December, 1997
- Calendar Quotation
- With this recognition of the finality of death, no one should willingly withhold acts that would bring benefits, joy or happiness to others. -- Joseph Lewis
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- Solstice Party, December 21
- CRT'S First Wedding
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- Taking A Cheap Shot At Atheism Cliff Walker's Monthly Column
- It is a heretic that makes the fire, not she which burns in it. -- "The Winter's Tale," Act 2, Scene 3
- Second Tuesday Still Going Strong
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- A Declaration of Intellectual Independence: An Atheist Manifesto a complete book by Joseph Lewis Copyrighted in 1954 and in the 178th Year of American Independence
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- Comics:
- Callahan: "Now when we get to the top let's say we're Christians and deny the whole thing happened."
- Photo: Grawood Baptist Church sign: "Reason is the enemy of faith"
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- The Humanist Hymnal by Jerry Phillips; Copyright, 1997
- A Candle in The Dark
- Beneath The Cross of Jesus
- Faith of Our Fathers ]
- It Came Upon a Midnight Clear
- O Come, All Ye Faithful
- There Is No Hell
- Silent Night
- All Hail The Power of Darwin's Name
- Just as I am
- Amazing Place
- Solstice Tribute
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- Atheism Is Villain in Kentucky School Shootings by Conrad Goeringer December 3, 1997
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- Important Notice (membership pitch)
- Membership Application and Renewal
November, 1997
- Calendar Quotation
- A precept claiming infallibility should certainly possess the universality of the law of gravitation and the perfection of the arithmetical table. -- Joseph Lewis
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- Misc News of the Weird, etc.:
- Believers therapeutically licked and nuzzled by their bull Joko
- Former Baptist minister Don McCary,'s diary, in which he described his yearning for young boys, and pornographic magazines, which he was found clutching while hiding among choir robes as police arrested him.
- Self-described faith healer Kim Wistey said Romero told him he was a the daily rush of ill people to the home of mutant who was genetically engineered and programmed by the federal government
- Gen. Butt Naked says his transformation occurred one day in 1996 when he was standing nude on the front lines waiting to kill some people, and God told him to stop.
- An order of nuns filed a lawsuit against another order of nuns over a $30 million (Cdn) investment dispute about a shopping center.
- The limited success so far in eliminating, in some parts of Ghana, the practice of giving a virgin daughter to a priest in order to atone for some sin of the girl's family.
- Golfer who got hepatitis from the defoliant used by his golf course because he licked his ball for good luck
- Rules established by Afghanistan: No paper bags (paper could be recycled Korans)
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- To Be -- Or Not To Be Cliff Walker's Monthly Column
- Extraordinary claims require extrordinary evidence. -- Carl Sagan
- Second Tuesday: Child Sacrifice Laws
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- Taking God's Name in Vain by Joseph Lewis from his book "The Ten Commandments"
- The Suicide Note of Charlotte Perkins Gilman
- Bhagwan Poisoned 751
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- Percy Bysshe Shelley (excerpt from Queen Mab)
- The Right to Death by Anthony Flew, from his book "Atheistic Humanism"
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- Schuller Gets Diversion (Rev. Robert Schuller roughing up a United Airlines flight attendant)
- Mysterious 'Bible Code' Phenomena by Kevin Courcey, Eugene Atheists and Freethinkers (review of book by Michael Drosnin)
- The democratic process and the gods (validated ballots for 10,000 gods and goddesses)
- Embarrassing Situation (Rev. James Eric Holmgren, 46, resigned from the pulpit after being charged with sexually administering enemas to a boy)
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- Mother Teresa's Obsession With Death by Christopher Hitchens from his book "Missionary Position"
