Ray Giunta, Discredited Pastor, No Longer Appearing At Pentagon Prayer Breakfast

[cbayer]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/27/ray-giunta-pentagon-prayer-breakfast_n_2198147.html

Amanda Terkel

Posted: 11/27/2012 12:09 pm EST Updated: 11/27/2012 12:19 pm EST

WASHINGTON -- A controversial pastor with a history of exaggerating his background is no longer scheduled to be the featured speaker at Wednesday's Pentagon Prayer Breakfast after the Military Religious Freedom Foundation drew attention to his checkered past.

As first reported by The Huffington Post on Monday, Ray Giunta -- co-founder of We Care Ministries -- was scheduled to appear at the Pentagon's weekly event on Wednesday morning.

In 2008, however, the Las Vegas Sun did a lengthy profile on Giunta, reporting that his past escapades included illegally taking $10,200 from a cemetery board, falsely claiming to have advanced degrees and allegedly diagnosing young people as having mental disorders -- despite not being a doctor.

Michael Weinstein, founder and president of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, demanded that the Pentagon revoke its invitation to the man he described to The Huffington Post as a "well-known Christian fundamentalist scam artist."

more at link

[MotherPetrie]

1. Why in the FUCK is the Pentagon having a prayer breakfast?

[lalalu]

2. Religion has a big grip on the military and always has.

This is not unique to America or modern times. Organized religions are nothing but organized crime groups protecting their turfs.

[patrice]

5. "nothing but" please cite your source for that or accept the possible fact that you are as bigoted

as whatever claim you make against religions, just wearing a different label.

And know this about me, I am one of the "first" to call religion to task for its hypocrisies and have paid a concrete price for doing so.

[lalalu]

6. My source? LOL

Just look at Jerusalem today. They are still fighting over there and have armed guards patrolling religious sites. Not a bit of difference between them and cartels or street gangs.

Then you can go back in time with a history book and see all the involvement religion has had in territorial fights. The only people bigoted are those who fight to death over their version of religion and destroy so much around them.

It is beyond hypocrisy. Organized religion has blood and crimes against humanity on its hands and they easily walk away because people continue to allow them so much influence. The Catholic Church has committed crimes against children around the world and has paid very little for their crimes. They continue to lead prayer services and have an influence as if they are some moral compass. It is not just them but all these religions.

[patrice]

8. What you "cite" is not the sum and total of religion. You are characterizing billions of people on

actions of certain limited subsets. You are implying that the differences between actual concrete persons means nothing. By your logic, I guess, all of us are mistaken in our concerns about the differences between cultures.

Let's see now, the 1% are lying thieves, therefore all business persons are lying thieves.

The people of southern France tend are not concerned about nudity, therefore they are perverts.

etc.

.................................

That kind of "thinking" DAMAGES whatever your cause is by supporting FALSE EQUIVALENCIES and, thus, giving the REAL criminals cover amongst the outrage created by the injustice that you perpetuate. If we want justice for Palestine or anyone else, it's stupid to lump the guilty in with the innocent, don't you think?

[lalalu]

9. Religion has been a dividing force and

behind war and crimes against humanity since the beginning of time. All of them.

Like I said even in Jerusalem the major religions can't even exist peacefully. They have armed soldiers protecting their turfs. I don't care how big or how small the whole concept behind organized religion is an us against them mentality. It is how they organize and when challenged they strike back by any means available and that includes violence. There will never be peace on this earth as long as there is organized religion.

[patrice]

13. You didn't answer my question; isn't it stupid to lump the guilty in with the innocent? nt

[lalalu]

17. I answered it.

Innocents? Wow, talk about childish beliefs. You can't claim innocence when you support a murderous groups of thugs with money or influence.

[patrice]

14. And the definition of stupid here would be anything that damages one's putative goals. nt

[cbayer]

10. Fundamentalist dogma is fundamentalist dogma, whether

it comes from theists or anti-theists.

It is generally not receptive to facts or reason. But give it your best shot, patrice.

[lalalu]

11. Yes, rejecting the fairy tales and hypocrisy of

organized religion is so unreasonable.

[patrice]

15. Your posts are VERY formulaic. Don't your templates include enough variations. Try a thesaurus &

maybe a few unexpected smilies, not the same old same old same old . . .

