Welcome back Brad Snowder, the astroholic, for his Guest Blog Series here every week!  I met Brad through social networking, and we immediately hit off.  His sarcasm and science-savvy resonated with me.  When he pitched me an idea for a satirical series of blog posts dissecting the Bible chapter by chapter, I could not resist.

Without further ado…Here’s Brad on Conspiracy: The Twelve Spies in Canaan!

Twelve Spies Numbers 11:1 to 14:39 11:1 When people complained about stuff it really irritated Yahweh. He would become very moody and go around randomly burning innocent people to death. The people ran crying to Moses about the unfairness of it all. Moses had a little talk with Yahweh who agreed to stop the random burning of people for the moment. 11:4 By this time the tribes were getting pretty tired of eating almost nothing but manna. It appeared as a scum on the ground with the morning dew and they scraped it up and made a sort of pastey bread out of it. It tasted like oil. After years of this being their primary meal they became depressed. They began to weep. They remembered Egypt where they ate fish, cucumbers, melons, onions, and garlic. Upon hearing the people weeping, Yahweh and Moses once again both became very angry. Moses said to Yahweh “This is just too much responsibility trying to please these whiners. I’d rather die so why don’t you just kill me and end all my stress.” At that point Yahweh took some of the authority and responsibilities away from Moses and reassigned them to the individual leaders of the various tribes. Yahweh said “I hear the damn whiners whining about the food and talking about Egyptian groceries. I will give you some food. How about some meat? I’ll have you eat so much damn meat that it comes out of your damn nostrils. You’ll eat meat for a month and you will hate it. This I will do because you hate me and all you do is talk about Egypt like it was the good ol’ days!” Moses responded with “Meat? Seriously? 600,000 infantry plus women and children eating meat for a whole month? Really? What are we going to do, slaughter every cow and sheep we have in every herd?” Yahweh said “You think I’ve grown weak? Just you wait. I’ll show you some meat.” While Yahweh was stewing about the meat a young boy came running up to Moses and said “There is someone going around saying that God is talking to him and telling him what’s in the future.” At first general Joshua said “Moses forbids this.” But then Moses said “No no, actually God wishes everyone was like that.” Meanwhile Yahweh got busy with making an odd wind blow. This wind came in hard from the sea and was strong enough to bring with it lots of quail which for some reason were out to sea. It dumped all the birds around the camp for miles, three feet deep. The people worked around the clock for two days gathering the millions of dead quail. The least amount anybody gathered was well over a ton. While they were stuffing their faces with windblown quail, Yahweh suddenly became all angry again, remembering something from earlier, and he killed a bunch of random people by sending a fatal illness, Salmonella maybe. 12:1 Moses’ brother Aaron and his sister Miriam conspired against him behind his back. They were talking trash about him because he had a foreign wife. She was one of those detestable Cushite bitches. They started bragging that Yahweh talked directly to them as much as he did to Moses. Yahweh heard this mean-spirited gossiping and ordered all three siblings to meet him immediately in his big tent. Yahweh appeared before the siblings as a cloud and said “When I talk to prophets I do so in the form of dreams and visions, all symbolic-like and with cloudy vague analogies that can be interpreted lots of different ways. But when I talk to Moses it’s in plain everyday language, from my mouth to his ears. Obviously he is special so what’s with all this talking smack behind his back, hmm?” Uh oh… Yahweh was mad again. He left the meeting abruptly after first giving Miriam leprosy, white leprosy, which is the really bad kind. Aaron was totally freaked out and started begging Moses to save their sister from the fatal disease. So Moses asked Yahweh if he could possibly be a bit more tolerant of humans being you know, human, and asked him to remove the disease. Yahweh asked rhetorically “If her dad spits in her face shouldn’t she be ashamed for at least a week? Throw her outside of the camp for a week.” So they threw her out and the whole confederacy of tribes including 600,000 troops stopped for the week and camped there staring out at Miriam while she stared back at them until she could be allowed to come back in. Then they packed up again and continued onward towards Canaan. 12:16 The tribes pitched camp just south of the Canaanite border where they began to plan their military offensive with the intention of conquering and seizing the land for themselves. Yahweh ordered them to send in twelve spies first to recon the enemy’s strengths and weaknesses for him. Of these twelve spies, only two eventually became famous heroes, Joshua of Ephraim and Caleb of Judah. The spies sneaked into Canaan and spread out and explored all over the tiny country. They returned from the mission and reported that the land was beautiful, and that the grocery stores had great produce sections. The salads they brought back were awesome, especially compared to eating that greasy manna crap. Caleb suggested they attack immediately while they had the element of surprise. But some of the spies told stories of the gigantic armor-clad troops that protected the land. They told of fortresses. They spoke in fear of Amalekite armies and Hittite armies and Jebusites and Amorites and all kinds of ites. Worst of all they saw fearsome giant Anakites! That night the tribes wept about the weakness of their position. They were stuck out on the desert facing well-entrenched land owners. They reckoned Yahweh would let the Canaanites come kill them and steal their women. They blamed Moses and some of them began plans to nominate and elect a new leader and head back to Egypt. Moses and Aaron fell on their faces while the two more optimistic spies tried to encourage and persuade the people. They said not to fear, that God would make the enemy a pushover. 14:10 The mobs grew all discontented and hostile again and they were all starting to chant loudly “Kill Moses and Aaron. Kill Moses and Aaron. Kill Moses and Aaron.” Yahweh finally had enough of the political unrest so he appeared to Moses. He said “Moses, me damn it, there they go again! I’m going to send bunches of insects and rodents! I will no longer consider them my children. I’ll, I’ll, you know what, I’ll make another nation for you Moses, a way better one I swear, bigger and stronger I promise.” Moses sobbed “But then the Egyptians will laugh at you. Is that what you want? Come on now, give them a break. You said you could be forgiving, except of course for the guilty and their children down to the fourth generation.” Yahweh said “Ok Moses, I’ll forgive them this time. But sure as I live the people will see how glorious and fearsome I am. For every person who saw me being glorious back in Egypt, but who now has doubts about my military strategy, I hereby sentence them to wander around in this desert until they die. Twenty years and older, all Israelites must die in this desert. In forty years I’ll probably take their children into Canaan. Caleb and Joshua however, they’re good spies. They’re the exception to this punishment, they’re ok.” To make his feelings clear Yahweh sent a special spy disease that killed only the ten reluctant spies. 14:39 When Moses told the mob of doubters the bad news of Yahweh’s decision to make them die in the desert the people became very depressed. In the morning they showed up and sincerely apologized and begged for forgiveness. They even said they were willing to go to Canaan and fight but Moses explained that the deal was off and that God would show no mercy and refused to protect them from harm. Sure enough some bad ass Amalekites came and killed the malcontents. Next: A Talking DonkeyMore at Skywise Unlimited

My Related posts:

1. Bible Story Retold: A Special Promise – The Ark of the Covenant
2. Bible Story Retold – Golden Cow and Worshiping Baal
3. Bible Story Retold: The Show Must Go On – The Tabernacle

A few months ago, I reviewed the book, Why Evolution is True by Jerry Coyne.  This book seemed to me an interesting primer for ex-Christians seeking more information about evolution.

One of my perceptive blog readers, Randy Walthall, disagreed with my review and sent me his own analysis of the book.  I appreciated his perspective (though I disagree on several points) and asked him if I could post it here on the blog.  He heartily agreed.

I would love to get your feedback about his assessment, too.  Feel free to leave your comments for Randy or me below!

Now, here’s Randy…

I must disagree with your rating of Coyne’s book. I think five stars is too high for a book that uses logical fallacies, insults, and guesswork to support its thesis. Coyne’s egotism should cost the book one star.

The book’s title promises a lot. What we get is unsupported dogmatic statements. On page xx we are told “(w)e are observing species splitting into two….” (Coyne uses the plural). Page four tells that there are “many examples of evolution known to occur within a human lifetime.” Coyne does not give us any examples of this. We have art, but no evidence. On page 178 he tells that we can’t see new species develop in our lifetime. Which is it?

