The Front Pew

Muslim French Minister: "Women who wear burquas live in prison."

Sat, 19 Jul 2008 12:07:14 -0500

A Moroccan woman who wears a burqua was denied French citizenship last month. Now the country's Urban Affairs Minister Fadela Amara, herself a practicing Muslim, says she backs the decision. From the news story: The burqa is a prison, it's a straightjacket," Urban Affairs Minister Fadela Amara, herself a practising Muslim who was born in France to Algerian parents, said in an interview in Le Parisien newspaper yesterday. "It is not a religious insignia but the insignia of a totalitarian political project that advocates inequality between the sexes and which is totally devoid of democracy." -- I've been uncomfortable about the burqua question for many years -- but in the end it was a Muslim woman who brought me around to being full-bore against it. Many women in her family wore the burqua and she had become something of a black sheep for rejecting it and deciding to go to college and study science. She was speaking from experience -- not having idle coffee table chat about something she didn't understand. "But if you asked Muslim women who wear the burqua why, wouldn't they say it's out of sincere religious belief and that they choose it?" I asked her. "Shouldn't they be allowed to make that decision, even if we don't agree with it?" "Sure," she said. "They should be allowed to do whatever they like. But the truth that most of these women will never tell you is that they would be beaten by their fathers and brothers if they did not wear it. And the 'belief' that makes them wear it is that they are the property of their fathers and husbands, which is what they have been taught from birth. That is what you support when you say it is all right for women to wear the burqua." Bill Maher has a religious riff from his act of a few years ago that includes a bit about the burqua. It's in the below video and begins at about the 20 minutes 30 seconds point (some strong language): In brief, without strong language: if any religion tried to sell us on the idea that they had to keep their black men in burquas because, after all, that's just their culture -- we would lose our minds. It would be apartheid all over -- but without a viable separate but equal pretense. But when they tell us the women have to be covered in this manner...well, that's just their religion. You have to respect that. Where do you guys come down on it?

"The Only and Universal Smoker's Church of God"

Sat, 19 Jul 2008 11:39:07 -0500

A Dutch ban on tobacco smoking indoors has been a windfall for "The Only and Universal Smoker's Church of God," which now has Dutch citizens flocking to become "Holy Smokers" -- which could let them legally circumvent the law on religious grounds. From the piece in the Telegraph: Michiel Eijsbouts, founder and "Smokelighter" of the church he founded in 2001, has insisted that the Dutch smoking ban in place does not apply to members of his church under national and European human rights legislation. "We think we have all the marks of a religion," he said. "We will have to find out what the secular powers-that-be think. For us the constitution and European rules say we have the right to express our religion and we express our religion through smoking." --- The First Commandment: smoke 'em if you got 'em!

Christ = glow in the dark pickles!

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 15:30:22 -0500

Grandpa John demonstrates the power of Christ. Using pickles, electricity and what looks disturbingly like a miniature sex sling. Hard to argue with that. (Via Filled with Chocolate Pudding!)

Prison food is lousy. And such small portions...

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 11:43:25 -0500

If you're a Jewish prisoner in an Ohio prison, you can get a kosher meal. But not if you're a Messianic Jew. Leaving aside the obvious question of why people who are paying this much attention to their diet for fear of offending God are...you know...in prison...I think this is an interesting debate. Is it your belief in things like strict dietary guidelines that make them an essential part of your spiritual life, or what your religious leaders and texts say about them? For those who are confused: Messianic Jews are Jews who believe that Jesus (or Yeshua) is the Hebrew messiah but do not consider themselves Christians. They are not to be confused with Jews for Jesus, whose name is much funnier and who are allowed to eat bacon cheeseburgers.

Psychosis or the voice of God?

Thu, 17 Jul 2008 11:10:07 -0500

A man in New Zealand is claiming God ordered him to behead two women with a samurai sword. The story seems to indicate the man's changed his story a number of times -- but I guess my question is: what do you do if you think God really is telling you to kill people? If you're a devoted Christian who believes in a literal translation of the Bible then you'd know your crimes would be in line with the many atrocities The Lord Your God has either performed, sanctioned or demanded in the name of faith. Killing heretics (Deuteronomy 17:12), atheists and people of other religions (2 Chronicles 15:12-13), raping and killing women (Deuteronomy 22:20-21, Isaiah 13:15-18), children (Hosea 9:11-16, Ezekiel 9:5-7) and even your own offspring -- if the Bible is your touchstone on the voices you're hearing, you may believe you'd be asked to do any of these things. Indeed, if you've read your Bible and think you're getting messages, you may realize that many biblical heroes killed on God's orders and might think yourself doomed if you hesitate (Jeremiah 48:10). Some of this can be chalked up to the utter strangeness of the Old Testament, which many modern Christians dismiss in large chunks or almost entirely. But once you've taken an Old Testament-rooted fundamentalist line on one thing (homosexuality, sex outside of marriage, contraception, inter-faith marriage, the utter impossibility of non-Christians to enter the Kingdom of Heaven), where do you draw the line, shake your head and say some of this stuff is crazy? And if you begin to hear voices or see signs -- do you obey them as a good Christian or seek psychiatric help and chance burning in Hell for all eternity? Christians are hardly the only people who have to struggle with this question -- but it would seem to me that if this Christian guy in New Zealand did kill two women with a Samurai sword on God's orders, he'd have some biblical loopholes even if he has no legal ones.