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- No comment: (enthusiastic Episcopalians who do not believe in God)
- Membership Application and Renewal
October, 1997
- Calendar Quotation
- Faith is the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, the lack of evidence. -- Richard Dawkins
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- Separation of Church and State: The Original Intent by John M. Swomley from his book "Religious Liberty and the Secular State"
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- Repenting In -- Washington DC!? Cliff Walker's Monthly Column
- I am against religion because it teaches us to be satisfied with not understanding the world. -- Richard Dawkins
- Lois Backus of Planned Parenthood
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- How Thinking Goes Wrong: Twenty-Five Fallacies That Lead Us to Believe Weird Things by Michael Shermer from his book Why People Believe Weird Things -- Psychological Problems in Thinking -- 23. Effort Inadequacies and the Need for Certainty, Control, and Simplicity -- 24. Problem-Solving Inadequacies -- 25. Ideological Immunity, or the Planck Problem -- Spinoza's Dictum
- Apparitions: Virgin Mary World Tour
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- Consumer Alert: Wall Builders' Shoddy Workmanship by Rob Boston, "Church & State" Magazine, July-August, 1996
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- Mything In Action: David Barton' s 'Questionable Quotes'
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- Good Works and Heroic Virtues: Mother Teresa and Charles Keating from The Missionary Position by Christopher Hitchens
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- Justifying Religion by Richard Dawkins from the essay On Debating Religion
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- Promise Keepers: A Threat to Separation? by Conrad Goeringer
- George Washington Worshiped in Texas
- Membership Application and Renewal
September, 1997
- Calendar Quotation
- "My earlier views of the unsoundness of the Christian scheme of salvation and the human origin of the scriptures have become clearer and stronger with advancing years and I see no reason for thinking I shall ever change them." -- Abraham Lincoln
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- Excerpts from: The Founding Fathers Were Not Christians by Steven Morris, in Free Inquiry, Fall, 1995
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- Bad Press: Better Than No Press? Cliff Walker's Monthly Column
- "the opinions of men are not the object of civil government, nor under its jurisdiction" -- Thomas Jefferson
- Second Tuesday: Politics and Gods
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- How Thinking Goes Wrong: Twenty-Five Fallacies That Lead Us to Believe Weird Things by Michael Shermer from his book Why People Believe Weird Things -- 15. Emotive Words and False Analogies -- 16. Ad Ignorantiam -- 17. Ad Hominem and Tu Quoque -- 18. Hasty Generalization -- 19. Overreliance on Authorities -- 20. Either-Or -- 21. Circular Reasoning -- 22. Reductio ad Absurdum and the Slippery Slope
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- Christian Greed, Betrayal (Nuns betray Tutsi refugees)
- Jew shows "less-than-perfect" loyalty to his religion (murdered his kids because he feared his ex-wife would not raise them as Jews)
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- Alcoholics Anonymous: Of Course it's a Cult! by RR founder Jack Trimpey -- from "The Journal of Rational Recovery," Vol. 9, Iss. 5, May-June, 1997
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- Badges!? We don't need no ... : Pitching God In Class -- by Jerry Billings
- Membership Application and Renewal
August, 1997
- Calendar Quotation
- When you can turn people on their head and shake them and no money falls out, then you know God's saying, "Move on, son." -- faith-healer A. A. Allen to Marjoe Gortner
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- Biology Text Books Adopted by Howard Thompson and John (Texas Schools)
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- Quite A Long Haul Cliff Walker's Monthly Column
- " the sun doth not wait for prayers and incantations to be prevailed on to rise " -- Epictetus, 1st century A.D.
