient Assyrians and Sumarians – actually happened, and I’m sure they’ll have no trouble convincing the rest of us the diversity of life on earth was preserved by a 500 year old drunk and his family.

(Update: The campaign ended up only raising 1k of the 2 million they needed)

Hypocrite child actor urges fan not to watch show

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I can’t stand TV sitcoms. Maybe it’s the fact their predictability is only surpassed by the insipidness of their jokes. Who knows. Generally speaking I tend to ignore the crap out of them and call it a day.

One of the chief perpetrator of nauseating trash on TV is the show Two and a Half Men. You might remember former star Charlie Sheen had a bit of a meltdown (give a junkie millions and watch what fun stuff he does), and was replaced with the even more obnoxious Ashton Kutcher. Now it seems another actor is drawing controversy.

Angus Jones, who plays the kid (well, now young adult) recently released a video about his religiosity, and apart from the regular tropes religious people can’t help but regurgitate, he also expressed remorse at his involvement with the TV show, which he called ‘Ungodly Filth’ due to its sex-heavy stories. He’s recently come out as a Seventh Day Adventist, and he urged his fan not to watch the show, lest the poor guy become corrupted by the message that sex is fun and awesome.

In case you were wondering what Seventh Day Adventists are all about (who can keep track of all these nutty religions?), they’re an offshoot of the Millerites, a Rapture-like movement who predicted the Second Coming of Jesus would occur between 1843 and 1844. When the prediction failed (something the Millerites called “The Great Disappointment”), most of the followers went back to their old congregations with their tails between their legs. A few decided that William Miller’s calculations of the Second Coming was something else entirely, and formed their own groups with different ways of justifying their total embarrassment in the face of reality.

The groups that eventually mutated into today’s modern Seventh Day Adventists focused on doctrinal differences with mainline Protestantism in 3 fundamental ways:

1) Immortality is conditional on belief in Jesus, who only grants you ever lasting life if he so chooses. Otherwise, you vanish into non-existence (no Hell)
2) Saturday is the day of rest, and not Sunday
3) Eat Kosher, and refrain from most of the fun stuff life has to offer

These former Millerites are all looking forward to the End Times and all that fun head chomping, wine-press full of blood shit fundamentalists are so fond of.

To recap, a kid who went to Christian schools his whole life (not a good sign or education) suddenly feels guilty that the 350k he makes per episode is leading to the moral decay of society; something he should actually be happy about, since this is but one of many supposed signs of the end times. Here’s an idea, pal: why don’t you quit the show, give all your money to charity, and sit on your roof waiting for your homicidal messiah to come down and kill all your enemies?

Religious whacko stabs husband because Jesus told her to

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A few days ago, I debated two religious dudes on a show called “Faith and Skepticism” (they might as well call the show oil and water considering how incompatible those two things are), and the one thing they couldn’t seem to grasp is the idea that “hearing the voice of God” is usually a sign of insanity. Obviously, the degree of this insanity can be measured by analyzing what is being communicated. If the little voice inside your head is telling you that you’re a good person and need to donate more money to whatever religious institution you’re part of, we would rank this as fairly low on the nut-job scale (though medical treatment should still be sought). If the voice tells you to stab your husband because Jesus and Mary told you he’s Satan spawn, you’ve probably reached the point where serious medication is your only “salvation”

A woman who allegedly stabbed her husband said she did it after, “Jesus and Mary told me to kill him because he is Satan’s spawn!” according to a police report… Horry County Police deputies were called to [Tammy] Estep’s residence at approximately 6:45 a.m. on the day of the incident. When they arrived, Estep told officers that “She was sent to save the world,” according to a police report.

What better way to save the world than by stabbing your partner repeatedly? My question is how long had she been over the deep end, and were there any other signs people ignored up until that point, convinced that her scary nonsense was just religious fervor. It’s kind of hard to tell sometimes, isn’t it? Yeah, that’s not a coincidence…

Fundy Road Trip!

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What do you get when you take a bunch of religious fundamentalists and take them on a tour of America while challenging their faith? Well, you get people even more determined to believe in silly bullshit while accusing everyone else of fabricating evidence of things they don’t understand. Worth a watch if you’ve got the 54 minutes of spare time to throw around.

