 "Don't believe in God? You are not alone." These words are part of a national billboard campaign designed to raise awareness about people who don't believe in a god, and the campaign is now in full swing in the Big Easy. The latest billboard can be read by motorists driving from downtown New Orleans on I-10 W. It can be seen on the left-hand side just prior to the Carrollton exits. It was placed by the New Orleans Secular Humanist Association and funded by the United Coalition of Reason. It features an image of blue sky and clouds with the words superimposed over. More...See also: Atheist Billboard Turns Heads Along I-10Earlier... A Streetcar Named Disbelief!
Scientists studying animal behaviour believe they have growing evidence that species ranging from mice to primates are governed by moral codes of conduct in the same way as humans. More...
Stretches of DNA previously believed to be useless 'junk' DNA play a vital role in the evolution of our genome, researchers have now shown. More...See also: Ancient Volcanic Eruptions Caused Global Mass Extinction
In some black communities it's akin to donning a white sheet and a Confederate flag. In others, it's ostensibly tolerated yet whispered about, branded culturally incorrect and bad form, if not outright sacrilege. More...
U.S. District Judge Barbara Crabb of the western district of Wisconsin, in an opinion and order issued on Tuesday, denied motions to dismiss the Freedom From Religion Foundation's far-reaching legal challenge of National Day of Prayer proclamations. Denied were motions to dismiss filed by defendants Pres. Barack Obama, press secretary Robert Gibbs and Shirley Dobson, of the National Day of Prayer Taskforce. More...See also: US judge refuses to dismiss 'Day of Prayer' suit
Americans United for Separation of Church and State today expressed disappointment with the California Supreme Court ruling upholding Proposition 8, which bans same-sex marriage in the state. More...See also: Prop. 8 upheld, but existing same-sex unions to standAnd... Supreme Court Nominee Should Be Closely Questioned On Church-State Views, Says Americans United
AU had received complaints that the Salvation Army regularly presents prayers and sermons at meals and holds religious services at its shelter facility. Yet the Army is in contract with the county, and in previous contracts, the Army promised in exchange for taking $50,000 in public funds to operate the shelter, it would not use the money for religious services. More...
Americans United for Separation of Church and State today asked the Internal Revenue Service to review the tax-exempt status of Liberty University in the wake of the school's decision to yank official recognition of a student-run Democratic club. More...See also: Liberty Univ. expels campus Democrats
The lawsuit contends Lane County violated the US Constitution's separation of church and state clause. More...
An Atheist public policy group has called upon the US Congress to be more pro-active in monitoring what it described as a "pattern of proselytizing." More...
Wired PR News -- A woman in Texas is claiming that she was fired from her job for being an atheist. More...
He has steadfastly argued that Texas students should be taught the weaknesses of evolution. More...
Told of the measure, several Democrats and liberal and atheist bloggers objected. More...
A group promoting the separation of church and state is asking La Crosse County to investigate complaints. More...See also: Lodi mayor says city may have to scrap prayers
On the same day Erica Conner listened to visiting author Don Piper give his purported glimpse of heaven from his book, "90 Minutes in Heaven"she got her own peek into the supernatural, she said. More...
A family breakfast turned into a religious experience when they spotted what appears to be the face of Jesus in the lid of a Marmite jar. More...
In an unprecedented effort to crack down on self-serving edits, the Wikipedia supreme court has banned contributions from all IP addresses owned or operated by the Church of Scientology and its associates. More...
The Diocese of Bridgeport lashed back Tuesday at critics, who delivered a letter asking Bishop William Lori to stop the legal fight to keep thousands of pages of court files secret, saying that the diocese has done more than any other institution to deal with the clergy sexual abuse scandal. More...
A West Belfast community worker who was sexually abused whilst in care has accused the Catholic Church of protecting paedophiles. More...
A Catholic man with four children was kicked to death by a sectarian "mob" in Northern Ireland, neighbours said yesterday. More...
Two people have been killed and at least 12 injured in an explosion at a Roman Catholic church in Nepal. --snip-- No group has said it carried out the attack but police said they suspected the involvement of a Hindu extremist group, the Nepal Defence Army. More...
A visiting Indian religious guru has been killed and 30 people were injured when a shooting and knife fight erupted during a dispute between rival communities at a Sikh temple in Vienna. More...