Evolution is about origins and development. Coyne forfeits the origins half of his theory when he tells us (p.3) that it all began with “perhaps a self-replicating molecule.” Perhaps is an admission of ignorance. (On pages xvi and 233 he does not use “perhaps.”) This is worse than speculation. What is the chemical composition of this molecule? Do any exist? Why did they stop self-replicating? Is there even a theory in physics or chemistry that will support this statement? On page 22 he admits he has no “window…at all into the origin of life.”

Coyne tells us that “evolutionary pressures wax and wane.” (p4) What are these pressures? How is the waxing and waning effected?

Coyne engages in speculation when he explains (p. 6) how groups grow apart and become incompatible. The most silly is what I call the Ugly Theory. No evidence, just assertion.

Coyne tells us that all vertebrates descended from a common ancestor (p. and that reptiles and mammals (p.9) “must” have had a common ancestor. How does he know this? Could not there have been parallel lines of descent from different self-replicating molecules? What in evolutionary theory precludes this?

On page 12 Coyne notes the slow process that sea turtles use to bury their eggs. He notes that this exposes the eggs to predators. It also exposes the turtles, but he does not note that. He fails to tell us that predators benefit from this but not to the extinction of the turtles. Coyne thinks that if the turtles had flippers more suited for digging that the turtles would not swim as well. How does he know this? This betrays the presuppositions underlying the book: I know all or at least enough.

Coyne fails to consider environmental changes. He cites plankton (p.29-30) as an example of evolutionary change. He points to the differences in the number of chambers in the final whorl of the shell. What caused this? Evolution of course! Environmental considerations are not mentioned. Could they have been a factor? He does not say. Are the different plankton of the same maturity? He does not say. Yet on page 30 he tells us that environmental changes explain the differences in the fossils of another creature. It is all related to natural selection, he says. How?

Is the recent news that North Koreans are on average an inch shorter than South Koreans an example of evolution? How do we know?

With the trilobites evolution can even go backwards. This is Coyne’s operating principle: always interpret the evidence to support evolution. See, the fossils prove it. Case closed. This is bad science. If size and shape variations are evolution, then the mesomorph, endomorph and ectomorph distinctions are valid.

Coyne openly guesses. Page 34 is all speculation about bird evolution. He says “we can guess that the common ancestor of birds and reptiles was a ancient reptile.” He “knows” the common ancestor of reptiles and birds was a dinosaur. “Its overall appearance would give few clues that it was indeed a ‘missing link’ –that one lineage of descendants would later give rise to all modern birds, and the other to more dinosaurs. Truly birdlike traits such as wings and large breastbone for anchoring the flight muscles, would have evolved only later on the branch leading to birds. As that lineage itself progressed from reptiles to birds, it sprouted off many species having mixtures of reptile-like and birdlike traits. Some of the species went extinct, while others continued into what are now modern birds.” (p.34-35) How? With what evidence?

Coyne appeals to transitional forms. In a from-the-sea-to-the-land progression these creatures evolved, he sites the fossils. But which way did they go? Could they have gone instead from land to the sea? He says this of whales. (p51) It is another case of interpret the evidence to fit the theory. Coyne cannot even prove the “transitional forms” are really transitional. He would need an unbroken series of transitions to do this.

Even his claim that reptiles came before birds is suspect. It is impossible to prove. He would need omniscience to state categorically what he states categorically.

Coyne makes more claims that cannot be proven. The Tiktaalik mentioned is supposed to be the “direct link between earlier lobe-finned fish and later amphibians.” (p.37) First he tells us that Tiktaalik “probably breathe above the surface.” But on page page 38 he tells us that this same creature had lungs and gills so it “could breathe both ways.” Which is it? Probably or definitely?

“Probably” is one of Coyne’s favorite words. He uses that word repeatedly, along with it synonyms. When he needs to have evidence of transitional forms, he is dogmatic. There is no doubt. But when he tries to explain the mechanics, it all probably, perhaps, and may.

Coyne’s tentative language is a big problem with the book. He uses these words continually. Do a word count on some randomly selected pages. I did four pages and averaged two tentative qualifiers per page. This language is a verbal mask he hides behind. With such language it is impossible to pin him down on many of his statements. These words camouflage the vacuity of much of what he says.

Coyne does not let the lack of evidence stop him. On page 51 we are told of Pakicetus. Actually, we are told only of its skull. That is all there is. From this Coyne tells us that “it or its close relative would give rise to a dramatic evolutionary radiation.” All this from a skull. What did the rest of this thing look like? Without the rest of the body how can Coyne tell us “it or its close relatives” did anything? Could this be one of those evolutionary dead ends? What close relatives? He is guessing. He makes this all up. He has no evidence. He passes this off as science. It is junk, but the art on page 50 is nice.

Coyne uses his imagination with the ostrich. (p57) The bird’s wings are vestiges. He does not know this. He just states it. Why are the wings not considered to be evolving so that one day the ostrich will fly? Because the idea of vestiges is essential to evolutionary theory; therefore, no other explanation is considered. Make the evidence fit the theory.

Coyne tries to explain the loss of flight among the ratites (p. 58-59) by saying that in the southern hemisphere there are fewer mammalian predators. Think about this! Fewer predators means more of the prey species. More of the prey species means more predators survive long enough to reproduce. This is well known. When plotted on a graph it is a pair of out-of-phase sine waves. Coyne’s argument make no sense. Furthermore, fewer mammalian predators does not mean fewer predators overall.

Coyne speculates that energy saved by losing flight ability “could” go into reproduction. It is good to give probably a rest. Coyne tries to have it both ways. Metabolic economy in the flightless birds but escape from predators in the flying birds. But what advantage is there in useless wings? He does not say. Nor does he say why useless vestiges do not lead to the extinction of the species. Useless means waste. Waste leads to death.

The issue of vestigial organs is working against evolution. The list of human vestiges has been continually shrinking. The most recent deletion from the list is the appendix. Coyne was not informed about this. On page 60 he call the appendix “the most famous” of human vestiges. He backtracks by admitting that the appendix has some uses.

The issue of vestigial organs raises the issue of the ignorance of science. As research advances, the number of vestigial features declines. The trend is against Coyne. Coyne’s tacit assumption is that if it is not explainable, it must be a vestige. Here Coyne would be wise to be tentative.

On page 62 he discusses the coccyx. Read this paragraph. It is a giant case of begging the question. “It still has a function (some useful muscles attach to it), but remember that its vestigiality is diagnosed not by its usefulness but because it no longer has the function for which it originally evolved.”

On page 75 Coyne mentions human embryonic gill slits. This was Ernst Haeckel’s deception. This idea has been thoroughly discredited and exposed as a fraud. It is outrageous that Coyne mentions this. It is worse that Coyne tries to defend Haeckel. Evolutionists groan about Haeckel. Stephen Gould was upset that this fraud is still found in modern science textbooks.

Coyne’s section on Bad Designs is a case of arrogance. What he cannot understand he considers as a bad design. Coyne gives no thought to the possibility that there may be yet an use for what he considers bad design. Coyne’s opinion assumes omniscience. He offers no alternatives. He forgets that the principle of evolution may be using a “nefarious organ” (another reference to the human appendix p. 81) to kill off a species. He contradicts his own principle.

Coyne further contradicts his principle when he discusses the prickly pear’s introduction into and spread within Australia (p.91). Why should not the pear dominate it new environment? Isn’t this evolution’s way? Isn’t it an evolutionary principle that the new, fitter species displaces the weaker? On page 110 he tells us, “Evolutionary theory predicts that many animals and plants arriving in new and unoccupied habitats will evolve to thrive there, and will form new species, filling up ecological niches.” Men are evolution’s product, so is their introducing the pear a way evolution works? If not, what evolutionary principle contradicts this?

