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Entries from December 31st, 2010

William Lane Craig, Original Sin and Original Guilt

December 31st, 2010 74 Comments

A lot of people are up in arms at the moment about a paragraph in William Lane Craig’s answer to Question 193 “Overweening Ignorance.” Facebook, blogs, twitter and message boards are abuzz with Christians angrily attacking Craig with the charge that this paragraph shows he either does not hold to the doctrine of original sin or […]

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A Refutation of Zeitgeist – The Movie

December 31st, 2010 6 Comments

Zeitgeist – The Movie is an internet phenomenon that has taken a lot of people in. I know several people who have seen it and have either been convinced by it or it has heavily rocked them. We’ve had commenters on this blog raising issues and asking questions which clearly have their roots in Zeitgeist. […]

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What Sex is Not

December 26th, 2010 67 Comments

Matt shows us that by reasoning from how we treat sex when it comes to children we can see what options cannot consistently be held when it comes to sex with adults.

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Contra Mundum: In Defence of Santa

December 25th, 2010 37 Comments

I grasped the sponge, water dripped down my wrist as I took aim. The man from the McGillicuddy Serious Party raised his voice and said “now throw!” The sponge flew through the air from my hand and struck Santa solidly on the chest soaking his red costume. Santa laughed and said “throw another one!” It […]

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Oprah Winfrey, Religious Pluralism and Woolly Thinking

December 24th, 2010 19 Comments

I once caught 5 minutes of Oprah discussing religion. She made the comment, in a very sage-sounding tone, that she believed all religions are true. The audience immediately interrupted her with resounding applause; camera shots caught audience members nodding in approval, clearly impressed with the wisdom of the claim just made. This commonly heard platitude […]

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The New Zealand Association of Rationalist Humanists and the Privileging of Secularism

December 20th, 2010 189 Comments

The New Zealand Association of Rationalist Humanists (“NZARH”) has a statement of aspirational ideals for the New Zealand state on their website. Entitled “The Tolerant Secular State” it is anything but. The first two sentences of the document exhibit a confusion which is inherent throughout (and commonly found in discussions of church and state): “The […]

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The Separation of Church and Self: Rethinking Separationism

December 16th, 2010 119 Comments

Is it just for a pluralistic society to ground its public policy on religious premises? What role should religion play in such a society? Debate over questions like these has figured in theology, philosophy, political science, jurisprudence and popular culture for centuries. In contemporary Western pluralistic society the debate continues. Even for those unfamiliar with […]

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