Not the 'image' the church wants

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 16:16:14 -0500

Publisher of Mormon calendar featuring shirtless men excommunicated.

The aftermath of immigration raids

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 11:10:30 -0500

Gone were all but two members of the choir he had assembled over the years. Gone were all but one of the eight altar servers. Gone were the husbands from the weddings he had performed, and gone were the fathers of the children he had baptized.

Police say they were training to wage holy war

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 11:04:42 -0500

BEIJING (AP) | Police fatally shot five members of a purported radical Islamic separatist group in the far west of China as Beijing tightened security ahead of next month's Olympic Games, state media reported Wednesday. The suspects confessed they had all received training in waging a holy war, Xinhua reported.

Serenity prayer: Who wrote it

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 10:56:46 -0500

Generations of recovering alcoholics, soldiers, weary parents, exploited workers and just about anybody feeling beaten down by life have found solace in a short prayer that begins, "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change." But who really wrote it?

Yes, it's come to this

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 10:51:14 -0500

Bradley LaShawn Fowler, 39, of Canton, Michigan is seeking $60 million from Zondervan Publishers and another $10 million from Thomas Nelson Publishing in lawsuits flied in U.S. District Court of the Easton District of Michigan, reports the Grand Rapids Press. Fowler states that he's suing the two major Christian publishers for violating his constitutional rights and causing emotional pain, because the Bible versions they publish refer to homosexuality as a sin.

Crazy snake handling Christians may have the right idea

Sun, 13 Jul 2008 19:23:23 -0500

Authorities have seized more than 100 snakes, many of them deadly, from the home of a fundamentalist Christian pastor in Kentucky. Looks like the pastor was buying many of the deadly snakes online for between $50 and $450 a piece. Choice quote from the local zoo director: "You can purchase anything off the Internet except common sense ...A venomous snake isn't a pet. You don't play with it. If you do, you're an idiot." All this makes me wonder..is there some way we can convince complete religious zealots outside of Appalachia to stop shooting doctors, bombing clinics, beating up gay kids and flying planes into buildings and start handling poisonous snakes? For those of you not hip to Christian snake handling -- let Billy Ray Cyrus school you:

Possibly closing in on "Dr. Death"

Wed, 09 Jul 2008 11:30:03 -0500

The amount of the reward -- $495,000 -- floored me until I read this: "Heim, who would be 94, tops the center's list of most-wanted Nazi war criminals. A reward of $495,000 is being offered jointly by the center and the German and Austrian governments for information leading to his capture. Heim, known as "Dr. Death," was indicted in Germany on charges he murdered hundreds of inmates at Mauthausen concentration camp, where he was camp doctor. "His crimes are fully documented by himself, because he kept a log of the operations that he carried out," Zuroff said. "He tortured many inmates before he killed them at Mauthausen, and he used body parts of the people he killed as decorations."

Atheist sues military

Wed, 09 Jul 2008 11:09:08 -0500

Could it really be this bad for atheist soldiers? Jeremy Hall says the military has become a Christian organization. His sudden lack of faith, he told CNN, cost him his military career and put his life at risk. Hall said his life was threatened by other troops and the military assigned a full-time bodyguard to protect him out of fear for his safety.

Straight from the Dead Sea: Answers to your skin care needs

Wed, 09 Jul 2008 10:49:09 -0500

The press release (with editorial opinion in bold): "Until now, the skin-rejuvenating line could only be found in high end department stores (for some reason I'm thinking of the rich man, camel and needle parable) or on the AHAVA website; but now the elite products can be found in select Christian bookstores. "... no one has to be left behind (groan) when it comes to having stunning and youthful looking skin!"

Rains on the just and unjust?

Tue, 08 Jul 2008 16:56:05 -0500

The winner of a $57 million Mega Millions lottery jackpot in June is a registered sex offender who also pleaded guilty to two breaking and entering charges in the 1980s, according to Time Magazine. Fred Topous Jr., 45, was discharged from Michigan Department of Corrections supervision in October 2006. Topous said he planned to buy a house, send his children to college and have some fun with his winnings. He said he and his wife work multiple jobs to make ends meet and thought they'd have to work till they died. "I want to enjoy a little bit of life," Topous told state lottery officials. "We're plain folks. We've struggled all our lives."