[lalalu]

16. The facts are always formulaic. They follow a basic line of truth.

Some people can't handle it. That's why they turn to religion.

[patrice]

18. Oh! my dear, they most certainly are NOT. Anyone who understands what science really is

knows that.

Facts are absolutely contextual. There may be similarities in the processes by means of which facts are identified, but the very purpose and essence of those processes is to identify and describe the various contexts that make a given fact a fact.

You have just revealed that you are not qualified to declaim on superstition vs. knowledge and rationalism. You are an absolutist and reality is more and/or less relative.

[lalalu]

20. They are only contextual to people trying to deny facts.

That is why you are drawn to religion. It allows you to pretend facts can be stretched to fit your fairy tales. Similar to religious people claiming God did create the world in seven days because a day was equal to millions of years. LMAO

[patrice]

23. You are only displaying what is either bigotry or ignorance. I sure hope that avatar isn't Minerva..

, 'cause Minerva, you ain't.

Have a nice day.

[humblebum]

25. My friend, the facts are that more people have been murdered under atheistic dictators,

by atheists and anti-theists than all religious wars combined. And most of such killing occurred in the 20th century.

That fact alone suggests that extremist humanity is to blame and not religion as you claim.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

26. Not true.

[humblebum]

27. Absolutely true.

[AlbertCat]

50. Absolutely false

But we're not going to ask you to back up your imaginings again, because rubber/glue game is really a bore and you play it endlessly!

[kwassa]

57. so, you don't think Stalin and Mao are not the greatest murderers ever?

Stalin killed 20 million of his own.

Mao 40 million.

Both are atheist dictators.

[humblebum]

58. Your numbers seem a little low.

http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/20TH.HTM

[AlbertCat]

73. Your numbers seem a little low.

Perhaps he subtracted the fellow atheist commies they killed....


But most likely, like you, he is just wrong.

[skepticscott]

60. And both had dark hair and wore funny hats.

What was your point again?

[kwassa]

62. My point is that atheists have killed more people than religious believers.

Should I draw is in large block crayon letters to help you understand?

Or do you need a graphic organizer? other visual aids?

[skepticscott]

64. And my point is that

dark haired dictators have killed more people than blonde dictators. Your point is no more sensible, unless you have evidence that all of those people were killed because of or in the name of atheism, rather than because of their dark hair.

[humblebum]

65. His point makes much sense. Whether or not they were killed directly in the name

of atheism has little bearing on the fact that they were indeed killed under atheistic governments by avowed atheists. Such demonstrates that religion was not the reason for the deeds.

However, history does teach us that many were indeed killed in the name of atheism, regardless of hair color or the existence of facial hair.

[kwassa]

68. Oh, no, that is a qualification you just made up.

Atheism is a subset of the communist belief system. The deaths do not have to be in the name of atheism to be murders by atheists. The communists were atheists and murdered many tens of millions. Atheism is completely relevant to the murders as part and parcel of the belief system.

[skepticscott]

84. And the deaths don't have to be in the name of brown hair

for them to be murders by brown haired people. So what? Communists were many things, and by no means all of them were truly atheists. If atheism is so relevant, you should have no trouble at all citing millions of deaths that a lack of belief in gods directly dictated.

Go to it.

[kwassa]

87. Communist atheists murdered 60 million people

and these are the hard atheists, the ones that believed that there was no God.

your soft-atheist definition is modern and irrelevant. It isn't about lack of belief, it is about active disbelief.

[Dorian Gray]

94. And they both have killed more than red heads

so I WIN!

Red heads are morally superior! WHOO!

[AlbertCat]

67. Both are atheist dictators.

But neither killed in the name of atheism. Besides, replacing an infalible god with an infalible party is not atheism. They killed people they thought were threats to their power, not their atheism.

However.... all those innocent people killed in the name of religion, for their religion, by a religion.... since the beginning of religion (and try to realize "religion" does not just mean Abrahamic religions)...

History does not start in the 20th century
And religion is not just "Christianity"

[kwassa]

69. They don't need to kill in the name of atheism. Atheism is part of the Communist belief system.

They were athiests murdering people, tens of millions of them.

The Communists thought of themselves as atheists whether or not you think they were or not.

