Letting Go of God - Part 1

Letting Go of God - A Catholic Journey

This really looks like a great mixture of good sense and humour. This is the trailer, and I am hoping to post the entire thing in short segments over the next few weeks.

Julia Sweeney, Letting Go of God.

For anyone interested in listening to the whole thing at once (it is just over 2 hours and very good) here is a link.

Good Luck to Darth Vader Junior, Max Page!

Remember this wonderful VW ad featuring a pint-sized Darth Vader trying to magic things around his house and finally "succeeding" to his immense surprise?

The boy actor, Max Page - who also plays a character on the popular daytime soap "The Young and the Restless"- was born with a heart defect which requires surgery, which he will undergo this week.

Max, though understandably nervous about major open-heart surgery, is determined to put on the best face he can going in. But, even more admirably, Max and his family - along with the ad agency Deutsch - are using this opportunity to help raise money so that other kids with similar diagnoses can get the surgeries they need, too.

At a difficult time, a young boy - and his family and friends - still finds it inside himself to think of other kids who, like him, are facing scary health issues necessitating surgery but who, unlike him, may lack the financial resources or health insurance to get the heathcare they need.

Good luck to you, Max.  May your surgery go perfectly, your recovery run smoothly and swiftly and may you enjoy great happiness and success in your future endeavors!

The Greatest Show On Earth

I'm still struggling with several complex topics, but in the meantime:

Lyrics:


[David Attenborough]
How could one species turn into another?


[Richard Dawkins]
How is it that we find ourselves surrounded by such complexity, such elegance?


[Bill Nye]
The genes of you and me
They're all made of DNA
We're all made of the same chemicals
DNA - we're all made of DNA


[Attenborough]
Only the fittest survive
And that is the key
Natural Selection
That is the key


[Dawkins]
We are surrounded by endless forms
Most beautiful, most wonderful
Evolution - the greatest show on Earth


There is grandeur in this view of life
Evolution - the greatest show on Earth


[Attenborough]
The history of life can be thought of
As a many branched tree
The five kingdoms of life
were established early on


Bacteria
Protists- amoeba like creatures
Fungi
Plants 
And animals


[Dawkins]
We find ourselves perched on one tiny twig
In the midst of a blossoming tree of life


[refrain]


We are surrounded by millions of other species
Walking, flying, burrowing, stalking, chasing, fleeing,
Outpacing


[Attenborough]
Animals strive to reach this one ultimate goal
To ensure the survival of the next generation
This one ultimate goal
To pass on their genes
That is what life is all about


[refrain]


[Dawkins]
As we look back on the history of life
We see a picture of never ending,
ever rejuvinating novelty


[Attenborough]
Those animals may seem to us to be very remote,
strange, even fantastic


But all of us alive today
Owe our very existence to them

Tuesday Tonics - Throwing Darts in the Dark?

via Trenchant Atheist, Faith vs. Science: A Difference in Darts

565 Million Years...or More

Balm for a weary mind.

I'm off to the dentist with a broken tooth. I hope this video will sooth you as much as it calms me!

Mistaken Point

Parks Canada

The Drook, Portugal Cove South

The Garden Of Your Mind

via pbsdigitalstudios

Did you ever think about growing things in the garden of your mind?

It's good to be curious about many things.

You can grow ideas in the garden of your mind!

(via def shepherd)

Even Stevphen - Islam vs. Christianity

Steve Carell and Stephen Colbert (with Jon Stewart, briefly) demonstrate 

the inherent similarities and shared stupidities of theism..

Thank Gods It's FreyaDay!

Good Evening, Humans.

It has been a long, busy week. A hot, busy, tiring and long week.

Yes, let's have a refreshing beverage. Well, you go ahead. I will just take a little cat nap.

It has been a long busy week.

Thank gods it's FreyaDay!

Voter Suppression Threatens The Republic

Wait!  Don't skip this post because you've been registered to vote forever and are pretty sure it doesn't apply to you. Even if you think you are registered to vote. Even if you have been voting for decades, please take a moment to ensure that you are, in fact, still registered to vote.

Recent news about Republican attempts to suppress the vote highlights just how important it is for citizens to pay attention to what those in power are doing.  Voter suppression has become the most egregious of the tactics in a campaign pockmarked with slimy pits of lies, disinformation and outright intimidation.