On page 121 Coyne gives an unsupported assertion: “This [symbiosis] is a direct prediction of evolution , and one that does not follow from the notion of special creation or intelligent design.” He does not tell us how it does not follow. How does symbiosis contradict special creation? Assertions are not evidence nor logic.

Coyne tries to use dog breeding as an example of evolution. The problem is that however dogs are bred, they always produce dogs. For dog breeding to be an example of evolution, we would need a dog to produce a lobster. By Coyne’s thinking, since each human is different from every other human, each person is a new species.

In dealing with drug-resistant bacteria (p.131) Coyne assumes that the bacteria evolved. He make the unsupported statement that penicillin could “wipe out every strain of staph in the world.” He then states that the bacteria evolved a resistance to the drug. Where did the bacteria get this new genetic information? How did it know to use it? Was this a case of evolution or a case of penicillin’s not quite killing every single germ because some of the bacteria had a prior natural immunity to penicillin? Was penicillin originally so effective because it killed most of the bacteria, allowing the body’s natural defenses to kill the rest? Was Typhoid Mary a new species of human?

Coyne tries to deal with the information increase on page 131, but he just dodges the issue. He claims that evolutionists do not need to explain because it is impossible to do so. Coyne did not accept this argument when it came from the creationists. This necessity to explain is the basis of his “Bad Designs” section.

Further, Coyne begs the question. He cites Doolittle’s and Zhaxybayeva’s explanation of the unexplainable evolution of the flagella: “Evolutionist need not take on the impossible challenge of pinning down every detail of flagellar evolution. We need only show that such a development, involving processes and constituents not unlike those we already know and can agree upon, is feasible.” We already know it is true, so we do not have to prove it. This is bad science and bad logic.

Coyne then defines their use of “feasible.” “[B]y ‘feasible,’ they mean that there must be evolutionary precursors of each new trait, and that evolution of that trait does not violate the Darwinian requirement that each step in the building an adaptation benefits its possessor.” Coyne does not apply this to his “nefarious organ,” the human appendix. Nor does he apply it to the flagella in question. How does a partial flagella benefit an organism? Is this not a waste of metabolic energy that could go into reproduction? That was his argument on pages 58-59 when he was discussing the flightless birds.

Coyne even contradicts his vestigial argument by mentioning his ability to wiggle his ears. Aside from pandering to his vanity (he also mentions that he was a graduate student in Boston, hint, hint; that he attended Harvard as a graduate student; and became close friends with a famous person but you can’t disprove this because he is now dead) by demonstrating this in class so his students (at least the smarter ones) will laugh at him, this trait could be interpreted as progress in evolution. It is easy to assume that this ability is evolution’s way of improving human hearing. Why does Coyne think that this is a vestige that wastes metabolic energy that could go into reproduction? I will leave it to others to determine if this is a chick magnet.

Coyne says there no evidence disproving evolution. What would he accept? He tells us that “(d)espite a million chances to get it wrong, evolution always comes up right.” (p.223) What chance is there to get it wrong? If his predictions are not fulfilled he can say that we just have not looked in the right place. If we had only dug a foot over, a meter deeper, on the other bank of the river on the larger island. How can you disagree with this? What would disprove evolution? This is a major problem with the theory. If something cannot possibility be falsified it is not a good theory. This principle is valid in all other branches of the natural sciences. Why not in evolution?

In criticizing the creationists, Coyne tells us that “if you can’t think of an observation that would disprove a theory, that theory simply isn’t scientific.” What observation would disprove evolution? Coyne gives us none. Apply this dictum to evolution.

Coyne tells us that evolution is very slow, except when it’s fast, unless it is not working for the moment. Evolution always goes forward, except when it goes backwards. Evolution is successful except when it creates dead ends. Evolution is always proven right although there is no stated way it could be proven wrong. Sounds like evolution should be spelled Evolution. This is not science. It is scientism.

Coyne tells us that ‘(w)e should be deeply suspicious of speculations that come unaccompanied by hard evidence.” (p.230) We should. Now delete from Coyne’s book all such speculation.

Coyne insults his opponents. On page xx he tells us that “enlightened religion always found a way to accommodate the advances of science.” You are not enlightened if you disagree with him. It is an implied ad hominem argument. It is also begging the question. He demeans “supernatural explanations” as “always mean the end of inquiry: that’s the way God wants it, end of story.” (p.225) Faraday, Watt, and Maxwell must not of thought so. They even have scientific units named after them.

Coyne is a materialist. He admits this in his last chapter. Coyne’s shahada is “There is no god but Materialism, and Darwin is its prophet.” Today materialism is a major force. Evolutionary thought dominates the academy. But the history of science is a story of discarded theories. Kuhn in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions noted that theories tend to change when their proponents are replaced by the younger scientists. Neils Bohr is said to have stated that science progresses one funeral at a time. In physics it is string theory, in economics it is Keynesianism, disagree at your peril. Jun-Yuan Chen stated that “In China we can criticize Darwin but not the government. In America you can criticize the government, but not Darwin.” Coyne need not worry: Darwin is safe, for the moment.

Coyne fails. He uses made up evidence, forced interpretations, bad logic, speculation, and vague language. You need go no further than the book’s cover. It tells you exactly what is in the book. By looking at the cover the reader is given the impression that the art represents the process of evolution. The explanation on the inside back flap disabuses the reader. It is all cobbled together out of unrelated parts. The cover really does tell us what is in the book. Creationists could not ask for a better opponent than Jerry Coyne.

Science answers question. Since Coyne is a scientist, I have a few to ask him:

At what time did pre-humans become human? When would killing one of them have been murder?

Divide modern humans any way you want. Which group is the most evolutionary advanced? Which is the least?

If humans continue to evolve, when do they become super-human? If they evolve backwards, when do they become sub-human. Would the super-humans be justified in killing off the inferior species?

What happens if a lower species become better than the humans?

Is homosexuality a evolutionary dead-end? You said “it is reproduction, not survival, that determines which genes make it to the next generation and cause evolution.” (p.120)

Regards,

Randy

My Related posts:

1. Why Evolution is True by Jerry Coyne – Book Review
2. The Greatest Show on Earth by Richard Dawkins – Best Evolution Primer

Whether you are new to the blog or have followed my blog for months, it’s a good idea to periodically discuss our origins.  Each of us have distinct personal histories.  Many of you are familiar with my story about leaving the IFB (independent fundamental baptist) cultic group in 2007.  I was asked by Tristan Vick, the Advocatus Atheist blogmaster, to tell my story in his collection of essays in a Deconversion Anthology.  It will be released in December 2012.  I will keep you posted as to the details and availability of this book.  Therefore, I put together a 10-part-essay of my journey out of a religious cult into mainstream American culture.

Today, I give you the final installment of my story:  Living After Faith.  

If you missed them, you can read all my prior posts in this story here:

Part 1: Asking the Hard Questions

Part 2: Leaving My Man Behind

Part 3: Losing My Education

Part 4:  Exploring My Religion

Part 5: Floundering in Religious Options

Part 6: Married Outside the Church

Part 7: Dropping My Church

Part 8: Catholicism, My Last Resort

Part 9: Coming Out as an Atheist

—————–

Dark months followed for my relationships with my husband and mother-in-law, who was also our landlord living above us at the time.  She planted seeds of doubt in J.O.’S  mind about our marriage, how she had been right all along about my insanity.  I had finally jumped off the cliff and committed spiritual suicide.  Because of her needling, we came to the very brink of divorce.  It seemed as if we could not continue our lives together, no matter how deeply we loved each other.  Thankfully, we diagnosed the problem as the mother-in-law (and not our differing belief systems) and promptly moved out from her building several miles away.  This act salvaged our marriage, and we began afresh.  I lived freely as an atheist, and he chose Catholicism.  Both of us respected the other’s decision, key to sustaining our marital satisfaction.

Living after faith.  I thought it impossible to live a meaningful life without a god dictating my every move.  How could I be a moral person without an otherworldly being reading my every fleeting thought?  How could I love my husband without Christ’s love flowing through me?  What would I do with my freed up Sundays?  Now, that was the easiest question of them all.