[AlbertCat]

72. Atheism is not a system of government.

Religion, on the other hand is just ancient government.

[kwassa]

75. Atheism is part of a system of government, the Communist system of government.

[humblebum]

70. I am not quite sure what your point is. However, ALL members of the Communist party in the USSR

at that time were required to declare themselves to be atheists, and many who acted against such groups as the League of Militant Atheists or happened to get targeted by them were indeed killed in the name of Atheism.

[cleanhippie]

71. Humblebum got to use his "League of Militant Atheists" line! Everyone take a drink!

[lalalu]

28. What a nice republican sponsored history lesson.

Just ignoring the facts never works. Religion was in the forefront and helping to lead the troops in every conquest and invasion.

You typically think only in terms of what are now the major religions. Those religions alone, with such events as The Inquisition and present day gang war in Jerusalem, prove you wrong. Then there are the so called pagan religions and beliefs which preceded them and also were behind massive deaths and destruction. Wherever there has been war and destruction there has been organized religion standing right there and helping to protect its turf.

[humblebum]

30. You have provided no sources for any of the garbage you are spouting.

All blather and BS.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

35. it is neither blather nor BS. The fact that it makes you uncomfortable? well, that's your problem

Ever read Wil and Ariel Durant? Do you even KNOW who they are?
I highly recommend that you read their works. A little factual education would do you no harm.

[humblebum]

63. As a matter of fact i do know about the Wil Durant writings on the Muslim Conquest of India, but

the numbers of deaths attributed to religion over a period of about 700 years or so in India still do not come close to the numbers of those killed under atheistic governments in the 20th century alone.

Perhaps you have heard of the works of Alexander Solzhenitsyn. In 'Gulag Archipelago' he estimates the mass killings between 1917 and 1959 at 60 million. You might want to educate yourself a bit more also.

[cleanhippie]

32. HERE WE GO AGAIN!!! SAME OLD SONG AGAIN!!!

Broken record! Broken record! Broken record! Broken record! Broken record! Broken record! Broken record! Broken record!


Dude, please, for the love of your god, get a new schtick.

[humblebum]

33. I would suggest the same. You seem to have an aversion to the truth. If you

want a one-sided atheist-only discussion or argument, stay in the atheist group. That is my advise. Otherwise get used to my old schtick as long as your old warn schtick about religion is being bantered about.

[cleanhippie]

48. Bwahahahahahaha!

You really are a funny guy!

Have a nice day!

[humblebum]

36. BTW, I seem to recall that you were finished with me and that I was put on

your IGNORE list a short while ago.

[cleanhippie]

49. What can I say? Your posts are just to funny to pass up!

Like Old Faithful, I can rely on you to provide the much needed humor and silliness that this group enjoys.

Have a nice day!

[truebrit71]

82. That is complete and utter horseshit...

...You'd be right if it weren't for things like The Crusades, The Inquisition...you know..minor little tiffs like that....

[humblebum]

104. You don't even have a clue of what you are talking about. So,

how many were killed in the Crusades and the Inquisition and how large were the populations at that time?

[truebrit71]

111. Your "facts" first please...expressed as a percentage of the population at the time...

...and then we'll see...Hells bells, the Catholic Church is STILL murdering people to this day!!!

[humblebum]

113. And so are atheist governments, so what is your point?

What facts are you referring to?

[truebrit71]

115. The numbers that you argue show that more atheists have killed people than religious folks..

...(hint - don't use Hitler he was a christian..)

[humblebum]

116. So who mentioned Hitler? nt

[cbayer]

21. Never said that. Your individual choice to reject organized religion is just that -

your individual choice. If I were to condemn you and everyone who thought like you for making that choice, that would be dogmatic fundamentalism. It's bigotry wherever it comes from, and that is unreasonable.

[lalalu]

29. History and the facts prove me right.

Organized religions promote war to promote their agenda and live off the misery of people. They always have and always will just like any organized gang. How ironic and people still buy the crap.

[humblebum]

31. On the contrary, history proves you wrong. You have a clear agenda

with absolutely nothing to back up your claims.

[lalalu]

37. LOL

Sure I have an agenda and organized religion doesn't.

[humblebum]

38. Back up your accusations or your argument is toast. nt

[lalalu]

39. I have and you just refuse to acknowledge it.

Not my problem.

