Ewan McDonald, comment on CultureWatch Secular Religion, 23 May 2007:

Cosmological evolution can be witnessed today as new stars form, but this does not prove a naturalistic origin. Rather, since the process of stellar evolution remains a mystery, a supernatural origin makes much more sense.

[Best example of a 'god of the gaps' argument I've seen for some time. Ewan, mate, you just don't get it, do you?]

[The next half-dozen quotes are from the same source, 'Who Is Doing the Hatred?' on Bill Muehlenberg's CultureWatch site, 6 Jun. 2007. Increasing numbers of angry and outspoken fundamentalist Christians are being attracted to this site by Muehlenberg's extreme views.]

David Skinner, 7 Jun. 2007:

I could also go on and talk about the ideology, evolutionary humanism, that is using homosexuality as a Trojan horse to impose its own tyrannical world view on all of society, and the way this will have devastating consequences on education and the freedom to reason and debate without the thought police dragging you off for diversity re-education.

[David, when you're talking to people at parties, do you ever notice them sidling towards the door?]

Bill Muehlenberg, 8 Jun. 2007:

The truth is, we are all ‘assholes’ as you put it, facing a lost eternity.

[Oh Mr Muehlenberg, don't tell us that even you are being gradually secularised.]

Muehlenberg again, 8 Jun. 2007:

…[W]hat is not factual about the Old Testament?

[It really is far easier to answer the question: 'What is definitely factual about the Old Testament?']

Kim L. Ruhl, 8 Jun. 2007, regarding homosexuality:

I now ask you, how can two men seeking to gratify the supposititious love of their wicked, self-centred desires (by openly defying God and his holy commands) wreak anything but havoc and harm?

[I had to look up 'supposititious', only to discover that it means 'spurious' or 'substituted for the real'. And here was I thinking there was a word for my superstition about suppositories.]

Ewan McDonald, 16 Jun. 2007:

Harmony in the sense of agreement between Christians and those who identify as homosexuals (I say ‘those who identify as homosexuals’ because there is no such person as a homosexual - there [are] only men and women who practise homosexuality) is not possible wherever the Bible is regarded as true.

[Ewan likes to solve his problems by defining them away. Does a good job of it, doesn't he?]

A. A. Hoysted, 20 Jun. 2007:

The whole scenario has been choreographed with diabolical cunning by secular humanists and atheists in positions of political, educational and media influence who want to destroy the Judeo-Christian basis on which Australian society is built.

[A.A., I'd like to introduce you to David Skinner and Bill Muehlenberg. Something tells me you boys are going to get along just fine.]

Rev Dr Peter Barnes, ‘Cloning human embryos’, Family World News, Jun. 2007, 1:

In modern Western thinking, there is no real sense of God, so man is in the image of the earthworm, and therefore he seeks to exalt himself, but actually degrades himself.

[I hope they didn't give him his doctorate for this.]

David Skinner, comment on CultureWatch Sense on the Census, 30 Jun. 2007:

I believe we are witnessing the homosexualisation of Western civilisation now - which will make it even harder for the homosexual to break from his or her bondage.

[David, while I'm still coming to grips with your concept of 'homosexualisation', can I pick you up on something else? A lot of homosexuals aren't even into bondage!]

Lael Weinberger, review of Richard Dawkins A Devil’s Chaplain in Journal of Creation (Creation Ministries International), Vol. 21 (2), Jun. 2007, 22:

[Dawkins] ignores the flood of scholarship coming from the creationist and Intelligent Design (ID) camps.

[Lael, that particular 'flood' has all the credibility of Noah's Flood. There's no scholarship at all emanating from either of those 'camps'.]

Philip Bell, review of Richard Dawkins The God Delusion, ibid., 30:

[Dawkins makes] some especially fatuous statements, such as … ‘The historical evidence that Jesus claimed any sort of divine status is minimal … It is even possible to mount a serious, though not widely supported, historical case that Jesus never lived at all …’ Each of these assertions is made without a shred of supporting evidence and amount to so much bluff and bluster.

[Philip, as you're well aware, it's your responsibility to provide evidence for claims such as 'Jesus existed' or 'Jesus claimed to be God'. The evidentiary status of the Bible is doubtful, to say the least. Neither Dawkins nor anyone else is in the business of proving negatives, although he does provide an extensive and relevant bibliography. Try not to be so blatantly disingenuous even though you are a creationist.]

Philip Bell again, ibid., 31:

Of course, [Dawkins'] ideas that God, as the cause of complexity, must be still more complex, and that to explain this requires an even more complex cause (and thus an origin for God) are no more philosophically sophisticated than the age-old child’s question of who made God.

[Kids can be pretty crafty, Philip. In this case, crafty enough to ask an essentially unanswerable question.]

