A pastor, and a senior counsellor at a christian "boot camp" where the goals are to build character, integrity, and among other things, bring morality back into the lives of children, have been arrested for aggravated assault after tying a rope tether from a van to a teenage girl before dragging her along on her stomach several times.
Apparently the girl was running in an exercise at the ineptly named "Love Demonstrated Ministries" camp, but became tired.
Undoubtedly seeking to demonstrate their higher moral understanding and help instill greater morality in the girl, police allege that the counsellor held the girl down and yelled at her while the pastor tethered her to the van before they drove the van, regardless of whether she could remain upright or not, dragging her on her stomach.
Hardly what one could describe as religious people behaving in a morally acceptable way.
References:
The height of immorality was demonstrated by Reverend Dagoberto Valle Arriaga recently when the Mexican priest was sentenced to over 50 years goal for murdering his son.
Not only, as a Catholic priest should his vow of chastity have actually prevented him from fathering a child, but not wanting his superiors to find out about his little secret, he murdered the son to try to save his career.
A sickening display of a poor moral example.
References:
In what is clearly a direct contradiction to some of the most fundamental claims of christianity - peace, tolerance and goodwill towards others - alarming reports have been published regarding a deep rooted attempt by fundamentalist evangelical christians attempting to "take over" the US Military and turn it into an army of religion.
Michael Weinstein, a veteran from the U.S. Air Force, has recently published a book titled With God on our Side: One Man's war Against an Evangelical Coup in America's Military. In this book he presents compelling arguments on a considerable problem emerging in the US military.
During the course of his research, over 5,000 people contacted the organisation he is a member of, the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, providing details of coercion, harassment and guilt tripping.
Quoting Independent Weekly:
An army private ... contacted me when he was going through basic training. When he signed up, they asked him his religious denomination and he said Christian, but they identified him as not being fundamentalist enough Christian, and they punished him by putting 'none' on his dog tags. When he got to Afghanistan, the commander said that the blessings of the Lord Jesus would not be on the unit unless everyone was evangelical, and since he would not convert, this 20-year-old private would be responsible for the deaths and injuries the unit might suffer.
As noted by Michael Weinstein, were this level of religious abuse conducted in the private sector, it would not last very long before a large lawsuit were to be taken out. However, these sorts of constitutional freedoms do not appear to be available to those in the armed forces, making them ripe for abuse.
References:
Recently a tragedy occurred where two Hindu pilgrims in India were run over by a truck in a hit-and-run incident.
However, what followed was a tragic example of immoral practices. Taking revenge, a mob went on a rampage, blocking roads, and burning buses and police cars.
One would have expected better from religious people.
References:
Muslim militants from the terrorist organisation Abu Sayyaf ambushed Philippine soldiers on August 9, killing 9.
While the Philippines is predominantly a Catholic nation, various muslim groups, but most notably Abu Sayyaf have other designs, apparently willing to convert the country by sword (or gun and bomb as the case may be).
This primitive, vicious and brutal notion shared by so many religious groups that the ends justify the means when it comes to converting nations and populations to desired religions is an intensely immoral notion, regardless of the original or the desired religion.
References:
A priest has been arrested for for indecent exposure after being found running at a high school track around an hour before sunrise in June of this year.
While he admitted that what he did was wrong, he claimed that he sweats considerably if wearing clothing while jogging.
Surely if its necessary to exercise naked it might be a morally appropriate thing to do so in private, rather than say, at a place where minors may be?
References:
One of the strongest claims of religions, world wide, is that it grants a stronger sense of "serving one's fellow man", the sense of community spirit or reaching out to those who are in most need of help.
Yet, according to Science Daily, a recent study reported by the Annals of Family Medicine found that just 31 percent of physicians who were religious worked with the underserved, whereas 35 percent of physicians who declared themselves to be atheist, agnostic or had no religion worked with the underserved.
One would have expected that had religion granted moral ascendancy, there should have been a very high percentage of religious physicians working with people who need it most.
References:
The Australian government, led by christian Prime Minister, John Howard, has announced plans to introduce discriminatory legislation into parliament during the next sitting, thereby preventing gay couples from adopting children overseas.
This would be achieved by denying the visa application automatically for any child who is being brought into the country for the purposes of adoption by a same sex couple.
While some states have permitted same-sex couple adoption, this legislation would override the states.
This comes remarkably soon after a lengthy report was presented to government detailing the large number of instances in which homosexuals are discriminated against in Australia, particularly at the federal level. Of course, the government, led by a known liar who makes "non-binding promises" during elections and to colleagues for support, continues to maintain the falsehood that they are for equal rights and are indeed non-discriminatory.
Thou shalt not bear false witness eh John?
Given that Howard has repeatedly stated that children should only be brought up by a man and woman who are married, one assumes that in order to prove that they're non-discriminatory, the government will outlaw divorce for couples with children. This probably won't come about however as the government whose mindset is firmly entrenched in the 1950's do believe that heterosexuals are first class citizens.
References:
Clearly a sign of someone needing anger management, a catholic priest in Melbourne has in the last few days been embroiled in controversy after video clips were posted on YouTube showing him spewing racist, sexist and homophobic comments against skateboarders.
Now, while it should certainly be acknowledged that at the start of the video the priest was asking the skateboarders to remove themselves from church property, the rapidity at which the priest degenerates into spewing vitriolic abuse is by far and away completely uncalled for.
Surely a man of the cloth could simply resort to calling the police, rather than calling people "f*cking c*nts", or asking "how's your arsehole from being f*cked by all these c*nts?" After all, if the skateboarders had been repeatedly hanging around the church when they weren't welcome, surely that should be a matter for the police?
After the video was first posted and the story was picked up by Australian media, the priest in question apologised for his actions, saying that he had been more angry at that point than any time in his life. Within a couple of days however, videos surfaced showing the same priest, hurling the same sort of vitriol, over six months past, and another even later incident.
References:
