Sunday, September 30, 2007

DANCING, THINKING & Crying ALL AT THE SAME TIME

How ‘bout that? Some of the songs on this new album by my friend Kate Schrock made me dance, think and cry -- all at the same time.

"Kate Schrock is a US indie artist / rebel - raised on the coast of Maine - left home at 16 - landed in New York City and then Paris as a run-way model. Met cool people like Wim Wenders & Bill Murray and decided to use her brain and become a writer - enrolled at the University of Chicago to study philosophy and ended up fronting a rock band and transferring to art school (Bennington) where she met more interesting people and started making records and putting them out on her own label (Kakelane).

The status quo never held much fascination for Kate - who has seemed more interested in authentic life experiences than getting record deals. She just released her 6th indie album (2007) - 'Invocation' a collaboration with Legendary horn player Glen DaCosta of 'Bob Marley and the Wailers' fame...." For more go HERE.
To sample a few songs on Kate's new album Invocation, go HERE.

These are songs that roll around in your head and pull and stretch your emotions right out of you. Just like they need to be stretched out of you. Like you have an itch and the songs are the scratch that makes everything alright again.

It’s such a total gift to know someone as smart and talented as Kate. On top of being a gifted musician, she’s just become a mother, and after visiting her and baby Roosevelt yesterday I have a feeling she’s going to be a fab mother, too.

When I held Roo on the porch yesterday what blew me away was how at only four weeks he turned and tilted his head all around for almost five minutes staring at the tree leaves and clouds. And registering all these profound emotions on his face at whatever he was seeing up there.

I think if anyone has what it takes to raise the next generation of Goddess men, it’ll be Kate.

To order Invocation, go to Kate's website. When you order, make sure to tell her Athana sent you.

Monday, September 24, 2007

HEY! JUST Try HARDER, WILL YA?!?

Dear Readers,

Pick up almost any book on What’s Wrong with the World and How to Fix It in 10 Easy Steps and the answer 100 times out of 100 is this: When we try more, work harder and love better, things will be alright again.

Nuh-uh. They won’t.

As long as I’ve been alive this has been the standard, pat solution to the world’s problems. The problem is, if your heart, mind and soul are sabotaging you -- which ours are -- it doesn’t work to work harder. It makes no difference, babies, how hard you work to get North if your compass is directed South. You are *never* gonna get there.

Almost the entire world now is lead by war gods plunked into “holy” books which are then plunked into the chubby little hands of children. The kids are told, “Junior! Be like this war dude!” Then Junior grows up and all he wants to do is go to war.

*That’s* what’s simple.

In the christian bible Christ is plunked in there with the war god Jehovah. So who do people follow? Whichever is convenient at the time. If all’s hunky dorrie, they follow Christ. If someone’s threatening their home heating oil, they switch to the war god. This is not rocket science.

It is not – I repeat not – a matter of environmentalists and social-justice activists trying harder, working longer, or organizing better.

The world has its Mind set against itself. And kiddies, until we change that, we will never, ever end war amongst ourselves or the war against our Mother Earth.

Love,
Athana
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thnx so much to gregkendallball for the foto

TIME FOR Stealing?

Is it time we stole into war-god congregations and made them our own?

It’s important to grok that the Christian-Islamic-Jewish congregation is a unit that can be looked at as totally distinct from The Church, i.e. the rotten war-god hierarchy.

Although they don’t often do it, most congregations would be perfectly capable of flying off on their own, cutting themselves loose from any “higher” organization.

Congregations are simply separate and potentially removable cogs in the war-god Machine. If they’d fly away from god, most over time at least would probably be perfectly capable of shucking off their damaged and damaging baggage (war gods, war songs, fear of women and the human body, etc.).

At the same time however, they could hold on to all the benefits of congregations – the promises of love and support to members, of help to members in need, of help in socializing tots, toddlers and teens; the knowledge of group dynamics and small-group financial systems; and so forth. All it would take would be a few good Goddess followers to join a congregation and slowly convert it to the Goddess. When they discover what we're really all about -- not only the love of Christ but also the love of humor, the human body and that most priceless of all Goddess gifts, love making -- how could any congregation resist us?