- Second Tuesday, Stamps and Fish
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- How Thinking Goes Wrong: Twenty-Five Fallacies That Lead Us to Believe Weird Things by Michael Shermer from his book Why People Believe Weird Things -- Problems in Pseudoscientific Thinking -- 4. Anecdotes Do Not Make a Science -- 5. Scientific Language Does Not Make a Science -- 6. Bold Statements Do Not Make Claims True -- 7. Heresy Does Not Equal Correctness -- 8. Burden of Proof -- 9. Rumors Do Not Equal Reality -- 10. Unexplained Is Not Inexplicable -- 11. Failures Are Rationalized -- 12. After-the-Fact Reasoning -- 13. Coincidence -- 14. Representativeness
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- Does Prayer Make Sense? by Conrad Goeringer
- Fertile Imaginations (Japanese worship a 12-foot-long, bright pink, plastic penis)
- Worshipping the True King (Elvis Shrine in India)
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- Atheism in music: Jesus Thinks You're a Jerk by Frank Zappa -- from the album "Broadway The Hard Way"
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- "Religious Freedom" or Hypocrisy? By D.W. Steel, The Oxford Eagle, 7 March 1996
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- The Mind of the Bible-Believer a critique of Edmund D. Cohen's book (author unknown)
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- Christian Sect Rejects Loyal Supporter (KKK dumps black supporter)
- Childhood Bedtime Fable (headless killer on lake tale)
- Satanic Panic (Parish posted security ushers to be sure parishioners weren't pocketing communion wafers)
- ACLU NewsWire: South Carolina Court Okays Atheists for Public Office
- Membership Application and Renewal
July, 1997
- Calendar Quotation
- To believe the impossible is gross superaition; to believe the possible, simply because it is possible, is blind credulity. -- John E. Remsberg
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- Bible Prophesy Fulfilled? (Malachi 2:3) Orthodox Jews throw excrement on religious opponents
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- Did Dennis Rodman Have a Point? Cliff Walker's Monthly Column
- "There's this thing called being so openminded your brains drop
out." -- Richard Dawkins
- Second Tuesday, Stamps and Fish
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- The Scope Of Atheism From The Book, "Atheism: The Case Against God" by George H. Smith -- VII. The Significance of Atheism -- Theism on the Defense
- Greater than Jesus (Filipino crucifixion ritual)
- Trusting the Faithful (taxi driver for Muslim women)
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- Solidification and Isolation: How Biblical Faith Protects Itself From Critics by C. Dennis McKinsey -- from The Encyclopedia of Biblical Errancy
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- How Thinking Goes Wrong: Twenty-Five Fallacies That Lead Us to Believe Weird Things by Michael Shermer from his book Why People Believe Weird Things -- Hume's Maxim -- Problems in Scientifiic Thinking -- 1. Theory Influences Observations -- 2. The Observer Changes the Observed -- 3. Equipment Constructs Results
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- Jilted! by Cliff Walker
- No Excuse For Abuse ("exorcism" of 5-year-old Amy Burney)
- Bizarre Ritual (Roman Catholic women who "choose to dedicate their lives to chastity as servants of Christ")
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- Letters: Darwin is not opposite of Jesus so why the little fish with legs? (featuring contradictions in Genesis story)
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- Life Imitates Darwin by Richard Dawkins
- Voices of Thunder by John E. Remsburg (1848-1919)
- Who will be his successor? by Jules Soury from his book Studies on Jesus and The Gospels
- Money Used Wisely (Demolition company hires psychic; Bureau hires Buddhist priest, Catholic priest, and psychic to commune with the building)
- Comic
- Membership Application and Renewal
June, 1997
- Calendar Quotation
- "As nightfall does not come all at once, neither does oppression. In both instances, there is a twilight. And it is in such twilight that we all must be aware of change in the air -- however slight -- lest we become unwitting victims of the darkness." -- Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas
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- Are You Immune to Hoaxes? by Cliff Walker
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- "You Intellectually Dishonest Thinkers!" Cliff Walker's Monthly Column
- "In every country and in every age the priest has been hostile to liberty." -- Thomas Jefferson
- Second Tuesday; Fish; Stamps
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- The Scope Of Atheism From The Book, "Atheism: The Case Against God" by George H. Smith -- IV. The Varieties of Atheism -- V. Jacques Maritain and the Slander of Atheism -- VI. What Atheism Is Not
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- Opportunists by Gora
- Self-Reliance, Honesty, Truth: New Family Values by Jennifer
- Crackpot Group of the Month: Flat Earth Society
- Where will you go when you die? by Cliff Walker
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- The Relativity of Biblical Ethics Joe Edward Barnhart
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- Weird Science and Political Careers (abortion funding co-chair: a woman who is "truly raped" won't conceive: "the juices don't flow, the body functions don't work.")
- Weird Science and Performance Art (Psychiatrist staged public lectures (charging admission) in which his wife was showcased as his subject)
- Membership Application and Renewal
May, 1997
- Calendar Quotation
- I have always strenuously supported the right of every man to his opinion, however different that opinion might be to mine. He who denies to another this right, makes a slave of himself to his present opinion, because he precludes himself the right of changing it. -- Thomas Paine
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- The Heaven's Gate Portland Connection by Kevin Courcey
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- Christian Nation: An Oxymoron? Cliff Walker's Monthly Column
- Is religion wise to seek to lean upon the state as a crutch? -- Milwaukee Journal (12/16/52)
- Second Tuesday; Money Stamps
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- The Scope Of Atheism From The Book, "Atheism: The Case Against God" by George H. Smith -- I. The Myths of Atheism -- II. The Meaning of Atheism -- III. Agnosticism
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- More Berkeley Pet Psychot -- er, Psychics (prosperous telepathic "pet psychics.")
- Quadro Tracker 'not fraud' (says court, meanwhile, government agencies were bilked out of millions)
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- Verify by Gora from his book, I Learn
- Judge Charles Price Receives Profiles In Courage Award by Conrad Goeringer, AANEWS
- I Didn't Do It! (her "heart, mind, and spirit" were innocent, because some other personality within her did it)
- See? I Told You! (she had a Multiple-Personality Disorder (120 personalities, including Satan and a duck)
- God did it! (Negligently kills daughter, then says, "It was like God called my baby home to be with him, and God used me as a tool to bring her to Him.")
- Or So He Said ... (claiming to hear God, he climbed jumped off a building)
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- Freedom Under Siege -- by Joan d'Arc from paranoia: the conspiracy reader (article on Madalyn Murray-O'Hair)
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- Another Lively Second-Tuesday Discussion by Jerry Billings
- Membership Application and Renewal
April, 1997
- Calendar Quotation
- The way to see by faith is to shut the eye of reason. -- Benjamin Franklin
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- Feeling cross from all that Easter hoopla? by Cliff Walker
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- Such Educated People! Wot? Cliff Walker's Monthly Column
- "The only good is knowledge and the only evil is ignorance." -- Socrates
- Second Tuesday Explodes!
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- Statement by Alan Hale on Heaven's Gate Mass Suicide -- Delivered at a Press Conference in Cloudcroft, New Mexico, March 28, 1997 -- (Alan Hale is one of the co-discoverers of Comet Hale-Bopp.)
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- To Fathom Two Fathoms (Mark Twain "Captain Sommerfield" Hoax. [Yup! We bought it! Retracted on Page 0 of June, 1997, issue.])
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- The Plan (creation myth spoof)
- New Bible Discovered! by Jerry Billings (another creation myth spoof)
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- Religion and Boy Scouts in Portland Public Schools by Nancy Powell with Jerry Billings
- Porno "Christ" (Shinichiro Kaneko, "an actor in sadistic porno films," volunteer to be crucified in gruesome ceremony in Philippines)
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- Norma Jaeger Fools Nobody -- Jerry Billings writes: -- Cliff Walker writes: -- RR Founder Jack Trimpey responds to Cliff Walker: -- Larry responds to Cliff Walker -- Author Vince Fox responds to Cliff Walker -- Sheri responds to Cliff Walker -- Russ responds to the dialogue between Cliff and Vince -- Cliff is still skeptical -- Larry explains AA's popularity -- Vince Fox offers a ray of hope to the above discussion
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- Membership Application and Renewal
March, 1997
- Calendar Quotation
- Even though the most clever cannot satisfactorily define good and evil, all but the least clever know them and can readily distinguish them on encounter. -- Edmund D. Cohen
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- The Led Zeppelin Hoax Cliff Walker's Monthly Column
- Today's religion is tomorrow's bondage. -- Bob Dylan, 1983
- Addiction Care: Is It Religion?