[humblebum]

41. Oh I forgot. You said so. So it has to be true. LOL

[lalalu]

42. George Carlin said it best.

" "I have as much authority as the Pope. I just don't have as many people who believe it."

[humblebum]

43. So, in other words, you have nothing to back up your blather and your entire

rant is based upon the opinion of a comedian? You are a bloviator.

[lalalu]

44. You are proving me right and can't even see it.

[humblebum]

45. And neither can anyone else. You still have failed to present any historical evidence to

support your claims.

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

46. I certainly have seen nothing from you to back up your allegations

[lalalu]

47. LOL, you can't see because you don't want to.

Sticking your head in the sand is your choice.

[humblebum]

54. Who made the opening assertion, but failed to provide any sources, except the opinion of

an anti-religious comedian? if that is making the case, then it is indeed comical.

[skepticscott]

55. OMG....the irony!!

bummy asking for evidence to back up a claim!

[humblebum]

56. As I recall, you slithered out of our last exchange after refusing to admit that

you had indeed been given examples of OWOK, when in fact you knew all too well that I could provide the evidence of same from several past threads on the same subject and in fact, did do so in the same thread.

[skepticscott]

59. Slithered? No, just got weary of your evasions and lies

I knew all too well that you would never be able to provide evidence from any past threads, that you never have, and that you won't now.

[humblebum]

61. So again I'll ask you, are you again saying that you have never been a participant in a

thread or threads where examples of other ways of knowing have been presented or discussed? Whether or not you agreed with them is irrelevant.

And as you know, our differences are not that OWOK exist or not, but rather what constitutes "knowledge."

[skepticscott]

85. Oh I've seen you CLAIM all over the map

that those extra ways of knowing (EWOKS) exist, but I've never been in a thread where you or anyone else described any of them in a meaningful way, or showed that they actually lead to an increase in objective knowledge and understanding.

People like to talk about other ways of thinking, but any idiot can come up with those and say that they "know" something as a result. Our mental institutions are full of people who are absolutely convinced they "know" things that no one else does because they think in a different way, but you'd have to be more than a little crazy to call that "knowledge".

[humblebum]

97. Thanks for finally being honest. As I said before, it doesn't matter if you

agree with other ways or not. They have been recognized by many scholars for a very long time i.e. Locke.

Also never did I claim that any were totally objective.

[skepticscott]

119. As I said, neither me nor anyone here

has ever denied that there were other ways of thinking. Idiotic red herring No 189 from you.

You still fail miserably at demonstrating that any of your EWOKS lead to anything better than the "knowing" of more or less mentally balanced individuals, or that they do even remotely as well in their alleged spheres as science does in its sphere (which, despite your assinine repetitions, no one ever denies has limits).

[humblebum]

120. Like I said before, it doesn't matter whether you agree or not. Trying to apply your

ridiculously narrow-minded method to the broad range of human experience that it has absolutely no mechanism for assessing such is what is rather asinine. So how do you objectively determine whether a play is good or bad or rather or not a painting is beautiful. And on and on.

And as for "No 189," what in blazes are you talking about?

[AlbertCat]

74. Back up your accusations or your argument is toast.

Last edited Thu Nov 29, 2012, 02:19 PM - Edit history (1)

Why don't you back up yours by adding up all the people ever killed for their religion by a religion and/or in a war with religion telling the sides they are right, starting from the beginning of religions, and see how it stacks up to the USSR. Be sure to subtract the fellow communists the communist dictators killed....or explain how atheism is involved in killing fellow atheists. You seem to assume Commies only killed religious people: one reason why your arguments are not worth taking seriously. The real world is a little more complicated than your regurgitated religious talking points.

Anyway... we are not the only people to wonder about this. This may not be "proof" in itself, but it does site how it came up with the numbers:

I heard a while back that more people had died in the name of Jesus than in the name of Hitler. I’d always wondered if it was true, it seemed perfectly plausible given the persistence and viciousness of the Vatican during the Crusades. Unfortunately, I had found it difficult to find a number of deaths from the Crusades. But, I found in Google Answers, this webpage that chronicles numerous human conflicts and includes a category for religious conflicts. The numbers are hazy, of course, when we’re speaking about conflicts hundreds or thousands of years ago when death tallies were not a priority or of mild interest like they are today.