Think big is what I always say. Tee hee.
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thnx to eaglerm for the foto

Sunday, September 23, 2007

Dancing IN TO SUNDAY SERVICE

What's snapping and crackling today at The Goddess Temple of Orange County, California, one of the most active and well organized modern Goddess orgs in the country (and for that matter the world):

Sunday, September 23
TWO SUNDAY SERVICES for WOMEN
"PRIESTESS WISDOM, PEACE & POWER" Ritual
This month: "WORK & CAREER"
9:30 -10:15 AM
Love Offering
HURTFUL TRIBAL BELIEFS TRANSFORMED EVERY SUNDAY MORNING …
Your affirmations will only work when you have released your hidden tribal beliefs - those mistaken ideas about life passed down to you by your culture. These myths keep women oppressed, poor, sick, tired, fearful and miserable. Let them go here … now in Safe, Supportive and Sacred Feminine Space … and come to your greater Priestess Wisdom, Peace & Power.

2007 SCHEDULE of TRIBAL BELIEFS TRANSFORMED in First Service

This month: "WORK & CAREER"
October: HEALTH & HEALING
November: GRIEVING & SADNESS
December: HAPPINESS & STRUGGLE

"MAIN SUNDAY GODDESS SERVICE"
TIME: 11 AM -- 12:30 PM
COST: Love Offering
DESCRIPTION: TODAY'S Goddess: Pachamama
Animal Totem: tba
Medicine Woman Herb: lobelia
Themes: discipline/addiction
Colors: earth brown, leaf green, and ocean blue
Our main worship services start with drumming and dancing, include candlelighting, often a guest priestess with an amazing message, goddess culture and education, Jewel of the Lineage (honoring a great woman leader from history to the present), Medicine Woman Herb, Animal Totem, Women's World Healing Prayers, Spiritual Weather Report (astrology) and more. Always different … always wonderful … always spontaneous flowing of spiritual energy and power! Experience it.


Today's GUEST PRIESTESSES: CHRIS GASCI
with the presentation:
ABOUT TODAY'S GUEST PRIESTESS: more information soon

12:30 PM After Services, join your sisters in Oshun's Lounge for tea and cookies, and snacks, and intimate conversation with friends and newcomers. Feel free to bring food or beverage to share. INFORMATION: 949/651-0564 or info@goddesstempleoforangecounty.com


The Temple's website is worth checking out. Even if like me you live 3000-odd miles from CA it's still nice knowing what other Goddess lovers are up to.
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Thnx much to Smulen and Flickr for the foto

Saturday, September 22, 2007

GODDESS ‘Congregations’!?! WHAT THE --?

This idea so flabbergasted me I need to put it out for feedback.

My friend Jan – an interfaith minister but in no way, shape or form in love with the war gods -- thinks the new Guiding-Goddess world needs ‘congregations.’

Whoa! One of the nastiest words in my vocabulary is ‘congregation.’ To me it smacks hard of War-God-ness.

But the more I turned it over in my mind, the more I thought she miiiight be right.

War-god congregations give people a lotta stuff they can’t grab in other places: people sworn to love ya no matter what your breath’s like Sundays; free babysitting – and unlike those boing-eyed, bubble-gum-popping sitters at the bowling alley – these people look like they came from planet earth; friends for your kids you actually like (even Scouts are sposed ta let in kids with 40-piece artillery collections and the habits of trolls).

The other thing I liked about my childhood war-god congregation was Sunday School. I got to air my feelings about the deity. And people actually listened.

So waddja think? Could our covens, temples and other Goddess groups grab anything from the congregation?

