The Kind-Hearted Smart Aleck

It's very commonplace for liberals or progressives to desire change, to want the country to "progress" and move forward on a number of issues. It's one reason why I believe self-described liberals to be less consistent making it to the polls on election day, because if we don't see the progress we had anticipated or been told to expect, we'll often times feel less motivation to vote the next election cycle. Conservatives, meanwhile, as the term would suggest, tend to want things to stay as they are, for things not to change too drastically. Because drastic changes aren't very common, they tend to be regularly more content come election day than progressives, which may be one factor why Republican candidates have a tendency to outperform Democratic candidates in the midterms. Going along those same lines, conservatives tend to claim that they love this country as it is or "as it was" and will even go so far as to criticize progressives for seeki...

I find it funny that I wrote a blog last night concerning Rush Limbaugh's comments on how a person can't "intellectually" both believe in God and global warming. I then made note that there's really nothing "intellectual" about religious beliefs in any context, so I found his statement to be humorous on multiple fronts. Then today I read about a recent study which made the following finding(s): "Are religious people less intelligent than atheists? That's the provocative conclusion of a new review of 63 studies of intelligence and religion that span the past century. The meta-analysis showed that in 53 of the studies, conducted between 1928 and 2012, there was an inverse relation between religiosity -- having religious beliefs, or performing religious rituals -- and intelligence. That is, on average, non-believers scored higher than religious people on intelligence tests." The scientists and researchers most frequently said the reason ...

As I have just a little bit of time before I head out of town, I thought I'd touch on something that's been in the news lately and which has been irking me somewhat. Following the devastating tornado which hit Oklahoma earlier this week, I've heard some people say they prayed during the tornado, or that their prayers were answered, and have seen some die-hard religious individuals post these quotes on Facebook. Why is it that people tend to think they're one of the chosen ones? The tornado ravaged how many homes, killed how many people, including some children, yet some individuals still believe that their homes and lives were spared because they prayed? What, since the kids who died hadn't prayed that day, God decided to let them die? I don't think so. God: "Okay, a tornado is sweeping through Oklahoma again. Since I'm all-powerful, I'm going to allow the tornado to pass through. I'll direct where it can go. I'll spare the people whom...

The Invisible Man To thou whom I speak, To thou whom I pray, To thou whom I listen, Every minute of every day, When I rise in the morning, Go to sleep at night, I know you’re wit me, My guiding light, I look to you for answers, Look to you for love, To look after my children, Look after myself, With me when I drive to work, When I return home, With me at every waking moment, With me until I’m gone, One day I will rise to be with you, See my family and friends, Be rewarded for my everlasting faith, Be forever saved, I’ve never seen your face, Nor heard your voice, Yet I adamantly declare, To know of your presence, I don’t believe in ghosts, Yet hold no doubts of your existence, Having never seen either, Absent of any evidence, The invisible man is coming, Believe in him or else, He will strike ye down to the fiery pit, A ghost sending you to hell.

Ever know a person who would openly discuss things with you, regardless of the topic, but if and when you got to the topic of religion, that all changed? I know some people like this and just heard a story from a friend of mine a couple years ago that illustrates it. She, we'll call her Lucy, was raised Catholic and he, Adam, is Jewish. All throughout the relationship, Adam said he had to marry a Jewish woman. Lucy, because she cared about him so much, showed an interest and was willing to convert. All throughout the relationship, Adam made it known that he was the ever omniscient one when it came to the topic of religion. He read in one book that a person felt Catholics believed that Jesus was God, so he told Lucy about this and Lucy came back with, "No, we believe he's the son of God." Adam argued and said, "You should do some reading and studying on your own religion before you come talk to me about it." There it was, a conversation closer, becaus...