Without unfounded belief, I have embraced life beyond the scope of my experience as a Christian.  Life is finite, each day to be treasured.  I no longer fear death or the flames of hell.  Death is inevitable and final, but I can accept that reality.  I have never felt the thrill of being alive, as I do now.  I only wish that more people could experience this freedom to think for themselves, without fear.

Looking back upon my journey, I am amazed that I survived psychologically without a mental professional, something I would recommend to those leaving any type of restrictive group.  I actually escaped childhood indoctrination, forsook the cultic group, and emerged into a healthy and happy non-believer.  Not a likely path for all of my family and friends still trapped in religion.

As a recovering Christian, I understand both sides of the religious coin.  One of my struggles with my newfound atheism is that I lack fundamental critical thinking skills.  I am still like a child learning to access my rational brain.  I am learning the need for patience with myself while I adjust to a life after faith.  Not a stereotypical atheist, I embrace rational discussions with believers and skeptics alike.  I am not a confrontational atheist by any means.  My ambition is to live the life of a good atheist, to demonstrate to my family and friends that it’s possible.  It’s only been a year since I came out, but even my mom has commented that I’m still a nice person, nothing like her perception of a militant atheist.

Was the journey easy to leave faith?  Not at all.  I risked everything to leave faith.  The cost was more than most Christians would be willing to lose.  Would I do it all over again knowing what I know now?  Without a doubt.  Deconversion is a painful process, but worthwhile for the person seeking unbiased truth based upon verifiable evidence.  Christian or non-Christian, we all have a responsibility to examine the evidence and make a choice.  Ultimately, that choice is up to you.

————–

Readers:  Have any of you converted or deconverted from a faith?  How did that decision affect your relationship with others and with yourself?  Leave your comment below.

My Related posts:

1. My Deconversion Story: Coming Out as an Atheist
2. My Deconversion Story: Dropping My Church
3. My Deconversion Story: Asking the Hard Questions

Welcome back Brad Snowder, the astroholic, for his Guest Blog Series here every week!  I met Brad through social networking, and we immediately hit off.  His sarcasm and science-savvy resonated with me.  When he pitched me an idea for a satirical series of blog posts dissecting the Bible chapter by chapter, I could not resist.

Without further ado…Here’s Brad on A Special Promis – The Ark of the Covenant!

The Ark of the Covenant
Numbers 1:1 to 7:1

1:1 Yahweh said to Moses, “Count up how many men, 20 years and older, that are capable of going to war. I need to know how many soldiers I can field. Except don’t count the Levites. I need them to take care of the church and administrate this little theocratic dictatorship we have developing.”

Moses and Aaron organized a confederation of tribal armies. They reported a total of 600,000 troops plus women and children, a truly unbelievable number considering their limited agricultural capacity. Each tribe’s army pitched camp separately under its own flag while the Levite tribe camped all around Yahweh’s big church tent. Yahweh was adamant about the Levite exemption from the draft. He said “The Levites are mine, all mine, all mine. Ever since that time I killed all those Egyptian children I’ve considered the Israelite’s firstborn sons to be mine. I mean, even the firstborn livestock are mine so it just makes sense. All firstborns are technically mine because I am God, but I decided to take as mine all of the Levites, every one of them, instead of the other tribe’s firstborns.” So Moses counted the Levites by themselves. He reported to Yahweh, 7500 sir yes sir.

3:30 A man named Elizaphan was put in charge of moving all the religious stuff Yahweh had accumulated including the fancy sacred gold box that Yahweh stayed in when they travelled. When they camped the paraphernalia was all kept in the big tent. Any strangers seen coming anywhere near the big tent were immediately killed.

Yahweh said to Moses “Count all the firstborn, one month and older, even the cows.” So Moses counted them too. This time he used the figures to tax the tribes and then handed the money over to the head priest, his brother Aaron.

Yahweh then explained in long boring detail just how he wanted his golden travelling box taken care of and exactly how to spread out the purple cloth and how to arrange his precious badger skins. Yahweh has badger skins and he is kind of touchy about how they are displayed.

After Yahweh’s fancy golden box was readied for travel, the sons of Kohath were honored with the task of carrying it by the long poles attached to the sides. It was like luggage for a god. They were warned however that if they even barely touched the box itself, Yahweh would instantly kill them, perhaps by melting their faces off. So it was dangerous luggage. The boys would wait until some Levites had covered up all the holy stuff in the church before they went in to get the box or Yahweh would kill them instantly just for looking at that other stuff. Yahweh declared that some guy named Merari and all his fellow Gershonites, 30 years and older, had to carry all that other tabernacle hardware, like furniture, and candles, and badger skins.

5:1 Yahweh said to Moses “Kick all the stinking lepers and other disease-ridden people from the camp. I don’t want those people in the camp where I live.” Moses kicked them out of the camp.

5:12 Yahweh said to Moses “If a man’s wife sneaks off for the purpose of doing the bedspring boogie with another man and refuses to admit it, or if there is no proof and the man suspects she’s been cheating on him, tell him to bring her to the priest and bring a couple of pounds of flour with no oil on it or anything, just flour. Here’s a formula for finding the truth, it works every time.”

1. Sit her down in front of me.
2. Take some holy water and add a pinch of dust off the tabernacle floor.
3. Have her hold the flour while the priest holds up a pitcher of the bitter water that causes the curse.
4. Have the priest tell her that the water will have no effect if she is innocent but if she’s been fooling around, her thighs will rot and her belly will swell.
5. Tell the woman to say amen, amen.
6. Write the curse in a book and then wipe it out with some of the water.
7. Make the woman drink the water.
8. Take the flour from her and wave it in front of me then throw a handful on the altar and burn it.
9. Have the woman drink some more water.

“If she’s pregnant she’ll abort, and after that if her thigh rots and her belly swells, she’s cursed and a lying slut. If not, she’s ok. In this way the husband can avoid being guilty of sleeping with a slut and the woman will have received proper justice.”

6:1 Yahweh said to Moses “Ask the people whether any of them would like to make a super-duper special promise to me and separate themselves from other people as being super-duper special. It’s called the Nazerite Club and they can join by following these three simple rules.”

1. No drinking wine. No drinking or eating anything that is related to wine; no vinegar, no grapes, no raisins, no grape leaves, no grape seeds and so forth.
2. No haircuts, none. This is a wild and shaggy long hair club.
3. No touching dead bodies ever, not even close relatives.

Yahweh included gory details on the proper butchering of farm animals, should one of the elite Nazerites break the third rule and touch a dead body by accident. In addition to animal sacrifice, the rule breaker would then have to shave his head and start all over growing his hair long again, but he could then go out and get drunk sucking down wine for that one night.

6:22 Yahweh said to Moses “When you bless the Israelites say this: God bless you, God bless you, may he smile on you and give you peace. And I will bless them.”

7:1 When Moses first declared the tabernacle to be in service, the people brought tons of livestock and other valuables to the opening ceremony. Moses directed them to hand over all the valuable merchandise to the Levite officers. Then they had a special dedication program that lasted almost two weeks. Moses went into the big tent and heard a loud voice booming from just above the fancy golden box. It was Yahweh’s voice of course and he gave them a bunch more tedious ritualistic details about lighting candles and incense and stuff.

Yahweh told Moses to have someone make two special trumpets so Aaron could have a way to signal the people.

1. Blow both trumpets and it means everyone come to the big tent.
2. Blow one trumpet and it means just the leaders come to the big tent.
3. Blow an alternating two horn alarm and it means the tribes are to freak out, go into full bore linear panic mode with every man for himself, scatter and hide.

Yahweh said if he heard them sound the two alarm thing during a big battle he would probably come save them.

Yahweh’s cloud lifted from on top of the big tent and wandered off again so they all struck camp and headed out chasing after it. Moses told his in-laws from Midian that if they wanted to tag along he would make it worth their while. As they travelled they carried Yahweh’s box out in front and Moses would say “Ok, God, get out there and scare the enemies.” When they stopped to pitch camp for the night he would say “Ok that’s enough, come back God, get back in your box.”

