Evolution Meme: Not The Evolution That Scares The Bejeebus Out Of Creationists

I was tagged by Stardust Musings to do the Evolution Meme. A good description of what I'm supposed to do can be found at Tangled Up In Blue:

The idea is that I list five old posts that I think are reflective of the evolution of this blog (which happens to be named Evolution, so this could get confusing). In addition, I am to “tag” (”meme?”) five other blogs and they must do the same thing else suffer the usual dire consequences.

1. This is my 498th post. My first post was my shortest post. As you could see, I had no direction or goals:

January 16, 2005
Now I have a blog

And my life hasn't changed one iota. I know I should give it some time, but I'm impatient when it comes to life changing experiences.
This might be my last post on this board. I'm getting bored already.

My blog was similar to the first life form on earth, a one celled creature, who if it could talk would have said: "What the hell am I doing here and what am I supposed to do now?"

I remember I was inspired to do the blog because I really liked what Elder of Ziyon was doing with his specialty blog.

2. I was getting something like 10 hits a day for quite a few months. I posted whenever I felt the urge, maybe 4 times a month for the first 8 months. Most of my posts were very in depth and pretty much a combination of trivial things along with the odd religious/atheist themed posts as well as a few Israeli conflict posts while I tried to maintain my phenomenal sense of humour. I think a post that pretty much stood out and foreshadowed my current style was one that didn't even receive one comment: EVERY RELIGION CAN'T BE RIGHT
Although I was way more respectful of religion than I appear to be now.

3. September of 05 I started doing NFL predictions. It committed me to do at least one post a week. I started getting more blog hits and this caused me to feel more obligated to post more. By November I was posting more than I do now. I started openly mocking religious belief more with ironic and very valid posts. I also created a Bacon and God comic strip as well. I like this particular post though as it reflected my blog back then: PRAYERS PAY THE SAME INSURANCE PREMIUMS

4. I was starting to attract regular visitors who commented on many of my posts, and I started becoming cognizant of playing to them (writing for them, in a good way). I noticed that I was being placed on many blogrolls, and I of course, reciprocated. But my big breakout post that put me on the map was when I simply linked a Penn and Teller video (it seems like ages a day as Youtube was either in its infancy or not even around). I had just learned how to embed videos, and I've embedded quite a few since. The post: PENN AND TELLER: THE BIBLE IS CRAPOLA wound up getting me a load of comments. I still get the odd one today even though it was posted April of last year. The post was linked by many, but Pharyngula's link wound up getting me an absolute ton. I remember getting around 8000 hits for 3 days.

5. I knew I had more readers, most of whom it seems were interested in (and still are) in atheism and layman's science (evolution and morality related) and religion satire and bashing. I did write a lot about Israel still, dropped the NFL picks, discussed the threat of Islam, usually in back to back to back posts. I found my readers weren't that interested in anti-semitism angle (which is why I think it is valid that Israel exists), so I decided to do a new blog called Judeophobe Watch where I could highlight discussions I've had online with anti-semites (Jew haters for the dictionary impaired).
Today, I like to post 2 to 3 times a week. I focus on layman's science, atheism, religious nonsense (including real history and absence of evidence), and I've started getting more into issues of separation of church and state.

Back in the spring I did a video that answers pretty much why I blog and I put it in this post: God Mysteriously Appears In My Latest Youtube Video


OK, now I must tag 5 bloggers. I'll warn you in advance. This post was harder than it looks.

