Reborn

What level of evil do we assign to religion? Specifically, what level of evil is tolerable under the guise of religious freedom? We explore this, and other topics, on the inaugural podcast of Heathens. A show, where if the name is not a dead giveaway for you, then you probably will get mad about the topics we cover and the manner in which we cover them.

The history of the United States is being bastardized by religious nutbags, who want to sell us a bag of excrement masquerading as historical fact. Also in this segment, Rep Lynn of TN turns out to be a self righteous theocrat, a catholic priest throws a dead body out of its own funeral and why evangelical Christians with their holier than thou stuff support a twice divorced racist who screwed a porn star.

Human history is littered with gods. By some account, there have been over 1000 major and up to 3 million minor gods. Not counting spiritual beings and various different belief systems, which all together, account for some 30 million variations for spooks, goblins, vampires, gods and other assorted human invented deities. Also in this episode, we give a 9 middle finger salute to Paula White, Trump's spiritual advisor, for suggesting Jesus would have been OK with treating refugees as criminals.

How millennials and Gen Z are destroying religion - and replacing it with spirituality. Nothing pleases us more than the knowledge that people are becoming less religious and more scientific. Replacing enlightenment with ignorance is always a good thing. But for the sake of all that is just and good, why switch to another BS story to replace one BS story? Even if the new BS story is less evil than the previous one? Or perhaps this is a necessary step humanity needs to take towards the elimination of religion from society? Also in this episode, support the Pastafarian movie! https://www.ipastafari.com/ And a double handed, 10 level big old up yours to evangelical Christians for supporting Donald Trump and his administration while he sells our country out to Russia's Putin.

Since the dawn of time people have been trying to figure out the universe.  Religions stem from an early attempts at doing this.  Since holy books were written during less civilized times, their message no longer resonates with the vast majority of modern societies.  Especially in Christianity, most Christians today tend to focus on the parts of the Bible where good things happen - such as the sermon on the mount or Jesus healing the sick people.  Few Christians actually talk about stoning people for working on the Sabbath or killing their unruly children.  So here is the problem.  If you believe the good parts of the Bible, how do you reconcile the bad and nonsensical ones?  This is where we get apologetics.  The attempt to reconcile the irreconcilable.

The life of Jesus dissected - was he a real character?  According to James Valliant, in "Creating Christ: How Roman Emperors Invented Christianity" he wasn't even a credible invention.  We think he was a fictional character.  Judge away...

In the beginning, people created explanations for life because they knew nothing about the universe. Somehow, those explanations ended up being codified and written down in a book format, and despite having ample scientific evidence to contradict those original idiotic ideas, millions of people still believe them to be true today. We attempt to make fun of Genesis and the 6 days of creation - because what the hell else could you do with such ignorance? Also in this podcast, today is the anniversary of the first 400 kiloton Soviet hydrogen bomb detonation. An Arkansas preacher, whose sermons frequently included chastising homosexuality, gets busted for propositioning who he thought was a 14 year old boy online - turned out to be a police officer. What a guy. Also, today, NASA, put into space the first ever made solar probe, designed to kiss the face of our home star and we are just giddy over the prospect of being able to learn things about the sun from a mere 4 million miles of distance.

In this episode, we were supposed to talk about how monotheism hijacked polytheism and expropriated the concepts of previous religions and gods. However, 2 things prevented us form doing the topic we wanted to do.  1.  Justin has been invaded by an alien parasite and sounds like a member of the Walking Dead.  2.  A huge story broke out of PA - the grand jury finding that over a course of 50 years, some 300 priests and members of the church have abused well over 1000 KNOWN victims.

What happened last week The scandal versus the crime - why we should not be caught up in the word scandal while forgetting the victims News - John McCain passing away and Trump being a douchebag - Jeff Sessions picking a fight with Trump and the religious task force The biggest claims made by religion Part 1      God made the world and the Universe      The power of god is infinite      Not believing in religion is the same as rebelling against God      No proof is needed for god      Every religion is incorrect - except the one the person belongs so

A recap of last week - the biggest lie ever uttered by religion is the existence of an all knowing, all loving deity, that watches your every moves. This week: Religion purports itself to be the one entity that not only claims the existence of a deity, but claims for itself the sole ability to interpret the mind of god. Claims of direct connections to god By drawing a direct reference to the anticipated reward or punishment awaiting a person in the next life, religion understands the repercussions of this life and wants to force people to live in such a way that it is pleasing to their nonsensical invention, namely their deities. Determining the moral value of a person based on god's thoughts - leading to speculative and very objectionable criteria to judge a person based on old, decrepide holy books.

Recap of last week - religion claims it has a direct connection to "god" - sort of like a red line from their brain to the big smelly bearded dude in the sky.  The afterlife.  Is god infallible Is god timeless - but somehow still evolves over time as a response to scientific discoveries The god of the gaps (a bit of science and why chemistry is the most important science there is, because just talking about religion constantly is nauseating)

Recap of last week - hurricane Florence and the devastation of the storm. Why Pat Robertson from the 700 Club is a gigantic bag of dirt. Agnostic vs atheist. Labels which people are hung up on and determine who they are when it comes to a god belief - or lack thereof. Atheists, agnostics, gnostics, gnostic theists, gnostic atheists, agnostic theist, agnostic atheists and various other artists. Plus, a little Big Bang cosmology, why the necessity of a god is disproven by quantum mechanics and the formation of the universe.

