The Hazards of Belief

silverharp · 04-08-2016 03:56PM

while I wouldn't condone any vandalism on church property, either the Journal or someone somebody talked to has a gift for the dramatic

http://www.thejournal.ie/satanic-attacks-on-donegal-churches-2909501-Aug2016/#comment-5336189

'Satanic' attacks made on three churches in Donegal

THREE CHURCHES IN the same area of Donegal were targets of a ‘satanic’ attack last Sunday.

St Mary’s Church in Bocan, Culdaff, discovered that symbols had been drawn onto their altar cloths, and similar attacks were reported in two other parish churches in the area of Inishowen.

The attack at St Mary’s Church is believed to have occurred between midday and 7pm on Sunday 24 July. The incident has been reported to the gardaí and an investigation is underway at Carndonagh garda station.

Local councillor Bernard McGuinness (FG) has condemned the attacks and has called on anyone who might have noticed anything unusual to report it to the gardaí.

A curate of St Mary’s Church Bocan said in an interview with the Donegal Daily that they were shocked to find the graffiti last week.

Penn · 04-08-2016 04:00PM

So many young men of a homosexual inclination were applying to study for the priesthood that “we might as well talk about a feminary rather than a seminary”, he declared.

PopePalpatine · 04-08-2016 04:07PM

Ah here, they wouldn't show the offending graffiti? By any chance, was it a Dickbutt? :pac:

silverharp · 04-08-2016 04:32PM

PopePalpatine wrote: »

Ah here, they wouldn't show the offending graffiti? By any chance, was it a Dickbutt? :pac:

dont make me have to google that....

Hotblack Desiato · 04-08-2016 06:08PM

silverharp wrote: »

http://www.thejournal.ie/satanic-attacks-on-donegal-churches-2909501-Aug2016/#comment-5336189

We’ve never had anything like this happen in Culdaff before. While I’m not unduly worried, I would urge anyone not to approach people they see hanging around the church.

Good advice to live by.

PopePalpatine · 04-08-2016 06:54PM

The Independent (the UK one, not the Irish one) reports on Christian fundamentalist schools in the UK, where students are indoctrinated in creationism, where girls are taught that they must "obey, respect and submit to the leadership of her husband...[and she] is available all times day and night" and, of course, that homosexuality is a sin. On top of that, students won't even get a GCSE or an A-Level at the end of it, but instead an "International Certificate of Christian Education".

seamus · 05-08-2016 07:54AM

PopePalpatine wrote: »

The Independent (the UK one, not the Irish one) reports on Christian fundamentalist schools in the UK, where students are indoctrinated in creationism, where girls are taught that they must "obey, respect and submit to the leadership of her husband...[and she] is available all times day and night" and, of course, that homosexuality is a sin. On top of that, students won't even get a GCSE or an A-Level at the end of it, but instead an "International Certificate of Christian Education".

This is the one thing I've never gotten. Or perhaps soft enforcement is the problem.

Surely the law sets out the minimum educational requirements of any child. And the state has a duty to police this, including inspections of any individual or facility who is providing full-time education to a person under the age of 18.
And the power to shut them down if the taught curriculum does not meet basic requirements or if the average test results fall below a certain threshold?

I can understand in the US where people just do whatever they want, but how does this quackery happen in Europe? How can kids be spending 14 years at school and not be walking out with a basic state certification at the end?

Hotblack Desiato · 05-08-2016 08:15AM

seamus wrote: »

I can understand in the US where people just do whatever they want, but how does this quackery happen in Europe? How can kids be spending 14 years at school and not be walking out with a basic state certification at the end?

Because religion.

If the leaders of any other organisation tried to do the things religions can and do get away with they'd all be locked up.

Peregrinus · 05-08-2016 08:40AM

seamus wrote: »

Surely the law sets out the minimum educational requirements of any child. And the state has a duty to police this, including inspections of any individual or facility who is providing full-time education to a person under the age of 18.

Yes. But in the UK they do this with quite a liberal touch.

There’s the National Curriculum, but only state-funded schools are required to teach the National Curriculum. If parents want to send their children to schools which don’t teach the National Curriculum (and are prepared to pay for it) they can do that.