But forget about being a “flock.” We’d hafta be something like a ‘pack’ or a ‘pride.’ Or – whaddya call a group of leopards?
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Thnx to wcm1111 for the foto

Tuesday, September 18, 2007

GODDESS Spells N-O * W-A-R

The plain fact is we’ve dug up no evidence that the Neolithic and Bronze-Age guiding-goddess societies did war. As archaeologist Jonathan Haas puts it “’endemic warfare was much more the exception than the rule until the first appearance of state-level societies between 4000 and 2000 B.C.E. in the centers of world “civilization.”’”

Anthroplogist Billy Haviland chimes right in behind Jonny: in his survey of human prehistory Billy mentions war only when he talks about the first state-level societies.

And in her “The Natural History of Peace” Leslie Sponsel follows suit: “nonviolence and peace were likely the norm throughout most of human prehistory.”
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Thnx to James Wainwright for the foto

PHILLIP

In a previous post, a very learned UK Atheist and anthropology student and I have been having a splendid time playing tug-of-war about my take on the world. Phillip’s brot up quite a few points others might be wondering about too, so I’ve plunked a tiny fraction of our tiff down here for all to view:

PHIL: Harappan society* could well have been peaceful but since it largely follows your war god take-over you have to explain why its male gods didn't drive it to wars of conquest.

ATHANA: War gods didn’t take over India until well after they took over Europe and the Near East -- not until somewhere between 1500 and 500 BC, and well after the Harappan Civilization had disappeared.

PHIL: Harappan society was certainly not egalitarian.

ATHANA: Can you cite evidence for this Phil? Almost every home in the Harappan Civilization was the same high quality as any other. Almost all had indoor bathrooms and lavatories – something you don’t even see 1500 years later in the Roman world, where only the wealthy had indoor bathrooms and lavatories. As a matter of fact, the next time you see this in human history is c. AD 1950 when much of the Western world at any rate scrapped their outdoor outhouses and moved to indoor plumbing.

PHIL: Neither was Minoan society for that matter [egalitarian].

ATHANA: Again – could you cite evidence? Dietary differences showing on skeletal remains? Differences in grave goods? What? No one anymore thinks the so-called “palaces” were homes to kings and queens. There’s no evidence of any king or queen among the Minoans – or any evidence of any rulers at all. Everyone else around them – Egyptians, Sumerians had despots plastering their faces and bodies over every piece of art they could get their hands on. I think the “palaces” were like our modern shopping malls where you could go and do any societal business you needed to get done – trade in the market, for example, sit and slurp a strawberry sundae, or take trombone lessons.

PHIL: As to the famous Minoan peace, recent evidence has challenged its lack of warfare status. The status of weapons once thought to be ceremonial is now challenged, and evidence of fortifications has been uncovered.

ATHANA: What a tricky little phrase “recent evidence has challenged” is. Have you done any in-depth reading about this “evidence”? Do you know how flimsy it is? Do you know that not all Minoan experts support this “evidence”? Do you know how prehistory works? Everybody piles on the guys who came before them, trying to prove them wrong, picking at every little scrap of data and calling it “evidence.” Especially in certain hot-button areas like the history of warfare and ancient Goddess worship, academicians stand on their heads trying to score points for their ‘team.’ Sometimes it begins to look more like a city soccer match than an academic undertaking.

PHIL: It is also possible that warfare didn't exist because there was no one to fight - the Aegean civilisations being too remote from each other to be territorially threatening (unlike the Middle East).

ATHANA: First, it seems you’re making an assumption that grabbing someone’s territory is the cause of war. Ain’t necessarily so. Furthermore, it takes the good part of a day to drive across the island of Crete – in a gasoline-powered vehicle. There’s a whale of a lot of territory there for one Minoan group to grab from any other. So why don’t we find even 5% of Minoans living in defensible sites on high ground? Why do we find 95% of them living without the protection of city walls? Why do 95% of their so-called weapons have hafting that would never stand up in an actual fight? Where are the warriors buried with their weapons?

PHIL: Minoan society also provides evidence of human sacrifice - that doesn't sound very nurturing to me.