In short, 809 million people have died in religious wars. That’s nearly a billion people.

Oftentimes, a retort is that secular ideals and Godless Communism have killed many more. It is true that Stalin, among others, slaughtered his own people by the millions during the industrialization of Soviet Russia. By comparison, 209 million have died in the name of Communism. Some 62 million died during World War II, civilian and military, on all sides. Conclusively, more people have died in the name of religion than in the name of Communism or Hitler, or the two combined times two.

from: http://www.bookrateblog.com/2006/07/22/deaths-over-history-religious-vs-nonreligous/



Because the above is only Religious conflicts, be sure to add:

Human sacrifice and ritual suicide

This section lists deaths from the systematic practice of human sacrifice or suicide.
Lowest estimate Highest estimate Description Group Location From To Notes
300,000 1,500,000 Human sacrifice in Aztec culture Aztecs Mexico 14th century 1521 Up to 250,000 sacrificed yearly[191]

13,000 13,000 Human sacrifice Shang dynasty China BC1300 BC1050 Last 250 years of rule
7,941[193] 7,941 Ritual suicides Sati Bengal, India 1815 1828
3,912 3,912 Kamikaze suicide pilots Imperial Japanese AF Pacific theatre 1944 1945
913 913 Jonestown murder-suicide The Peoples Temple cult Jonestown Nov 18, 1978 Nov 19, 1978 The event was the largest loss of American civilian life in a non-natural disaster until the September 11, 2001 attacks.

I don't want to format the chart... so if you want to see the actual chart it is here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_and_anthropogenic_disasters_by_death_toll
a little more than halfway down the page.


I don't need the butter now. Would you like some for your toast?

[humblebum]

78. "You seem to assume Commies only killed religious people" never said that

nor implied it.

[humblebum]

79. Well just considering that the world population around the fifteeth century was roughly only

half a billion, the number of people killed in any war around that time probably did not exceed that number. Other than that, you are pulling number out of thin air.

However, since the archives were opened after 1989, many records have now become accessible and there were also many witnesses, journals, pictures, and films.

[AlbertCat]

86. you are pulling number out of thin air

I haven't pulled any of these numbers out of anywhere.

You ARE aware I got these off of other web sites.... maybe not you're so blinded by anything that bursts your little bubble.

Both web sites show where they got their numbers...usually from some official or scholarly source.

"many witnesses, journals, pictures, and films.".... uh... Again...history doesn't start in the 20th century. Or even the 15th century.
"the number of people killed in any war around that time " the dead outnumbered the living...until the end of the 20th century. The numbers go back as far as possible, not to one century.

You guys just can't stand to be so wrong. Tie yourself in knots! Like all science deniers, it's useless to show you research and facts.

Too funny! and pitiful.

as usual.

[humblebum]

89. Who ever said the numbers only went back one century?

I simply stated that the greatest mass murder in all of recorded history happened in the 20th century. There are several sources for that and it was even recorded in the Guinness book of records, among others. It would have been physically impossible for such an event to occur in any other point in time because the population simply was not large enough.

[AlbertCat]

91. I simply stated that the greatest mass murder in all of recorded history happened in the 20th centur

No you didn't....


Unbelievable! No wonder 99% of people here have you on ignore.

Adios!

[humblebum]

92. Yes as a matter of fact I did in post #25.

Last edited Fri Nov 30, 2012, 12:07 PM - Edit history (1)

And your sources, "The numbers are hazy, of course, when we’re speaking about conflicts hundreds or thousands of years ago when death tallies were not a priority or of mild interest like they are today" - beyond comical LOL.

And though your 809 million number or whatever it was obviously did come from thin air, your post did claim
"209 million have died in the name of Communism" - which of course implies under atheistic dictators and state atheism. All Marxist-Leninist Communists WERE self-declared atheists.

And where did you get that 99% of the people here have me on ignore? Or is that just another figure you felt like grabbing from thin air?

[kwassa]

88. 809 million? uh, no. The source page says no such thing.

The blogger who makes up that figure in no way shows how he arrived at that figure. It is nowhere evident in the page he allegedly quotes.

Apparently, pulled out of his ass.

We do have the figure of 60 million killed by Stalin and Mao.

