Episode 39: Japan, Westboro Baptist Church, Darrel Ray Interview

Our hearts go out (but we don’t pray!) to the strongly atheist country of Japan after their terrible tsunami, a somewhat heated debate arises over the question of whether the bigoted Westboro Baptist Church is really a church, and Robin sits down with Darrel Ray, author of The God Virus.

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Don’t Pray for Japan

The 8.9-magnitude earthquake which struck Japan this morning has left at least 180 people dead and over 700 missing. Farmland and coastal cities have been critically damaged, and the port town of Sendai, the closest municipality to the quake, has lost thousands of homes and roads.

Almost immediately across the Internet, well-meaning cries went out to pray for the well-being of all those affected.

Don’t.

Numerous articles and studies have discussed the proof that prayer, statistically, is irrelevant: it’s as useful as animal sacrifice with regard to affecting the physical world. It is, then, largely, a comfort mechanism, and a wasteful one.

Instead of donating time or money to the victims of the quake, the feelings of unease we all experience when nature reminds us of such harsh realities is wasted away through the calming drug that is prayer.

Consider what would happen if folks couldn’t pray for the victims? What else would they do then, to calm their nerves?

Actually do something.