Atheists hope (don't pray) to bring ads to Toronto (G&M)

[CDL.TO]

The United Church has announced, in conjunction with its Wonder Cafe website, that they will be rolling out their own ads in response, with the statement:

There's probably a God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.

I'm excited about the United Church's willingness to approach the topic as a debate rather than an attack on their beliefs. I like their message as well; even if you're religious it's worth evaluating the role that worry and fear plays in your belief. Religion doesn't have to be inherently overbearing.

 

[Prometheus The Supremo]

CDL.TO, see my post on the previous page for my response to this subject.

 

[CDL.TO]

I don't think a more evangelical church than the United (basically any other church) would even permit the word "probably" in there.

I'll take it. By placing both positions on an equivalent and equal footing, this could create some serious debate.

 

[Prometheus The Supremo]

does it get any more serious than 10 pages.

 

[CDL.TO]

does it get any more serious than 10 pages.

Of course. It's called the dining room table.

 

[Prometheus The Supremo]

Of course. It's called the dining room table.

i guess you're right. it's probably not wise to discuss such things if the people you're eating with are very serious individuals and have sharp things in their hands.

and definitely not something to talk about during christmas time. as we all know, santa doesn't leave gifts under the bodhi tree.

 

[Mot]

The United Church has announced, in conjunction with its Wonder Cafe website, that they will be rolling out their own ads in response, with the statement:

There's probably a God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.

I'm excited about the United Church's willingness to approach the topic as a debate rather than an attack on their beliefs. I like their message as well; even if you're religious it's worth evaluating the role that worry and fear plays in your belief. Religion doesn't have to be inherently overbearing.

I bet people will add "Not" on the ads when they see them. CP24 ran a poll and more people said they were offended about the original ad than not offended. Why are people so upset that we don't believe in their God? Get over it. We're all atheists I just believe in one less God than they do, it just happens to be theirs.

 

[Hydrogen]

Why are people so upset that we don't believe in their God? Get over it.

Exactly. There really is nothing more arrogant than someone who presumes to speak on behalf of god. In the past it was gods. Other times it was female gods, or non-gendered god, or gods with really nasty attitudes, or kings who said they were gods, and so on.

Sadly, what we have here is nothing new. It's a case of one group attempting to dictate their version of what they think is right, and using a godhead in order to avoid explaining on what grounds they think they are right.

 

[Prometheus The Supremo]

why is it soo taboo to criticize a religious ideology? imagine if criticizing political ideology was that taboo in canada! but i think the reason why criticizing political ideology isn't taboo is because politics effects us all on the public scale. i think that anything that effects other members of the public should be subject to scrutiny.

it's one thing to personally be against gay marriage, embryonic stem cell therapy, pornography, musical lyrics, abortion, etc.. but if you're against these things because they go against your religious ideology and you want the government to be in accordance with your religious ideology and you're trying to influence the government to be in accordance with your beliefs, don't cry discrimination when your religious beliefs get criticized and don't argue that your beliefs should be free from all debate. it is you after all that put them on the public playing field which is subject to questioning and debate.

the moment you say canada should ban gay marriage or stop funding hESC research because it's against god's wishes, your personal beliefs are no longer personal.

 

[Brian69]

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/nova-scotia/story/2009/02/02/ns-transit-god.html


Halifax is keeping God off its buses
CBC News

A 'Without God' ad has proven too controversial for Halifax transit.

Humanist Canada wanted to place ads on Metro Transit buses with the slogan, "You can be good without God."

But officials with the transit authority deemed that too controversial.

"We're a public transit system first, and then we sell advertising," Lori Patterson, spokewoman for Metro Transit, told CBC News on Monday.

"So, if anytime we feel there's a message that could be controversial and upsetting to people, we don't necessarily sell the ads."

That decision is upsetting to Pat O'Brien, president of the non-profit group dedicated to the separation of church and state.

"It would be interesting to see what vegans think about the KFC ads. I mean, at what point do you stop offending people?" he said.

The group hopes to buy ads in Toronto and Vancouver.

"Our ad has been shown to be acceptable to everyone else in the country," said O'Brien. "Some people like it, some don't. That's fine. It's all about getting the message out and getting the conversation going."

A slightly different message has been splashed on buses in London, England. Various groups and individuals paid for atheism-promoting slogans like, "There's probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life."

Patterson said the transit authority would reconsider its position if Humanist Canada toned down its message.

But O'Brien said that won't happen.
__________________________________

Halifax has wimped out over the ads--well, the transit authority anyway. Apparently the slogan "You can be good without God" might encourage atheists everywhere to randomly commit acts of goodness thus upsetting the order of the universe. Or else it might offend people who are certain that you need God to be good and it is anathema to consider another possibility.

They are really setting the bar low on what is considered offensive as this one doesn't even question the existence of God.

 

[Prometheus The Supremo]

LOL bwian!


maybe they should stop running ads all together. we wouldn't want to offend communists, would we?

can you say can of worms?

 

[khris]

I would have expected this more from Calgary, not Halifax. NS is pretty lame though. I can say that after growing up there. People just can't accept anything that's not "normal" or "typical" there. If you're different, you don't belong, and they'll never accept you.
So really this doesn't surprise me I guess.

 

[Hydrogen]

The melding of church and state continues. Merely another example of the state forfeiting its responsibilities. Federally-funded religious initiatives can even continue to discriminate in hiring.


Hub pastor will head president's faith effort

By Joseph Williams

Globe Staff / February 6, 2009

WASHINGTON - President Obama yesterday established his own White House office to help religious organizations compete for federal grants and installed a young Boston minister as its leader, seeking to amend a Bush-era program that critics said violated the separation between religion and government and used federal money to advance an evangelical Christian agenda.