ATHANA: Again, Phil, not all Minoan experts agree that what was found at one single site – Anemospilia – had anything to do with human sacrifice. The archaeologist Nanno Marinatos for one. But the idea certainly appealed to journalists all across the world. Wow! This made hot news! You suddenly lurch from a peaceful, nurturing society to one drenched in the horror of human sacrifice! Boy did that sell papers. Fact is there are alternate explanations for everything found at Anemospilia.

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* The Harappans, or Indus Valley Civilization dudes, were an amazing people who lived around the same time as the ancient Egyptians and Sumerians but were as peaceful as doves. They lived over a huge tract of territory that took up a good part of southwest India. They built cities of up to 100,000 dudes and dudettes. They worshipped one or many goddesses, but there’s not much evidence in their art for their gods. They did writing but we’ve not been smart enough yet to decipher it.

Sunday, September 16, 2007

WANT UTOPIA? Get THE GODDESS ~ Pt. 3

This is the third of three-part series summarizing this weblog.

THE BEST EVIDENCE

The fact is, the best evidence today suggests that during the millennia-long Neolithic our ancestors revered a Great Goddess and at the same time lived in relatively utopian societies. Then at the end of the Neolithic, when Goddess was demoted, humans slid into a veritable hell of chronic warfare, conquest, violence, social ranking and despotic political regimes.

Let’s look at what no one disputes first. No one disputes that archaeologists have unearthed thousands of female figurines from Neolithic settlements all over the world.

Second most admit that the best explanation for most of these figurines is that they are goddesses.

Third most admit that while gods might have accompanied these Neolithic goddesses, the latter did not allow the former to push them around.

Fourth no one disputes that, compared to the Bronze Age that followed it, the Neolithic was a time of relative bliss – little war, little violence, little ranking and no despotism.

Fifth no one disputes that in the hellish Bronze Age most people were saddled with pantheons that included male gods at the top of a ranked system of deities. Although goddesses were included in these pantheons, as time went by they were increasingly pushed around by the gods. My guess is that just as Bronze-Age people were forced into “accepting” war, violence, ranking and despotic rulers, they were also forced into worshipping the new upstart power-over gods.

SO WHAT’S THE PROBLEM?

So what do people dispute? Well nothing really. Some military historians and even archaeologists still insist there’s always been war. Of course they conveniently “forget” a few key and telling pieces of evidence. Bonobos for example. And Neolithic towns like Abu Hureyra, which existed for millennia without any signs of warfare. Also they have a boatload of excuses for why various modern cultures such as the Semai, Copper Eskimo and others have never engaged in warfare.

Of course just because Goddess and utopia occur together doesn’t mean Goddess caused the utopia. However the data on oxytocin, bonobos and the Moso, Hopi and Basques provide excellent evidence of just such a causal relationship.

CONCLUSION

The idea that centering our societies around a goddess might put an end to war and other social ills is potentially threatening to many piddle-puddles who benefit from the status quo. Nevertheless several lines of evidence concur: centering societies around an honest and true unconditional-love archetype (Mother) – one modeled before us in both the human and the animal worlds on a daily basis – would give us what we need to produce the kinds of societies we all want to live in (but few of us do): peaceful, non-violent, equalitarian and democratic.
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The pic above is a goddess figurine from Neolithic Egypt

WANT UTOPIA? Get THE GODDESS ~ Part II

This is the second of three-part series that summarizes this weblog.

(3) MODERN GODDESS SOCIETIES

The Hopi, Basques and Moso are three current societies that, until very recently at least, revolved around a strong Great Mother Goddess. Each stands out among its neighbors for its various “utopian” characteristics.

(4) THE NEOLITHIC GODDESS UTOPIA: BACKLASH & COUNTER-BACKLASH

In the 1980s and before, many wrote about the predominance of a Neolithic Great Mother Goddess. Anthropologists also wrote then (and still do) about the Neolithic as a time of peace, nonviolence, equality and community-run political systems.