Developing Your Web Presence
Simply Jews

Random Thoughts
Shlemazl
Gripes Of Wrath

The Atheist Jew Goes To Church

Here is the deal: I am friends with a Fundy couple. They know where I stand. They aren't really sure about where my wife stands though. Either was I. I'll get to that later.
The husband is a real handyman. He did a lot of unpaid work for me on my last car. He is retired, so he didn't seem to mind doing it. He did make a request. He and his wife wanted to bring my wife to church a few times as sort of a payback. My wife agreed, though I'm positive she was just being nice (occasionally she is nice).
She's put off going for a few months, and even I was starting to feel guilty about it. So when they phoned saying that their church (a small Calvary Baptist Church) had a guest who had just came back from spreading the Gospel in the Phillippines, and they really wanted her to go, I told my wife I would accompany her. So last night at 6:30 (I SACRIFICED watching the end of the 4:00 NFL football games), I was present for a good hour and a half of Gospel gobblygook.
There were less than 20 people attending the evening service (or whatever they call it). Apparently, they did a morning service too. Not sure how many showed up to that one. I found the people there to be nice, though I didn't get a chance to talk to them much.
The church minister (or whatever he is called) started things off. He told us that someones brother died in the morning, and that a couple of the church members were to sick to show up. He then did a few hymns, and everyone sang along...well except for me. Even my wife sang. Hey, I was a hypocrite too, both my wife and I donated a tooney each (a Canadian two dollar coin) to the donation plate.
Then the young guest preacher/minister from the US got his shot. He didn't win any points by humbly admitting that he had a grade 7 education (what a shocker!).
He was accompanied by 3 of his kids. They had talent. They could play multiple musical instruments. I especially enjoyed listening to the 10 year old girls piano playing. But mostly, all I could think of is how much brainwashing these kids have had in their short lifetimes.
OK. I have had a very strong feeling that Preacher dude knew he had an atheist Jew in the Pews. Why? He started talking about the Old Testament and Jews and how the NT "proved" that Jesus was the Messiah that the Jews were waiting for (something to do with Jesus being born in a manger and wearing whatever he supposedly was wearing). Was I little paranoid? Nope.
He then said that he was going to talk about "simple things" tonight because the church was really small in members, but THE LORD told him to change the sermon for tonight. It reminded me of the old saying "when you speak to God it is called praying, but when God speaks to you, it is called insanity."
When he started going into details about Cain and Abel, the only thing that crossed my mind is that the people who are buying into this are buying into a gory fairy tale, what is wrong with these people?
He started talking about the colour red, and how it is "proof" that the NT is better than The Farmer's Almanac when it comes to explaining everything around us.
You see, red represents Jesus' blood, and the "fact" that Jesus sacrificed himself for mankind. And he bled a lot. After Jesus, there was no need to sacrifice defenseless animals anymore.
Quick question: If God is perfect, why did he need humans to sacrifice animals to him? Sounds like he has a bit of an inferiority complex and needs assurance. Why would a perfect God need anything? And if he created man in his image, then why aren't we perfect. Like, what happened to my hair, and why can't I dunk a basketball?
Back to the colour red. Did you know that barns are red because God made red paint cheap to use for poor farmers so that they could remind us that Jesus and all the blood that he sacrificed started out in a manger? Or that Stop signs are red because God influenced man to make them red so that when we stop, we have time to reflect on Jesus and all the blood that he lost before he died? And fire hydrants are red, and they are shaped like a cross. See, the bible proves everything.
I was starting to think that this guy must have at least a grade 9 education to figure out all these things.
So he ended off by telling US that we now had no excuse not to believe. He must have repeated that three or four times near the end. And finally, he said, "I KNOW THAT THERE IS A SOUL IN HERE THAT HASN'T BEEN SAVED " I don't think God told him that, I think my friend clued him in. And he was wrong, there were two of us in the crowd.
Afterwards, we were invited to have some food, but we declined. My wife was exhausted from a bout of insomnia and preparing food for a friend's bridal shower earlier in the day. It was for the best, as I might not be able to keep my militant atheism in check much longer.

Back to my wife. She was an atheist long before I was one. But I just found that out. 17 years ago when I got married, I was pretty much agnostic. And prior to that outside of letting out my secret that I was an ethnic Jew, I didn't talk about beliefs, and I didn't care what my "dates" believed in either. If they liked me, I liked them.
I didn't even talk about my beliefs with my fiancee (now wife). Though she assumed (correctly) that we were to be married in a Jewish ceremony. Tradition was important to me at the time, with family and all. But I didn't ask her to convert, and that posed a bit of a problem because we had to find someone qualified to marry us traditionally. We found someone. Not sure if he called himself a rabbi or not, but his claim to fame was that he once married parrots (I kid you not).