These independent schools are subject to Ofsted inspections. They’re inspected against the “Common Inspection Framework”, which does involve looking at what is taught, as well as how it is taught, and which does involved looking at pupils work and their results in tests and exams. But on the substantive academics the framework is very “high level”, as opposed to being prescriptive in detail about what pupils should know. The inspection will look at how well pupils acquire “speaking, listening, literacy and numeracy skills”, for example, whether they receive “personal, social, health and economic education which reflects the school’s aim and ethos and encourages respect for other people”. But there’s no requirement that, e.g. at this age they should have mastered Euclidean geometry, at that age Cartesian geometry, and at that age the calculus.

Focussing on evolution, because that’s an obvious thing to focus on in this context, there’s no requirement (for any English school) that pupils should understand the theory of evolution. This is partly a consequence of the high degree of specialisation that the English system allows; from an early age you can focus on, say, languages and the humanities, and receive next to no scientific education (or vice versa) and in this context it’s impossible to specify mandatory levels of attainment at a subject-specific level. If pupils who take science courses emerge from them with no understanding of evolution, of course, you’d expect that to be noted in the Ofsted report. But if they can give a satisfactory account of the theory of evolution, the fact that they reject it on religious grounds would not be something that concerns Ofsted. Ofsted’s role with regard to belief is very limited. Schools must teach “the fundamental British values of democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty, and mutual respect and tolerance of those with different faiths and beliefs”. But that’s it.

seamus wrote: »

And the power to shut them down if the taught curriculum does not meet basic requirements or if the average test results fall below a certain threshold?

Because there is no mandatory curriculum, you can’t shut down a school because you don’t like the curriculum. Poor educational outcomes, though, is a legitimate concern; in fact measuring educational outcomes is mainly what an Ofsted report does. (Note that "educational outcomes" is much wider, though, than “what the kids learn”. But what the kids learn is part of it.)

If educational outcomes are judged to be “inadequate” (Ofsted’s lowest grading) then the school authorities are notified of the identified weaknesses, and the school goes on a regime of regular inspections to monitor how well it is addressing its problems. If there’s no improvement Ofsted can have the school governors removed (but cannot, an independent school, dictate who the new governors are to be). In the last analysis they can have the school closed, but this is rare. More usually the school closes itself when enough parents withdraw their pupils that it becomes unviable.

seamus wrote: »

I can understand in the US where people just do whatever they want, but how does this quackery happen in Europe? How can kids be spending 14 years at school and not be walking out with a basic state certification at the end?

There’s no legal requirement to sit GCSE (or, in Ireland, Leaving Certificate) exams. Practically every school offers it because parents demand it, but there are alternatives (not all of which are cooky Christian options - you’ve probably heard of the International Baccalaureate) and, in principle, a school might choose to avoid exam-based qualifications entirely. (I think there are one or two international schools in London which basically operate on the US high school model.) While that’s a minority option, it’s perfectly lawful.

(And I think this is true in most European countries. While the state offers publicly-validated qualifications, there’s no obligation to obtain them, and running a school which caters to those who aren’t pursuing a state-validated qualification is lawful.)

robindch · 08-08-2016 09:52AM

The University of Michigan's Center for Local, State and Urban Policy carried out some research recently to establish what people believe about climate change:

http://closup.umich.edu/national-surveys-on-energy-and-environment/nsee-data-tables/nsee-2016-spring/

The most fun finding is that while 95% (Question 8) are "fairly confident or very confident" that, on average, Earth has been getting warmer, a striking 84% (Question 19) are "fairly confident or very confident" that, on average, Earth has not been getting warmer.

786 people were polled and the stated margin of error is 4%.

recedite · 08-08-2016 10:51AM

Americans tend to be very confident about everything

robindch · 09-08-2016 01:52PM

Last night, Gay Byrne revisited the unutterably sad case of Ann Lovett.

http://www.irishmirror.ie/news/irish-news/gay-byrne-says-death-schoolgirl-8584598

Anybody see this?

Hotblack Desiato · 10-08-2016 08:40PM

Pity I didn't see this yesterday to let you know - it was actually on last night (Tuesday)

Should have it recorded but the saorview box has a mind of its own most of the time

It's on RTE player now anyway (although not showing up in latest episodes, for some reason)

http://www.rte.ie/player/ie/show/last-orders-with-gay-byrne-30004163/10608046/

cowboyBuilder · 12-08-2016 08:02AM

My God , posts attacking Christianity gets lots of thanks.
Posts critical of Islam gets 0 thanks.

smacl · 12-08-2016 08:14AM

cowboyBuilder wrote: »

My God , posts attacking Christianity gets lots of thanks.
Posts critical of Islam gets 0 thanks.

