Perhaps emboldened by the success of the atheist bus, or his own Living Architecture initiative (in which top architects design desirable holiday homes), or the fact that he's got a new book to promote, Alain de Botton is now proposing a series of temples for atheists to be built around the UK.

"Why should religious people have the most beautiful buildings in the land?" he asks. "It's time atheists had their own versions of the great churches and cathedrals." Sounds great, Alain. But what are we worshipping?

"You can build a temple to anything that's positive and good," he continues. "That could mean: a temple to love, friendship, calm or perspective."

In order to make atheism more attractive, De Botton argues in the accompanying book, Religion for Atheists, its advocates should pick and choose from the aspects of religion they all like. So, yes to a sense of community and civic responsibility; no to persecuting gay people and abusing choirboys. And one of the things we all like about religion, especially De Botton, is the architecture, isn't it? It gets the message across far better than something like a book. Unless that book is the Bible, or the Qur'an, but certainly if that book is Religion for Atheists.

--snip--

What De Botton seems to be preaching is his own rather narrow definition of atheism, with its own unified philosophy, set of rules and even architectural brand identity. It feels rather like, er, a religion.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2012/jan/26/alain-de-botton-temple-atheists?newsfeed=true

During this election cycle, a lot of candidates have been pandering incessantly to the Religious Right under the assumption that wearing one’s religion on one’s sleeve will mean more votes. Turns out they’re wrong.

A survey conducted by LifeWay Research, which is the research arm of the Southern Baptist Convention, found that just 16 percent of Americans are more likely to vote for a candidate who speaks regularly about his or her religious beliefs. In fact, religious discussion is a turnoff for many voters. Thirty percent of poll respondents said they were less likely to vote for candidates who flaunt their religious commitments. This just goes to show how out of touch some politicians really are.

“Different people get a different picture in their mind when a political candidate shares or shows their religious convictions,” said Scott McConnell, director of LifeWay Research. “While some Americans warm up to this, many don’t see it as a positive.”

The survey also revealed some interesting trends about voting preferences by age and race. Thirty-seven percent of Americans age 65 and over were the most likely to say a candidate’s expressed religious views would have zero influence on their choice of a candidate.

--snip--

The least surprising finding was that nonreligious Americans don’t like overly religious candidates. Sixty-seven percent of respondents who do not attend worship services said a candidate’s repeated religious rhetoric would make them “less likely to vote for a candidate.” Just 3 percent would be more likely to vote for the candidate.

http://www.secularnewsdaily.com/2012/01/26/candidates-and-religion-voters-want-policy-plans-not-a-profession-of-faith/

Presidential candidates who share their faith on the campaign trail may not be helping their bid for the nomination, according to a recent LifeWay Research survey of American adults.

The online survey, conducted Sept. 23-26, 2011, asked, "When a candidate running for office regularly expresses religious conviction or activity, how does that impact your vote?"

According to the survey, only 1 in 6 Americans (16 percent) are more likely to vote for a candidate who regularly shares their religious beliefs. While 30 percent indicate they would be less likely to vote for a candidate expressing religious activity, 28 percent say it would have no impact on their choice of candidate. Twenty-one percent of Americans say it would depend on the candidate's religion.

According to age distinctions, the survey revealed younger Americans ages 18-29 (24 percent) and ages 30-49 (24 percent) are more likely to select "depends on the religion" of the candidate. Those age 65 and over are the most likely (37 percent) to say a candidate's expression of religious conviction or activity would have no impact on their choice of candidate.

http://www.lifeway.com/Article/Study-Americans-weigh-in-on-political-candidates-who-express-their-faith

A slew of conservative Christian parents — and even an orthodox rabbi — implored the Anoka-Hennepin School District to purge schools of any mention of homosexuality and demanded that teachers teach about the “ex-homosexual” movement and “gay-related immune deficiency.” One district member even assailed Dan Savage’s It Gets Better campaign as vulgar and accused the popular columnist of teaching children about “three-ways.” Several people testified using little more than versus from the Bible that are often used to demean and degrade the LGBT community.

The controversy in the district is over the sexual orientation curriculum policy also called the “neutrality policy” which says that LGBT issues are not to be discussed in the district’s schools. Six students are suing to eliminate the policy on the grounds that it makes for a hostile school environment and the district announced last month that they are considering scrapping the policy and replacing it with one that deals with “controversial topics” but doesn’t single out LGBT students and issues.

But the Parents Action League, a group of conservative Christians, want the policy to remain.