I always assumed my wife was agnostic or perhaps a bit of a theist. I knew she grew up as an ethnic Christian. Just recently I asked her if I was an influence on her becoming an atheist (lately she has mentioned that she doesn't believe God exists). She surprised me by telling my she never believed in God. Never Ever.
Even as a little girl she remembers telling her girlfriends that she thought the bible stories were just that: stories. Though she did tell them that the points of many of the stories were important.

Maybe I should talk to her more, maybe I'll find out other things I didn't know about her:)

Are Clothes The Only Thing That Separates Union Workers From Monkeys?

From BBC News Science:

Monkeys have a sense of justice. They will protest if they see another monkey get paid more for the same task.

Monkeys display sense of justice Researchers taught brown capuchin monkeys to swap tokens for food. Usually they were happy to exchange this "money" for cucumber.

But if they saw another monkey getting a grape - a more-liked food - they took offense. Some refused to work, others took the food and refused to eat it.

Scientists say this work suggests that human's sense of justice is inherited and not a social construct......."We put pairs of capuchins side by side and one of them would get the cucumber as a reward for a task."

The partner sometimes got the same food reward but on other occasions got a grape, sometimes without even having to work for it."

'A highly unusual behaviour'

The response was dramatic, the researchers said.

"We were looking for a very objective reaction and we got one. They typically refused the task they were set," Sarah Brosnan said.

"The other half of the time they would complete the task but wouldn't take the reward. That is a highly unusual behaviour.

"Sometimes they ignored the reward, sometimes they took it and threw it down," she added.

Nature/Emory University The researchers were not surprised that the monkeys showed a sense of fairness, but they were taken aback that they would turn down an otherwise acceptable reward.

"They never showed a reaction against their partner, they never blamed them," Sarah Brosnan said.

Commenting on the results, experts in the subject told BBC News Online that the idea of a long evolutionary history for a sense of fairness was an exciting one.

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By the results of this experiment, is sure does seem that union mentality is indeed innate in primates. Monkeys can't possibly understand the concept of striking, but they really don't behave much differently than unionized workers when it comes right down to it.

Aside from the correlation between monkeys and union workers, there is further evidence that morality, fairness, ethics, etc. is innate as well. These monkeys were not taught the "morality" found in the bible, or the "ethics" or "fairness" that comes from reading the bible and going to a house of worship regularly, yet one could easily write down a few commandments or bible verses based on how to right this wrong when it comes to special treatment for certain monkeys:

1. Thou shalt not be envious of thy neighbour even if thy neighbour seems to be a lot more luckier than thou.

2. The Lord giveth some monkeys more than others. Remember, the Lord works in mysterious ways, there is always a reason for this, so thou shalt accept whatever the Lord giveth without thinking about it further.

3. Though shalt not covet thy neighbour's grape.

4. Those who eat cucumbers shall inherit the earth.

OK, enough of that.

Hey, how about a Ontario election political spin?:

John Tory: "It is only fair that if one monkey gets a grape that every monkey that wants a grape should get one too. Even though it will be costly and probably 75% of all monkeys will want grapes in the near future, and I haven't really thought about the overall cost of this, fair is fair. I realize that this violates separation of produce and state too. And I can't worry that these grape eating monkeys won't hang out with the cucumber eating monkeys or that the cucumber eating monkeys will be getting lower quality cucumbers. And I especially can't worry about certain grape eating monkeys from using their grapes for terrorist purposes."

DAlton McGuinty: "We have improved the quality of cucumbers the last four years and will continue to focus on improving them. The fact that certain monkeys get grapes is not something I can do anything about right now. The cucumber eating monkeys health and welfare is my main concern, and it is great to see black, brown and white monkeys all getting along while eating cucumbers."

Howard Hampton: "I agree with McGuinty that we should focus on improving the quality of cucumbers, though he is lying about improving the quality of them in the last 4 years. I too choose to ignore the grape eating monkeys, because I want to get as many seats as possible. Though, if the cucumber eating monkeys get really upset that certain monkeys get grapes, I will support as many strikes as it takes to at least get the cucumber monkeys something better than cucumbers."

Frank de Jong: "I think that if monkeys want to eat grapes, they should all pay extra for them. This is the only fair solution that is acceptable. As far as I'm concerned the government should only fund monkeys who eat will accept cucumbers. I strongly believe in the separation of produce and state. But heck, I can tell the truth because I have no chance of getting elected anyway."