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- Isaac Asimov on Science and the Bible the "Free Inquiry" Interview -- Spring 1982
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- Our Apologies
- In Memoriam: The Critical Thinker has just learned of the death of CRT member Nick Schachter. We will remember Nick and his wonderful piano music.
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- Koran, Dathan, and Abiram Numbers, chap. xvi, accounted for. by Thomas Paine
- God at 39.17 MegaHertz by James Randi (1986)
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- Turning the other cheek (Blinded victim reads Bible to Kidnapper)
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- The Problem of Paul from The Mythmaker: Paul and the Invention of Christianity by Hyam Maccoby
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- Crucifixion Attempt Fails (A naked man tried to nail himself to a wooden cross in a church basement)
- Group Pulls Ads ("Prayer won't cure AIDS. Research will.")
- Operatives Spread Fear (fear of penis-shrinking sorcery spreads panic)
- Membership Application and Renewal
February, 1997
- Calendar Quotation
- If people think God is interesting, the onus is on them to show that there is anything there to talk about. Otherwise they should just shut up about it. -- Richard Dawkins
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- CRT Announces New Meeting Schedule
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- For A Positive Future Cliff Walker's Monthly Column
- Christian morality is essentially the doctrine of passive obedience -- John Stuart Mill
- ACLU Lawyer To Speak
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- The Reagan Doctrine by Isaac Asimov
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- Education In Reverse (parents demand that Africa and Germany be removed from maps and globes in local classrooms because they believe those places are anti-Christian)
- Don't Confuse Me With The Facts (Professor believes the Bible: the Earth is the center of the universe)
- Demon-Haunted Tree (exorcism of an oak tree)
- God-Haunted Tree (tree fell on preacher; County: "act of God)
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- Religious freedom!? But -- you said it's a war memorial! While Christian Coalition Stumps for "Religious Freedom," Should Eugene Pay Legal Fees for Skinner's Butte Cross? -- by Conrad Goeringer and Kevin Courcey
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- Skinner's Butte Cross: A Symbol of Terror -- Letter to Eugene Register-Guard by Lance Sparks
- Hello! You freaks! (Attempt [later successful] to get gov't offices to greet people with "Heaven-o" because "Hello" [according to these nuts] contains the root "Hell.")
- Snake-Handling Sects -- from The Discovery Channel
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- Book Review: In Name Only "Not-So-Christian America" by Thomas C. Reeves
- Mark Twain Defended by Ernie Dickinson
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- Blaise Pascal, Las Vegas, and Chinook Winds by Jerry Billings
- In Memoriam -- Nick Caravacio (wrong name corrected in March issue)
- Support Groups, Call Home! (support group of those who say they were abducted by aliens)
- Jailhouse Modesty (lawsuit against Jail to reassign female guards away from the showers and toilet areas -- "Christian modesty.")
- Radio Host Gets 15 Years (Anti-Child Abuse leader, a Mormon, convicted of molestation)
- More Insurance Fraud (Blue Shield and Blue Cross of Idaho do not cover exorcism)
- Different Strokes (Stalagmite phallus of god Shiva)
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- Recent CRT Activities; New, Improved Programs -- 1996 Winter Solstice Party -- County Supervisor Bev Stein -- Critical Thinker Improving
- Membership Application and Renewal
January, 1997
- Calendar Quotation
- [Spiritualists] are lacking not only in criticism but in the most elementary knowledge of psychology. At the bottom they do not want to be taught any better, but merely to go on believing. -- Carl Gustav Jung
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- Fed up with fish? Federal-Reserve graffiti?