A fair bit of criticism of both to be fair. The Catholic church gets more flak because it continues to interfere in the education system, and has historically committed more atrocities locally. While I've no use for Islam, I don't see it ever being anything more than a minority religion over here with no power or influence outside if its immediate membership.

cowboyBuilder · 12-08-2016 08:35AM

smacl wrote: »

A fair bit of criticism of both to be fair. The Catholic church gets more flak because it continues to interfere in the education system, and has historically committed more atrocities locally. While I've no use for Islam, I don't see it ever being anything more than a minority religion over here with no power or influence outside if its immediate membership.

I hope you're right.

Peregrinus · 12-08-2016 08:39AM

smacl wrote: »

A fair bit of criticism of both to be fair. The Catholic church gets more flak because it continues to interfere in the education system, and has historically committed more atrocities locally. While I've no use for Islam, I don't see it ever being anything more than a minority religion over here with no power or influence outside if its immediate membership.

This. A good deal of the animus against the Catholic church in Ireland is that they really did have a good deal of power, and it wielded that power in oppressive and damaging ways. You certainly can't say that about Islam, at least in the Irish context.

Muslims are a minority in Ireland, and indeed in Western society generally, and to a large extent they are a minority that encounters some degree of discrimination, some degree of marginalisation and alienation, and a large degree of misunderstanding. In many respects, attitudes to Muslims have much in common with attitudes to Jews, say, ninety years ago. (And we know how that panned out.) All of which makes people, even if they have genuine and thoughtful criticisms of Islam, a bit squeamish about adding their thanks to anything that might look like "let's sneer at Muslims!" thread.

(For the same reason, in spades, we see practically no posts directed against Jews or Judaism, and those that do appear don't attract a lot of thanks.)

cowboyBuilder · 12-08-2016 09:13AM

WE shouldn't be afraid to criticize though, it is a long term solution to this issue of radical islam the world faces :

check out this article from the Sunday Times

http://markhumphrys.com/islam.st.html

volchitsa · 12-08-2016 10:20AM

Peregrinus wrote: »

This. A good deal of the animus against the Catholic church in Ireland is that they really did have a good deal of power, and it wielded that power in oppressive and damaging ways. You certainly can't say that about Islam, at least in the Irish context.

Muslims are a minority in Ireland, and indeed in Western society generally, and to a large extent they are a minority that encounters some degree of discrimination, some degree of marginalisation and alienation, and a large degree of misunderstanding. In many respects, attitudes to Muslims have much in common with attitudes to Jews, say, ninety years ago. (And we know how that panned out.) All of which makes people, even if they have genuine and thoughtful criticisms of Islam, a bit squeamish about adding their thanks to anything that might look like "let's sneer at Muslims!" thread.

(For the same reason, in spades, we see practically no posts directed against Jews or Judaism, and those that do appear don't attract a lot of thanks.)

Well, with the significant difference that a subsection of Jews weren't murdering people in the streets of Europe basically for not being (the right kind of) Jews, were they?

I think that weakens the comparison greatly, and personally I suspect that the reason people hesitate to criticize Islam openly is because of what has happened to others who have done the same. Beginning with Salman Rushdie, which was a long time ago now, so it's not exactly a recent development.

smacl · 12-08-2016 10:54AM

volchitsa wrote: »

Well, with the significant difference that a subsection of Jews weren't murdering people in the streets of Europe basically for not being (the right kind of) Jews, were they?

Substitute other terrorists such as the IRA, UVF, ETA, and Baader-Meinhof with Jews and they were killing people on the streets, often their own country men and women. While I've no time for Islam, nor would I want to tar all Muslims in western society as potential terrorists as this is exactly the type of polarisation the actual terrorists look for. Nothing like indiscriminate intolerance to swell the ranks of the no-goods. Much as I've no time for Islam, I've no time for Catholicism, but I wouldn't blame the RC for the IRA either. In many ways, I think the Bush regime has a lot to answer for by declaring a war on terror post 9/11, as basically they clearly illustrated to those with an axe to grind that terrorism works.

I think that weakens the comparison greatly, and personally I suspect that the reason people hesitate to criticize Islam openly is because of what has happened to others who have done the same. Beginning with Salman Rushdie, which was a long time ago now, so it's not exactly a recent development.