Anti-John Tory Ad, The Atheist Blogroll, And Blog Rush

I don't like making more than one post every two or three days on average, so I figured I'd do a 3 in 1 today.

First, I want to continue on with my worthy cause of attacking Ontario Conservative Premier candidate John Tory for his idiotic platform to expand faith school funding. I made an internet poster which is symbolic on many levels. But try not to compare it to symbolic artwork that is done at A Study of Revenge. DT's work hurts my brain when I try to analyze it:


The Blogging Tories message board cretins are having fits over my militant atheism and my in your face defense of separation of church and state. So far nobody commented on the above poster which I linked there last night. I don't think too many of them go to my links. As Friedrich Nietzsche once said, "faith is not wanting to know what is true."

Next up is the Atheist Blogroll. Many atheists on the roll are now making a post dedicated to listing all the blogs on the roll to perhaps enhance our Google and Yahoo search rankings. So what the heck, call me a sheep if you must:
2 Intellectual Atheists

A Daily Dose of Doubt
A Human Mind
A Load of Bright
A Night on the Tiles

A Veritable Plethora
A Whore in the Temple of Reason
A-Deistic
AA
Aardvarchaeology
AASAUF
About: Agnosticism / Atheism
Abstract Nonsense
Aces Full of Links

acrylic.
Action Skeptics
AEsahaettr
After Faith
Agnostic Atheism
aidan maconachy blog
Ain’t Christian
Al-Kafir Akbar!

Alien Atheist
Am I mad, or is the world?
Amused Muse
An Enlightened Observer
Angels Depart
Angry Astronomer
Arcis Logos
Ateistbloggen
Atheism is the Rational Response

Atheism Online
atheism | simra.net
Atheism: Proving The Negative
Atheist Blogs Aggregated
Atheist Ethicist
Atheist Ethics
Atheist Father
Atheist Girl
Atheist Housewife

Atheist Hussy
Atheist Movies
Atheist Revolution
Atheist Says What
Atheist Self
Atheisthought
atheistperspective.com
AtheisTube
Austin Atheist Anonymous

Author of Confusion
Axis of Jared
Aye!
Ayrshire Blog
Babble, bullshit, blasphemy and being.
Bay of Fundie
Beaman’s World
Beep! Beep! It’s Me.

Ben’s Place
Bert’s Blog
Bible Study for Atheists
biblioblography
Bill’s View
Bitchasaurus
bits of starstuff

Bjorn & Jeannette’s Blog
Black Sun Journal
Bligbi
Blogue de Mathieu Demers
blurp
Bob Kowalski
Born Again Atheist

brainstorms
brokencats
Buridan’s Ass
By The Book Comics
Can’t make a difference
CaroLINES
CHADMAC Speaks
Christian Follies

CHRISTIAN PWNAGE 101
Church of Integrity
Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster
Circular Reasoning
Cogita Tute - Think For Yourself
Coming Out Godless
Complete Materialist
Confessions of an Anonymous Coward
Cosmic Variance

Crazy Christian Chain Emails
Culture for all
Daily Atheist
DAILY BBG
Dark Christianity
Dark Side of Mars
Darwin’s Dagger
Daylight Atheism

Debunking Christianity
Deep Thoughts
Deeply Blasphemous
Desperately Seeking Ethics and Reason
Deus ex Absurdum
DEVOUT Atheist Godless Grief
Die Eigenheit
Dime a dozen
disambiguation

discernible chaos
Disgusted Beyond Belief
Dispatches from the Culture Wars
do not read this blog
Dr. Joan Bushwell’s Chimpanzee Refuge
Drunken Tune
Dubito Ergo Sum
Duplicitous Primates

Dwindling In Unbelief
Edifying Spectacle
Edward T. Babinski
Elaine Vigneault
EnoNomi
evanescent
Everyday Atheism
Everyday Humanist
Everything Is Pointless

Evolution
EvolutionBlog
ExChristian.Net
Expired Convictions
Explicit Atheist
Feersum Endjinn
Fish Wars on Cars
Five Public Opinions
Flex Your Head