Evolution is a lie because dogs have never been on the moon

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Truly there is no greater comedic bastion than Facebook. It’s the only place you can find such a high concentration of crazy outside of the Phelps compound. The combination of free expression and ignorance is a constant reminder that as a species, we still have a long way to go. Every once in a while, someone crafts an argument so brilliant, you just have to stand back in awe at the inspired mind that came up with it. This is not one of those:

Here we go. God created humans. God created angels to look after humans (guardian angels). Lucifer and many other didn’t want to look after that was inferior to them. They revolted, they fell. Today we call them demons. They have many forms and manifestations, including us. (We were made in God’s image. Hence He already knew He has to build a vessel in which He could put His soul into, Yeshua.) So you have these spirits, Lucifer and his crew influencing all kinds of events. Wars, murders, ect [sic] . Mind you humans are actually the one [sic] who do they [sic] work. They carry out the plan.

Why does Satan sound more like Danny Ocean? Idiots, can’t you see all of the evidence of God’s creation all around you already? Sure, giving God credit means you have to ignore all of the really unpleasant shit that incorporates nature (like parasites and viruses), but these were probably a product of gay marriage anyway (if they can cause a flood, surely they can cause all kinds of other disasters). And who is behind all of this confusion? Why, it’s Satan of course!

How many times have you done something because someone mentioned it to you. Doesn’t have to be anything bad per se, could be “Hey I like cheeseburgers. Wow I’ve never tasted those before that’s good!” Now Lucifer’s (Satan’s) plan is to convince people there is no God, that he himself doesn’t exist, and then when you die, you simply die. Everything God does, Satan does the complete opposite.

Shit, I’m confused. If he does the opposite of God, does that mean he tried to save all of those innocent Jews that God arbitrarily kills for not obeying his commands? If he’s such a thorn in God’s side, why isn’t Hell just a sweet alternative to Heaven? Playing dungeon keeper sure makes him seem more like a minion than a supreme lord of darkness, doesn’t it? Also, I want to eat a cheeseburger right now.

There are some false sciences being taught every day. Like evolution. The biggest lie ever told. There is no proof of it existing ANYWHERE. Proof of God? I’m glad you asked. It’s everywhere, just look animals, plants, HUMANS, by saying that we are a product of evolution is a) Blasphemy, b) you’re not giving yourself and intelligence enough credit. you ever see a dog make it to the moon? Oh by the way, your ancestor was a rock….Friends! I know I’ve been bold before, no ones[sic] perfect.

Dogs can’t go to the moon, therefore evolution is a lie. Take that, science!

But the message is simply this: if we continue to live the lives we’re living we will not be able to be born after we die here on Earth understand? We don’t get the keys to Heaven. Which is unlike anybody has any idea about. Unexplainable [sic]. Only two places, Heaven and Hell, both very real places. They will be just as physical! Hell simply is the furthest place from God, complete seperation [sic]. That heart breaking feeling after a break-up….It’ll be like that times 100, maybe worse. So here’s the point of this statement. It can clearly be found in the book of John, chapter 3 verse 16. Go look it up if you don’t know it!

That’s the “God so loved the world that he sent his son to have a really bad weekend for all of our sins” one that football fans are so proud of. Never mind how morally repulsive it is to think that a loving God solves all of his problems by killing something innocent; it’s not really a very impressive ‘sacrifice’ if the thing you kill doesn’t stay dead. This hell idea, the supposed place furthest away from this malevolent deity, is starting to sound more and more attractive, isn’t it?

CHRIST to OUR place on the cross. He said I’ll get us out of here and save us all. Without his resurrection, we’d be wasting our time. But he died AND came back. So, that alone makes it worth living and dying for him. Jesus loves you, no excuses.

Jesus loves you, but his Dad thinks you’re a gigantic piece of shit that deserves to be crucified for the things your imaginary ancestor did. What a swell guy! Can’t you feel his suffocating love surrounding you like a thick smog of poisonous gas?

Dr. Pepper ad upsets Christians

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My friends and loved ones will testify to my undying love of Dr. Pepper. I like the taste, I like the logo, and for a while, I even had a Dr. Pepper background on my x-box. You could say I was a little obsessed with the drink, to say the least.

Now I’m officially in love, considering the fact that the company’s new ad – featuring a monkey evolving into a man after having found a can of Dr. Pepper – has upset fundamentalist Christians every time someone doesn’t credit Jesus for everything in the Universe. The Facebook post is still generating discussion, with comments sitting somewhere in excess of 3k.