Our visit to Megacon in Tampa! Gods are perverts because they are the brainchildren of perverted people.  Foreskins, foreskins, gods want more foreskins!  Genital mutilation for god.  Also, gods love killing people and getting into our business in the bedrooms.  What the hell is up with the whole virgin thing?!  Why not a bunch of experienced people who know what the hell they are doing? Gods are perverted.

RECAP from last week: Our visit to Megacon Why gods are perverts IN THE NEWS: Donald Trump should be a comedian - he managed to make the entire UN general assembly burst out laughing. A sex maniac judge nominated to the US Supreme Court clears the Judicial Committee On this week's podcast: We are discussing a profession. See if you can spot which one: 1. If you are on fire, a firefighter will hose you down 2. if you are sick, a doctor will finger you 3\. If you are a gangster, the cops will feel you up 4\. OR: if you are religious and gullible, a prosperity preacher will straight up rob you blind Today. We talk about prosperity preachers. The scum of the Universe. Stealing from orphans and widows.

In this episode: WE GOT OUR WEBSITE UP AND RUNNING! [www.heathenslmc.com](http://www.heathenslmc.com). Go check it out, comment, send us suggestions, add to our blog posts and do all those media things that make us more popular because we rely on YOU! The News - a Pakistani girl is going to be put to death because as a Christian, she dared to touch a bowl of water that a Muslim took offense to. This is how stupid all religions are, they are willing to put a person to death for insults. Also, Brett "The Man" Kavanaugh gets confirmed to the US Supreme court and we give him a 2 finger salute. Also, why is it OK to give hand outs to companies in the forms of tax breaks (which we are not against) but not to individuals in the forms of food stamps? This week's main topic : just how much money do religious organizations have? Our estimation, about 45 TRILLION DOLLARS of the world's wealth are controlled by religious organizations. That's a lot of money. We break down the percentages of wealth owned by various religious people - Xtians control about 55% of the world's wealth. Muslims, about 8%. Bit of a disparity there. In closing: we talk directly to our atheist friends. The religious need not tune out, but we take a few minutes to talk directly to only our fellow atheists to recognize the help you have given us over the past 3 months in getting our podcast up and running by listening to 2 idiots rant an rave about the world.

Welcome to the halfway point of season 1!! To celebrate our 16th episode, we are announcing that we are now officially on Apple!  To find out, go to our website and click on the Apple link on our podcast page.  Last week we discussed the wealth of religious organizations and broke it down based on religions.  Hint: Christianity is the richest.  We also touched on the case of Asia Bibi who was trying to escape the death penalty at the hands of the Religion of Peace.  Saudi Arabia executed a WAPO journalist, Jamal Kashoggi and the world has done nothing to stop it or to condemn it.  Including our very own government. Today's main topic is a special privilege for us because for the first time in our history, we have a caller who will contribute his own unique perspective on the topic we are discussing.  You know him form Twitter as Apetivist or Ape, but you should know him from his brilliant insight into what impact religion has on society and on individuals.  Check him out and follow him on Twitter!

On this week's podcast: What happened to Jamal Kashoggi in Turkey? Why is Saudi Arabia the "victim" in this situation and how we can go about interpreting their official statement on Jamal's murder inside the consulate? The main topic is: religion is the biggest MLM in history. If you ever joined a multi level marketing company, you know it is a trap. We welcome Author of Confusion to the podcast to tell us about how her background as a fundamentalist Christian helped her recognize an MLM as yet another way to control her life. How she lost her faith, found reason and what she is up to today! Check our her twitter feed @authorconfusion and her website at [www.authorofconfusion.com](http://www.authorofconfusion.com)

In this episode: An update on Jamal K's death at the Saudi consulate.  Apparently, the government of Saudi Arabia released an official statement that Khashoggi died during a fist fight - which is just north of a bucket of nonsense. Sinead changes religion and the Ark Encounter loses millions of taxpayer money. Dead Sea scrolls turn out to be fakes and people are mad about … everything. This week's main topic: part time atheists and part time Christians.  People who only believe during the holidays.

"He's not the Messiah, he is a very made up boy!" In this week's episode we discuss the border wall being built by Trump - its purpose is to decapitate wildlife.  Holy sugar beans!  Tornado in Tampa! Bombings and shootings and other assorted items which have no place in civilized society. Douchebag arguments - part douche: God works in mysterious ways - but somehow is still knowable to the select few 2nd law of thermodynamics - which is totally misused by the religious You send yourself to hell - a god who is all good, designed the entire thing, designed you to send yourself to hell Christian persecution NEXT WEEK: THE BEST ATHEIST.  EVER

This podcast is late because Sunday, which is normally when we record, we were at a Seth Andrews (The Thinking Atheist) talk and the drive home took a lot longer than anticipated.  Thanks, Florida drivers! Today, we discuss who is the best atheist ever.  Do you have a favorite on our list?