Flumadiddle
Free Mind Joe
FreeThought by a FreeThinker
Freethought vs. Friel-Thought
Freethought Weekly
Friendly Atheist
FVThinker
Genesis-fel
Geoff Arnold

Gimme Back My God!
God is for Suckers!
God is Pretend
godisajoke.com
Godless Kiwi
Godless on the Wasatch Front
godlessgeek
goldbricker
Goosing the Antithesis

Gospel of Reason
Gratuitous Common Sense
Greg Hartnett
Happy Jihad’s House of Pancakes
Hayleys Paranormal Blog
Hellbound Alleee
hell’s handmaiden
High Maintenance Hags

Honjii’s Harangues
Human Psyche of J.D. Crow
Ice Station Tango
In Defence Of Reason
Incessant Expressions
INFIDELIS MAXIMUS
Infophilia
Inkblot Icon

Interesting
Irked off
Jewish Atheist
Judith’s thought-provoking hard-hitting journal
K H A L A S !
Kill The Afterlife
King Aardvark
Lary Crews

Le Contestataire
le tiers monde
leaping rabbit/lapin sauteur
Leicester Secularist
Let There Be Light
Letters from a broad
Life & Otherwise
Life is an adventure

Life Without Faith
Life, the Universe and Everything
Lifecruiser
Living with Missy and other thoughts
LOL god
Look at the Bright’s Side
Lord J-Bar For Democracy, Not Theocracy
louis’ blog

Love the Nimbu
Lubab No More
lynn’s daughter, thinking
Masala Skeptic
Matt’s Notepad
Mechanical Crowds
mediawatchwatch.org.uk
Meet An Atheist

Memoirs of a (G)a(y)theist
Memoirs of an ex-Christian
Midwest Atheist
Migrations
Mike’s Weekly Skeptic Rant
mindcore
MINISTER OF RANTS
Misc. Musing

mister jebs blog
Modern Agnostic
Modern Atheist
My Case Against God
My Elemental Muse
My Life Thinly Disguised as Groove
Nanovirus
Naturalistic Atheism
Neural Gourmet

New Humanist Blog
NewAthei.st
Nicest Girl and Destroyer of Planets
No Double Standards
No More Hornets
No more Mr. Nice Guy!
NoGodBlog.com
Non Credo Deus
Non-Prophet

North Alabama Rant
Nothing Is Sacred
Nullifidian
olio
One Fewer God
onegoodmove
Onion Breath
Onwards and Forwards
Open Parachute

Outchurched
Oz Atheis’s Weblog
parenthetical remarks
Pharyngula
Philosophers’ Playground
physicshead
Pink Prozac

Pinoy Atheist
Planet Atheism
Pooflingers Anonymous
Primordial Blog
Principles of Parsimony
Prose Justice
Psychodiva’s Mutterings
QuarkScrew

Quintessential Rambling
Ramblings of an Atheist Undergrad
Random Intelligence
Rank Atheism
Re-imagine Ritual
Reeding and Writing
Religion is Bullshit !
REV. ART’S ATHEIST PIN-UPS!

Rev. BigDumbChimp
Richard Carrier Blogs
Rideo ergo sum
Robert’s Thought’s
Ron’s Rants
Rupture the Rapture
Russell’s Teapot

RWANDAN ATHEIST
Saint Gasoline
Salient
Sans God
Scientia Natura
SDARI
Sean the Blogonaut
Secular Humanism with a human face
See For Yourself

Shared Difference
Silly Humans
Skeptic Rant
Skeptical Personal Development
Skeptico
Skepticum
So long, and thanks for all the guilt!
Son Shines Zee 365
Southern Atheist

Stardust Musings and Thoughts for the Freethinker
Staring At Empty Pages
stereoroid.com
Steven Carr’s Blog
Strange Land
Strappado
Summer Squirrel
Talk Reason

Talking to Theists
Tangled Up In Blue Guy
Tarpan’s Blog
Televangelists with Toupees
Terahertz - From Physics to Life
Thank God I’m An Atheist
The Affable Atheist
The Allen Zone

The Angry Atheist
The Anonymous Atheist
The Apostate
The Ateist Endeavor
the atheist chronicles
The Atheist Effect
The Atheist Experience
The Atheist Jew
The Atheist Mama

