Whatever the outcome, the one thing that is completely clear from the caution of the CERN scientists about their findings is the vast difference between the ways Science and Religion try to make sense of the universe. Here it is in summary:

(You can click on the image to see a larger version, or read a transcript of the text below.)

On god, holy books, and faster-than-light neutrinos

RELIGION
“Here’s this ancient Holy Book that contains the divinely-inspired words of God, the Creator of the Universe himself.

It tells you how you must live and how you must behave, what you can do and what you cannot do. If you think some parts of the book contradict other parts, remember that your human mind is too small to understand God’s mysterious ways.

Should you not obey our interpretation of this Book, you will suffer excruciating pain and torment for all eternity, after you die.
All this is absolutely true. How do we know? It’s written right there in the Book. DUH!”

SCIENCE

“We’ve apparently detected neutrino particles traveling faster than the speed of light, which means we are going to have to re-think a lot of things we thought we knew about the universe and how it works.

This is extremely exciting, but, even though we have actually observed this phenomenon tens of thousands of times, there is still the possibility that there was something wrong with our experiment.

So, to be as sure as we possibly can, we want other scientists to conduct their own experiments to independently reproduce and verify these results before we can accept them.”

Faith vs. evidence. Who you got?

Try 10 minutes of Bible contradictions conveyed as cute animated quiz show. No guarantees you’ll be more persuasive, but this excellent vid just might sweeten the pill a teeny weeny bit. Enjoy!

Jesus had two dads - why can't I?

Indeed, why not? Why all the anger against homosexuals from the Christian camp?

I mean, come on! You say that Jesus – the same guy who rounded up twelve men who were willing to leave their wives behind to follow him – hates gays?

Read your Bible and you’ll see that the Jesus portrayed in its pages would have empathized with gays in the same way that he did with all other social outcasts, from lepers to prostitutes to tax collectors. So go out and love your neighbors – even the gay ones!

The ossuary of no one in particular

The whole St. Paul’s bones issue has left me wondering. What would it take to convince the Pope Benedict and the Vatican that a number of first century bones were those of Jesus, and that he was not in fact physically resurrected?

If you recall, a few years back, the famous case of the James the brother of Jesus ossuary was debunked as a forgery, and for very good reason.

Now imagine that archaeologists actually find an ossuary and authenticate an inscription that says it contains the bones of Jesus himself. Imagine this inscription is conclusively shown to have been made by first century Gnostics, who believed that Jesus was not resurrected. Surely an authenticated inscription is a level above the two millennia of oral tradition that have been used to argue the case for the St. Paul bones, and just because the Gnostics did not benefit from a friendly Roman Emperor to help them spread and grow like the Catholics did, it does not automatically make their beliefs any less valid. Imagine also that the bones in the ossuary are dated and found to exactly match the time of Jesus’ death with any margin of error being well within the limits (unlike the St. Paul case).

Would this be enough evidence to convince Pope Benedict XVI and Christians in general that Jesus was not bodily resurrected into Heaven like they believe? Will the Pope hang up his pointy hat and announce that the central belief of Christianity – salvation through the resurrection of Jesus – has been disproven?

I guess not! So what kind of scientific evidence and how much of it would it take to convince them that Jesus died and stayed dead?

Comments please!

"The thigh bone connected to the back bone, The back bone connected to the neck bone, The neck bone connected to the head bone, Oh, hear the word of the Lord!"

Suddenly, Pope Benedict XVI seems to be thinking that science is his best friend.

Actually, the Pope has just shown the world that he has no idea how science works. And apparently, he even lacks a grasp of basic logic.

You see, the Pope gleefully announced that some old bones in a sarcophagus have been scientifically tested and shown to be those of St Paul, as the Catholic Church has maintained all along.