Australian Prayer Network, ‘New Prayer Initiative to End the Violence in Iraq’, International News, 25 Jun. 2007:

A new prayer initiative to mobilise churches throughout the world to pray for an end to the violence in Iraq has been launched … James 5:16 says that the prayer of the righteous is very powerful. The focused prayer of churches worldwide can make a difference to seeing the violence end.

[And these are the sorts of people who criticise others for watching television, playing computer games and generally 'living in a fantasy world'.]

Australian Prayer Network, ‘British Poll Shows People Believe Religion Does More Harm Than Good’, International News, 25 Jun. 2007:

[Christians must try to] divorce Christianity in the minds of the masses from [the concept of] a religion based on rules (as is Islam), to a way of life built on relationships, the principal one being with Jesus himself. Until and unless we can do that, the majority of people will increasingly lump Bible-believing Christians into the same ‘box’ as fundamentalist Islamists …

[And why wouldn't people do exactly that? Extreme dominionist and Reconstructionist Christians, who are well-represented in Australia, demand the imposition of strict biblical law. This would include measures such as the public execution of homosexuals and adulterers, and the death penalty for 'offenders' such as recalcitrant adolescents. I see that the latest issue of Creation Ministries International's Journal of Creation approvingly quotes Reconstructionist author Greg Bahnsen (pp. 22-3). There are good reasons to class extremist varieties of Bible-believers together with fundamentalists of other religions.]

Senator Barnaby Joyce (NP, Qld.), as quoted in Aaron Smith ‘Importance of Christian influence in Australian society’, Christian Today, 18 Jun. 2007:

If Christian people do not put their view forward that Australia is a Christian state, then within a short period of time … another religion might fill the vacuum.

[But Australia is not now, nor has it ever been a 'Christian state', as much as some people might like the idea. Australia is a secular state. So there's no vacuum to fill.]

Answers in Genesis (AiG), Renowned “rock doctor” added to AiG’s research team - 19 Jun. 2007:

Dr Andrew Snelling, one of the world’s most respected creation scientists specialising in geological studies, has joined [AiG] as the organisation’s new director of research … ‘Dr Snelling’s stature among the scientific community should be an unequivocal sign to the academic world and the media that serious research is being conducted at AiG and its museum’, [AiG President Ken Ham said.]

[But Snelling has no special 'stature' in the scientific community. The only interesting thing about him is that his serious scientific papers display no trace of creationism, while his creationist papers display no trace of science.]

Family Council of Victoria (FCV) (offshoot of National Civic Council’s Australian Family Association), media release, June 2007, regarding the Victorian Law Reform Commission’s final report on Assisted Reproductive Technology and Adoption:

… [T]here is no such thing as a basic or inalienable human right to have a child. It is a ‘conferred right’, a privilege extended to men and women bonded in marriage. For good reasons, there are no international [legal] instruments or Australian law that confer this privilege on women or men living in a same-sex relationship. This is not a form of discrimination …, for no such [basic] right [to have children] exists. Nor does it exist for single men or women.

[FCV, if you're going to talk absolute rubbish, I think you should drown it in more legalese than this.]

Barney Tomasich, Chairman, Salt Shakers Board, email to supporters, 20 Jun. 2007:

This God-ordained ministry [i.e. Salt Shakers] was founded by Peter and Jenny Stokes and has had a huge impact on the political, social and moral landscape of our country …

[Barney, could you please tell our readers that? It might put a stop to all the emails we get saying, 'Who the hell are Salt Shakers?']

Gerard Goiran, Christian Democratic Party (WA), ‘CDP Senate candidate supports Catholic Archbishop’, press release, June 2007:

Archbishop Hickey has been reported as saying that Catholic MPs who would vote in favour of the [Human Embryo Bill, permitting therapeutic cloning] should not take part in holy communion …I [Goiran] think this is not a matter of undue interference by the church in the affairs of state … Christian leadership is not just about delivering sound biblical sermons, it is about keeping unity in the faith. Sometimes, to achieve this, exercising discipline is necessary. None of us would object to an army general disciplining his troops to achieve a particular outcome. In the same way, therefore, the Christian Church needs to exercise strong discipline in a loving and caring way to bring back its erring members to the truth of the Word of God.

[As a Protestant, Gerard, you'd recall another time that the Catholic Church 'exercised strong discipline ... to bring back its erring members to the truth of the Word of God'. It was called the Inquisition.]

More Gerard Goiran, this time opposing new WA anti-vilification laws - ‘Vilification Laws in Western Australia’, press release, June 2007:

… [S]uch laws would be detrimental to the work of mission of the Christian church. For instance, sermons denouncing homosexuality as a sin could be viewed as ‘vilifying’ practising homosexuals.

[Really, Gerard? Now why would anyone think that?]

Filed in: Their Own Mouths