A place for progressive atheists.

Wrenn and SB, I'm so sorry for your losses. A friend of mine was murdered by a hitman (his life cost all of $2000), but that's the closest I've ever been to that flavor of evil. I hope you've found peace and closure after going through something like that.

(((((Hugs)))))

I kept thinking how the person who killed my brother might have a sister and how the death penalty would be putting her through the same loss... no good is done, with retribution.

A little early, but too funny...hope everyone has a great secular, peaceful, and healthy holiday!

Merry early Yule🎄🎄

Hope everyone has a happy Thanksgiving!

Good one. I like that.

A commentary by Peter Wehner in NYT on Christians:

"After all, they insist, Mr. Trump may be personally immoral, but he is also a viciously effective street fighter for their cause. He is also the only person preventing a takeover of America by the Democratic Party and progressives — and that, they insist, would produce a moral calamity nearly unmatched in American history....

Sohrab Ahmari — a convert to Catholicism who is both the op-ed editor of The New York Post and a contributor to the religious magazine First Things — was so outraged that drag queens were reading stories to children at a library in Sacramento that he has relegated civility to a secondary virtue while turning against modernity and classical liberalism.

Mr. Ahmari and those who share his worldview believe our traditions and way of life are under assault by an aggressive, ruthless adversary and that liberalism is a huge part of the problem... Whether these Christians will be able to walk back or not, the effects have been injurious. This apocalyptic moral mind-set has led to an alliance with a shockingly unethical figure, who embodies a mobster's mentality and an anti-Christian ethic. Mr. Trump, a skilled demagogue, has taken full advantage of this. There appears to be almost nothing he can say or do to break the bond that has developed, and virtually nothing that many of his Christian supporters will not excuse."

Oh my! I'm thinking that the PBS showing of Kinky Boots stage play is really an affront to their narrowmindedness.

I appreciate this discussion thread---it does match my belief system.

To add to the discussion about whether 'Christians' are truly following Christian tenets, etc: I don't feel very attached to the word spiritual, but I am intensely committed to morality.

My moral compass and my belief systems about what's ethical and right are enormously important, and they shape my decisions and my interactions with others. These happen not to be attached to liturgies and stone tablets, but they are logical, and based on philosophical inquiry. Secular humanism. The so-called Religious Right has an extremely different morality code than mine.... Denying basic human rights, and on and on.... I feel quite like a foreigner in my country. Alas....

A friend of mine uses the word 'secular' to describe his non-attachment to religion. He explains that this word is a little less inflammatory than atheist, and he finds that in his (Jewish background, orthodox family) that word is more palatable and easier for people to take. I'm sticking with atheist, but I thought that his explanation of that was quite interesting.

So much of "othering" goes back to early childhood, and the kind of "other" you had in your Mom. A good mother is a *safe, empathic* other. A good mother helps you understand and imagine the interior self of others because she understands and imagines her way into you. In early childhood and preverbal years this is conveyed through carrying, play, touch, eye-to-eye gazing, smiles and tickles, rocking, and other physically pleasurable things.

People who have mistrust and hatred of the other are very often reflecting their early life primary relationship.

The best thing we can do for a better world is to use our free time to be nurturing to small children who need to learn these things, encourage vulnerable moms, promote breastfeeding and attachment, etc. We have to plant trees as seedlings. Like Johnny Appleseed, we have to seed for the future.

This time, I have to say YAY CHURCH.

this:

hahah this is horribly funny