I'm not convinced it does, and doubt Rushdie would even get a look in these days with the likes of Charlie Hebdo, or Team America. I wonder whether Parker and Stone have more to fear from ISIS or Trump after this rather prophetic opening from 2012;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FyrNktD_PwA

silverharp · 12-08-2016 11:27AM

smacl wrote: »

Substitute other terrorists such as the IRA, UVF, ETA, and Baader-Meinhof with Jews and they were killing people on the streets, often their own country men and women. While I've no time for Islam, nor would I want to tar all Muslims in western society as potential terrorists as this is exactly the type of polarisation the actual terrorists look for. Nothing like indiscriminate intolerance to swell the ranks of the no-goods. Much as I've no time for Islam, I've no time for Catholicism, but I wouldn't blame the RC for the IRA either.

false equivalence , the IRA were not Catholic terrorists in the sense that any of their core beliefs were driven by catholic beliefs, I doubt that anyone in the IRA had a WWJD key ring and ponder it before blowing up a shopping centre.
In the fullness of time terrorism might decrease so it might not be a big deal but in the long run a bigger deal is having a culture and belief system which is antagonistic to the host populations in Europe and is so resistant to integration that they aint really an asset when compared to migrants from other parts of the world.

smacl · 12-08-2016 12:00PM

silverharp wrote: »

false equivalence , the IRA were not Catholic terrorists in the sense that any of their core beliefs were driven by catholic beliefs, I doubt that anyone in the IRA had a WWJD key ring and ponder it before blowing up a shopping centre.
In the fullness of time terrorism might decrease so it might not be a big deal but in the long run a bigger deal is having a culture and belief system which is antagonistic to the host populations in Europe and is so resistant to integration that they aint really an asset when compared to migrants from other parts of the world.

But would the west be encountering terrorism on its own soil if it hadn't bombed the living daylights out of various foreign powers ostensibly for the good of the indigenous people, but as more likely to protect its own oil interests? Similarly is ISIS using Islam as a rallying point in such a way as is hurtful to the majority of Muslims, and if so is this for cynical reasons rather than religiously altruistic ones? My firm belief, as is the belief of many, is that ISIS is working hard to inspire increased xenophobia against the larger Muslim population in order to swell its own power base, and fragment the enemy. If you consider that Brexit has a strong anti-immigration element, and there is a significant swing to the far right in both Europe and America, it is a strategy that would appear to be working.

silverharp · 12-08-2016 12:26PM

smacl wrote: »

But would the west be encountering terrorism on its own soil if it hadn't bombed the living daylights out of various foreign powers ostensibly for the good of the indigenous people, but as more likely to protect its own oil interests? Similarly is ISIS using Islam as a rallying point in such a way as is hurtful to the majority of Muslims, and if so is this for cynical reasons rather than religiously altruistic ones? My firm belief, as is the belief of many, is that ISIS is working hard to inspire increased xenophobia against the larger Muslim population in order to swell its own power base, and fragment the enemy. If you consider that Brexit has a strong anti-immigration element, and there is a significant swing to the far right in both Europe and America, it is a strategy that would appear to be working.

im not a neocon I wish the US would pull all their troops home and let the rest of the world get on with things but there is more to this than isis terrorists. I'd put it the other way , if Merkel and the lads hadnt opened the borders Britain might still be in the EU. Islamic migration to Europe is destabilising Europe.

robindch · 12-08-2016 12:32PM

silverharp wrote: »

Islamic migration to Europe is destabilising Europe.

Only in the sense that immigration of people with islamic beliefs is being used to destabilize Europe - an important distinction.

silverharp · 12-08-2016 12:40PM

robindch wrote: »

Only in the sense that immigration of people with islamic beliefs is being used to destabilize Europe - an important distinction.

even if from a purely selfish position from residents in these countries this has to be putting pressure on social services, education health and housing. its easy to chortle from a middle class position that there is nothing to worry about but it is kind of obvious that if a pressure is built up in a society there will be consequences especially when Europe is in a long term depression

smacl · 12-08-2016 12:52PM

silverharp wrote: »

im not a neocon I wish the US would pull all their troops home and let the rest of the world get on with things but there is more to this than isis terrorists. I'd put it the other way , if Merkel and the lads hadnt opened the borders Britain might still be in the EU. Islamic migration to Europe is destabilising Europe.

