Dedicated to God's favorite men, the Roman Catholic priests.
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02
Apr
I finally came out as atheist (or, rather, was forced to come out, since my mother had badgered me about why I was refusing to pray) to my conservatively Catholic family on Palm Sunday, April 1 (and, no, it’s not an April Fool’s joke).
No details will be shared. All I can say is it was an unpleasant experience.
Nonetheless, it feels good to have that out of the way, and I still think it’s good to finally stop pretending.
19
Mar
I’m looking at you, Mitt Romney. If life supposedly begins at conception, then why does it end at birth?
^ This. And the worst thing about Mitt is he just might win…
17
Mar
Good job, Ricky. You just put the final nail on the coffin of your presidential aspirations.
16
Mar
Most annoying Pokemon ever. If I were in Ash’s team, I would have gotten a machine gun and shot those crapheads to pieces.
15
Mar
*from Louis, Pharyngula reader*
When a mummy and a daddy love each other very much, sometimes the mummy will look at the daddy’s thingy and the daddy will look at the mummy’s hoohoo and they will give each other a special hug. They have to be married to do this or else mummy is a horrible, horrible slut.
Then the fairies at the bottom of the garden will ask The Baby Jesus to give mummy a baby who they can look after underneath the gooseberry bush until it’s time for Mr Stork to put it in mummy’s tummy and simultaneously deliver it to the hospital. Or trailer, if mummy is poor and a horrible, horrible slut who hates The Baby Jesus.
Sometimes one mummy and another mummy look at each other’s hoohoos, and sometimes a daddy and another daddy look at each other’s thingies (or to use the biological term: wee-wee. See also: dingle). This is Evil and makes The Baby Jesus cry. This type of behaviour is responsible for hurricanes, floods, house prices collapsing, economic downturns, AIDS, high petrol prices and unhappy hair cuts. But not earthquakes. Ladies’ tatas cause earthquakes.
If mummy is a horrible, horrible slut who hates The Baby Jesus sometimes she will use something called “country reception”. This is something to do with radio in rural areas and means that mummy does not have babies. This is worse than something else called “a bore shun”, which is when someone is not listened to when talking a lot about The Baby Jesus. “A bore shun” kills babies and is responsible for deafness and Satan worship. “Country reception” is worse than “a bore shun” because it is free and hurts less.
The reason it is free is because Libraries, who hate The Baby Jesus and America, make Good Honest Baby Jesus Loving Americans pay for mummies who are horrible, horrible sluts. And also for mummies and daddies who only like other mummies and other daddies, which is nearly as wrong as being Black, Mexican, disabled or mad. Not mad in the good way, like rich people, but mad in a naughty way like poor people or daddies who like other daddies.
I hope this helps.
Louis
P.S. I copied this verbatim from the Discovery Institutes “Thicker End of the Wedge” documents on “Teaching the Controversy in the Reproductive Sciences and Social Policy”. A most enlightening organ.
(Source: freethoughtblogs.com)
13
Mar
Bollywood makes Assassin’s Creed. Now I’ve seen everything.
Here’s the lowdown: A modern-day Indian Ezio sports hidden blades and a katana, fights with gun-armed baddies, and gets beautiful girls. So fuckin’ badass.
The acting and the stunts suck, but it’s so bad, it’s good. You should watch it.
12
Mar
I don’t get it. How does a celestial psycho, who is capable of creating infinite torture for diversity in opinion, give warm fuzzy feelings?
(Source: richarddawkins.net)
09
Mar
Kids are astoundingly more mature than many adults.
(Source: facebook.com)
06
Mar
Here’s a lesson on Christianity-driven homophobia coming from our local schools. Translated from above:
I still remember our values exam from before. There was this question:
“What will happen to people who have relationships and have sex with those of the same gender?”
I chose the more realistic answer which is: “They will be gossiped about by other people”, but the right choice is: “They will go to hell.”
(Source: facebook.com)
03
Mar
This is a response to PZ Myers’ question on why ordinary American Catholics ignore the doctrine, like the ban on birth control, and yet continue to support the Catholic Church.
I can give an answer because, for a time (i.e. the entirety of my teenage years and my early twenties), I was such a liberal Catholic.
For as long as I can remember, I supported homosexual relationships, gay marriage, contraception, euthanasia, divorce, and females in the priesthood. Nobody taught me this; in fact, I come from a family that was conservatively Catholic and opposed all those mentioned. I didn’t have a desire to rebel for rebellion’s sake, either.
I supported these anti-Catholic things because I saw no good reason for opposition, and because their ban only brought unnecessary misery to some people.
I thought the priests (and my family) simply got it wrong. I thought that, since I understood and empathized with these people, God, being the Fount and Epitome of All Understanding, all the more understood and empathized with the gays, the terminally ill and suffering, the couples who don’t desire to have children, the people stuck in unhappy marriages, and the women who want to become priests.
The priests simply got it wrong. But they had power, and they continued to use this power to make everyone comply with what they want, and make people miserable.
Yet, I still remained a Catholic. At this point, it was mostly because my parents were Catholic, practically everyone else was a Catholic (note: this is the Philippines) and I believed that they were right. I also believed that whatever doubts I had were brought about by youthful ignorance and temptation and evil, and had to be discarded. Still, I could not ignore the voice of reason within me…
Fast forward to college. With its obsession with controlling the government and the glaringly obvious corruption in its ranks, I became increasingly disillusioned with the Catholic Church. And then, one day, a friend asked me if I would consider becoming a Protestant.
Why not?
Well, no. For one, I didn’t believe in the Protestant dogma. (Sure, it is just the Catholic dogma with some revisions, but I didn’t see it that way at the time.) Furthermore, I didn’t like the idea of compulsorily donating part of my income to the church and trusting a pastor on personal matters. The little I saw of Protestant pastors and their blatant chiming for money only served to worsen my image of them.
To me, converting from Catholicism to Protestantism was like jumping from the frying pan into the fire. It wasn’t worth the effort, and it was probably bound to get worse, so… I remained a Catholic.
A Catholic who didn’t support the church, that is. That is pretty strange, considering that the Virgin Mary, according to Catholic doctrine, demands believers to respect and love their priests. It was a doctrine that I did not agree with, like all the rest.
Despite my doubts and disagreements, I remained a Catholic, because I thought it was the only option.
It didn’t occur to me that it was possible to leave Catholicism and not join another church.
To cut the long story short, I eventually, after a number of years, allowed myself to admit that I believed only because I was brought up to believe. I also realized that not believing was an option. It is an option that makes a lot of sense. I am now an ex-Catholic, and an atheist.
I know I cannot speak for others. Liberal Catholics have their own reasons for staying in the church. I can only guess.
Perhaps it is family.
Perhaps it is community and society.
Or, perhaps, like the younger me, they think that Catholicism is the only choice they have.
Learning from my experience, we somehow have to show that, incredible as it sounds, there is life outside of Catholicism. We have to show them that there are a multitude of options for the ex-Catholic, and that joining a different church need not be one of them.
Lastly, we, as a community, have to continue to be vocal and welcoming. You never know when a curious Catholic (or a person of another faith) questioning his/her faith will stumble upon your blog for information. Be the source of encouragement for that person. ;)
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