Next: Conspiracy

More at Skywise Unlimited

My Related posts:

1. Bible Story Retold: The Show Must Go On – The Tabernacle
2. Bible Story Retold: My Way or the Highway – Mosaic Law
3. Bible Story Retold – Golden Cow and Worshiping Baal

Let’s welcome Parvati Tyler to the blog today for a guest post about how her experience within Islam shaped her novel! Parvati is a fellow thriller author, who just released her debut thriller novel, Shadow on the Wall.  Periodically, I feature a specific writer or reader who contacts me through my Get Featured! page. I want to feature YOU, my loyal and new readers, here on the blog!

And here’s Parvati on her experience within the religion of Islam…

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Behind the Veil: My Experience with Hijab

Hijab is the headscarf some Muslim women wear.  There is great debate over the need, use and appropriateness of the hijab, which has fueled cultural debate and conflict.  In Islam there is a cultural practice of covering a woman’s hair and neck, this is considered modest dress and the roots of the practice are based in the Qu’ran.  There are multiple surahs (verses) and hadiths (oral histories) which are used to explain the need for men and women to dress modestly.

The specifics of what needs to be covered is controversial.  Some say only the hair must be covered, others say everything but the eyes and hands should be.  From Burquas in Afghanistan to hijabs in France, it seems everyone has an opinion.

In 2001, right after 9/11, I participated in an event called “Sisters for Solidarity.”  The sponsoring group was an interfaith movement for social awareness.  Over 200,000 women in the US donned hijab for Eid Al-Fitr, a celebration that marks the end of the fasting month of Ramadan.

Somewhere in the depths of my basement there is a picture of me with a beautiful red-and-gold scarf covering my hair and neck. For three days in November, 2011, I went to work, the grocery store, church and everywhere else with my hair covered.

I could discuss the political reasons for doing this, or my own religion beliefs, but what I learned during those three days has nothing to do with either. I donned a headscarf for very personal reasons, which I believed deeply and still hold dear.  And every moment I wore it, I felt stronger in my convictions.  Something about a physical declaration of my beliefs was empowering and liberating.

I also felt a part of something.  Other women in hijab would stop, smile and speak with me no matter where we were.  It was a kind of sisterhood I haven’t experienced in other parts of my life.  Even when they found out I wasn’t Muslim, the kind response I received for what I was doing was deeply touching.

Simultaneously, I found the covering very oppressive.  It was hot under there, and kept slipping.  This was probably mostly due to my inexperience, but I found it physically cumbersome and something that needed constant monitoring.  I was also very surprised to find that a number of co-workers with whom I had been close to did not speak with me during the days I was wearing hijab. I received sideways glances on the bus and subway, not the usual smiles and commuter camaraderie I was accustomed to.

There are three female characters in my novel, Shadow on the Wall.  Each has an opinion of and relationship with wearing the hijab.  I pulled on my short experience to inform how I wrote these characters. Rebekah, Darya and Maryam – each of them represents a different archetype of Middle Eastern women.  While it’s certainly not an exhaustive representation, the issues of gender and the veil are explored in depth through the course of the story.

What I learned during the Sisters for Solidarity movement – and what I hope Shadow on the Wall conveys – is that covering is a deeply personal experience. Ideally each  woman would be able to decide for herself without the pressures of politics, family or cultural assumptions.  Unfortunately, we don’t live in that world, which is what makes the discussion so volatile.

I’m curious as I move into publishing Shadow on the Wall how readers will feel about these women.  Which will they respond to?  With which will they identify?

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Author Bio:

Pavarti K Tyler is an artist, wife, mother and number cruncher. She graduated Smith College in 1999 with a degree in Theatre. After graduation, she moved to New York, where she worked as a Dramaturge, Assistant Director and Production Manager on productions both on and off Broadway.

Later, Pavarti went to work in the finance industry as a freelance accountant for several international law firms.  She now operates her own accounting firm in the Washington DC area, where she lives with her husband, two daughters and two terrible dogs.  When not preparing taxes, she is hard at work as the Director of Publicity at Novel Publicity and penning her next novel.

Pav’s blog is all ages: http://www,fightingmonkeypress.com

Pav’s tumblr is 18+ only: http://pavartidevi.tumblr.com/

Pav’s Fan Page needs your likes: https://www.facebook.com/#!/FMPress

Pav’s Twitter likes friends: http://twitter.com/#!/PavartiKTyler

Pav’s Google+ is random: https://plus.google.com/?gpinv=JFSVnKSj7Uk:FdjR-3NCJW8#me/posts

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Readers:  Do you have any questions for Pav about religion, specifically her experience within Islam?  Leave your comment below.

No related posts.

Whether you are new to the blog or have followed my blog for months, it’s a good idea to periodically discuss our origins.  Each of us have distinct personal histories.  Many of you are familiar with my story about leaving the IFB (independent fundamental baptist) cultic group in 2007.  I was asked by Tristan Vick, the Advocatus Atheist blogmaster, to tell my story in his collection of essays in a Deconversion Anthology.  It will be released in December 2012.  I will keep you posted as to the details and availability of this book.  Therefore, I put together a 10-part-essay of my journey out of a religious cult into mainstream American culture.

Today, I give you Part 9 of my story:  Coming Out as an Atheist.  

If you missed them, you can read all my prior posts in this story here:

Part 1: Asking the Hard Questions

Part 2: Leaving My Man Behind

Part 3: Losing My Education

Part 4:  Exploring My Religion

Part 5: Floundering in Religious Options

Part 6: Married Outside the Church

Part 7: Dropping My Church

Part 8: Catholicism, My Last Resort

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Though it was a gradual process, one morning I woke up and reality dawned: I no longer believed in God. The evidence did not line up. The Bible was not inerrant. Jesus may not have even existed.  I could deny it no longer:  I was an atheist.

Coming out.  Those two words scared the devil out of me.  I would destroy relationships if I even breathed the word “atheist” let alone claimed to be one.  My marriage was precarious already, and I knew it would devastate my almost-converted-to-Catholic husband to know.  How long could I stay in the closet?  Many people survive closeted unbelief for years, if not decades.  I could never again live a lie.  The “fake it till you make it” philosophy was over for me.

I read The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron, more for my writing ambitions than establishing my newfound freedom from religion.  Still, this book played a vital role in my coming out as an atheist. Doing the exercises in Cameron’s 12-week-course re-established that I no longer believed in a sky daddy in any form.  And that was okay.  I possessed my own identity, not that attached to a spiritual calling.  A part of this course was Morning Pages, three pages of stream of consciousness writing.  I used this time to explore my refashioned psyche, the one who no longer believed in a god.  Because I am a writer by nature, I think best through typing my thoughts.  Each word that appeared on the screen was like another drop of soothing balm on my religiously molested mind.  True healing began only after I let go of the god fallacy.

At the time, it seemed crazy that I could not heal psychologically while attempting to embrace the IFB movement, the pentecostal craziness, and antiquated Catholicism.  Even my parents doubted my sanity at times, because they could not accept that I experienced severe mental and spiritual abuse at the hands of seemingly good-hearted Christians.  The official term for this occurrence is Religious Trauma Syndrome (RTS).  The consequences of RTS often mimic the symptoms of clinical mental disorders.  I struggled within my emotions.  I thought of the accusations from my mother-in-law and former church members about my mental instability.  I remembered all the harsh words accusing me of bipolar syndrome and a plethora of other religious members’ “diagnoses” of my wavering unbelief.

I had a choice to make.  I could succumb to their Christian brainwashing under pretense, or I could ally with courage through atheism.  The choice was mine this time.  I was no longer dependent upon my pentecostal parents for financial stability or my church for community.  After several weeks of silent wrestling, I came out.