(AP) Pakistani troops have retaken the largest town in the Swat Valley from the Taliban as the army presses its offensive against militants in the country's northwest, the army spokesman said Saturday. More...See also: 2 Explosions Rock Market In North PakistanMassive Car Bomb Rocks PakistanPakistan religious schools get scrutiny
(AP) A battle in a militant-controlled region of western Afghanistan killed 30 insurgents and nine Afghan soldiers, while a roadside bomb in the country's north wounded an Afghan governor, officials said Saturday. More... See also: 3 NATO Troops Killed In Afghan AttackAfghan governor wounded in blast
BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- A U.S. soldier and four Iraqi civilians were killed Wednesday by a car bomb that exploded near a market in western Baghdad, officials said. More...See also: Roadside Bomb In Iraq Kills 3 AmericansUnease as Iraqis prepare to take over in cities
(AP) Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton urged Israel in unusually blunt terms Wednesday to completely halt settlements on land that Palestinians claim as part of a future state of their own. More...See also: Syria, Israel At Impasse Over Golan Hts.? Israeli forces kill local Hamas leader
(CNN) -- Somalia needs international help to fight Islamist extremists battling for power in the lawless Horn of Africa nation, the country's moderate Islamist president said Monday. More...
The godless are gathering for the 68th Annual Conference of the American Humanist Association in Tempe, Arizona, to honor such trailblazers as PZ Myers, Barbara Forrest, the Reverend Barry Lynn, Norma Ramos and Neil deGrasse Tyson. A special press conference at 9:00 AM, Friday, June 5, at the Tempe Mission Palms Hotel (the annual conference's main venue) will launch the event with the unveiling of a nontheistic billboard going up along a nearby, well-traveled Arizona highway. More...
This is the slogan that was put on 25 buses in Chicago this week, as a part of the Indiana Atheist Bus Campaign. The bus ads will be seen cruising all over Chicago through the month of June. More...Earlier... TRANSPO board chooses to allow atheist group's bus ads
RALEIGH -- On Sunday mornings, when many of their contemporaries are taking their seats in church pews, a group of young parents mingle in the living room of a suburban home while their children run around playing games. This congregation of Triangle residents has no creed or ceremony, just a desire to get together and offer each other support for rearing children without religion. Taking their cue from a primer of the same name, they call themselves Parenting Beyond Belief, and they meet nearly every Sunday, in a city park, an indoor playground or in people's homes. More...
A survey conducted by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life found that white evangelical Christians are more likely to support torture than people who rarely or never attend religious services. More...
The Wichita Falls Independent School District is one of six Texas public school districts asked Thursday by the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas to disclose all information about distribution of Gideon Bibles and other religious information on its schools' grounds. More...See also: Parents Fuming as Texas Schools Let Gideons Provide Bibles to Students
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) -- Gov. Brad Henry on Monday signed a bill to permit a Ten Commandments monument to be placed on the grounds of the state Capitol. More...
Former US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has been accused of using quotes from the Bible in his briefings to George W Bush during the Iraq War. More...See also: Bible quotes said to adorn Pentagon documentsPentagon Briefings No Longer Quote the Bible
WAUSAU, Wis. - A mother accused of praying instead of seeking medical help for her dying 11-year-old daughter was found guilty Friday of second-degree reckless homicide. --snip-- Her daughter, Madeline Neumann, died of untreated diabetes March 23, 2008, surrounded by people praying for her. When she suddenly stopped breathing, her parents' business and Bible study partners finally called 911. More...See also: Mother knew diabetic daughter was gravely ill, sister-in-law testifies
Last October, back before Barack Obama was in the White House, several college kids in Virginia decided to start a chapter of College Democrats on their campus. They set up a table in the cafeteria, handed out literature and got a faculty adviser. Nothing too unusual about this situation -- unless it's at Liberty University. More...
Milan -- The northern Italian city of Milan is experiencing a boom in the number of people who want to renounce their baptism and leave the Catholic church. More...
Rape and sexual molestation were "endemic" in Irish Catholic church-run industrial schools and orphanages, a report revealed today. The nine-year investigation found that Catholic priests and nuns for decades terrorised thousands of boys and girls in the Irish Republic, while government inspectors failed to stop the chronic beatings, rape and humiliation. More...See also: Irish Report Details Catholic Child AbuseArchbishop of Westminster attacks atheism but says nothing on child abuse
The Church of England has been accused of conducting a cover up over allegations that it drugged girls in one of its children's homes in the 1970s and 1980s. More...