It is not just imperative that Americans "get out the vote" this year, but it is now necessary to ensure that citizens' legal right to vote is protected from a campaign to disenfranchise even longtime voters with no reason to think their voter registration would be problematic. Seniors, disabled citizens who do not and cannot have a driver's license, and millions of poor working Americans - for whom acquiring the notarized documentation, filling out the legal paperwork, paying fees and taking time away from their jobs to file for government IDs present insurmountable hurdles - all face potential disenfranchisement in the upcoming election.

Republicans continue to argue disingenuously that they are protecting voter rights by placing more and more roadblocks in the way of the poor, the elderly and the disabled because, they claim, they are protecting us all from potential voter fraud. Repeated studies and investigations into voter fraud have proven that it is exceedingly rare, and that the threat that potential voter fraud poses to the electoral process is minimal. Conversely, the potential for harm to the democratic process resulting from voter suppression practices is very high. In third world countries, American observers stand by to ensure that evidence of voter intimidation and suppression can be recorded and publicized. Who is watching out for the same thing in the USA?

This is a democratic Republic and it is the right and the duty of citizens to protect our own rights and freedoms. Knowledge is power, but action is even more powerful. Let's start paying attention, spreading the word, and mobilizing our fellow citizens to hold our government representatives accountable when they overstep the bounds and try to impede our right to vote.

First stop: knowledge.  To wit:

ACLU on voter suppression:

"During the 2011 legislative sessions, states across the country passed measures to make it harder for Americans – particularly African-Americans, the elderly, students and people with disabilities – to exercise their fundamental right to cast a ballot. Over thirty states considered laws that would require voters to present government-issued photo ID in order to vote. Studies suggest that up to 11 percent of American citizens lack such ID, and would be required to navigate the administrative burdens to obtain it or forego the right to vote entirely."

Rolling Stone   Ari Berman's excellent article on Florida's purge of voter rolls to suppress Democratic vote:


"Imagine this: a Republican governor in a crucial battleground state instructs his secretary of state to purge the voting rolls of hundreds of thousands of allegedly ineligible voters. The move disenfranchises thousands of legally registered voters, who happen to be overwhelmingly black and Hispanic Democrats. The number of voters prevented from casting a ballot exceeds the margin of victory in the razor-thin election, which ends up determining the next President of the United States.


If this scenario sounds familiar, that’s because it happened in Florida in 2000. And twelve years later, just months before another presidential election, history is repeating itself."

CBS  Lucy Madison reports of mass mailings and robo-calls falsely telling voters that they should not or could not vote in the June 5 Wisconsin recall election.


"(CBS News) As voters head to the polls Tuesday to decide the fate of Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, reports out of the state suggest that robocalls are being placed informing voters, falsely, they don't have to vote if they signed the recall petition.


There have also been reports of mailings going out to voters telling them they can't vote unless they did so in 2010, and of people going door-to-door telling voters they don't have to go to the polls if they signed the recall petition, both of which are also untrue."

Raw Story offers a disturbing national roundup of stories from numerous states whose Republican governments are pulling out all the stops to disenfranchise voters. One excerpt (from LAWeekly):


"In a brazen attempt to steal this fall's election, Florida's Republican lawmakers have outlawed voting on Sunday, an African-American tradition. Indeed, across the United States, from Montana to Maine and Texas to Tennessee, 41 states have recently passed or introduced laws to restrict voter registration and early voting, and generally limit suffrage.


It's the greatest show of racially fueled political chicanery since turn-of-the-century laws banned scores of African-Americans from casting ballots. More than 5 million voters — largely nonwhite — could be kept from the polls, according to New York University's Brennan Center for Justice:

'State governments across the country enacted an array of new laws that could make it significantly harder for as many as 5 million eligible Americans to vote. Some states require voters to show government-issued photo identification, often of a type that as many as one in ten voters do not have. Other states have cut back on early voting, a hugely popular innovation used by millions of Americans. Still others made it much more difficult for citizens to register to vote, a prerequisite for voting'. "

Don't be caught off guard by voter suppression tactics. Go online and be sure that your voter registration is secure and that you will not be disenfranchised this November.  Here are some handy links to information and resources:

FAQs About Voting, Smart Voter (League of Women Voters).

USA Gov. page on voting information, including a link to voter registration deadlines by state and easy-to-navigate information links to answers for frequently asked questions about voting, registration, voting from overseas, working on elections and trouble-shooting.

USA Gov Resources for voters

Brennan Center of Justice Election 2012, information for voters and resources for assistance with barriers to your right to vote.

Here is a 2008 video about voter suppression tactics which is depressingly prescient - it is a brief but thorough overview of the methods and traps used to suppress the legitimate right of American citizens to vote. Please watch and share: