GOP Lawmakers Question Constitutionality of State Department Grants to Spread Atheism Abroad

Republican lawmakers are questioning the constitutionality of a Biden State Department program to fund the spread of atheism and humanism internationally.

At the end of June, a group of 15 Republican members of Congress wrote to President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken about a State Department funding program from April 2021 that “would award grants of up to $500,000 to organizations committed to the practice and spread of atheism and humanism, namely in South/Central Asia and in the Middle East/North Africa.”

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Arizona Rep. Paul Gosar Co-Signs Letter Slamming Grant to Fund the Promotion of Atheism in Other Countries

Arizona Rep. Paul Gosar cosigned a letter recently sent to the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken (D) and President Joe Biden (D), which speaks against the Biden administration’s granting of funds to international organizations committed to the practice and spread of atheism and humanism.

“Of course, we all know that America was founded largely by Christians who wanted to escape oppressive dictators and the State Church of England,” Gosar said in his weekly update letter. “Beginning in the 1960’s, leftist activists posing as judges started to dismantle our Christian heritage and iconography. Crosses were ordered removed from parks. A prayer before school was limited then banned. The left did their best to remove our Christian culture from public life.   I am working to reverse that cultural cleansing with others in Congress and to restore our Christian heritage.”

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‘The Time Has Come for ‘Gaytheism’:’ Library Promotes Radical, Anti-Christian Books

Rider University

Rider University is promoting a book in their online library that, according to the publication description, “Argues that homophobia will not be eradicated in the United States until religion is ended.”

“Slouching Towards Gaytheism: Christianity and Queer Survival in America,” written by W.C. Harris, a professor at Shippensburg University in Pennsylvania, can be found in Rider’s library research guide for “Christian and Religious Privilege.”

The “Christian and Religious Privilege” guide is a subcategory of Rider’s “Privilege and Intersectionality” web page.

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Commentary: Former Atheist Explains How Rationality, Not Emotion, Encourages Religious Belief

by Annie Holmquist   I recently ran across an interview with author Stephen Asma in The Irish Times. Although an atheist, Asma is a rather unique atheist because he believes religion is necessary, a fact evidenced in his recent book Why We Need Religion. According to Asma, a philosophy professor, religion does not make sense rationally, but it makes a lot of sense emotionally: “Of Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris, he says: ‘I agree with them that religion fails miserably at the bar of rational validity, but we’re at the wrong bar.; Religion is not necessarily meant to be true, he argues, but it’s meant to be useful. ‘Religion helps people, rightly or wrongly, manage their emotional lives’ and especially cope with pain. Asma goes on to say, “Rationality cannot do the heavy lifting that is required in the face of devastating loss. What is needed is positive emotion and pain-reduction – in a word, religion.” At first blush, such an admission seems like a backhanded compliment – a recognition that religion is a useful and needful element. On second thought, Asma’s comment seems simply to echo Karl Marx’s famous statement that religion is the opium of the people. But one of modern…

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