Hat tip to one of our fine Irish viewers, Fergus Russell, for this amusing story.
It transpires that some dimwit named Joe Coleman, who thinks of himself as “a visionary of our Blessed Mother and a spiritual healer under the energy of the Holy Spirit” — which is an awfully big mouthful to say in lieu of simply "kook" — predicted that there would be yet another vision of Mary at a shrine called Knock, a name that is simply begging for jokes. Naturally, thousands of fellow dimwits showed up for this. When nothing happened, Coleman made yet another prediction. Mary, who must have remembered a pressing last-minute appointment to appear in a tamale somewhere last time, has rescheduled for this coming Saturday. Naturally, thousands more dimwits are again expected to turn up, "learning" not exactly being a skill of your garden variety religious dimwit.
Funny enough as all this is, what's funnier is the huffy reaction from the local clergy. The Archbishop of Tuam, one Michael Neary, complains, "Unfortunately, recent events at the Shrine...risk misleading God’s people and undermining faith. For this reason such events are to be regretted rather than encouraged."
And of course, it takes an atheist to put all this in its proper perspective, as Liam Meehan does in a letter to the Irish Times.
I'm a little confused that the Archbishop of Tuam, Dr Michael Neary, is discouraging people from gathering at Knock to witness apparitions which he believes "risk misleading God's people and undermining faith".
This is the same "faith" that believes that a cosmic Jew who was his own father by a virgin can enable you to live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh, drink his blood and telepathically tell him you accept him as your master, so he can remove an evil force from something invisible called your soul that is present because a woman made from a rib was convinced by a talking snake to eat an apple from a magical tree.
Har! That's beautiful enough to memorize, Liam. Hope you don't run afoul of those dadburn Irish blasphemy laws or anything!
pretty sure I've seen a similar line on a /b/ motivator
ReplyDeleteI really DO want to memorise that. Fantastic!
ReplyDeleteWhen I read that in the Times yesterday I was looking forward to a flurry of righteous indignation today. No such luck.
ReplyDeleteOnly one reply:
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/letters/2009/1029/1224257600597.html
A distinct "Whooshing sound" is heard as the point flies right over this reader's head.
Maybe righteous indignation takes a day or two. So I'll just look forward to tomorrow's paper instead.
"http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/letters/2009/1029/1224257600597.html"
ReplyDeleteAHAHA massive facepalm
Friend,
ReplyDeleteYou need to research your facts when it comes to "cosmic Jew".
There is no such thing! Study prophecy in the Holy Bible and you might see the relevance of Jesus Christ ( the Nazarene ).
He fulfilled 109 distinct prophecies from ancient prophecies that were 800+ years in advance.
To the last poster:
ReplyDeleteYou're an idiot. Do you not realise that a more plausible explanation is that the whole thing was made up to fit the prophecy? How do you KNOW that ISN'T what happened?
I love how you people keep trying to throw scripture in our faces. We REJECT that silly book! Don't you get it? What are you hoping to accomplish by referencing it? Embarrass yourself?
Go talk to a snake.
I used that a week or so back on the Pharyngula blog. There was a link to an article by some Christian writer who was disturbed by how many Christians believe in ghosts and how gullible his Christians are.
ReplyDeleteCosmic Jewish zombie who was his own father can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh and telepathically tell him you accept him as your master, so he can remove an evil force from your soul that is present in humanity because a rib-woman was convinced by a talking snake to eat from a magical tree? Hell, yeah and proud of it.
Ghosts? Whoa! You gotta be gullible to buy into that!
It is always amazing how clearly we can see other people's delusions and ignore our own. Of course this point is completely lost on the Jesus troll.
ReplyDelete"
ReplyDeleteThere is no such thing! Study prophecy in the Holy Bible and you might see the relevance of Jesus Christ ( the Nazarene ).
He fulfilled 109 distinct prophecies from ancient prophecies that were 800+ years in advance."
Gosh, makes you wonder how all those Jews missed out huh?
Hey, the Jews miss a lot.
ReplyDeleteHey Terry Burton
ReplyDeleteConsider this message to you a preemptive one.
This isn't Ray's blog. Every day I see you lying, being a jerk, and repeating "you believe everything came from nothing". Ray likes to censor stuff in his blog, but it's not really like that here. You may have posted here before, but this is the first time I have seen your name here and I am familiar with your brand of honesty.
I may sound like some angry loon that just popped out of nowhere, but I have been reading Ray's blog for quite some time, and I have seen the "Terry Burton Way" of debating. I'm just making sure everyone here knows what they are dealing with when talking to you.
And mods, if you feel I have gone too far, I'm sorry in advance. Delete the post if you feel it's necessary, no hard feelings. But having to watch Terry post lie after lie, and distort everything that is said to him, I won't sit idly by and watch him do it here.
Maverik713
And mods, if you feel I have gone too far, I'm sorry in advance. Delete the post if you feel it's necessary, no hard feelings.
ReplyDeleteNonsense! When I see a post like yours, I reach for the popcorn.
TIPU is right. The comment from Terry was tame, pretty soon he'll be throwing bible quotes at you and wishing you a nice roast in hell.
ReplyDeleteTerry is seriously disturbed.
Who the hell is Terry Burton?
ReplyDeleteTerry Burton = ITs All About Jesus!!!
ReplyDeleteWow, you know that clown? So he's the young-Earth type?
ReplyDeleteNot really. He and I are regulars at Ray Comfort's blog. Don't ask why I go there, it's a complicated thing lol.
ReplyDeleteI have seen him at work for months(feels like years?) and would be genuinely surprised if he didn't pull some sort of fast one here.
Admin wrote:
ReplyDelete"Do you not realise that a more plausible explanation is that the whole thing was made up to fit the prophecy? "
That's somewhat more plausible, but more plausible still is that in the decades after Jesus's death, his followers struggled to find meaning in what they remembered from his life, and they retrofitted as much as possible to fit whatever lines in the Old Testament that could remotely be considered prophetic.
A smoking-gun example is the story of the pregnant young woman in Isaiah who had a child called Emmanuel. The writer of Matthew thought the story was about a virgin so added the flair about the Angel telling Joseph of the kid who was to be called Emmanuel, implying that it was his new bride's baby. There are lots of others.
The rant that Liam did was pretty much pulled word for word from a de-motivational image that's been spread around the net for quite some time now. Sometimes in games I see players use this as their "spray" and it always puts a smile on my face. :)
ReplyDeletehttp://www.motifake.com/demotivational-poster/0712/christianity-explained-god-demotivational-poster-1198455582.jpg
The gift that keeps on giving:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2009/1030/breaking54.htm
Religion always seeks to post itself beyond the pale of testability. Thus, when one of its adherents foolishly makes a claim that can be tested, those older and "wiser" will always try to distance the religion they represent from the claim.
ReplyDelete