Fuck Religion (1 Viewer)

[pete]

http://theoatmeal.com/comics/religion

 

[Psycho Punk]

Love it!

Austrian driver allowed 'pastafarian' headgear photo

Having received his driving licence, Niko Alm now wants to get pastafarianism officially recognised
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-14135523

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An Austrian atheist has won the right to be shown on his driving-licence photo wearing a pasta strainer as "religious headgear".

Niko Alm first applied for the licence three years ago after reading that headgear was allowed in official pictures only for confessional reasons.

Mr Alm said the sieve was a requirement of his religion, pastafarianism.

Later a police spokesman explained that the licence was issued because Mr Alm's face was fully visible in the photo.

"The photo was not approved on religious grounds. The only criterion for photos in driving licence applications is that the whole face must be visible," said Manfred Reinthaler, a police spokesman in Vienna.

He was speaking on Wednesday, after Austrian media had first reported Mr Alm's reason for wearing the pasta strainer.

After receiving his application the Austrian authorities had required him to obtain a doctor's certificate that he was "psychologically fit" to drive.

According to Mr Reinthaler, "the licence has been ready since October 2009 - it was not collected, that's all there is to it".

The idea came into Mr Alm's noodle three years ago as a way of making a serious, if ironic, point.

A self-confessed atheist, Mr Alm says he belongs to the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, a light-hearted, US-based faith whose members call themselves pastafarians.


A medical interview established the self-styled "pastafarian" was mentally fit to drive
The group's website states that "the only dogma allowed in the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster is the rejection of dogma".

In response to pressure for American schools to teach the theory known as intelligent design, which some Christians favour as an alternative to natural selection, the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster wrote to the Kansas School Board asking for the pastafarian version of intelligent design to be taught to schoolchildren.

Straining credulity
In the same spirit, Mr Alm's pastafarian-style application for a driving licence was a response to the Austrian recognition of confessional headgear in official photographs.

The licence took three years to come through and, according to Mr Alm, he was asked to submit to a medical interview to check on his mental fitness to drive but - straining credulity - his efforts have finally paid off.

It is the police who issue driving licences in Austria, and they have duly issued a laminated card showing Mr Alm in his unorthodox item of religious headgear.

When asked for his reaction to Mr Reinthaler's comments, Mr Alm told the broadcaster ORF: "I didn't know I was guilty of not collecting it. That doesn't alter the fact that it still took nearly a year [to be issued]".

The next step, Mr Alm told the Austrian news agency APA, is to apply to the Austrian authorities for pastafarianism to become an officially recognised faith.

 

[Psycho Punk]

Whoa! I used to mock xtians telling them I was Satan or the Anti-Christ, maybe not such a good idea.

Florida ‘Jesus’ threatens ‘Antichrist’ neighbor with tire iron
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/07/22/florida-jesus-threatens-antichrist-neighbor-with-crowbar/
By David Edwards
Sunday, July 22, 2012 15:32 EDT


A man claiming to be Jesus Christ in Palm Bay, Florida has been charged with aggravated stalking and aggravated assault for allegedly attacking his neighbor, according to Click Orlando.

Kenneth David Peterson, 51, allegedly told his neighbor Fred Padilla he was attacking him because he was the Antichrist. Peterson attacked his car with a tire iron in February and has now begun regularly shooting at him with a BB gun, Padilla said.

Police said they had been called to the area at least 9 times. Peterson has been arrested three times, but charges have not been pressed against him because of a lack of evidence.


“This is heading for a really bad ending,” Padilla said.

Peterson is being held on $150,000 bond at the Brevard County Jail.

Watch video, broadcast by WESH 2, at link above.

 

[nooleen]

i'm sure i picked up some dodgy creationist type leaflet at the giant's causeway when i was there about 7 years ago too

 

[pete]

http://theoatmeal.com/comics/religion

http://catholicdefense.blogspot.ie/2012/07/a-catholic-reply-to-how-to-suck-at-your.html

 

[pete]

https://twitter.com/Oatmeal/status/228578157589053441

 

[therealjohnny]

 

[egg_]

That Catholic defence blog post is fairly reasonably argued tbh

I was a bit put out to see that only 30% of kids raised as atheists stay atheists. See http://cara.georgetown.edu/staff/webpages/reverts2.jpg ... it's from a religious school, no reference to the source of the data, so perhaps it's just bullshit. Still though, I'd be interested to find out

 

[Psycho Punk]

Bets shes cross now.