My husband already knew that I was struggling with faith, but he never expected me to revoke belief completely.  I broke the news to him one night, and he broke down in tears.  An unspoken tension between our combatting belief systems lasted for several weeks.  Soon afterwards, I came out as atheist through a post on Facebook.  (As an introvert, I have my limits when it comes to confrontation.)  This act had consequences.  My mom, who had just been diagnosed as bipolar, sunk into depression.  Many of my religious family members sent emails and posts that they were praying for me, in addition to a list of Christian apologetics books. They assumed my atheism was due to my negative experiences with religion.  They refused to accept as valid any alternate explanation. How could I, the prior “Missionary Mindi,” abandon God?

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Readers:  Have you ever come out to your family or friends with a controversial revelation?  How did they react to your announcement?  Leave your comment below.

My Related posts:

1. My Deconversion Story: Married Outside the Church
2. My Deconversion Story: Catholicism, My Last Resort
3. My Deconversion Story: Dropping My Church

Welcome back Brad Snowder, the astroholic, for his Guest Blog Series here every week!  I met Brad through social networking, and we immediately hit off.  His sarcasm and science-savvy resonated with me.  When he pitched me an idea for a satirical series of blog posts dissecting the Bible chapter by chapter, I could not resist.

Without further ado…Here’s Brad on My Way or the Highway – Mosaic Law!

Mosaic Law Leviticus 18:1 to 27:34  18:1 “Listen to me. I am God. Don’t behave the way you did in Egypt, running around buck nekid all the time.” Yahveh gave Moses a long sermon about nudity. He explained when to get naked, when not to get naked, who to see naked, who not to be naked with, and so forth. “You must do as I order. I am God. Do not go to one of your relatives and try to take their clothes off and see them naked. Do not try to see your dad naked, or your mom naked, or your dad’s other wife naked, or your sister, or grandchildren, cousins, aunts, uncles, or in-laws. And don’t be trying to get your wife’s sister naked while your wife is still alive. That’s an important one. Don’t ever get a woman naked if she is menstruating, which goes without saying because that’s just gross. Just as a reminder, avoid having sex with your neighbor’s wife. I am God.”   Yahveh highlighted some more of the ever-increasing volume of stuff he hates. “Don’t follow the popular tradition of taking your newborn babies and running quickly through the ceremonial fires of the god Molech to insure them good fortune and health in life. Ooh how I hate that other god Molech! Also, gay men must not be having gay sex. I hate when gay men have sex with each other! Don’t have sex with animals because well let’s face it, that sort of thing is just confusing. These are all things that those other people do, but not you. I will punish those other ethnic, or sociopolitical, or religeous groups who tolerate such weird behavior by taking away their land. Don’t ever do any of the many things that I hate, I am God!”   19:1 Yahveh recounted some of the basic common sense rules of social order, like “love your neighbor.” But then he included rules about the absolute extreme importance of never marrying outside one’s ethnicity in order to maintain the people’s racial purity and proper skin tones. He also insisted people maintain the racial purity of their cows, and even their grain crops.   19:20 “Any woman who is engaged to be married and is caught having sex with another man, he and she will both immediately be put to death. I am God.”   19:27 “Don’t cut the corners off your beard, leave it shaggy. You must never have any tattoos at all, none. Don’t force your daughters to be prostitutes if they don’t want to. Don’t work on Saturday. Don’t even talk to wizards but be nice to strangers. Fear me always! I am God.” 20:1 Yahveh again expressed his violent hatred of his current rival and chief competition in the local geographic region, the mighty Molech. Anyone caught participating in the rituals of Molech was to be killed. That included a lot of regional tribes for whom these Molech rituals were commonplace. Having shown his disdain for Molech, Yahveh relisted some of the many crimes for which the penalty is death. “Cussing at your parents, adultery, homosexuality, bestiality, don’t forget to kill the beast also. If it is discovered that a man has had sex with both a woman and her mother, then all three of them must be burned to death with fire. If a man has sex with a woman who is menstruating, you don’t necessarily have to kill the two of them, you can just run them both out of town. Kill all wizards. I am God.” Yahveh then asserted, “I don’t want anyone to dress, talk, or walk like an Egyptian. Ooh how I hate that. Did I mention I am God?”   21:1 Yahveh gave Moses an even stricter set of rules for the priesthood to follow. If a priest’s daughter has sex for money she is to be burned to death. A priest must never touch a dead person and he must marry a virgin. Yahveh insisted that “A priest of the highest order must be without any physical blemishes whatsoever, such as blindness, a limp, a flat nose, a broken foot or hand, a crooked back, or too short, or with any scars. Don’t even let those freaks anywhere near my altar!”   23:1 Yahveh spoke to Moses and reiterated all the fine details concerning the holidays and precisely how to observe them and this time he included a few new details about sacrificing animals. Also this time he demanded bread and wine be served with his barbecue. 24:10 One day a young half Egyptian boy from the tribe of Dan was heard calling Yahveh a dirty word. Moses jailed the young lad and calmly awaited Yahveh’s personal judgment of the case. The powerful, all-knowing, loving and merciful Yahveh said “Kill him! Kill him! Take him out and pound him to death with rocks! Kill anyone who ever cusses me! It’s eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, kill for cussing, etc.” So they pummeled a little kid to death with rocks.   25:10 Yahveh declared that every 50 years they were to let the land rest and not plant any crops for a whole year. Also all existing debts were to be completely forgiven and nullified, all mortgages considered fully paid and so forth. This was supposed to represent a sort of economic renewal, obviously a silly impractical idea that was wholly ignored by everyone.   25:44 Yahveh said “Here’s a handy tip, you can buy slaves of both varieties, male and female, from the people in the nearby nations.”   26:1 Yahveh summed up his ultimatum. “If you follow my orders I will let it rain on your crops, especially during the rainy season. I will chase your enemies around and make them tired so you can kill them with swords. Five of you will be worth a hundred of them. I will live in the big awesome tent you made and I will not hate you much hardly at all. I am God. I’m the one who brought you out of Egypt. Not Molech!   On the other hand if you do not obey every single word I say… I will terrorize you big time. Your enemies will take away your food supply. They will kill you. I will punish you seven times the usual amount. I’ll make you weak and pathetic. I’ll make all your crops die. I will give you seven times as many diseases as I usually send your way. I’ll send some wild animals to eat your children. I’ll send animals to eat your cows. I will come down myself and kill you with my very own sword. I will send extra bugs to annoy you. You will lose wars. I will cause you to go hungry. So hungry that you actually eat your own children. I will destroy all your religious paraphernalia. I’ll waste your cities. I’ll scatter you abroad. I will kill you with my sword again.   Those of you that survive all of that stuff will be so totally batshit paranoid that the least little sound will send you running in panic. Then if you come and say you are sorry and humble your uncircumcised hearts before me, I will start to remember some of the promises I have made and probably give you a little bit of a break.”   Yahveh then told Moses to tax the people each according to his wealth. Yahveh demanded a flat ten percent of the adjusted gross annual earnings.   27:34 These are the demands Yahveh dictated to the Israelite tribes from his earthly headquarters on Mount Sinai. Next: A Special Promise   More at Skywise Unlimited

My Related posts:

1. Bible Story Retold – Golden Cow and Worshiping Baal
2. Bible Story Retold: The Show Must Go On – The Tabernacle
3. The Parting of the Red Sea Story Retold: God is into War

Let’s welcome Mark Yost to the blog today for a guest post about writing great characters! Mark is a fellow thriller author, who just released his debut thriller novel, Soft Target.  Periodically, I feature a specific writer or reader who contacts me through my Get Featured! page. I want to feature YOU, my loyal and new readers, here on the blog!

And here’s Mark…

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Is Your Next Character Sitting Next to You at Work?

It’s perhaps a sad commentary on our culture that the written word seems to have less and less value. As such, many of us have “real” jobs and write when we can. But for me, it was that “real” job that proved the inspiration to finally write my first novel.

