Ack! That's totally not what I meant to say, and I'm really sorry if people took it that way.

I have no issues at all with people simply not being interested in religion. Or with people not believing simply because they don't believe. What I was complaining about was people who are willfully ignorant of religion arguing against it anyway. (The particular letter that put me over the edge was one that said (and I'm slightly paraphrasing because I can't find it right now), "I know I don't believe in a personal G-d, and that's the basis of all religion, so there's no reason for me to have to read any of the details to know that all religion is nonsense.")

That said, I do think there's a notion in here that some people can justify their atheism and others can't. I do not think Hil, or anyone else here, was throwing stones - but I do think the implication is there, and it bothers me.

I don't think there's any reason why anyone should need to justify their atheism, or their theism, or their religion. (And in the "we need more words" vein, is there a word for a religious atheist? My grandmother was an Orthodox Jew, but in terms of belief, she was at most agnostic. I saw one survey that said about 75% of people who marked "Jewish" as their religion checked off "yes" to the "Do you believe in G-d?" question.)

And yes, I thought the "atheists can't have hope" part of that article was ridiculous. (It also made me want to go read the philosophers he was talking about, because my first thought was "These words he's using must have some sort of technical meaning within philosophy or theology, because he's not actually saying what it seems like he's saying, is he?" But I really don't know.)

And again, I see no reason why anyone should have to justify anything about their belief. Just that someone who comes to it from a perspective of "I've read all this stuff, and listened to all these people, and discussed all of this, and this is what I've concluded" is coming at it from a very different perspective than someone who's saying "Yep, I feel that G-d is there" or "Nope, not feeling anything there," and that it makes for craziness when you try to approach the former with "Can't you just close your eyes and sense that you're one with the universe?" or when you try to approach the latter with logical proofs.

I feel like sometimes that salon dot com ick gets on us.

True. And it just makes me sad -- both the ick here, and because s.com is where I met half the Buffistas, including David. It used to be one of the absolutely smartest, wittiest, most interesting places on any of the internets. And now Table Talk is subscriber only, and the letters sections are just a howling wasteland of rage.

In general my own faith wobbles somewhere between Susan's faithful doubt and actual capital-F Faith; I think I'm one of those people who is just hardwired for faith, and even in my most doubtful moments it's still my default setting (weirdly, if I slide off my ADs the first, immediate effect is a gnawing gut-ache of existential doubt so profound it utterly paralyzes me; I literally can't function).

My big battle lately is about how to express it. I'm a big old crunchy Social Justice and Solidarity!Jesus girl, and I'm feeling more and more like my own church actively wants me and everyone like me OUT. Not my actual parish, which is lovely and progressive and deeply, deeply home for me -- but sometimes it feels like we're in opposition to the entire rest of the body of the church. I don't know what the tipping point is or where one goes after tipping; it just feels like eventually it's going to be no longer worth it to stay where so many people I love feel so unwelcome.

When I look back at the church of my childhood, or the modest reforms and whispers of openness and change I remember from the mid-90s, and then look at the frankly mean and unpleasant people running the place now, I just want to cry, or throw something.

the letters sections are just a howling wasteland of rage.

I think that's true everywhere -- most days, I read some letters attached to articles for the local paper and for the New Orleans paper, and invariably I wish I hadn't, because I'm so depressed by the racism and hatred I find there.

Are you still in Houston Dana? Because, yeah...

I like to read the local paper's letters to see if my neighbors are getting smarter. Often I'm disappointed, but I see occasional blue sky in the cloudy sky of ignorance.

Yeah. I really should stop reading, but I keep doing it.

The ones on nola.com are worse.

I think I'm one of those people who is just hardwired for faith, and even in my most doubtful moments it's still my default setting

Yeah. I'm far more inclined to stop speaking to God than stop believing in her.

My big battle lately is about how to express it. I'm a big old crunchy Social Justice and Solidarity!Jesus girl, and I'm feeling more and more like my own church actively wants me and everyone like me OUT. Not my actual parish, which is lovely and progressive and deeply, deeply home for me -- but sometimes it feels like we're in opposition to the entire rest of the body of the church. I don't know what the tipping point is or where one goes after tipping; it just feels like eventually it's going to be no longer worth it to stay where so many people I love feel so unwelcome.

I think that's pretty cyclical in all denominations and (possibly) even more dramatically so in the Roman Catholic Church because of the hirearchy.

Don't worry, he can't live forever. (Though I suppose if anyone could its a Nazi Pope -- that guy is hooked in with EVERYBODY)

Traffic jam mystery solved by mathematicians

Mathematicians from the University of Exeter have solved the mystery of traffic jams by developing a model to show how major delays occur on our roads, with no apparent cause. Many traffic jams leave drivers baffled as they finally reach the end of a tail-back to find no visible cause for their delay. Now, a team of mathematicians from the Universities of Exeter, Bristol and Budapest, have found the answer and published their findings in leading academic journal Proceedings of the Royal Society.

The cause, in one word? "Idiots."

(Though I suppose if anyone could its a Nazi Pope -- that guy is hooked in with EVERYBODY)

He's actually a Nazi War Robot cloaked in human skin. One of the SS' top-secret projects.

This is totally true, by the way. I know, because I got it from the same guy who pointed out that pointing a laser at a digital camera and taking a picture and then viewing the picture on the monitor can kill you.

I still like Salon, but I don't*venerate* it like I used to. Which I suspect would be inevitable with all the "Keith Olbermann says..."(KO used to have a Salon Column, too.) rattling around in my brain these days, but I do sense a decline in quality, I think the TV critic is juvenile(Which I don't post there cause she did write a whole column in Deadwood-speak, which I had to admit was *damn* funny)and I think Post All Letters should take its place in Broadcast History right next to "As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." Well, maybe not, but they write letters a lot.