As Catholic Online reports:

In his homily, broadcast live on Italian television, the Pope told the faithful that the tomb had been “…subject to a scientific investigation. A small hole was drilled in the sarcophagus, unopened for centuries, and a probe was introduced. It found traces of a valuable purple fabric, in linen and gold layer-laminated, and a blue fabric with linen threads. Red incense grains and substances containing proteins and limestone were also discovered. Small fragments of bone were found and radiocarbon dated by experts who did not know their place of origin. Results indicate that they belong to someone who lived between the 1st and 2nd century A.D. This seems to confirm the unanimous and undisputed tradition according to which these are the mortal remains of the Apostle Paul. All this fills our soul with deep emotion.”

What Pope Benedict XVI is actually saying is, “Hey! Check out these old bones that we think belong to St. Paul. We’ve scientifically shown that they could be enough to be St. Paul’s, so, of course, they must be his.”

Of course, experts are skeptical about this claim.

First of all, the bones were dated to the first or second century CE, meaning any time between 1CE and 200 CE. Given that St. Paul is said to have been beheaded around 65CE, there is a greater chance than not that the person those bones belong to died after St. Paul. Secondly, unless St. Paul was the only person alive at the time, how can we be sure that the bones in the sarcophagus are definitely his?

Wishful thinking. That’s how!

Now, you might even think that it’s only reasonable for poor old Pope Benedict to get carried away and fabricate fact where there is none. After all, he has a vested interest in this ‘discovery’ of St. Paul’s bones.  But the mental acrobatics needed to arrive at such a conclusion are astounding, to say the least.

And since when have the Pope and the Vatican rushed to uphold a scientific claim, anyway?

Prepare to believe in a Photoshopped world

Welcome to the Creation Museum.

• Live the history of Creation – seven wonderful days, magically compressed into a couple of hours.
• Visit the Garden of Eden, where children play in the shadow of benevolent dinosaurs and evil serpents talk down from forbidden trees.
• Learn how Noah heroically managed to fit millions of animal species into a tiny boat.
• Discover how unscrupulous Victorian archaeologists buried billions of fake fossils all over the planet in history’s biggest hoax.

Come along and enjoy a terrific day out for all the family. Just check in your brains at the door and prepare to believe in a fantastic Photoshopped world.

Why wait until you die to find out if you are going to heaven? Take our test now, absolutely FREE!

This test is virtually guaranteed to be 100% accurate, provided your result is ‘no’. Unfortunately, we are not able to make any warranty in the eventuality of a ‘yes’ answer. Thank you for your understanding.

Take a free test to see if you are dumb!

Meanwhile…

Hidden inside a catholic confessional...

(More comments below the image.)

WARNING: God's judgment is coming!

As you can see, the warning is quite clear. Pay attention you:

• sex addicts (Both practising and non-practising ones. God hates you all.)
• baby killers (And sperm wasters too, says God.)
• sports nuts (Whether you live healthy lives working out all the time or just chuck beers in front of NBA, NFL or Super Bowl.)
• racists (Not bigots, mind you. God seems to love those!)
• atheists (Yikes!)
• rebellious women (Rebellious men are exempted.)
• lewd women (Phew! I thought he was going to say lewd men for a minute.)
• f se religions (Looks like God asked him to write ‘false religions’ but some doubting Christian took offence and tried to deface it.)
• money lovers (Ooops! Told you God was a commie.)
• liar (Which one? The one with the sign. DUH!)
• drunkards (So your wife left you, you lost all your money gambling, and you had to drown your sorrows? Not God’s problem.)
• two faced people (No! Not Zaphod Beeblebrox as well!)
• child molesting homosexuals (At least normal homosexuals will be spared.)
• thieves (That includes YOU who are reading this at work and thus robbing your employer.)
• witches (Wizards, warlocks and all male practitioners of the occult, you can breathe a sigh of relief.)
• pencil necked, weak kneed, gutless men (Yes, you who don’t reign in your rebellious and lewd women!)
• pot smoking little devils (Only big devils and angels are allowed to smoke pot.)
• AND MORMONS (Sorry guys! You really had it coming.)

God’s judgment is coming, and you’re going to be the first in line. Repent now, or prepare for an eternity of hellfire and gnashing of teeth.

I’d really love to have a video of this kid preaching out there. Should be funny as hell!