The 1990s however witnessed a backlash against both these ideas. Anglo feminist archaeologists and military historians figured prominently in this backlash. Many feminists view any emphasis on the biological differences between the sexes as harmful to women’s social and cultural advancement. And they see the idea of Mother Goddess as limiting women to their biological functions. In the 1990s a flurry of books and articles appeared that blasted the Mother Goddess and her ancient “matriarchy” (a term psychologically loaded as well as misunderstood). A major backlash book was The Myth of Matriarchal Prehistory, published in 2000 by an assistant professor of religion, Ms Cynthia Eller.

But now we’re beginning to see a backlash against the backlash (this is how science works). In 2002 the great French archaeologist Jacques Cauvin wrote at length about the Great Mother Goddess of the Neolithic, especially as She existed at the Neolithic town Catal Hoyuk (Cauvin, The Birth of the Gods). Anthropologists Keith Otterbein (How War Began, 2004), Raymond C. Kelly (Warless Societies and the Origin of War, 2003), and Douglas Fry (Beyond War: The Human Potential for Peace, 2006) argue vehemently against the notion that humans are intrinsically violent.
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The pic above is a Goddess figurine from the Japanese Neolithic

Saturday, September 15, 2007

WANT UTOPIA? Get THE GODDESS ~ Part I

This is the first of three-part series that summarizes this weblog.

Four lines of evidence point to a causal relationship between Goddess and “utopian” societies: 1) New biochemical studies on the hormone oxytocin; 2) New primate studies on our first cousin the bonobo; 3) The existence of societies still centered (until recently) around Goddess; and 4) The apparent pairing in the Neolithic era of the Goddess and utopia (ca 10,000 to 3000 BC depending on where you are around the globe).

DEFINING TERMS

By utopia I mean not a perfect society but one relatively free of war, violence, despotic government, and social ranking (a condition often including ageism, classism, sexism, poverty, slavery, caste systems and other ills).

By “Goddess” I mean a Great Mother deity who is the source of earth and everything on it as well as the source of the cosmos.

(1) OXYTOCIN

The hormone oxytocin is found more often and in greater strengths in women than men. Recent evidence suggests it makes mothers automatically fall in love with their babies at birth. Since this mother love is unconditional it can serve as a powerful social archetype/role model, helping us treat others with the same unconditional regard that healthy mothers model for us 24/7.

Oxytocin is also a calming hormone. Under stress men fight or run (“fight or flight”). Recently however it’s been discovered that oxytocin helps women respond differently to stress – with “tend and befriend” behavior. So for this reason also women would seem to provide excellent societal role models – if we’d let them.

(2) BONOBOS

Although bonobos, the last primates discovered, are as genetically close to us as chimps, unlike chimps they apparently do little war, violence or social ranking. Furthermore females do not allow males to dominate them. Recently someone quipped that if we’d discovered the bonobo before the chimp we’d all be talking less about human violence and male dominance and lots more about human empathy, caring and cooperation.
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Above is a 3,400-year-old wall painting from a Guiding-Goddess society on the Mediterranean island of Santorini. It shows a teenaged girl admiring the Goddess (obviously not in the picture)

Sunday, September 09, 2007

ON SPLITS AND Splitting

[Sound of Athana getting very serious]: I wonder: is there a connection between the mind-body split and the sacred-profane split? Could both have been dropped on us at the same time by the war gods back in the BCs? With the same crinkly consequences?

The war gods have always labored to steal what's good about us -- our laughter, sensuality, beauty, sexuality, the earth under our feet -- and split it off into some separate box that has to be kept high on a shelf out of reach.

With Goddess on the other hand everything is whole. Nothing about us is splintered off and piled on some shelf somewhere because it's somehow less than sacred. Goddess adores every little thing about us -- and expects us to, too.
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thnx to mona, eh for the foto

Thursday, September 06, 2007

BIBLE: BOOK WITH NO Yuks

Just for the heck of it I punched “laugh” into an online Bible concordance. Got ten hits. Gee. Ten whole times the Bible uses the word “laugh” – but in the following senses: rueful laughing, sarcastic laughing, talking about someone who laughed sarcastically, quarreling about the word “laugh,” “Wiping your forehead with relief” laughter, and a at least one case of “Gotcha” laughter”:


Genesis 17:17
Abraham fell facedown; he laughed and said to himself, "Will a son be born to a man a hundred years old? Will Sarah bear a child at the age of ninety?"

