Category Archives: Religion
A Dummies’-Style Guide to Becoming a Cult Leader
These guidelines will help people to recognize such scam artists when encountering them. Just about all cults include most or all of these elements. Make a Promise that gets at something people really want and don’t have, such as community, … Continue reading
School Vouchers, or, Coming Soon: Bob’s Real Good Flor-uh-duh Skool and Bob’s Ayahuasca School for Little Cosmic Voyagers
ALERT!!!! PLEASE SHARE. In his 2020 State of the Disunion Address, Don the Con gave Ditzy DeVoid, his Secretary of the Department for the Privatization of U.S. Education, formerly the Department of Education, everything her little walnut-hard heart could have … Continue reading
Espinoza v. Montana
So, the Supreme Court is hearing a case called Espinoa v. Montana Department of Revenue. It’s about whether a state can refuse to provide religious schools with the same per pupil support (typically, seven or eight thousand per student, though … Continue reading
History of Ideas: Background to Puritan and Pilgrim Protestantism in North America
For some 1,300 years, from roughly 300 to 1600 CE, the Catholic Church, headquartered for most of this time in the city of Rome, was the most powerful institution in the Western world. It was the ultimate spiritual and temporal … Continue reading
How to Change a Lightbulb, an Ecumenical Guide | Bob Shepherd
Amish: What’s a lightbulb? Buddhist: The brokenness of the bulb is in the nature of things. By renouncing the desire for fixing the bulb, you can release yourself from the endless cycle of changing bulbs only to have them break, … Continue reading
Anachronism, Historical Fakes, Cults, and Scriptures
An anachronism is something inappropriate to the time and place being described. A momentarily famous recent example is the Starbucks coffee cup accidentally left on a table in a scene from Game of Thrones. Here are a couple others: In … Continue reading
Ideas Matter, Exhibit 1: The Horrific Legacy of Christian Neo-Platonism
The Christian Church grew up mired like a fly in treacle in the utter darkness that was Platonism–the sick, world-and-life-denying doctrine of Plato, who split the universe down the middle, into an airy-fairy spirit world “up there” and a contemptible … Continue reading