(CNN) -- Christian Eshiett was a rambunctious pre-teen who spent a lot of time cavorting with his friends in southern Nigeria. He would skip school and run away from home for days, frustrating his grandfather, who oversaw the boy's care. "I beat him severely with canes until they broke, yet he never shed a tear," said Eshiett Nelson Eshiett, 76. "One day, I took a broom to hit him and he started crying. Then I knew he was possessed by demons. ... Nigerian witches are terrified of brooms.""I beat him severely with canes until they broke, yet he never shed a tear," said Eshiett Nelson Eshiett, 76. "One day, I took a broom to hit him and he started crying. Then I knew he was possessed by demons. ... Nigerian witches are terrified of brooms." More...See also: Witch-hunt terror stalks Gambia
Police in Austria say one of the two Sikh gurus who was shot in a violent dispute between rival Sikh groups at a temple in Austria has died. More...See also: Violence hits Austrian Sikh templeSikh youth moving away from teachings of Sikhism
Thousands of people blocked the centre of Ankara, to defend the secular Turkish state and accuse their government of being pro-Islamic. Local television said 100,000 people joined the rally, many brandishing pictures of Kemal Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey and a staunch defender of secularism. Similar demonstrations have been held since 2007, amid growing fears that Turkey's Islamist-based ruling AK Party and its Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan want to erode the traditional separation of religion and the state. More...
Islamic militants have beheaded a retired Christian carpenter abducted nearly two months ago in the southern Philippines. More...
From Satanists desecrating Islam's holy book to journalists who publically criticize them, Saudi Arabia's religious police flexed their muscles on Sunday and cracked down hard with a sweep of arrests and lawsuits. More...
Muslim clerics are seeking ways to regulate online behaviour in Indonesia, saying the exploding popularity of social networking sites like Facebook could encourage illicit sex. More...
President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed's forces control only parts of the city and central region after two weeks of fighting. Human rights workers in the Horn of Africa nation say the clashes have killed at least 172 civilians and wounded 528. More...See also: Dozens of civilians killed in latest Somalia fighting
(CBS/ AP) Pakistani security forces have entered the main town in a northwestern valley where Taliban fighters are holed up, engaging the militants in fierce street fights, the army's top spokesman said Saturday. More...See also: Pakistan Refugee Crisis GrowingExodus in Pakistan called biggest since '47U.S. Sends Humanitarian Aid To PakistanPakistan Denies Nuclear Expansion
(AP) Two Americans have been killed in separate incidents inside Baghdad's highly fortified Green Zone, U.S. and Iraqi officials said Saturday, raising concerns about its security as Iraq's forces assume more control. More...See also: Baghdad Blast Kills 3 U.S. Troops
On Wednesday, a roadside bomb near Kabul killed two Americans - one service member and a civilian, the U.S. military said. More...See also: Mullen: 2 Years To Turn Tide In Afghan War
A fundamental but elusive step in the early evolution of life on Earth has been replicated in a laboratory. Researchers synthesized the basic ingredients of RNA, a molecule from which the simplest self-replicating structures are made. Until now, they couldn't explain how these ingredients might have formed. More...
In what could prove to be a landmark discovery, a leading paleontologist said scientists have dug up the 47 million-year-old fossil of an ancient primate whose features suggest it could be the common ancestor of all later monkeys, apes and humans. More...
ScienceDaily -- The 2008 excavations at Hohle Fels Cave in the Swabian Jura of southwestern Germany recovered a female figurine carved from mammoth ivory from the basal Aurignacian deposit. This figurine, which is the earliest depiction of a human, and one of the oldest known examples of figurative art worldwide, was made at least 35,000 years ago. This discovery radically changes our views of the context and meaning of the earliest Paleolithic art. More...
ScienceDaily -- The Herschel and Planck spacecraft successfully blasted into space at 6:12 a.m. Pacific Time (9:12 a.m. Eastern Time) on May 14 from the Guiana Space Centre in French Guiana. The European Space Agency missions, with significant participation from NASA, hitched a ride together on an Ariane 5 rocket, but now have different journeys before them. Herschel will explore, with unprecedented clarity, the earliest stages of star and galaxy birth in the universe; it will help answer the question of how our sun and Milky Way galaxy came to be. Planck will look back to almost the beginning of time itself, gathering new details to help explain how our universe came to be. More...See also: Kepler Begins Search For Earth-like WorldsMy stars! Slideshow of Hubble's greatest hitsDouble planet treat in the predawn skyAstronaut to watch 'Star Trek' film in space
They're making antimatter at the Large Hadron Collider?! That little jolt of reality is what sets the plot in motion for "Angels & Demons," Hollywood's follow-up to "The Da Vinci Code." More...