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- Curiosity: A Boy's Best Friend Cliff Walker's Monthly Column
- Mystery is the wisdom of blockheads. -- Horace Walpole, 1761
- Second Tuesday Gears Up!
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- The Fine Art of Baloney Detection -- by Carl Sagan -- from "The Demon-Haunted World"
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- Forcing the Faith -- by James Kilpatrick -- from The Oregonian Friday, December 27, 1996 (Prison regulations requiring inmates to worship God violate constitutional guarantee of religious freedom)
- Psychic Center!? (writing vulgar graffiti on the "psychic center" of Hallsville)
- Do They Never Learn? (stealing six power company transformers needed to make a time machine His landlord evicted him)
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- Holy Water Infects (severe bacterial infection holy water sprinkled on him)
- River Baptism Unfit (move baptisms indoors increasing pollution of creeks and rivers)
- Indoor Baptism Kills (minister was electrocuted standing in a pool about to baptize a dozen people)
- Myth vs. Public Health (pneumonic plague many Hindus refuse to kill rats)
- Superstitious Bobbitizer (the advice of a fortune-teller cut off his penis so that a new one would grow)
- Idolatry Kills Child (A 4-year-old boy . killed when a statue of the Virgin Mary fell on his head)
- Voodoo Oops! (Firefighters pulled from her oven a smoldering voodoo doll); (Customs officials 27 pounds of marijuana undetectable sprinkled with"magic voodoo potion" she had bought from a witch doctor)
- Pilgrimages Lethal (trampled to death symbolic stoning of the devil); (drowned as two boats returning from a Hindu pilgrimage collided)
- Can't Walk On Water (drowned while trying to walk on water as a test of their faith near)
- Polygamy Payback (too heavily in debt from support payments to his 26 children, 35 ex-wives, and four current wives)
- Vegas Wedding Binding (wedding was performed by an Elvis Presley impersonator)
- Talking With 'God' (Oral Roberts University failing to attract a buyer in eighteen months God told him to build it)
- Castration Futile (eunuchs 10,000 sex acts would take place show little sexual restraint)
- Spoons Bend Easily (grasp the spoon in both hands with thumbs underneath the smallest part of the handle and "apply some downward strength." shouting, "I bent!")
- Er, Motor Oil? (forced a service station to sell him oil poured on himself in order to ward off evil spirits)
- Worship Ignored (Nineteen worshipers killed during Palm Sunday services when tornadoes struck)
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- Ouija Deliberations (Jury has a seance)
- Demon Derfense (Preacher: Demons made me do it)
- Holy Roller or Idiot? (India's leading Hindu holy "rolling " Lotan Baba)
- Book Burning Blocked (pollution-control permit)
- Jurassic Jesus (Cloning Jesus with Turin Shroud DNA)
- The Rev. Doc Johnson (Catholics like sperm-gathering machine)
- Crisis in Education (school board member hired witch doctor to put a spell on fellow member)
- Enlarged Frontiers (Penis-enlargement quackery includes bits of Bankok phone book)
- Think and do what!? (Think and Grow Breasts)
- Military Intelligence: Oxymoron (Israeli pork bullet kills Muslims' souls)
- Galileo Pardon Explained (Catholic Church to baptize extraterrestrial life)
- The Crisis Continues (Arkansas Governor Jim Guy Tucker bans Congressional Record from schools: Contains "bizarre polemics on religious and political positions.")
- Space Program Proposal (22,000-mile-high tower)
- Beauty Secret Revealed (sacrificed a goat, ten oxen)
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- The Witch Hunts: The End of Magic and Miracles 1450-1750 by Helen Ellerbe -- fromThe Dark Side of Christian History
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- A Reversal, Of Sorts (The Moorish Science Temple members have sex with prisoners, smuggle cocaine into prison. They had taken advantage of lax procedures for religious visitors.)
- Atheists Remember Carl Sagan by Conrad Goeringer