Alaskan candidate for US Senate speaks in tongues

Via Ed Brayton's blog, I learn that Kathleen Tonn, a nitwit up north, is running for the US Senate in Alaska. And she speaks in tongues. Have you ever wondered why these evangelical fools speak in tongues? It's quite simple, really. Here's Tonn's explanation.

“Speaking in tongues or singing in tongues is very valuable because the message cannot be understood by Satan. But the Holy Spirit can use that message to bring deliverance, to bring clarity, to bring discerning and words of wisdom and knowledge. And tongues is interpreted by a person who has the gift of interpretation,” she explained.

See? It's totally sensible. Alaskans really come up with some major wingnuts, don't they? I'll bet Sarah Palin is totally jealous of this woman.

Ed's got a video of Tonn in action at the link. Speaking in tongues! It's just amazing. Religious people are so strange. And yes, I mean all of them. If you believe in fairytales, I get to call you strange.

PZ, defending Hitchens, tells it like it is

An atheist apologist (a contradiction in terms, but the fellow doesn't know this) wrote dismissively about Christopher Hitchens. Apparently Hitchens didn't bow down sufficiently to religious nitwits. PZ dismisses the apologist with dispatch in a blog post today, and adds the following gem. He's speaking about religious apologists here:

It’s a red herring: when we ask for evidence of a god, the apologists point to a whole bunch of people wrangling at daunting length about the interpretation of holy writ and say, “See? There. They couldn’t possibly be arguing about nothing at all, now could they?” I wish this would sink in, that someone making an intricate paean to the ineffability of nothing is not evidence of anything other than the human brain’s immense capacity for masturbatory self-reference.

Hear, hear.

PS: Republished because I got my signals crossed. I thought I found this on Jerry Coyne's blog, but it was PZ's. Duh.

So funny

Ed Brayton's right. This one's comedy gold. It's a for-real Christian saying things that he believes -- not a comedy routine or a prank. Honestly, it's astounding that religious people can get out of bed in the morning. You'd think it would be too complicated for them.

Creationist lunacy

Both PZ and Jerry Coyne focused on one particular intelligent-design fool's remarks today. I want to excerpt something the creationist idiot said. Here's the quote:

Is the process of eating and cellular respiration the result of a mere fluke of evolution? Alternatively, could it be that a common Designer made certain that the process of eating and cellular respiration would function in such a precise and perfect manner? Which answer appears to be the most probable to you?

Yes, indeed. Jeebus sure did make everything convenient for us, didn't he? I mean, if you think about it, he's the one who's responsible for ensuring that children who are buried under an earthquake -- but still alive -- have the awareness to know that rats are eating them as they die. And come to think of it, it must be this Jeebus fellow who made pain so painful. Wow, he was really watching out for us with that one, huh? Thankfully, because of Jeebus' "precise and perfect" ministrations, many people live in intense, unbearable and constant pain throughout their lives. Jeebus must be one swell guy. 

I swear, these creationists haven't got a single brain cell in their heads. They can't think clearly about anything.

Let us adore the virgin Mary's sacred belt

BVM with hand-beams but no belt.

Maybe you're having a difficult day, burdened by all the things you have to do for Thanksgiving -- cooking, traveling, dealing with dreadful relatives, etc. Some of you are probably feeling overwhelmed about now. Well, take heart -- at least you aren't doing something colossally stupid and meaningless today, like these people are:

MOSCOW (AP) — Braving freezing cold temperatures and ice-covered sidewalks, tens of thousands of Russians stood in line Wednesday to see and kiss a newly arrived relic of the Virgin Mary in Russia's largest Orthodox cathedral.

It gets worse:

The Virgin Mary's Cincture, a belt that Christians believe was worn by Jesus' mother, was brought to Russia last month from Mount Athos, a monastic community in Greece.

Kissing the relic, which is encased in an ornamental box, is believed to help barren women conceive and heal other ailments.

The line of people, mostly women, waiting to enter the golden-domed Christ the Savior Cathedral stretched for 2.5 miles (4 kilometers) along the Moscow River despite temperatures that dropped to below minus 5 Celsius (23 Fahrenheit).

Police officers announced through bullhorns that it will take worshippers 24 hours to get to the relic as the line swelled to tens of thousands.

So be happy today. At least you're not an imbecile waiting in the cold for 24 hours to kiss a goddamn belt that somebody probably made a couple of years ago. Happy Thanksgiving everyone, and remember -- the thing to be most thankful for is that you're not burdened by mindless religious beliefs. Woot!

Polish Roman Catholics are nuts too

If you want to read a really funny story about religious nitwits, click on over to Polish Catholics see Miracle in Communion Wafer at the NY Times today.

It's very funny. There's a red spot on a wafer and you know it's definitely a miracle. In fact, it must be a piece of the actual heart of Jeebus, come down to Earth to haunt people.

Religious nitwits are everywhere, not just in the U.S.

Oops: Re-published to fix link.