Ehrman, a best-selling author and a professor of religious studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, is a biblical sleuth whose investigations make some people very angry. Like the fictional Robert Langdon character played by actor Tom Hanks in the movie "Angels & Demons," he delves into the past to challenge some of Christianity's central claims. In Ehrman's latest book, "Jesus, Interrupted," he concludes: Doctrines such as the divinity of Jesus and heaven and hell are not based on anything Jesus or his earlier followers said. At least 19 of the 27 books in the New Testament are forgeries. More...
During the eight years that George W Bush, a born-again Christian, was in the White House, the United States appeared to be a nation tilting towards deeper religious faith. But appearances can be deceiving. In fact, a recent study has found that about one in every five Americans either no longer believes in God at all, or doubts that a higher force exists. More...
SOUTH BEND, Indiana (CNN) -- President Obama delved into the abortion debate in a controversial Notre Dame commencement address Sunday, calling for a search for common ground on one of the most divisive issues in American politics. More...See also: Understanding America's Shift on AbortionChurch Politics: Why the Pope Is Sidestepping Notre Dame
MINNEAPOLIS -- A Minnesota judge ruled Friday that a 13-year-old cancer patient must be evaluated by a doctor to determine if the boy would benefit from restarting chemotherapy over his parents' objections. More...
The Democratic governor said he now believed that gays and lesbians were entitled to marry under the fairness and equal protection provisions of the state constitution. More...
PENSACOLA - After months of negotiating through the courts, the American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Florida have won the final chapter of a lawsuit filed against the Santa Rosa County School District last August. The suit was filed on behalf of two Pace High School students who alleged that school officials regularly promoted religion and offered prayers at school events in violation of their First Amendment rights. More...
In an ongoing series of occasional reports, "Religion and the Courts: The Pillars of Church-State Law," the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life explores the complex, fluid relationship between government and religion. Among the issues to be examined are religion in public schools, displays of religious symbols on public property, conflicts concerning the free exercise of religion, and government funding of faith-based organizations. More...
(AP) A Massachusetts hospital is trying to figure out what to do with a window in which some Catholics claim to see an image of the Virgin Mary. More...
ON THE MORNING OF Thursday, April 10, 2003, Donald Rumsfeld's Pentagon prepared a top-secret briefing for George W. Bush. This document, known as the Worldwide Intelligence Update, was a daily digest of critical military intelligence so classified that it circulated among only a handful of Pentagon leaders and the president; Rumsfeld himself often delivered it, by hand, to the White House. The briefing's cover sheet generally featured triumphant, color images from the previous days' war efforts: On this particular morning, it showed the statue of Saddam Hussein being pulled down in Firdos Square, a grateful Iraqi child kissing an American soldier, and jubilant crowds thronging the streets of newly liberated Baghdad. And above these images, and just below the headline SECRETARY OF DEFENSE, was a quote that may have raised some eyebrows. It came from the Bible, from the book of Psalms: "Behold, the eye of the Lord is on those who fear Him...To deliver their soul from death." This mixing of Crusades-like messaging with war imagery, which until now has not been revealed, had become routine. On March 31, a U.S. tank roared through the desert beneath a quote from Ephesians: "Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand." On April 7, Saddam Hussein struck a dictatorial pose, under this passage from the First Epistle of Peter: "It is God's will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish men." More...
Inquiries into alleged child abuse by Catholic orders in the Irish Republic are due to publish their findings. More...
A tide of torture and killing of innocent women linked to 'sorcery' and the 'dark arts' is overwhelming the nation's police. More...
(CNN) -- Somalia's hard-line Islamic group Al-Shabab seized control of Jowhar, the president's hometown, after a battle with pro-government forces Sunday. More...See also: More than 100 die in Somalia clashes
More than 80 Afghan teenagers have been admitted to a hospital for headaches and vomiting in the third apparent poison attack on a girls school in as many weeks. --snip-- It was unclear if the incident was a deliberate attack on the school, though the Taliban and other extremist groups in Afghanistan who oppose girls' education have been known to target schoolgirls. Under the Taliban's regime, girls were not allowed to attend school. More...See also: Attack Fear Keeps Afghan Girls From SchoolAmbush At Afghan School In 'Valley Of Death'95 Children Killed, Afghan Official SaysTeams Of Suicide Bombers Hit Afghan CityAfghanistan: U.S.-Led Strikes Kill Dozens
(CBS) President Obama has ordered the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay closed and his new administration is close to figuring out what to do with the 240 inmates still held there. Some, like Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the self proclaimed mastermind of 9/11, will undoubtedly be put on trial for their lives. But more than half the so-called detainees will probably never go before a jury because the U.S. government does not have a case that will stand up in court. So what happens when a prisoner is set free from Guantanamo? More...