The Atheist Resistance
The Atheocracy
The Atheologist
The Bach
The Blasphemous
The Blog of M’Gath
The Cat Ranch
The Chronicles of Gorthos

The Conscious Earth
The Daily Cat Chase
The Eternal Gaijin
The Flying Bagpiper
The Flying Trilobite
The Fundy Post
The Gay Black Jew
The Godless Grief
The Good Atheist

The Great Realization
The Greenbelt
The Happy, Religion Free Family
The Homeless Atheist
The Honest Doubter
The Humanist Observer
The Incomer
The Jesus Myth
The Jewish Atheist

The Labour Humanist
The Libertarian Defender
The Lippard Blog
the LITTLE things
The Mary Blog
The Nate and Di Show
The Natural Skeptic
The New Atheist
The New Horizon

The O Project
The One With Aldacron
The Pagan Prattle Online
The Panda’s Thumb
The People’s Republic Of Newport
the post-bicameral mind
The Questionable Authority
The Rad Guy Blog

The Raving Atheist
the right of reason
the Science Ethicist
The Science Pundit
The Second Mouses Guide to Life
The Second Oldest Question
The Secular Outpost
The Secular-Man Blog (An Oasis of Clear Thinking)
The Serenity of Reason

The shadows of an open mind
The Skeptic Review
the skeptical alchemist
The Strong Atheist
The Thermal Vent
The Uncredible Hallq
The Underground Unbeliever
The Uninformed Suburban Housewife
The Uninspired Manifesto

The Zen Of G
These Twisted Times
They Promised Us Jetpacks and We Got Blogs
Thought Theater
toomanytribbles
Toxic thought waste site
UberKuh
Uncouth.net
Ungodly Cynic

Unscrewing The Inscrutable
Uri Kalish - Urikalization
Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy
Vetenskap & F?rnuft
View From Earth
Villa Nandes
Wanderin’ Weeta

Way of the Mind
Why Dont You Blog?
Wild-Eyed Atheist Boy
Without Gods
WORKS WITHOUT FAITH
Writer Philosopher Culture Warrior
Yet Another Blog
You Made Me Say It
Young Earth Creationists Anonymous

Zeemy’s Paradigm
Zen Curmudgeon
zenbullets
“Atheism Sucks” sucks

To join the Atheist blogroll, read this post, and then email Mojoey as instructed.


And finally, I recently joined up with Blog Rush. It is a way in which a blogger might be able to increase traffic. It is new, but becoming very popular. It is free and easy to install on your sidebar. Click here to find out more. I put this blog under the category of religion, even though atheism is not a religion, I want to attract those who are questioning their faith.

If All Theists Thought Like Pastor Jerry Lossner, There Would Be No Atheist Movement

I admit it, I'm part of a new phenomenon, The Atheist Movement. I am considered by many to be a militant atheist thanks to my outspokenness on this blog and many message boards. Yes, I tend to irritate others who ARE WRONG and I also have a tendency to belittle my opponents on occasion. See, I can admit my weaknesses and strengths.

I read an excellent and very refreshing article this morning called 'He Trusts God But Likes Secular Coins' by Pastor Jerry Lossner of Our Savior Lutheran Church in Bellflower. It isn't long so I will copy it here and include a few of my witty gems as they pop into my head:

P-T columnist Tim Grobaty sure knows how to get my juices flowing! I must respond to his Wednesday article about "In God we Trust" on coins.
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Grobaty's article is pretty boring but his line "filthy secularists" made me smile. Oh, and he does admit that the God in "In God We Trust" is the Christian God.

I guess I'm one of the few Christians who opposes God's name on coins, in the pledge of allegiance, and I am opposed to prayers in schools.
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I wonder what percentage of Christians and other non religious theists agree with this statement. I'm thinking maybe 5% tops.

Don't misunderstand. I am a devout Christian who believes that Jesus Christ is the only way God has provided for our salvation. I just don't think God wants us to cram our faith down other's throats. The Lord Jesus wants people to come to Him because they love Him, not because they feel coerced.
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Does that include not indoctrinating children at a very young age? Isn't taking a child to church before he even realizes Santa Claus is a myth forcing the parents faith down the child's throat. You know, like choosing faith based schooling over public schooling for instance.

