Hi. My name is John, and I’m a spiritual atheist. Like “God,” the word “spirituality,” is a conveniently ambiguous term. That said, it’s not so vague as to be totally meaningless. I think it captures an area of concern better than any other term out there. I especially like Wikipedia’s definition: Spirituality can refer to [...]
Entries Tagged as 'Skeptic'
Spirituality for Skeptics.
February 25th, 2010 · by John · 29 Comments
Tags: Atheism · Skeptic · Spirituality
“a nation of citizens who are bound by ideals and […] values”
April 9th, 2009 · by xJane · 2 Comments
This is how our president defined our country yesterday. Explicitly denying that it was a “Christian nation” and explicitly stating that this fact is one of our “great strengths”. It’s nice to be reminded of this—and by someone so high in the administration! It is vogue for politicians to exclaim “God bless America!” Whether or [...]
Tags: Activism · Atheism · Belief · Best · Blasphemy · Christianity · Church and State · Current Events · Dialog · Ethics · Getting over Religion · Gods · Justice · Politics · Reason · Religion · Skeptic
Texas & England: Creationism & Its Dangers
March 19th, 2009 · by xJane · 13 Comments
Texas is reviewing its science standards, specifically with the desire to remove them altogether. Skepchick has a great discussion of exactly what this means, but here’s the short version: Texas and California’s choices for scientific textbooks drives the availability of textbooks nationwide because of their massive marketshare the Texas State Board of Education (TSBE) has [...]
Tags: Activism · Atheism · Belief · Christianity · Church and State · Creationism · Culture Jamming · Current Events · Education · Ethics · Getting over Religion · Law · Media and Design · Politics · Reason · Religion · Science · Skeptic · Society · Web 2.0
Hacking Our Social Systems.
February 15th, 2009 · by John · 10 Comments
From xkcd. (shared under a Creative Commons license) When I first migrated to the Mormon Matrix, it seemed to me a flawlessly elegant combination of history, science, and society. I immediately benefited from my conversion, upgrading my interpersonal skills, self-esteem, and sense of life purpose. It didn’t take long for me to start finding flaws [...]
Tags: Culture Jamming · Peace; conflict resolution. · Pop Culture · Skeptic · Social Hacking · Society
Creating New Constellations.
January 9th, 2009 · by John · 5 Comments
Our story begins at the Thinkspace Gallery in Los Angeles’ Silverlake District. There are thousands of galleries in SoCal, but CatGirl and I love this one because it showcases some of our favorite artists, “low-brow” creators often featured in the likes of Juxtapoz (which William Gibson apparently reads to cure writer’s block). When we visited [...]
Tags: Art · Humanity · Jana · Media and Design · NYC · Personal · Photos · Pop Culture · Skeptic · Web 2.0
Sparks: Daylight Atheism
January 3rd, 2009 · by xJane · No Comments
I’m catching up on local news (read: blogs) while my cousin is in town (trying not to be too antisocial by spending all my free time blogging) and enjoyed particularly this most recent post at Daylight Atheism: No Holy Ground, a rational look at the conflict in the so-called “Holy Land” and how it is [...]
Tags: Atheism · Belief · Christianity · Dialog · Doubt · Getting over Religion · Reason · Religion · Skeptic · Society
“Are you really an atheist?”
December 29th, 2008 · by xJane · 9 Comments
said the friend sitting next to me at Christmas Eve dinner, with a vague look of disgust on her face, like I’d just admitted to enjoying self-flagellation. I was in the company of a number of people who had escaped Western religion (all some form of Christianity) and landed firmly in Eastern religion (all some [...]
Tags: Atheism · Belief · Buddhism · Christianity · Dialog · Doubt · Feminism · Gender · Getting over Religion · Gods · Humanism · Judaism · Law · Meditation & Prayer · Musings · Mysticism · Personal · Reason · Religion · Skeptic · Society · Spiritual Progressives · Spirituality
Spark: Does Religion Empower Women?
October 23rd, 2008 · by xJane · 33 Comments
WaPo’s On Faith asks its panelists Does religion empower women? This is one of the few On Faiths that I’ll probably read each response to. I’m looking forward to the Christian/Catholic answer, which I’ve found generally centers around “having kids is empowering!!1!” There is some wonderful evidence for non-child-based empowerment which I’ve yet to hear [...]
Tags: Atheism · Belief · Blogging · Christianity · Dialog · Feminism · Gender · Getting over Religion · Humanity · Justice · Links · Meditation & Prayer · Musings · Mysticism · Religion · Skeptic · Society · Spark · Spiritual Progressives · Spirituality
In the Dark about AFTERdark
October 21st, 2008 · by xJane · 16 Comments
So, we’ve got these posters up all over campus for an “event” tonight called “AFTERdark” and it’s pissing me off because I think this is a microcosm of the general bait-and-switch of religion. The campus event of the year AFTERdark the compelling drama of Joe White “a top 10 influencer of the century” -New Man [...]
Tags: Activism · Atheism · Belief · Christianity · Depression · Dialog · Doubt · Ethics · Musings · Religion · Skeptic · Society
Book Review: the Devil’s Delusion: Atheism and Its Scientific Pretensions
October 15th, 2008 · by xJane · 2 Comments
This was cross-posted from my account at GoodReads, where I gave it two stars (of five). I would like to note that I did not read the whole book—I got through the fifth chapter before it was due at the library (and I couldn’t renew it because someone else had a hold on it). I [...]
Tags: Atheism · Book Reviews · Getting over Religion · Judaism · Reason · Religion · Science · Skeptic · Writing