I was a professional writer for many years at The Wall Street Journal and always felt I had a novel in me (no Christopher Hitchens quotes, please). I also always knew that if I wrote a novel, it would be some sort of political thriller. I had been in the military, had written about defense/NATO/Bosnia/Iraq-Iran for the Journal, and I’m not the kind of guy who was gonna write the male equivalent of “Eat, Pray, Love.”

For the past 10 years I have been a firefighter/paramedic. It’s been a great career and day-to-day more satisfying for me than journalism. I wished I’d discovered firefighting when I was 25 instead of 40.

As my novel continued to rattle around in my head, I looked around at the genre — Clancy, Le Carre et. al — and realized that thriller heroes had run the gamut from gumshoes to spies to soldiers. But there had never been a thriller where the hero/protagonist was a firefighter. That’s how Nick Mattera was born.

He is the main character in my new novel, “Soft Target,” the first in a four-book series I have planned. In “Soft Target,” two al Qaeda operatives, Abdullah and Jhalil, get tired of dodging drones in Afghanistan and come to the North Shore of Chicago to open up a new front in the War on Terror. Until, of course, they run into Nick Mattera.

Ripped from the headlines, as Dick Wolf would say, Abdullah and Jhalil are what Western intelligence agencies are calling “Nike Terrorists.” Instead of planning the next 9/11, al Qaeda and other radical Islamic groups are encouraging followers to “Just Do It,” hence the name “Nike Terrorist.” Instead of figuring out how to steal an airplane and crash it into the nearest symbol of gluttonous capitalism, Abdullah and Jhalil plan smaller missions that only require readily available weapons and simple explosives that can be found at most construction companies (hint, hint).

But as “Soft Target” builds an audience, it’s clear to me that the real-life aspect of the book that most readers are interested in and enjoying is my experiences as a firefighter. Indeed, if I take a bow for any part of “Soft Target,” it’s how I have written about life in the firehouse. Like the most of the characters in the book, the firefighters are not one-dimensional. They’re not the “every one is a hero” caricature that seems to fit with the national narrative on firefighters. Even Nick Mattera has flaws, because that’s real life.

In Highwood Station 37, which is both my real firehouse and the fictional setting for “Soft Target,” there are definitely stereotypical firefighter/hero types, but there are also firefighters who are selfish, manipulative, lazy, stupid, gay, straight, honest, liars, big, small, fat and ready for the buff-boy calendar. In other words, they’re real people. And, yes, all the guys in my firehouse are trying to figure out which character is based on them. The truth is, they’re amalgams of firefighters I’ve known over the years. But more to the point, they’re not people I created because I’m such a great writer, but people I’ve run into outside my life as a writer.

The same is true for some of the fire and EMS calls I write about in “Soft Target.” Some of them are almost word-for-word real-life fire calls that I have been on over my career. Others are calls that I’ve read about, heard other firefighters talk about, etc. etc.

The point of all this, I guess, is that, yes, as writers we’re creative people. And many of the plot lines, twists, turns and characters that we develop are manufactured out of whole cloth. They are a direct result of our creative talents. But for me, someone who had struggled writing his first novel, the perfect characters weren’t in my imagination, but staring me in the face every day at my job outside of writing. Maybe the lead character for your first — or fifth — novel is somewhere in your life, just waiting to be put on the page.

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Author Mark Yost

About Mark Yost: Mark Yost has been a professional writer for more than 20 years. He worked for The Wall Street Journal full-time for 10 years. He was an editorial page writer in both New York and Brussels, and also wrote for the Journal’s Leisure and Arts pages, in the U.S., as well as Europe and Asia. For the past 10 years, he has been a full-time freelance writer.

In Spring 2012, Mark Yost completed his first novel, “Soft Target,” featuring firefighter Nick Mattera as the hero/protagonist. The book is the first in a four-book series revolving around the North Chicago firefighter and former Marine EOD TEch who runs into al Qaeda agents hellbent on killing Americans, Mexican drug lords determined to protect their turf after a newly elected Libertarian president decides to legalize drugs, and a disgruntled airline passenger who decides to take his anger out on the FAA and the members of the House Transportation Committee.
In addition to being a writer, Mark Yost is a firefighter/paramedic in both Highwood and Lake Bluff, on Chicago’s North Shore. He’s also a CPR instructor and certified in Advanced Cardiac Life Support, Pediatric Advanced Life Support, International Trauma Life Support, and as a Fire Apparatus Engineer and Hazardous Materials Operations.
Mark Yost is originally from New York, served six years in the U.S. Navy, and lives on the North Shore with his son, George.

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Thanks, Mark, for being our guest on the blog!  We wish you the best of luck in your writing efforts for your four-book novel series!

Readers:  Name one of your favorite characters in fiction. (One of my favorites is Snape from the Harry Potter series.) Leave your comment below.

My Related posts:

1. Mark Petruska: Debut Thriller Author Interview
2. Why Do Low-Carb Diets “Work”?
3. The Writing Machinist: Author Michael Infinito Interview

Whether you are new to the blog or have followed my blog for months, it’s a good idea to periodically discuss our origins.  Each of us have distinct personal histories.  Many of you are familiar with my story about leaving the IFB (independent fundamental baptist) cultic group in 2007.  I was asked by Tristan Vick, the Advocatus Atheist blogmaster, to tell my story in his collection of essays in a Deconversion Anthology.  It will be released in December 2012.  I will keep you posted as to the details and availability of this book.  Therefore, I put together a 10-part-essay of my journey out of a religious cult into mainstream American culture.

Today, I give you Part 8 of my story:  Catholicism, My Last Resort.  

If you missed them, you can read all my prior posts in this story here:

Part 1: Asking the Hard Questions

Part 2: Leaving My Man Behind

Part 3: Losing My Education

Part 4:  Exploring My Religion

Part 5: Floundering in Religious Options

Part 6: Married Outside the Church

Part 7: Dropping My Church

————–

My husband and I had discussed Catholicism prior to our marriage.  He desired to explore their beliefs because he was a traditionalist.  He put heavier stock into tradition, as opposed to individual analysis of a system.  He was skeptical of non-traditional approaches to belief, including atheism, skepticism, and anything anti-Christian.  I desperately wanted to believe in God.  I willed Catholicism to be true.  I opened my mind to the possibilities, even though I was indoctrinated to believe the Catholic Church was “the mother of Harlots” and would birth the anti-Christ during the apocalypse.

I began attending weekly mass at our local parish.  I enjoyed the solemnity and sacredness of the services, a stark departure from my baptist and pentecostal experiences.  After a few months of attendance, my husband and I met with the priests about joining the Church.  It was not as simple as walking the aisle and getting baptized (baptist) or speaking in tongues at the altar (pentecostal).  Catholicism required several months of weekly RCIA (Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults) classes to become a member.  We both signed up for the next available sessions.

During those classes, I struggled internally.  I wanted to stop holding myself accountable for my discoveries that did not support religion.  It was a weight hanging onto my mind.  If I resisted and blindly embraced Catholicism, the doubts would magically disappear.  I could again feel that freedom in Christ.  That warm, bubbly “I’m in love with Jesus” delusion.

Halfway through the program, I told my husband that I was done.  I could not force myself to fake belief.  Teachings of the Church were not adding up. My husband was devastated.  He floundered in his own belief for a few weeks, but he pressed on through the course without me.  This was a tremulous time for our marriage.

My last chance for belief in God – gone.  Without a god to believe in, what was the meaning of life?  Why was I here?  All these answers I had drilled into my head to refute these questions – they were all well-fabricated lies.  I admitted it:  for the first 23 years of my life, I lived in a world of virtual reality, of religion.  Now what?

I was ignorant of the basics.  The following are just a few of my misconceptions.  Evolution meant we came from monkeys.  Critical thinking was just the devil speaking.  Skepticism was the sin of Lucifer which condemned him to hell.  Humanism was undermining Christianity. Conspiracy Theories supported the irrefutably nearing Armageddon.  Communism was still a global threat even though the Berlin Wall came down decades ago.  All of a sudden, I was allowed to study these forbidden concepts without the distortion of mistaken presuppositions.  Exploring this new world dominated my reading material, YouTube viewing, and podcast listening.  I instituted my own Reality 101 course, but I still refused to tag myself as an atheist.