Permission refused for Sister Mary Michael's cross
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lincolnshire-19002236

Sister Mary will continue to invite friends and family to pray in her garden

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A nun who wanted to erect a 7.38m-high illuminated cross in her back garden has had planning permission refused.

Sister Mary Michael said she believed God wanted her to have the "Cross of Love" at her home in North Hykeham, Lincolnshire.

But North Kesteven District Council said the cross would be "inappropriate and intrusive".

Sister Mary said she will now have to be a "little light" herself.

"I thought it would be lovely for people," said the 68-year-old.


The illuminated cross would have been higher than Sister Mary's bungalow
Sister Mary said the cross would have been a scaled down version of the 738m Glorious Cross of Dozulé in France.

She wanted it to be a beacon for people to come to her garden to pray.

But the planning application, number 666, was rejected by the council who said: "The proposed development would, by virtue of its height in comparison with surrounding residential properties and its illumination, represent an inappropriate and intrusive feature within this wholly residential area."

Continue reading the main story
“
Start Quote

You can't fight the council. I think the Devil is a bit easier really”

Sister Mary Michael

Sister Mary said she would not try to appeal against the decision or submit another application.

"You can't fight the council. I think the Devil is a bit easier really," she said.

She said she will continue to invite friends and family to pray in her garden.

She previously attracted wide attention when she held a prayer vigil at the Da Vinci Code premiere in Cannes.

She also protested at Lincoln Cathedral when the Da Vinci Code was being filmed there.

 

[magicbastarder]

this is superb.

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2012/07/28/my-take-this-is-where-god-was-in-aurora/comment-page-1/

the top comment, that is.

 

[Psycho Punk]

An underground (literally) caliphate, Mr Sattarov, 83, declared himself an Islamic prophet in the mid-1960s after interpreting sparks from a trolleybus cable as a divine light from God. What a guy!

Russian Muslim 'catacomb sect' faces cruelty charges
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-19180554

Members of the sect could be seen at the gate of the house

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Four members of a breakaway Muslim sect in Russia's Tatarstan region have been charged with cruelty against children for allegedly keeping them underground.

Police discovered 27 children and 38 adults living in catacomb-like cells in an eight-level underground bunker.

The sect's elderly leader, Faizrakhman Sattarov, had reportedly wanted to build his own Islamic caliphate beneath the ground.

Prosecutors said some of the children had lived there for more than a decade.

The sect was uncovered last week in a suburb of the city of Kazan during an investigation into recent attacks on Muslim clerics in Tatarstan, a mainly Muslim region on the River Volga.

Mr Sattarov, who had declared himself a Muslim prophet, has been charged with the crime of "arbitrariness", a broad crime that covers "actions contrary to the order presented by a law".

No immediate reaction to the charges was reported.

'Divine light'
Nineteen under-age children were removed by the Russian authorities, some of them placed in care, others in hospital, Russian government-owned newspaper Rossiyskaya Gazeta reports.

Officials said the children, aged between one and 17 years, had never left the compound, gone to school or been treated by a doctor, and had rarely seen the light of day.

Continue reading the main story
“
Start Quote

The teachings of Sattarov, who declared himself a prophet, have been rejected by traditional Muslims”

Rais Suleimanov
Kazan-based theologian
According to the Russian website Islam News, Mr Sattarov, 83, declared himself an Islamic prophet in the mid-1960s after interpreting sparks from a trolleybus cable as a divine light from God.

He and his followers began to shun the outside world in the early part of this century.

The sect, dubbed Faizrakhmanists after their founder, reportedly do not recognise Russian state laws or the authority of mainstream Muslim leaders in Tatarstan.

Only a few sect members were allowed to leave the community to work as traders at a local market, local media report.

The cramped cells descend on eight levels under a decrepit, three-storey brick house on a 700 sq m (7,530 sq ft) plot of land, the Associated Press reports.

The house was built illegally and will be demolished, local police were quoted as saying.

Teachings rejected

Muslim leaders in Tatarstan said Mr Sattarov's views contradicted their own.

"Islam postulates that there are no other prophets after Muhammad," Kazan-based theologian Rais Suleimanov told the BBC.

"The teachings of Sattarov, who declared himself a prophet, have been rejected by traditional Muslims."

Mr Sattarov is said by Rossiyskaya Gazeta to be bedridden and delirious.

The crime of arbitrariness is defined as "unauthorised commission of actions contrary to the order presented by a law or any other normative legal act" and is punishable by up to five years in prison.