No argument there, but if Bush and Blair hadn't got involved in the gulf to begin with, there may well never have been an immigration crisis to start with. From what I've read, many experts agree that destabilisation in the gulf, followed by the resulting power void are root causes to the growth of ISIS. And while a certain number of terrorists may be coming in with immigrants, I'd guess as many are not and some are even home grown. Thus the notion that stopping migration would reduce terrorist attacks seems to be a fallacy.

smacl · 12-08-2016 01:19PM

silverharp wrote: »

even if from a purely selfish position from residents in these countries this has to be putting pressure on social services, education health and housing. its easy to chortle from a middle class position that there is nothing to worry about but it is kind of obvious that if a pressure is built up in a society there will be consequences especially when Europe is in a long term depression

Depends really when and if the immigrants become productive citizens. Outside of the refugee crisis, most of the immigrants are economic, productive and a net benefit to society. For example, in the UK, all those Pakistani doctors, Filipino Nurses and Polish engineers aren't exactly taking jobs from the local lads on the dole queue with their two GCSEs, or buying houses that they might otherwise be given by the social. If those travelling for low skilled jobs aren't doing anything that whole generations of Irish haven't done in the past. Having worked abroad myself and always been welcomed, I wouldn't discriminate against I work with here just because they're not local.

robindch · 12-08-2016 01:22PM

silverharp wrote: »

[...] this has to be putting pressure on social services, education health and housing.

All the evidence suggests that immigration has a net positive impact upon a country's finances and services - the majority of immigrants tend to be young, healthy tax payers - many of whom provide, for example, the very health services which the right-wing press say they only consume.

Somebody came up with a good phrase to describe how the right-wing press spins fear of foreigners - "Schrodinger's Immigrant" - a mythical beast who arrives into a country and simultaneously claims unemployment benefit while stealing one's job.

silverharp wrote: »

its easy to chortle from a middle class position that there is nothing to worry about but it is kind of obvious that if a pressure is built up in a society there will be consequences especially when Europe is in a long term depression

Europe is not in a depression, long-term or otherwise.

silverharp · 12-08-2016 01:34PM

smacl wrote: »

Depends really when and if the immigrants become productive citizens. Outside of the refugee crisis, most of the immigrants are economic, productive and a net benefit to society. For example, in the UK, all those Pakistani doctors, Filipino Nurses and Polish engineers aren't exactly taking jobs from the local lads on the dole queue with their two GCSEs, or buying houses that they might otherwise be given by the social. If those travelling for low skilled jobs aren't doing anything that whole generations of Irish haven't done in the past. Having worked abroad myself and always been welcomed, I wouldn't discriminate against I work with here just because they're not local.

I specifically mentioned compared to immigrants form other parts of the world in one of my other posts. In the UK muslims fare badly compared to people from India even though in many cases they are their next door neighbour countries. if you want to break it down further someone who is an engineer , doctor or even a nurse has proven they are well adjusted people that will be a benefit. On the other hand letting large numbers of low to zero skill people in does create pressure for jobs and services at the low end and depress wages possibly and creates ghettos like they have in Europe. I would ague against Ireland sleep walking into having a "Molenbeek" . Then look at somewhere like Sweden where they are conducting a huge social experiment which Im sceptical of, give it 20 or 30 years and from space it will look like it has a caste system.

silverharp · 12-08-2016 01:44PM

robindch wrote: »

All the evidence suggests that immigration has a net positive impact upon a country's finances and services - the majority of immigrants tend to be young, healthy tax payers - many of whom provide, for example, the very health services which the right-wing press say they only consume.

I didn't say anywhere that it was a binary proposition , but not all immigrants are created equal, break it down by where they come from and you will see good numbers and bad numbers.

robindch wrote: »

Somebody came up with a good phrase to describe how the right-wing press spins fear of foreigners - "Schrodinger's Immigrant" - a mythical beast who arrives into a country and simultaneously claims unemployment benefit while stealing one's job.Europe is not in a depression, long-term or otherwise.

You keep trying to throw buzzwords at me like "foreigners" as if that my position. All Im saying is that Europe or Ireland needs to be picky, letting a million Chinese or people from India into Europe is a different proposition to letting a million Muslims many of which are poorly educated with numbers of people that are illiterate, combined with a religion which is pro segregation

The Hazards of Belief

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