The Age reports on the pressing issue of the growth of independent schools teaching from a faith-based curriculum in Australia. Presenting religious indoctrination in the Howard era clothing of “choice”, some such schools are teaching creationism in science classes and directly counteracting government efforts to provide sex education to students.
For example, the principal of one […]
Archive for the 'religion' Category
The Sydney Morning Herald and Catholic News tell us that judges and other members of the legal community in New South Wales recently participated in ‘Red Mass’, a European tradition in which members of the legal profession seek divine guidance for the courts.
The image of judges - wearing the robes which represent their role in […]
religion is in the inverse of…
12Dec07The always interesting Possum Comitatus has some analysis of voting trends and social factors at the last federal election. Tucked away in there are some very interesting graphs about religion and its correlation to several other variables (about half way down, look for “Update 2“).
In particular, two relationships stand out:
atheism is proportional to growth […]
no ape in 08: i !heart huckabee
06Dec07FYI, Mike Huckabee, potential Republican presidential candidate and by extension potential President of the United States, has this to say about creationism (and the fact that he believes in it):
If you want to believe that you and your family came from apes, that’s fine. I’ll accept that. I just don’t happen to think that I […]
There’s quite an interesting post here about this article in the LA Times, in which the Times’ religion reporter William Lobdell describes finding and then losing his faith in the process of reporting on the subject. He was initially attracted to Catholicism:
Meanwhile, Roman Catholicism, with its low-key evangelism and deep ritual, increasingly appealed to […]
The 2006 census has been published, and amongst many interesting trends, the figures show that people of “no religion” numbered 3.7 million at the time of the census - only 11,691 fewer than the number of Anglicans, and 18.7% of the population. In fact, if the different Christian denominations are treated separately, people of no […]
German officials have allegedly refused to grant the makers of a new film starring T. Cruise, Crazy Cult Member, access to historic military locations for the purposes of filming. The film is about a plot to assassinate Hitler, and the German military is concerned about the portrayal of important historical figures by a […]
Further to previous posts (one, two), here’s some great “Jesus with the little dinosaurs” art (thanks to KO):
Meanwhile Legal Eagle points to this article on the actual details of the legal battle in the Ham v Anti-Ham lawsuit.
it is more important to force raped women to have children than to stop murder and torture: god
15Jun07Those wacky funsters at the Vatican are at it again - this time they’re misrepresenting Amnesty’s new policy regarding abortion and instructing Catholics not to support the organisation. Amnesty’s position is that women who are pregnant as a result of rape or incest, or whose health is endangered by pregnancy, have the right to […]
You will recall our friend Ham, curator of the Creation “Museum”, from the story about dinosaurs with saddles - he who told us that T-Rex ate grass until “the fall” and other such nuggets of wisdom.
It seems that some of Ham’s former followers have decided to wrest back control of their (pre)destiny as an unthinking […]
The double standards on display in relation to this story are fascinating. A religious leader threatening members of the New South Wales parliament with holy consequences if they vote for a particular piece of legislation:
Catholic politicians who vote for this legislation must realise that their voting has consequences for their place in the life […]
You have probably heard about this by now: evangelical Christians will today open a “Creation Museum” (or, ‘moron magnet’, as this blog eloquently puts it) in the USA. Rather than being designed along the lines of a giant roach motel, as one might naturally assume, the ‘museum’ is actually dedicated to teaching people about […]
young americans
25May07This research is interesting - in a survey of American Muslims, the young are both more devout and more radical than those over 30. For instance, 60% of those in the 18-29 age group thought of themselves as “Muslim first” rather than “American first”, whereas only 41% of those in the 30+ age group said […]
This is an odd little piece of civil disobedience - the Little Mermaid statue in Copenhagen was draped in ‘Muslim dress’ and a headscarf.
Apparently a previous incident in which a Burqa was put on the statue was linked to disquiet about Turkey joining the European Union, and presumably by extension the fear of the influence […]
purity control
21May07You’ve no doubt seen the proposed question for the Australian cultural and ideological purity control test over the weekend: link here in case you haven’t.
Some of the questions are, as John Quiggan puts it, nothing but “Carmen Sandiego” questions like “Australia’s national flower is…”. It’s very hard to see what they have to do […]