Genesis 18:12
So Sarah laughed to herself as she thought, "After I am worn out and my master is old, will I now have this pleasure?"

Genesis 18:13
Then the LORD said to Abraham, "Why did Sarah laugh and say, 'Will I really have a child, now that I am old?'

Genesis 18:15
Sarah was afraid, so she lied and said, "I did not laugh." But he said, "Yes, you did laugh."

Genesis 21:6
Sarah said, "God has brought me laughter, and everyone who hears about this will laugh with me." (Laughing because at age ninety you have to go through the pain and danger of childbirth and getting an hours sleep everyday after nursing and changing diapers? Whaddya call this? Sarcasm again maybe?)

Genesis 38:23
Then Judah said, "Let her keep what she has, or we will become a laughingstock. After all, I did send her this young goat, but you didn't find her."

Exodus 32:25
Moses saw that the people were running wild and that Aaron had let them get out of control and so become a laughingstock to their enemies. .

Job 5:22
You will laugh at destruction and famine, and need not fear the beasts of the earth.

Job 8:21
He will yet fill your mouth with laughter and your lips with shouts of joy. (The next verse is “Your enemies will be clothed in shame,
and the tents of the wicked will be no more.").

Job 12:4
"I have become a laughingstock to my friends, though I called upon God and he answered— a mere laughingstock, though righteous and blameless!
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Thnx to five2b4u for the foto

TV WRITERS: A Gift FOR U

Go Morgaine over at The_Goddess! Morgaine's putting out the following dynamite idea for someone to pick up (with her help) as a sci-fi TV series:

The idea is to follow the history of the Bible from a sort of "Chariot of the Gods"/ Book of Enoch perspective: Yahweh is a captain of a ship of people called the Annunaki, angels are crew members, Jesus is one of them, and there are competing ships or races that become pantheons of other cultures - Isis leads one ship, her lover Osiris is murdered, etc.

Moses is talking to a hologram, the ark of the convenant is a radio transmitter that allows the humans to communicate with the ship at great distances, Ezekial is taken aboard a ship he describes as a wheel, etc. We see the story from the perspective of the Annunaki, who are observing and interacting with primitive humans. Some, like Yahweh, intend to establish themselves as deities in the minds of the humans; others, like Isis and Jesus, are trying to help civilization develop along peaceful lines.
Go to The_Goddess Sept. 3 for further details.

I'd watch a series like this in a heartbeat -- seven days a week if it were on that often. Think about it: seeing Isis fleshed out as a real being?! What exactly would She be like? How would She interact with Yahweh? How big of a contrast would there be between the deities and the humans?

This kind of show would attract viewers in the kazillions. Everyone's interested in religion these days -- even Atheists! Any such series, however, would definitely demand a consultant conversant with goddess theaology, and Morgaine could serve in that capacity as well as general advisor.
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thnx to outlaws road for the foto

Wednesday, September 05, 2007

TV Goes PAGAN

National Geographic's airing a show tonight that's supposed to be partly about Paganism -- with an emphasis on sky-claddedness. Looks like a repeat. I hope to tune in, if only to see how badly they butcher us.

‘Taboo: Nudity’
Shedding clothes as an act of expression or liberation, and even as a means of worship.

Date: Wed., Sep. 05, 2007
Time: 10:00PM (Eastern Standard Time)
Channel: 65, NGC (where I live it's channel 75, not 65).
Descriptor: Repeat Episode, Dolby

Sunday, September 02, 2007

ATHEISTS: CHRISTIANS in drag?

In many ways, Western Atheists are simply Christians in sheep’s clothing. What’s more, unless and until Atheists get retrained, they’ll always remain simply Christians in drag.

