Leaving Unitarian Universalism

Thu Nov 6, 2008 5:53 PM EST

There is much conceptual confusion going on in Unitarian Universalism, which renders impotent the good intentions on which this movement is built. I have become an independent atheist, a status which better suites my needs.

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Postmodernism Disrobed by Richard Dawkins

Seeded on Wed Apr 23, 2008 1:57 PM EDT (richarddawkins.net)

Suppose you are an intellectual impostor with nothing to say, but with strong ambitions to succeed in academic life, collect a coterie of reverent disciples and have students around the world anoint your pages with respectful yellow highlighter.

science, culture, dawkins, postmodernism, imposture

Richard Dawkins: Author of the Year!

Seeded on Sun Apr 13, 2008 4:12 AM EDT (richarddawkins.net)

Richard Dawkins has been named Author of the Year by the Galaxy British Book Awards!

book, award, science, god, faith, author, belief, atheism, richard-dawkins, sanity

Although winter is coming to Antarctica, ice shelves keep breaking

Seeded on Fri Apr 11, 2008 10:57 PM EDT (stopglobalwarming.org)

A chunk of Antarctic ice about seven times the size of Manhattan suddenly collapsed, putting an even greater portion of glacial ice at risk, scientists said Tuesday.

global-warming, climate-change, world-news, antarctica, iceberg, ice-shelf

Tell the EU to Keep Coyright Sound! A handful of major record labels are trying to break their fifty year-old promise.

Seeded on Mon Mar 3, 2008 10:04 AM EST (soundcopyright.eu)

A handful of major record labels are trying to break a fifty year-old promise. Musicians and their fans will not be the only victims.

europe, music, politics, consumer, culture, copyright, freedom, petition, eff

Unitarian Universalist congregations welcome transgender people

Seeded on Fri Feb 8, 2008 5:36 AM EST (uuworld.org)

She had doubted that she'd be welcome at any church. She'd had transgender friends who were booted out of other churches. At JUC Ganow felt support.

religion, left, liberal, transgender, lgbt, tolerance, uu, unitarian-universalist

Resolving to be imperfect... what a liberating thought

Seeded on Wed Feb 6, 2008 7:17 AM EST (CLF Quest)

Resolving to be imperfect... what a liberating thought. We don't need resolutions to make us perfect; we can find beauty and hope and comfort and peace as ordinary human beings. And we can feel grateful for what is already right and good. May we rest in our imperfections.

peace, religion, left, progressive, religious, liberal, new-year, uu, perfectionism, unitarian-universalist

Why do people go to church? To worship? No. To derive pleasure from the confirmation of their beliefs.

Seeded on Sat Feb 2, 2008 3:33 AM EST (goerie.com)

The study indicates that when exposed to new information, we filter it through our emotional brain systems, ending in our pleasure center. The area of our brain responsible for reasoning is virtually dormant.

religion, bias, progressive, faith, liberal, belief, emory, uu, church-attendance, religious-left

Stop debating creationists. It will only give them the illusion of legitimacy.

Seeded on Fri Jan 18, 2008 3:23 AM EST (richarddawkins.net)

The point is not, he said, whether or not you would 'win' the debate. Winning is not what the creationists realistically aspire to. For them, it is sufficient that the debate happens at all. They need the publicity. We don't.

evolution, religion, progress, intelligence, intelligent-design, creationism, reason

We should start eating insects. Insects have a much lower environmental burden, while their nutritional value measures up to chicken or beef.

Seeded on Tue Jan 15, 2008 2:56 AM EST (AlterNet.org)

While the world population is growing and our global wealth is advancing, meat consumption is rising dramatically. Currently, 70 percent of farmland is being used for meat production. If this trend continues, it will prove unsustainable.

diet, global-warming, meat, climate-change, world-news, greenhouse, insects, gases, insect, envirnomnet

The Dunning-Kruger effect is the phenomenon wherein people who have little knowledge think that they know more than others who have much more knowledge

Seeded on Sun Dec 30, 2007 3:08 AM EST (en.wikipedia.org)

Incompetent individuals tend to overestimate their own level of skill. Incompetent individuals fail to recognize genuine skill in others. Incompetent individuals fail to recognize the extremity of their inadequacy. If they can be trained to substantially improve their own sk …

science, psychology, stupid, competence, dunning-kruger

J.K. Rowling: it is possible "to live a very moral life without a belief in God," and it's possible "to live a life peppered with ill-doing and believe in God"

Seeded on Sun Dec 23, 2007 6:04 PM EST (TIME)

Rowling's religious agenda is very clear: she does not have one. "I did not set out to convert anyone to Christianity. I wasn't trying to do what C.S. Lewis did.

harry-potter, religion, god, christian, atheism, moral, j-k-rowling

The things that are holy and sacred in this life are neither stored away on mountaintops nor locked away in arcane secrets of the saints

Seeded on Sat Dec 22, 2007 12:38 PM EST (UU World)

