Thursday, July 5, 2007

Notes from the Bible Bending Diaspora

SCOTLAND: Scottish youth need a little more Bible in their lives. At least that is the thoughts of Scotland Bible Society who have recently appointed a youth development minister. "Living with the iPod generation means the Bible is increasingly faced with the 'boring and irrelevant' label." Nothing new here. So what does it mean that the Scotsman is reporting this as news?

TEXAS: A Texas' court rejected the claim filed by the American Civil Liberties Union and the People for the American Way that it is unconstitutional for a school district to offer a Bible class. The lawsuit is, as the Christian Post puts it: "on going."

AUSTRALIA: Paul Kelly reveals his appreciation for the Bible in his new album. As an atheist, Kelly utilizes the Bible as his artistic muse. "It's just always been a part of my diet, I guess. Little bits of Shakespeare tend to crop up a lot, too. If I only had two books, Shakespeare and the Bible would probably keep me pretty well occupied."

But despite enjoying the benefits of the Bible, Kelly will not read it to his children. He tells the Australian newspaper The Age, "[...] if you've gone back to read it as an adult, it's just full of . . . I mean, the Old Testament is appalling! The chosen people just slaughtered all the other tribes. (There's) Lot's daughters sleeping with him; there's Noah, drunk, lying naked on his bunk - there's another rhyme."

BULGARIA: Lottery fans who believe in the biblical significance of lucky number seven have caused the jackpot to rise. Only tomorrow will tell who is the luckiest of them all.

ENGLAND: The Gay and Lesbian Humanist Alliance (GALHA) responded to the Bishop of Carlisle's remarks that the recent floods in Britain are a response to pro-gay laws. Bishop Graham Dow commented last week that, “In the Bible, institutional power is referred to as 'the beast', which sets itself up to control people and their morals. Our government has been playing the role of God in saying that people are free to act as they want."

The GALHA chairman Jim Herrick had this insight: "People like Graham Dow [Bishop of Carlise] bring religion into even more disrepute with such fatuous comments. No wonder people are abandoning the Church of England in such huge numbers when it is led by silly people like him."

OREGON: A doctor published an article highlighting what he believes is evidence that the Bible condones marijuana for medicinal purposes. If I were to reduce this man's logic to an SAT analogy equation, it would look like this:
Kaneh bosum : biblical medicine :: marijuana : modern medicine
See? aren't you convinced?

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