The president's executive order also established a 25-member interfaith council to advise him and Joshua DuBois, 26, the Boston University graduate with Cambridge roots as the executive director of the new office. The advisory council is also charged with promoting dialogue between religions in America and around the world.

At the annual National Prayer Breakfast yesterday, Obama told the assembled political and religious leaders that the new office "will not be to favor one religious group over another - or even religious organizations over secular organizations. It will simply be to work on behalf of those organizations that want to work on behalf of our communities."

Faith organizations "are closer to what's happening on our streets and in our neighborhoods" than government, Obama said. "People trust them. Communities rely on them. And we will help them."

But Obama's order leaves intact, for now, one of the most disputed policies of the Bush administration's faith-based initiative: A White House Office of Legal Counsel opinion that allows faith-based organizations who receive federal funds to fire or choose not to hire employees who do not agree with their religious beliefs. Bush's policy prompted several lawsuits and outraged civil libertarians.

Obama's order says only that the Justice Department will make case-by-case decisions on employment issues in the short term while studying the issue to determine if any changes in the policy are necessary.

Christopher Anders, senior legislative counsel of the American Civil Liberties Union, said his organization strongly objects to Obama's decision to allow the most controversial part of Bush's faith-based agenda to remain in force. Launching another faith-based initiative before resolving the discrimination issue, he said, will allow groups that hire and fire based on religion to continue receiving taxpayer dollars.

The stimulus bill working its way through Congress includes hundreds of millions of dollars in social-service grants that would be apportioned and distributed through various federal agencies including the departments of Health and Human Services and Housing and Urban Development.
"The Obama administration might be taking this on in the reverse order," Anders said. "They should first write the rules to correct the abuses that took place during the last administration."

But religious leaders praised the president for highlighting their role in administering social-service programs, and for maintaining Bush's commitment to faith-based charities.

"There's a real chance here of taking this to a different place," said Rev. Jim Wallis, president of Sojourners, a progressive Christian activist group, who will serve on Obama's interfaith advisory council. "The office recommits our nation to the necessary and positive vision of partnership between the public sector and the faith community."

Obama has long been a supporter of special efforts to reach out to faith-based groups - a point of separation between him and some of his fellow Democrats.

Campaigning in Ohio last year, Obama pledged to ramp up religious charities' work in solving the nation's social problems, from providing basic services for the poor to job training for those who need work. In the same speech, Obama - who taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago - said he believes in the separation of church and state, and promised that no organization that takes federal money will be allowed to practice discrimination or proselytize to its clients.

Yet yesterday's executive order does not explicitly void the Bush Office of Legal Counsel opinion allowing charities to discriminate in hiring and firing depending on religious beliefs, saying only that "the Executive Director of the Office [will] work through the White House Counsel to seek the advice of the Attorney General on difficult legal and constitutional issues."

Kathryn Kolbert president of the civil libertarian group People for the American Way, said she was disappointed that the president didn't seize the opportunity to issue a strict, clear directive: Religious groups that take federal money cannot discriminate in hiring.

"The president has the power to do that. He made a promise on the campaign trail to do that. He should have done that," said Kolbert, whose organization monitors the boundary between religion and government.
White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki said yesterday the executive order the president signed "is a key step forward. It doesn't resolve all issues at the outset, but it does provide a mechanism to address difficult legal issues moving forward."

On the matter of discriminatory hiring, Obama "found that one of the problems with the previous initiative was that tough questions were decided without appropriate consideration, data, and input from different sides," Psaki said in an e-mail interview. "There were ideological decisions, instead of decisions based in fact."

The order "creates a new mechanism for the executive director of the office to work through the White House counsel and seek guidance from the attorney general on any and all difficult legal and constitutional issues," she said, including hiring.

In a December 2008 report on the White House and faith-based charities, the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank, advised Obama to avoid making sweeping moves to undo Bush policies, suggesting a take-it-slow approach.

Authored by Wake Forest University professor Melissa Rogers and E.J. Dionne, a senior Brookings fellow, the report called on the new president to appoint a committee to study the issue and deliberately "rethink an approach that long predates the Bush presidency and will far outlast his own."

One leading critic of the Bush program said Obama's order is a step in the right direction.

Rev. Dr. C. Welton Gaddy, president of the liberal-leaning Interfaith Alliance and a critic of the Bush administration's faith-based initiative, issued a statement yesterday expressing optimism about Obama's version.

The executive order, while imperfect, "has moved faith and community outreach in a new direction that represents an improvement over what we saw during the Bush administration," Gaddy said.

 

[Prometheus The Supremo]

...promised that no organization that takes federal money will be allowed to practice discrimination or proselytize to its clients.

that will be hard to enforce. i don't think you'll find many that will complain about being preached to when in a negative point in there life. when you're starving to death or worried about freezing to death, that would be one of the last concerns on your mind. also, any help you would get you would equate with what ever religious institution is helping you which is kinda unfair since it's public money. i think a more positive thing would be to equate the help your getting to the public or the government. attributing your help to the religious institution can leave you believing that only people from that religious institution are capable of such good. this causes divisions in society.

the other point is that it is hard to prove if someone is discriminating in their hiring practices. BS excuses on the employers part can be easily fabricated.

 

[Brian69]

In doing this Obama is trying to dilute the influence of evangelicals and open it up to other religions. Although two wrongs don't make a right it's probably the most pragmatic thing he can do given the difficulty in cutting the initiative altogether. It's a bad idea and I'd like to see it go away but it looks like its here to stay.

But here in Ontario we have our own faith-based legacy (thanks Bill Davis) with full provincial funding for the separate school system, a system where non-Catholic teachers have a much harder time getting into the system than Catholics unless they have a pastoral letter handy.