Just like YAJites Atheists think Mother Earth is mostly something to be cut apart, dissected and conquered.

Just like YAJites they think Mother Earth is inert.

Just like YAJites, when their plane’s about to crash they look up to heaven and pray “Dear God, help me.”

Just like YAJites, on their death beds many look up and pray, “Dear God, help me.”

Just like YAJites they think humor and spirituality have no connection.

Just like YAJites many don’t do well with sexuality.

Just like YAJites they think sexuality has nothing to do with spirituality.

Just like YAJites many are out of touch with their bodies.

Just like YAJites many spend very little time enjoying their senses, sensual things, sitting in and listening to nature, or sitting on and listening to earth.

Just like YAJites many think those who don’t do things “our” way are fair game for colonization.

Just like YAJites most are closet snooty snobs who think people can be set out on a ladder of good, better, best and utterly worthless (they might use different scales to judge people than YAJites do; one for example would be IQ).

Just like YAJites many think it’s only the natural order that some are poor, others not.

Although I could go on and on, I have other things to get done today. But bless their hearts, atheists all need a big hug.
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thnx, Bitter Bettie, for the foto

Saturday, September 01, 2007

GOD IS NOT GREAT Tours the US

Funny-bone reading from Christopher Hitchens (author of the current best-seller God Is Not Great) describing his recent US speaking tour:

A few snippets:

May 1, New York City: An evening at the Union League Club…. A full house of upscale right-wingers who at least agree with me on the single issue of fighting Islamic jihadism…. I am interviewed by the publisher Peter Collier. He's just closed the meeting when a man in a clerical collar puts up his hand. In a magnanimous mood, I say, Fair enough—let's extend the event for a man of the cloth. This turns out to be Father George Rutler of the Church of Our Saviour, who announces that he's on the committee of the club and will make sure that I am never invited there again. There's some shock at this inhospitable attitude, but I think: Gosh. Holy Mother Church used to threaten people with eternal damnation. Now it's exclusion from the Union League Club. What a comedown. In a brisk exchange near the elevator, the good father assures me that I shall die a Catholic. Why do people think this is such a good point?

SNIP

May 14, Austin, Texas: A phone-in with WPTF ("We Protect the Family"), a conservative talk-radio station in North Carolina. The questions are very civil until the end, when I am asked if I know the anti-Christian works of Friedrich Nietzsche…. Am I aware, inquires the questioner, that when he was writing that very stuff he was suffering from terminal syphilitic decay?... Do I think, comes the next question, that there is a similar explanation for my own work? Should have seen that coming. My response is that I obviously can't be the best judge but that it's very compassionate of him to ask.

SNIP

May 15, Raleigh, North Carolina: At the airport, strangers approach to say, "Thanks for coming to take on the theocrats." Apparently the good folks at WPTF announced after my appearance on their show yesterday that I was going to hell. This doesn't prevent a huge crowd from showing up, which in turn means that Quail Ridge Books has to move the event into a neighboring Unitarian church. (The rector whispers to me, "I ought not to say this, but the church has never been this full before.") My opponent tonight is the very courteous Dr. Adam English, from the religion department at Campbell University. He's another Baptist, but when I ask if he believes Calvin's teaching about hell and pre-destination, he doesn't love the question. Southern hospitality is rightly famous, and he may think it would be rude to condemn a visitor to hellfire. Then again, he can easily tell that the audience is not with him. Many southerners are annoyed by the presumption that they are all snake handlers and shout-and-holler artists, and the most critical questions all go to Dr. English, who has unwisely told the local paper that he'll win the argument because god is on his team. Again I notice two things: the religious types are unused to debate and are surprised at how many people are impatient with them, or even scornful. Go HERE for the whole article, in Vanity Fair.

Heh. After Hitchens and others soften people up, I think the path will be open for the Goddess to gather them in. This is good!
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thnx to Pele and Flickr.com for the foto of Chris Hitchens