Be sure to subtract the fellow communists the communist dictators killed....or explain how atheism is involved in killing fellow atheists. You seem to assume Commies only killed religious people: one reason why your arguments are not worth taking seriously. The real world is a little more complicated than your regurgitated religious talking points.

You miss the point. This thread is not about atheists killing religious people. It is about atheists killing people, be they religious, agnostic, atheist, or whatever. Atheist dictators have been responsible for the death of 60 million. At a minimum.

[patrice]

12. The denseness suggests a motive other than truth. There's not much one can do with dishonesty...

intentional or not.

[lalalu]

19. LOL, dishonesty is pretending you don't support

organized religion and their destructiveness.

[cbayer]

22. That is the conclusion I have also drawn from previous experience.

[cbayer]

3. Because there are lots of people who pray there and it means something to them?

[narnian60]

7. Thank you.

[truebrit71]

81. Then GO TO CHURCH...

...and leave Government Property out of it...

[patrice]

4. Why not? as long as no one is ordered to attend and as long as there is no religious, and/or other,

discrimination in internal Pentagon processes.

[leftlibdem420]

24. Not the point.

The term "Pentagon Prayer breakfast" implies that the Pentagon endorses one religion over another. The Pentagon's policy should be to allow religious gatherings among its employees and officials at work without officially endorsing them.

[cbayer]

34. How does it imply that it endorses one religion over another?

Prayer is a part of most religions in one form or another.

[trotsky]

40. It endorses religion over non-religion.

Which violates the Lemon test.

Not that people steeped in Christian privilege will ever understand the concern here.

[atreides1]

52. What exactly does that mean?

"Christian privilege"

[trotsky]

53. See here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_privilege

[humblebum]

66. Your assertion of Christian privilege might stand if there are no non-prayer breakfasts at

the Pentagon. However, not only Christians are allowed at the Pentagon, nor are Christians the only ones allowed to eat breakfast at the Pentagon, nor is anyone required to pray while they eat breakfast at the Pentagon. So quite obviously no religion has been established at the Pentagon. Where is the privilege you speak of?

[AlbertCat]

51. as long as no one is ordered to attend

How about:

as long as no one is ostracized for not attending.

Uh oh!

[truebrit71]

76. Why are there prayer meetings on Govt property?

That STILL irks me...

[cbayer]

77. No one is forced to attend or even be exposed to it.

Should the atheist groups on government property also be prohibited from meeting?

[truebrit71]

80. No. Because atheism isn't a religion, nor does it require "prayer breakfasts"...

It doesn't matter whether anyone is forced to attend or not, it does not belong on Federal property...

[cbayer]

83. Could not disagree more. Providing space for employees to practice their religion

privately is a part of Freedom of Religion. The Supreme Court disagrees with you, FWIW.

[trotsky]

90. "Providing space for employees to practice their religion privately"

is not the same as an official, publicized, advertised Pentagon Prayer Breakfast. I'd like you to cite the Supreme Court Decision that equates the two. Will you back up your claim or remain silent?

[truebrit71]

100. They should practice their religion in their churches and leave govt property to govt business..

..

[cbayer]

101. You have made your point clear. We will have to agree to disagree and let the courts decide

(which they have).

[truebrit71]

102. (for now) Thank goodness there are groups like the FFRF to go after this type of nonsense..

[cbayer]

105. They are breaking no laws here.

There is freedom of religion and freedom from religion. This violates neither, and that's the way it should be.

If they FFRF had a case here, they would have made it, which leads me to think they have analyzed it and found no cause to take action. Were people being forced to attend this or if it were being held in a public area that others could not avoid, they would have a very strong case indeed and I would fully support them.

Should practicing Muslims and Jews have to leave work multiple times a day to pray? Should anyone be prohibited from exercising their religion if it does not impose on others? That would be a violation of their religious freedom, something guarantied to them in this country.

BTW, I just found out that Britain has nothing similar to the first amendment. This has caused some serious concerns about freedom of the press. What do you think will happen with that?

[truebrit71]

109. Should they have to leave to pray? Yes. That's what synagogues/mosques were designed for..

They are free to be as religious as they like at home, or in church/synagogue/mosque but NOT at work...