Much of the early discussion was dominated by a Christian troll by the name of Amy, who was filled with powerful gems of insight:

so all you people seem to think that moon has a gravity… have you been there, didn’t think so. just like your other theories. you were a human when you were born and you are still a human. Monkies [sic] stay monkies [sic]  humans stay humans. evolution is same if I claimed that an apple will in time turn in to a pineapple, but in fact it will just rot. think about that

If anyone didn’t get it before, i will never again drink dr. pepper. in fact i will go shoplift some and pour it on the ground, take that atheists. i did like it before but this is just wrong. the children will grow up to be stupid if they’re surrounded by this kind of media.

You’ll be happy to know the vast majority of the comments are actually making fun of these idiots and their inability to grasp reality. The Internet is, after all, dominated by Godless heathens like yourself. So, if you’re looking for a laugh, go read some of these comments yourself.

Did I mention this Amy chick also has a crazy website I’ll be making fun of in my next post?

FLDS Church sends ex-member kitten encased in concrete

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If you’re a religious fundie, odds are your level of respect for other living creatures not gifted with ‘a soul’ is not very high. Most fundamentalists see violence and cruelty towards animals as just a normal part of everyday life. God, in their deluded eyes, gave them total dominion over animals, and that means you can treat them like shit if you want.

How else can you explain this bit of cruelty? Ex FLDS member Isaac Wyler – who left cult leader Warren Jeffs’ little coven a number of years ago – woke up to find a kitten encased in concrete in his back yard. Still alive but terrified, the poor creature was buried to its neck, and left inside a metal tube in his back yard. The kitten was intended to be a warning for Isaac to stop speaking out against the church, and Warren Jeffs in particular. Jeffs is currently serving a life sentence for having forced himself on so many underage girls (the man took a page right out of Joseph Smith’s playbook), but he still appears to have enough power and connections in jail he’s even managed to stop all but 15 of his thousands of followers from having sex (well, I doubt the veracity of this claim, but I digress).

I’d like to tell you rescue workers were able to save the poor cat, but the trauma of being both encased and released from a concrete prison was too much for the little guy. The town sheriff, when made aware of this stunning bit of cruelty, simply laughed it off, and suggested ‘throwing dirt’ on the animal to fix the situation. The fact a police officer won’t take animal cruelty seriously (usually a sign of escalating violence) is itself a consequence of the level of religiosity of the town. What else do you expect, folks? Religion poisons everything, including police work!

Goat-Man wants you to have lots of babies

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So what do you do if your country is slowly accepting marriage equality, passing health care laws that disallow insurance companies from denying coverage, and even threatening to tax the rich? Why, you segregate yourself from society and form your own theocracy, that’s what!

In case you actually give a shit who this guy is, and why he has such a hideous/hypnotic beard, you should stop by his website, ChristianExodus.org. It’s a site dedicated to whackos seeking to retreat from a society they see as increasingly permissive and sinful. They’re pretty unhappy about the fact the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of The Affordable Health Care Act (colloquially known as ‘Obama Care’), and they’ve decided to secede from a democratic republic and want to form some ill-defined theocratic kingdom.

The initial goal was to move thousands of Christian constitutionalists to South Carolina to accelerate the return to self-government based upon Christian principles at the local and State level. This project continues to this day, with the ultimate goal of forming an independent Christian nation that will survive after the decline and fall of the financially and morally bankrupt American empire.

If this sounds mildly familiar, it’s because every single scary cult in history has tried to do the same thing (I think some of these psychos called themselves Puritans at one point). These particular psychos dislike government, contraception and women who talk back:

The desire that the Woman has for the Man is to usurp his God-given authority. In a similar way
that women seek to supplant male authority, sin seeks to seduce the hearts of men.

Wow ladies, sounds like a swell bunch of guys, eh? If you don’t think that’s enticing enough, you should watch the whole video of ‘goat-man’ and the plans he has for your uterus…

A lesson we can learn from David Albo

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Ladies, I know how frustrated, angry and terrified you are about the current “War on Contraception” that the Right is currently engaged in. You have every right to be, especially when it’s being framed not as a reproductive rights issue, but rather as a “religious freedom” issue.

The solution comes from an unlikely source: Virginia Rep. David Albo. In the above video, this moron describes his failure to bang his wife after watching the Rachel Maddow Show, which focused mainly on the very bill he had been debating the day before. Despite his best efforts to seduce her with wine and some soft music (what is this, an 80′s movie?), she refused him entry. Unbeknownst to her, Mrs. Albo has provided the perfect solution to this crisis: it’s time to get frigid, ladies.

