Vol. 1 No. 9 – October 2, 2006

Jesus Camp, a documentary feature film on religious experiences of evangelical Christian children, was released in Los Angeles last week. My supreme objections to exposing children to religion is a matter of public record, and this latest outrage is, well, outrageous. Camp founder Pastor Becky Fischer proudly compares her work to the indoctrination of young boys by extremist Muslims in Pakistan and elsewhere.

TART Remarks covers this story – without further comment, but to identify this behaviour as molestation, and proposes that the actions of the Christians involved in making and distributing and promoting films such as Jesus Camp indicate the corrosive influence of religion on young, receptive minds better than objectors to religion can ever hope to do.

A new U.S. poll found that receptiveness to religion really can help a candidate, and the party seen to be receptive to religion. Forty-four percent of those polled said they were more worried by public officials who don't pay enough attention to religion; 46 percent expressed more concern about public officials who are too close to religious leaders.

In the August 28 edition of TART Remarks the political acceptance of “atheists” in the United States was considered in an article on the Illinois Democrat, Senator Barack Obama. That article clearly indicated that atheists are America’s most distrusted minority – as is blatantly evident from a national survey conducted by researchers in the University of Minnesota's department of sociology, the results of which appeared in the April issue of the American Sociological Review.

Roman Catholic and Christian Orthodox leaders are focusing on writing a text that would serve as a basis to "seek the restoration of full communion" and close the nearly 1,000-year-old rift between the Catholic and the Orthodox. It astounds to note that while the Abrahamic religions are bent on obliterating each other, Christians are still attempting – after 1,000 years! – to “close the rift”. The mind boggles.

Another week…

Contents

Publisher’s Note

Editor’s Note

An Abstract On Origin And Evolution

Bridging The Divide

Receptiveness To Religion Really Can Help A Candidate

God's Boot Camp?

Escaping Illusion?

Paradise Lost

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Tart Remarks, Vol. 1 No. 9 – October 2, 2006

Vol. 1 No. 8 - September 25, 2006

Original Sin, the dogma, is preposterous. It ranks with predestination on the scale of ridiculous ideas. Professor Sakkie Spangenberg’s inaugural lecture, CAN A MAJOR RELIGION CHANGE? Reading Genesis 1-3 in the Twenty-First Century, had me revisit this doctrine and its influence on the human psyche. Original Sin is the raison d’être of Christianity – without Original Sin, Christianity collapses. Therefore, the title of this week’s main article is Original Sin(e qua non). Platitudinal, perhaps; descriptive nonetheless.

Richard Dawkins has a new book out – The God Delusion. In the course of his work, this tenacious evolutionary theorist has long asserted that belief in God is both irrational and profoundly harmful to society. In this book he tackles the subject head on, exposing both religion's faulty logic and the widespread suffering it causes.

He says, in the opening chapter, “The metaphorical or pantheistic God of the physicists is light years away from the interventionist, miracle wreaking, thought-reading, sin-punishing, prayer-answering God of the Bible, of priests, mullahs and rabbis, and of ordinary language. Deliberately to confuse the two is, in my opinion, an act of intellectual high treason.”

Joan Bakewell’s review of The God Delusion, from The Guardian – Judgment day – is featured in the Tolle lege section this week.

Contents

Publisher’s Note

Editor’s Note

Original Sin(e qua non)

NBC Draws Protests From Conservatives

Anglican Conservatives To Snub Female

The God Delusion, By Richard Dawkins

God And Allah Were Arguing, But Buddha Just Smiled

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Tart Remarks, Vol. 1 No. 8 – September 25, 2006

Vol. 1 No. 7 - September 18, 2006

“Three passions, simple but overwhelming strong, have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind. These passions, like great winds, have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course, over a deep ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of despair.”

These words of Bertrand Russell (recorded in the prologue to his Autobiography) have been reverberating in my mind ever since I first read them – in 1980 – as a young student about to endeavour to think for the first time.

It was with truly eschatological fear that I witnessed the unfolding events around Benedict’s Mohammed reference this week.

That the current “representative of ‘god’ on earth” can evoke tension extraordinaire by pronouncing unflatteringly on “the last prophet of ‘allah’ on earth” translates into dehumanising idiocy.

An overreaction?

Hardly.

Recall, if you will, the Danish “cartoon crisis” of 2005. Dozens lost their lives in the ensuing protests.

Enough said.

Religion must go.

But what then about human contentment… about human happiness?

In this issue, the claims of religious belief systems in dealing with reality are compared with a scientific paradigm… in search of happiness.

Contents

Publisher’s note

Editor’s note

In pusuit of happiness

Papal fallibility

Meet the new evangelicals

The Messiah Myth: The Near Eastern Roots Of Jesus And David

Benedict XVI cartoons

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Tart Remarks, Vol. 1 No. 7 – September 18, 2006

Vol. 1 No. 6 - September 11, 2006

Today all the world will remember this day, five years ago. TART Remarks publishes two perspectives, from the Los Angeles Times, on life after 9/11. The first considers “vibrant prayer movements catalyzed by 9/11”; the other looks at how Muslim Americans portray their faith in public after 9/11.

Intelligent Design, that informal intellectual settlement haphazardly constructed of the flotsam of Creationism, has reared its ugly head in South Africa, and, especially, in the Afrikaans language. ID was dealt a mortal blow in South Africa this last week with the eminent Professor Emeritus Phillip V. Tobias distancing himself unequivocally from those parts of Die Groot Avontuur (a recent ID apology in Afrikaans) which support ID.

The social benefits of teaching evolution in schools are considered in a review of a recent paper published in the South African Journal of Science.

Two book reviews from The Guardian are included: Dying to Win: Why Suicide Terrorists Do It, by Robert A Pape, and Tim Willocks's fundamentalist bloodfest, The Religion.

Contents

Publisher’s Note

Editor’s Note

Intelligent Design… Intelligently Debunked

The Social Benefits Of Teaching Evolution

Fundamentally Speaking

Ordure, Ordure

Post-9/11, More Are Putting Faith In Power Of Prayer

A Post-9/11 Identity Shift

Intelligent Design Cartoons

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Tart Remarks, Vol. 1 No. 6 – September 11, 2006

Vol. 1 No. 5 - September 4, 2006

Having addressed the existence of "god" in the previous issue, TART Remarks considers theology beyond "god" in this edition. It is more than a hundred years since Nietzsche declared that "God is dead", and yet…

With Intelligent Design aggressively promoted, the book by Human Genome Project head Francis Collins that attempts to demonstrate a harmony between science and evangelical Christianity, is considered. I can think of no better candidate to review this book than neuroscientist Sam Harris.

We report on the succession issue surrounding superstar evangelist Chuck Smith (the elder) and his son and touch on yet another poll in the United States that indicates how Americans currently see the Church and State issue.

Finally, an essay from The Guardian, on the problems of being a Muslim in contemporary Britain, is featured in the regular Humour slot.

Contents

Publisher’s Note

Editor’s Note

Can Theology Survive God?

The Language Of Ignorance

Religion… Even In The Movies

Father, Son And Holy Rift

Left And Christian Right Take Lumps In Poll

Back To School. Back To Reading, Writing, Arithmetic And Religion

How To Be An 'Ordinary, Decent' Muslim

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Tart Remarks, Vol. 1 No. 5 – September 4, 2006