Freedom of the press in the UK has been pushed to its absolute limit (and beyond one could argue) by the likes of Murdoch and other purveyors of filth and gossip and the Levenson Report has the attempted pushback. Some speech in England is already criminalized, especially for alleged "racial abuse", so something like the recommendations coming from this report are the epitome of a 'slippery slope' when it comes to free speech..The current PM, a rightwing puppet of the Corporatocracy, has a very thin line to walk..he is becoming more and more unpopular, and too much support for vermin like Murdoch will make his tenure at No. 10 even more likely to be just the one short stay...

[cbayer]

112. In this country, they are free to be as religious as they want anywhere they want as

long as it does not impinge on the rights of others. It may be different in your country, but the US is far more heterogenous and accommodating, imo, and that's the way I want it to stay. The largest growing group in this country is the "nones". They are not members of any churches or mosques, but some may still engage in religious practices. To expect them to confine this to particular, designated buildings makes no sense.

Thanks for the info on the current situation in Britain. I heard a piece on it yesterday that discussed the slippery slope you describe. In terms of the first amendment as it is interpreted here for religion, how is it handled in the UK?

[truebrit71]

114. FYI, I live in the USA...

..and firmly believe in the Separation of Church and State, and as such have no issues with private citizens exercising their religious rights, privately, or in groups in religious settings, or gathering places, just not on Government property which belongs to ALL Americans, and should not cater to ANY religion at all imho..

[cbayer]

117. It's not about catering, it's about accommodating.

All kinds of groups exercise their rights on government property, including the MRFF. Why should religion be discriminated against? The buildings don't just belong to atheists either.

IMO, there is no violation of church/state separation here. Most public hospitals have chapels for patients and family members. Should those be eliminated? Public libraries often have all kinds of clubs, including secular and religious ones, Should all the religious groups be prohibited.

Your position is extreme. Even the MRFF, no shrinking violet, does not object to these breakfasts, but to this particular speaker.

[humblebum]

118. Truebrit. There has never been an absolute separation of C and S in

the US at any time.

[Dorian Gray]

93. If all those allegations are true

then he should be in jail. (This is the first I've heard of him.)

[Dorian Gray]

95. That this thread

disolved into the same ole same ole is pretty annoying, but not shocking. This man is a charlatan, and nobody even addressed his BS. He was diagnosing young people with mental disorders? What right did he have to do that? That's a serious allegation and a serious abuse of his position.

[cbayer]

96. I noticed that as well. Not a single comment about the actual subject until now.

That often happens around here when a religious organization has actually done the right thing.

[trotsky]

98. The "right thing" would be for the Pentagon to not have prayer breakfasts.

Hooray, they dis-invited an asshole to an event that shouldn't be held in the first place.

Church-state separation is a pretty important issue to some people. I don't think it does any good to further discussion and communication in this group by dismissing their concerns.

[humblebum]

99. Government has no business telling people when and where they cannot pray.

It is unconstitutional. Requiring prayer would be an entirely different matter.

[Enrique]

103. fire whoever invited him

this is a major scandal.

The Pentagon gets so much public money, so much trust, so much prestige, they better do everything fucking PERFECT. Hiring a crook like this is a major screwup and someone needs to pay.

[cbayer]

106. It looks like the MRFF is on it. I think a head or two may roll.

MRFF renews its demand to the Pentagon to aggressively and expeditiously investigate the specifics of how and why this well-established Christian religious extremist scam artist was given the honor to speak in the first place. Any and all who bear responsibility must be severely and publicly punished."

[Enrique]

108. excellent

i'm writing my congressman about this, he's the chairman of some defense-related subcommittee. I'm going to use that language in my letter.

[Raster]

107. Dear Gawd: Help us kill in your name. Help us maim and disfigure. Help us poison the landscape.

Help us to plunder, rape and pillage.
These things we ask in your GLORIUS name. Amen.

There is no heaven.
There is no hell.
There are no angels, there are no demons.
There is only our real, natural world all round us.
Religion is but myth and superstition.
Religious conviction hardens hearts.
Religious faith enslaves minds.

[bongbong]

110. He didn't have to say that

> "well-known Christian fundamentalist scam artist."

He's repeating himself ("Christian fundamentalist" and "scam artist" are the same thing) within one sentence, possibly a grammatical violation.