The things that are holy and sacred in this life are neither stored away on mountaintops nor locked away in arcane secrets of the saints. I doubt that any church has a monopoly on them either.

religion, liberal, sacred, atheism, theology, uu, religious-left, unitarian-universalist, nontheism

Religious Left (UU) advertising campaigns launched at football games, and in Tampa Bay area

Seeded on Sat Dec 22, 2007 12:32 PM EST (UU World)

Will a UU message at a football game on Saturday put fans through the turnstiles at church on Sunday? Robinson-Harris noted there are UU congregations in all of the metropolitan areas where the bowl teams are from.

florida, religion, advertising, tampa-bay, liberal, orlando, uu, religious-left, bowl-game, unitarian-univesrsalist

I liked being the only heretic in Bodacia. Now we have forty-one heretics.

Seeded on Tue Dec 18, 2007 4:14 PM EST (CLF Quest)

As you know, I never have been much of a believer. The longer I live in Bodacia, the less I think I believe. I been gripin' about hypocrites and back-biters for forty years. I been damned and cursed more times than Satan hisself.

religion, liberal, christmas, xmas, uu, religious-left, unitarian-universalist, interconfessional

Ron Paul says evolution is "just a theory," doesn't "accept" it

Seeded on Mon Dec 17, 2007 11:57 AM EST (YouTube)

Ron Paul: "It's a theory -- the theory of evolution -- and I don't accept it." "I think it's a theological discussion..."

evolution, politics, fundamentalist, ron-paul

682

The Unexpected History of Christmas

Seeded on Thu Dec 13, 2007 2:45 PM EST (clf.uua.org)

Do you ever wonder what happened to the good old days, when the connection to Jesus at Christmas was strong, where the horse drew the sleigh, and the tree was trimmed with cranberries and popcorn and simple homemade ornaments? Where you gave an orange as a present, or a hair ribb …

religion, liberal, christmas, pagan, uu, unitarian-universalist

Karen Tse's human rights ministry is helping to eradicate torture

Seeded on Wed Dec 12, 2007 4:48 AM EST (uuworld.org)

Tse took a break from her international human rights legal work to attend Harvard Divinity School. She had been deferring admission to HDS for a decade, choosing to attend law school first and work in the trenches as a public defender.

human-rights, china, asia, religion, ministry, cambodia, africa, liberal, torture, vietnam

'Twilight Zone' writer defeated TV censorship by writing science-fiction scripts

Seeded on Mon Nov 12, 2007 6:26 PM EST (uuworld.org)

Advertisers demanded censorship rights — changing the race or religion of Serling's characters or watering down plots they deemed controversial.

history, tv, prejudice, television, liberal, censorship, science-fiction, sixties, uu, unitarian-universalist

The idea of Jesus as a sexual being, sheer blasphemy to most Christians, has a certain fascination

Seeded on Wed Nov 7, 2007 3:39 PM EST (TIME)

The idea of Jesus as a sexual being, sheer blasphemy to most Christians, has a certain fascination for some modern writers. In The Man Who Died, D. H.

religion, liberal, jesus, morality, sexuality, uu, unitarian-universalist, heretical, kazantzakis

The Founding Fathers and the First Great Battle over Church and State

Seeded on Wed Nov 7, 2007 1:40 PM EST (uuworld.org)

Thomas Jefferson is best remembered for seven words, the unalienable rights he enumerated as "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" in the Preamble to the Declaration of Independence.

history, constitution, separation-of-church-and-state, founding-fathers, protestant, uu, puritan, deist, unitarian-universalist, congregational

Should we thank the turkey?

Seeded on Wed Nov 7, 2007 1:31 PM EST (clf.uua.org)

In many hunting and gathering societies the custom is to thank the animal itself for giving its life to become food for the family or the tribe. In this way, one could argue, the middle man is eliminated.

turkey, religion, liberal, thanksgiving, uu, unitarian-universalist

Are You Scared of Scarcity?

Seeded on Wed Nov 7, 2007 10:02 AM EST (clf.uua.org)

For those who live lives of abundance, it is easier to defer to voices of doom, leaving the poor to fend for themselves.

religion, poverty, liberal, thanksgiving, social-justice, uu, scarcity, unitarian-universalist

Jazz Theology

Seeded on Sun Nov 4, 2007 9:11 AM EST (uuworld.org)

"It's a way to open the door a bit wider, to people who might not show up for church at ten a.m. Sunday but would at six p.m." He says the Sundown attendance is much more ethnically diverse than Sunday morning's.

church, music, jazz, democracy, liberal, arts, worship, uu, unitarian-universalist

I was tempted to imagine that a falling leaf had landed where it would work best poetically, not where nature had placed it

Seeded on Fri Nov 2, 2007 1:03 PM EDT (uuworld.org)

To write haiku I've had to tame old habits. My first effort, before I'd read much about the practice of haiku, came as I waited for a ride home from the commuter train station one autumn night. It went like this:

nature, arts, poetry, spirituality, haiku, uu, unitarian-universalist

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