On 19 July, Valiulla Yakupov, chief of the educational department of the Spiritual Administration of Muslims of Tatarstan, was shot and killed at his home.

The same day, Mufti Ildus Fayzov, the head of Tatarstan's Muslims, was wounded when his car blew up. At least four arrests were made.

There was no suggestion that Mr Sattarov or his followers were connected to the attacks.

 

[pete]

Freedom gone mad - The director of MCD, the concert promoters who hosted a concert on July 7 in the Phoenix Park after which two people died, nine were stabbed and there were several outbreaks of violence and 58 arrests, claimed on radio that "wherever you get a large number of young people you can expect a level of violence and disturbance".

Apart from being a pretty awful opinion of young people, this is not true. Last year I attended World Youth Day (WYD) in Madrid. The estimate of the crowd was somewhere between 1.5 million and 2 million young people, most of them aged in their late teens and 20s.

To the best of my knowledge there were no arrests or outbreaks of violence, except by a small number of anti-Church protesters.

The police presence at WYD was minimal. All I saw the officers doing was smiling, directing traffic and taking photos for willing pilgrims.

At the Phoenix Park event there were 511 security personnel and 125 gardai (at whose expense?).

At the celebration in Madrid I was privileged to see and be part of crowds of young people filled with joy, vitality and a spirit of service.

Doesn't the juxta positioning of these two events tell us something?

What is it we adults are holding up to our young people today as an example?

Is it to follow the whims of a freedom gone mad or to seek the truth which Christ, through his church, is offering us, calling us to love God and one's neighbour and to discover that true freedom is found in self-giving?

Fr Alphonsus Cullinan Rathkeale, Co Limerick

Because Catholics never do anything bad.

Ever.

edit: Also - selection bias?

 

[therealjohnny]

 

[тхеодоре кацзынски]

Amazing.

 

[Space]

Where'd you find that amazing gif?

 

[pissypants]

Oh man I saw an even better version on reddit, it had a caption like "religion "OFF" switch" or similar, but actually funny, not like what I just said.

And now this:

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[pissypants]

Scientologists spy on South Park's Trey and Matt, find nothing....

http://www.inquisitr.com/153535/church-of-scientology-spied-on-southpark-creators/

 

[magicbastarder]

The illuminated cross would have been higher than Sister Mary's bungalow
Sister Mary said the cross would have been a scaled down version of the 738m Glorious Cross of Dozulé in France.

just reading about this now. this glorious cross of dozule does not actually exist. can you have a scale model of a non-existent item?

 

[Psycho Punk]

Way to go! This fits best here & I've another post for the Pussy Riot thread.

In Petes absence how about offering a Thumped! award to anyone who chops down a cross or burns a koran?

Pussy Riot uproar continues: FEMEN offers bounty for desecrating crosses
http://rt.com/politics/cross-femen-cutting-money-952/

An activist of the Ukrainian feminist group Femen raises a chainsaw after cutting down a cross, erected to the memory of victims of the political repression in Kiev.(AFP Photo / Genya Savilov)


A group claiming to represent the Ukrainian feminist movement FEMEN has offered payment to anyone who desecrates Orthodox crosses and churches. Cutting down a cross will earn you as much as 6,000 rubles, or $188 US.

Leaving an inscription on an Orthodox cross will net around $62, while graffiti on a church wall comes with a nearly hundred-dollar reward. The bounty list was published on the Internet by Karina Pankova, a 23-year-old woman who presented herself as the leader of FEMEN’s branch in northwest Russia’s arctic city of Murmansk.

 

[Psycho Punk]

He should have stuck to Buckfast.

Naked monk in woods 'had eaten bad berries'
http://www.thelocal.de/society/20120911-44897.html
Published: 11 Sep 12 14:26 CET

A Bavarian hiker who called the police after coming across a naked man staggering around in the woods, might have saved his life – it turns out he was a monk who had eaten poisonous berries. Police in Unterwössen near Traunstein, took a call last Thursday evening from the worried walker, the TZ newspaper reported. The hiker said he had tried to help the naked man but he had refused all offers of assistance and wandered off.

Officers went into the forest to track him down – luckily not taking long to find the man and persuading him to go with them. They said he was disoriented and cold, and took him to hospital. It was later discovered that he was a monk from the Traunstein area who had set off on an expedition with his bicycle and tent, planning to be in the countryside for several days.