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Readers:  Have you ever ended up on the opposite side of the argument after researching the facts?  How did you feel about changing your stance to its polar opposite?  Leave your comment below.

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Welcome back Brad Snowder, the astroholic, for his Guest Blog Series here every week!  I met Brad through social networking, and we immediately hit off.  His sarcasm and science-savvy resonated with me.  When he pitched me an idea for a satirical series of blog posts dissecting the Bible chapter by chapter, I could not resist.

Without further ado…Here’s Brad on The Show Must Go On – The Tabernacle!

The Tabernacle
Leviticus 1:1 to 16:2

1:1 Yahveh talked to Moses in the new tabernacle tent and said things like “Bring me the Israelite’s best cows and slit their throats and smear blood all over.” And of course “Cook those tasty critters extra crispy! I like my steaks well done and extra lean.” Yahveh included all the specific details of just how he wanted his meat to be cleaned and cooked.

“From now on none of you is to eat any fat or blood” Yahveh commanded. Yahveh commanded lots of stuff. “If someone knowingly commits a misdemeanor they will be made to bring a cow to the priest so that it can be butchered and cooked. If one of the leaders screws up, but only through mere ignorance of the law, he has to fork over a goat for slaughter, a male goat. But for a slip up through ignorance by the common people, the cost is a female goat.”

Yahveh legislated lots of the mundane details regarding day to day living. He said “if you touch some guilty unclean creepy thing then you will also be guilty and unclean.” Uncleanliness typically involved a penalty; extra-curricular rituals and a payment of some type of farm animal. Waivers were made available for the very poor, so if someone could not afford to pay a fine of a whole goat, then they could get by with bringing a couple of birds and pulling their heads off but not ripping the guts out. Besides the regular ritual sacrificing to Yahveh, these animal offerings were also to be used to feed the head priest Aaron and his family. But sacrifices on behalf of Aaron’s family members themselves were to be completely burned and not used for food, thus avoiding a strange loop. Improper treatment of sacrificial food could result in being expatriated from the tribes, especially the eating of fat or blood.

8:1 Aaron and his family were officially installed as the ruling priestly mucky mucks by ceremoniously smearing a bunch of oil and blood here and there, and then burning a fresh pile of bovine entrails on the new altar. Following the ceremony Yahveh made Aaron’s family stay inside the big tent for a whole week under threat of death for leaving early. After that Aaron and his sons set about the job of preparing the main event, an unending series of regularly scheduled bloody matinees for Yahveh’s entertainment. At the climax of the show Aaron would bless the people and suddenly Yahveh would swoop down to the earth as a massive fireball and eat up all the crispy cow guts stacked on the altar. It was a rather macabre presentation.

10:1 Aaron had two sons. Nadab and Abihu. One day they lit some incense in the tabernacle in a slightly different way than Yahveh had spelled out in a long boring lecture about ritualistic dogma. Yahveh sensed the tiny discrepancy. He immediately conjured up a big fireball and heaved it down at the two boys. It engulfed them and burned them to death. As Nadab and Abihu lay dying Aaron went totally ape shit over the brutal injustice of it. Moses tried to calm Aaron and other family members down because they wanted to challenge Yahveh’s insensitivity and unfairness. Moses said to them “Don’t show any distress or you’ll be killed too! Just pretend they had it coming. Go back inside the big tent and stay there for now.”

Aaron’s family headed back inside the tabernacle and Yahveh said “Don’t be getting drunk while you’re in there. But I suppose you can go ahead and have a little bite to eat from the smoldering carcass leftover from the last sacrifice if you want. I hereby declare it to be your right.” Moses got upset when he saw that Aaron’s cousins refused to eat the meat as a protest over the heavy-handedness of Yahveh, but Aaron cooled Moses down, Moses cooled Yahveh down, Aaron cooled the cousins down, and Nadab and Abihu finally cooled down.

11:1 Yahveh gave orders to Moses and Aaron “These are the animals that the people are allowed to eat: animals that are both multi-toed and cud-chewing, like cows and sheep. But animals without that particular combination are not food, like horses or camels.” Yahveh prohibited the eating of rabbits which appear to “cheweth the cud” because of the way they wiggle their noses. The list on Yahveh’s menu of acceptable cuisine continued. “No pig meat ever ever ever! Fish are ok if they have both fins and scales but other aquatic creatures like lobsters, shrimp, and clams are to be hated. All predator birds are off limits but bugs are fine food, eat all the bugs you want. Bugs are yummy. Anything else you see crawling around that you’re not sure about might be unclean so if you touch it, be sure to wash up afterwards. Rodents, lizards, and snails are out, and anyone who touches one of these things is unclean and will be until nightfall.”

Yahveh had lots of rules about what was clean and unclean and what to do if one should find themselves tagged as “unclean” for any of the assorted weird reasons. If an unclean person accidentally touches something before nightfall, like a shoe, then it too becomes unclean and should be put in water until nightfall. If they touch a clay pot, toss it out but smash it first so no one will salvage and reuse it.

Yahveh declared “Hate all the really creepy things! I am God. Be holy, I’m holy, you be holy. I’m the one who brought you out of Egypt to be your God so you better be holy. I am holy. I hate creepy things and I am holy.”

12:1 Yahveh continued with the whole clean-unclean thing. “If a woman gives birth to a son she will be unclean for a month but if she has a daughter she will be unclean for two months. After that she must bring a lamb to be burned by a priest. If she’s poor and can’t afford that, a couple of birds will do.”

13:2 Yahveh had lots of rules regarding personal hygiene. “Anyone with skin problems should go see a priest. There they should be quarantined until it can be determined whether or not they have leprosy. If they do have the disease then the priest will take a live bird and dip it in the blood of a dead bird and sprinkle blood on the leper and then let the bird loose. When the disease gets worse, more animals must be slaughtered.”

“Anything unclean must be washed. If something appears to be growing on the wall of your house, like some algae or bio-slime of some sort, scrape it off. Then wipe down the whole wall with a live bird dipped in blood.”

15:16 “Sperm is unclean. Anything it touches must be washed and even then it will be considered unclean until sunset. Anyone who has sex is definitely unclean and must bathe thoroughly and still be considered unclean until the following sunset.”

15:19 “When a woman is menstruating she is considered unclean in a major way. Anything she touches is unclean, anyone she touches is unclean. Anyone who touches something that she touched is unclean. Anything that… oh well you get the idea. Even after she is finished having that not-so-fresh time of the month, she must remain completely separated from the rest of society for a whole week, just to be sure. Then she must give a couple of birds to the local priest. Then she will be clean, for the moment.”

16:2 Yahveh said to Moses, “Tell Aaron not to go waltzing into the big holy tent just any ol’ time he wants or I will kill him!”

Yahveh then described another primitive ritual for the tribes to add to their long and ever-growing list of ridiculous requirements. Once per year, after much more than the usual amount of ritualistic killings, a single goat was to be set free to roam alone but alive out on the desert. All of the crimes against Yahveh’s rules that the people had committed that previous year were blamed on this one liberated goat. It was all that stupid damn goat’s fault somehow. Stole grandma’s retirement? Damn goat. Cheated on the wife? Damn goat. The evil essence from all that wrong doing was somehow magically transferred to the goat. The evil would rise from the people’s bodies like so much mist or smoke and enter into the body of the goat, making it responsible, making it the guilty one. This would leave the people fresh to start a whole new year of being jerks all over again from scratch.

Having described the new procedure Yahveh announced oddly “No more will you be making sacrifices to those wild goats that you’ve been lusting after.” Then for good measure Yahveh stressed one more time that he hated people who drink blood.

Next: My Way or the Highway

My Related posts:

1. Bible Story Retold – Golden Cow and Worshiping Baal
2. The Parting of the Red Sea Story Retold: God is into War
3. Story of Joseph Retold – Dude, Nice Coat!