First of all, when we put God's name on coins, which God are we referring to? Christians believe that the only true God is the Holy Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, three persons, yet one God. Is that the God on the coins? Or is it some false God? Or is it the god we individually worship, such as money, sex, fame, etc.?
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I'm sure Christians will agree it is the Christian God. But this is a great point. I'm wondering how many Americans would like to see "In Allah We Trust" on coins.

We use money for things which are immoral and illegal. The thought of placing a bill with God's name on it in the G-string of a stripper makes me sick.
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Doesn't the G in G-string stand for God? But seriously, the God in the bibles did way more "immoral" things that were worse than lap dancing. God murdered millions of innocent babies in the flood, for example. I could go on of course:)

Putting a bill or coin with God's name on it into a slot machine is disgusting. We drag God's holy name through the mud when we put it on money.
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They uses cards and vouchers these days when it comes to most slot machines. Call it a moral victory for God.

We use it for shady real estate deals, purchasing illegal drugs and pornography, buying elections, etc.
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Cash is hardly used nowadays, except for maybe illegal drugs. But there isn't much of a difference in denying reality through drug use or religion.

We live in a nation which was founded on the principle of religious freedom. At the founding of our nation Christianity was just about the only religion practiced, except for Judaism. Freedom of religion meant you could be a Lutheran, Methodist, Catholic, or Jew, etc., and that was about it. Times have changed!
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I'm not going to slam this comment, I agree with it completely. Although "In God We Trust" came much later than the actual founding date of America.

Now that we are inundated with non-Christian religions, Christians feel threatened. They forget their own history, which says the church was built on the blood of the martyrs. The more Christianity is persecuted, the stronger it gets. God's Word predicted this, and since God's Word is true, the prophecy has come true over the centuries.
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I would say that Christianity is weaker today than yesterday and it will continue to get weaker because God's Word is not true. There is no evidence that any God exists. Science is not a conspiracy theory against religion, but it really takes the wind out of bible stories like Noah's Ark.

No faith has the right to force its faith on others. Do you really think anyone has ever been converted because they saw the name of God on a coin? Atheists also have rights.
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Another point is that nobody will lose their faith by removing God off money.

While I agree with what the Bible says about atheists, that they are fools (Psalm 14:1), they have every right in our country to believe what they want. They should not be constantly confronted with the name God.
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Call me a fool if you must. I'll give him that for writing such a refreshing piece.

The Christian faith begins in the home. That is where children are taught to pray. The public school is just that, a school for the public, not just Christians.
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I thought this guy was against shoving religion down the throats of others. I guess children don't count. They don't have the same rights as us atheists:)


If a child has not learned the Ten Commandments by the time he goes to school, it is unlikely he will learn it from a poster hanging in the school hallway. If he has learned them, then the poster is not necessary. If parents want their child to study the Bible in school then they should send them to a Christian school.

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And the parent should pay for Christian schools. Don't forget about that.

If the child has to go to public school, either because there is no Christian school in the area, or the parents can't afford it, then if the parents have done a good job instilling the Christian faith in the hearts and minds of their children, then the children's faith will be a beacon to their non-Christian friends.
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Yes, it is up to the parents to brainwash their sperm egg product, not the states.


If the non-Christian friends have a negative influence on the Christian child, then the parents did not do a good job. Having your child baptized and then never taking him or her to church or Sunday School, or teaching them to pray, or teaching them to study and love God's Word, is not nurturing the faith that was planted in them at their baptism.
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Didn't the good Pastor earlier say "I just don't think God wants us to cram our faith down other's throats." I guess he left out, "unless they are children."

The pastor is concluding 22 years of service at Our Savior Lutheran Church, Bellflower, this month. In October he will will become the pastor of St. Philip Lutheran Church in Compton.
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Still, I would have to say that the Bellflower Church is losing a progressive Fundy, though it was very hard for me to type "progressive Fundy."

I think the reason why atheists like myself are so obnoxiously outspoken these days is because Lossner represents such a small percentage of religionists. I'd like to see some stats on this one.