Brian Lindquist and Mike Skaalerud presented a resolution and list of demands that the Parents Action League wants to the school board to fulfill including incorporating “ex-gay” therapy into the school resources.

http://www.tcdailyplanet.net/news/2012/01/13/conservative-christian-parents-fight-right-discriminate-against-lgbt-students-anoka-

View the full resolution at the link

Republican Presidential hopeful Rick Santorum really dropped a load on CNN last Friday night when he said rape victims should accept their babies as gifts from God. In an interview with Piers Morgan, the most socially backward conservative candidate in the GOP field remained unyielding in his opposition to abortion, even in cases where rape is involved.

Morgan pressed Santorum on the issue and asked how he would feel if his own daughter came to him begging for an abortion after being raped. Santorum said, “I think the right approach is to accept this horribly created - in the sense of rape - but nevertheless a gift in a very broken way, the gift of human life, and accept what God has given to you.”

He added that rape victims ought to “make the best of a bad situation.”

MORGAN: On abortion, you did harden your position on that as you got older. Why was that?

SANTORUM: Life. You know, when I decided to run for public life, I was informed very quickly people wanted to know what my position on that was. So I went through the process of trying to better understand the facts.

It became very clear to me that life begins at conception and persons are covered by the Constitution and since life -- people, a human life is the same as a person, to me it was a pretty simple deduction to make. That's what the Constitution clearly intended to protect.

MORGAN: But do you really -- do you really -- let me ask you this. Do you really believe, in every case, it should be totally wrong, in the sense that -- I know that you believe, even in cases of rape and incest -- and you've got two daughters. You know, if you have a daughter that came to you who had been raped.

SANTORUM: Yes.

MORGAN: And was pregnant and was begging you to let her have an abortion, would you really be able to look her in the eye and say, no, as her father?

SANTORUM: I would do what every father must do, is to try to counsel your daughter to do the right thing.

(CROSSTALK)

MORGAN: It's an almost impossibly hypothetical thing to ask you, but there will be people in that position, and they will share your religious values.

SANTORUM: It's not a matter of religious values.

MORGAN: And they are looking at their daughter ,saying, how can I deal with this, because if I make her have this baby, isn't it going to just ruin her life?

SANTORUM: Well, you can make the argument that if she doesn't have this baby, if she kills her child, that that, too, could ruin her life. And this is not an easy choice. I understand that. As horrible as the way that that son or daughter and son was created, it still is her child. And whether she has that child or doesn't, it will always be her child. And she will always know that. And so to embrace her and to love her and to support her and get her through this very difficult time, I've always, you know, I believe and I think the right approach is to accept this horribly created -- in the sense of rape -- but nevertheless a gift in a very broken way, the gift of human life, and accept what God has given to you.

As you know, we have to, in lots of different aspects of our life. We have horrible things happen. I can't think of anything more horrible. But, nevertheless, we have to make the best out of a bad situation.

http://crooksandliars.com/diane-sweet/santorum-rape-babies-are-gifts-god

If you subliminally remind people about God, it can change their behaviour in all sorts of interesting ways. It can make people more honest, more obedient, more punishing, and even more persevering against impossible odds. And although it’s not certain, it seems to work for atheists as well as the religious.

Nobody really knows quite how this effect works, but one possibility is that reminding people about God creates in them the sensation that they are being watched. If people feel like they’re being watched, their behaviour changes markedly (even simply stick a photo of a pair of eyes in their peripheral vision, and they cheat less and condemn more).

--snip--

What Gervais found in his undergraduate subjects was that believers tend not to give socially desirable responses, unless they get primed first with thoughts of God. Non-believers, on the other hand, were more likely to give the socially desirable response without priming, and priming didn’t have any affect on them.

What these studies show is that god primes really do seem to trigger responses that you would expect if people felt they were being watched. That’s certainly the case for believers, although perhaps not so for non-believers.

http://www.secularnewsdaily.com/2012/01/19/people-say-theyre-good-if-they-think-god-is-watching-2/

The Bishop of Tenerife provided an interesting explanation for the vast numbers of children raped by Catholic priests: They asked for it.

In 2007, when the American Catholic Church was reeling from sex abuse scandals but not so much Europe, the Bishop of Tenerife, Bernardo Álvarez, made some interesting Christmas holiday comments.

In a Christmas Eve interview with La Opinión de Tenerife, Bishop Alvarez said that there are children who want to be abused:

There are 13 year old adolescents who are under age and who are perfectly in agreement with, and what’s more wanting it, and if you are careless they will even provoke you.

That’s right, the rapists aren’t the priests. It’s those seductive tempters and temptresses, fresh-faced whores all, bending over in front of priests, flaunting their taut, young, moist flesh, just begging to be used as the sexual playthings of perverted pedophiles (and hebephiles) who have sworn to their imaginary friend that they will be celibate for life.

http://www.secularnewsdaily.com/2010/04/07/catholic-bishop-children-want-to-be-sexually-abused/