The Miss Beautiful Morals pageant is the latest example of conservative Muslims co-opting Western-style formats to spread their message in the face of the onslaught of foreign influences flooding the region through the Internet and satellite television. More...See also: Islamic Idol: Music Spreading Message Of Faith
Is the National Day of Prayer (NDP) a good idea? Americans United for Separation of Church and State says no! More...See also: Jesus killed Mohammed: The crusade for a Christian military (Full article in print form only.)
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The more often Americans go to church, the more likely they are to support the torture of suspected terrorists, according to a new survey. --snip-- White evangelical Protestants were the religious group most likely to say torture is often or sometimes justified -- more than six in 10 supported it. People unaffiliated with any religious organization were least likely to back it. Only four in 10 of them did. More...
Faith is believing in something despite the evidence, for with evidence, faith is superfluous. Conversely, modern science and rationality have provided a way for us to examine our claims. So powerful is this method that the language of science has become universal, nearly every society on earth having adopted its practice. Yet religions have remained separated by geography because they cannot convincingly prove their own claims. More...See also: Is religion a threat to rationality and science?Noah's Flood Debunked (Part 1)
ScienceDaily -- What happened in the first trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a second after the Big Bang? --snip-- "The B-mode polarization is the most significant piece of evidence related to inflation that has yet to be observed," said Ki Won Yoon, a NIST postdoctoral scholar who will describe the project at the APS meeting. "A detection of primordial gravitational waves through CMB polarization would go a long way toward putting the inflation theory on firm ground." The data also could provide scientists with insights into different string theory models of the universe and other "unified" theories of physics. More...See also: Launch datesHow we could see another universe (Article in print form only.)
Santa Ana, Calif. (AP) -- A federal judge has ruled that a Mission Viejo history teacher violated the First Amendment by telling students that creationism is "superstitious nonsense." More...See also: High school teacher's anti-Creationism comment violated lawHigh School Teachers Influence Student Views Of Evolution & Creationism
ROME - Director Ron Howard claimed Sunday that the Vatican interfered with efforts to get permits to shoot certain scenes of his "Angels & Demons" religious thriller in Rome -- a charge the Vatican said was purely a publicity stunt. More...
A group that claims to represent the rights of atheists in Ireland has launched a campaign to expel God from the Irish constitution, starting with an attempt to block plans for a new blasphemy law. More...See also: New libel law is a threat to free speech
The polio vaccination campaign ran into trouble in Keringet Division of Molo District when some parents refused to let their children get the dose, saying it was against their religious beliefs. More...
A Buddhist preacher in Thailand has announced plans for new guidelines aimed at curbing the flamboyant behaviour of gay and transgender monks. More...
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A U.S. government panel listed 13 countries Friday as "egregious" violators of religious freedom. The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom's annual report named Myanmar, North Korea, Eritrea, Iran, Iraq, Nigeria, Pakistan, China, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam. More...
CAIRO (AP) -- An 8-year-old Saudi girl has divorced her middle-aged husband after her father forced her to marry him last year in exchange for about $13,000, her lawyer said Thursday. Saudi Arabia has come under increasing criticism at home and abroad for permitting child marriages. The United States, a close ally of the conservative Muslim kingdom, has called child marriage a ''clear and unacceptable'' violation of human rights. More...See also: Religious Police Feel The Heat
They were stoned, spat on and assaulted, but when 200 women staged Afghanistan's first public women's rights protest since the 1970s their voices were heard around the world. More...
(CBS/AP) A gunman wearing an Iraqi army uniform opened fire on a U.S. military team Saturday, killing two American soldiers and wounding three others at a combat outpost in northern Iraq, the military said. More...See also: April Ends As Deadly Month For U.S. Troops
(AP) The cave tucked in the remote Saudi mountains near the Yemeni border was clearly a way station for Islamic militants, Saudi police say, pointing to the stock of guns and ammunition, nooks for holding hostages and cameras for filming them. More...
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