This isn’t the first time the idea was suggested. In the Greek play Lysistrata, women use this tactic to stop their husbands from continuing to fight in the Peloponnesian War. Tired of not having any say in political matters, they decide to exercise the only power they do have over men: sex.

Now before you accuse me of being silly, I’d like to point out that sexual selection is one of the driving forces of evolution, and in most species, it’s the female that exerts this pressure. The reason for this is because of something called “Bateman’s Principle“. It basically states that the organism that has to expend the most resources will typically get to call the shots. Do you hear that ladies? Despite the fact that you’re the ones in our culture who does most of the “displaying” (i.e., doing more than simply wearing jogging pants all the time), you’re still the ones with the ability to determine who gets to pass on their genes, and who doesn’t.

On the big scale, this can have profound consequences. For some species, it means investing tremendous energy in totally arbitrary and sometimes deadly displays of physical health and prowess (why is the peacock’s feathers blue? Because the ladies like it that way). Our species needs a different focus now: we need humans to be more compassionate, understanding, kind, and thoughtful, all qualities that can breed true if women select the right mates.

In the short term, I think this tactic can be employed to silence men who use their power and influence to limit the rights of other human beings who don’t share their dangly parts. It has already worked to some degree; Republican lawmakers have announced plans to remove extremely controversial portions of their anti-women anti-abortion Bill.

Cindy Jacobs “mobilizing” thousands of morons to do nothing

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Mobilizing 10,000 people to pray! Wow, how amazing. Think of all the good you can do by sitting in a dark room and talking to yourself all day.

So, if you want God to interfere with human affairs (and apparently throw this whole “free will” idea out the window when it’s inconvenient), you just need to stop eating for several days, followed by imperceptibly mumbling to yourself. Sounds good to me!

“Imagine with me half a million people praying for a nation.”

Praying for what? The economy to recuperate? For the poor and indigent to finally get their due? Nope. She just wants to get rid of abortion and gay marriage. That’s the kind of priorities you can expect from someone who sits very still and begs their imaginary friend for shit they want.

Enroll at Angel University today!

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Did you know that each one of us has a non-denominational guardian angel that travels with us wherever we go? These same angels will help you overcome fear, doubt, and that lingering pile of money in your bank account, all thanks to Angel University. For the low price of a thousand smackeroos, you too can become a certified angel therapist. There’s no limit to your upward mobility once you learn the secrets of tricking gullible idiots out of their money, and what better way to do so than by enrolling today? Not convinced yet? Wait until you hear these powerful testimonials!

Before sleep, I call upon Archangel Jeremiel to join my magical night travels. He ushers in the dreams needed for healing, solution, and enlightenment. He keeps lower energies out and allows entrance to those for my highest good. If needed, Archangel Azreal and Archangel Jeremiel bring in passed over loved ones to generate healing. Supporting, encouraging, protecting and guiding me, Archangel Jeremiel delivers information that benefits my life’s journey. The Archangel of life review, Jeremiel will initiate past life dreams as opportunity for harmonizing ourselves and creating positive changes.

How useful! I used to have to learn things in fancy books, but now all I plan on doing is laying down in bed and waiting for one of these Archangels fellows to bring me all the information I need for my life “journey”.

The more you can focus on what it is you are grateful for, the more you can learn to ignore those things that you are not so grateful for. By tuning out these negative areas of our lives we are taking back our power from them. We are drawing our line in the sand and letting the world know that if they want to get through our wall, the way is through happiness not anger.

Just tune out your problems rather than facing them. Hey, if you’re going to embrace magical thinking, you’ve got to incorporate some kind of denial of reality in there somewhere, am I right?

At this point it would be far safer to say that it[ the power of prayer] is proven fact, rather than mere theory that prayer can and does have an enormous positive impact on our lives. Now you may have seen the results of a couple of studies on prayer that stated there was no effect at all, or worse that it even seemed to cause harm to the person who was praying. The fact of the matter is that there is a tremendous difference between cold mechanical prayer and real, devoted and heartfelt, praying. Just as in all other areas of our lives we cannot simply go at this halfheartedly and expect dramatic results.

At Angel University, unpleasant things like facts and statistics are replaced by simple platitudes. The power of prayer found not to work? It’s because everyone in the study was a robot! If prayer didn’t work, it was obviously because the people doing the praying didn’t care enough. Silly science: when will you learn that you can’t measure intangible things like love, anger, and (more importantly) stupidity?

(Update: The website is no longer operational)