Read about this series of posts here, The Christian Culture Survival Guide.There’s a saying that can vaguely be summarized as this- “Any publicity is good publicity”. When the first Dan Brown book to be filmed The Da Vinci Code was going to be released, there were protests from Christian groups calling it blasphemy. Aside from that, there were poor reviews all over the place (the movie holds a 24% rating at Rotten Tomatoes); the movie, however, did fairly well its opening release weekend. The reason was publicity, and all the Christian protesters were really doing was helping give this film more publicity. Christian boycotts don’t work much; what they do is spark curiosity in the people who hear their message, which in turn may make the person participate in the very thing the Christian boycotts are against. Let's face it, even the protesters may indulge in the very thing they claim to be against (I remember one Christian telling me he went to see the Da Vinci Code because he wanted to know what lies the adversity was spewing this time).In an effort to return to the immediate topic at hand, Paul Turner gives us a list of three signs that indicate we may be about to make an erroneous decision.

Read about this series of posts here, The Christian Culture Survival Guide.There was a gay parade scheduled for later that month in the city where the congregants met every Sunday. This meant that Satan had a stranglehold grip on these people, and was holding on tightly. The pastor decided to do something in retaliation, so he did what God called him to do. He got together with a group of other pastors, and they decided to have their own rally and parade. Walk for Jesus, it was called. It could have adequately been dubbed “Walk for injustice and inequality”, as it was crafted from a pitiful hate against people who were not like them. Like good Christians.

Since I could not go to yesterday's creation museum trip, I've decided to write a post about a news article about the trip. I'm doing my part to fight against weak "science", no matter how minor it may be. However, just in case you didn't know, PZ Myers (along with the Secular Student Alliance) decided to pay the creation museum (the one owned by Ken Ham) a visit. There was an incident in which one student, Derek, was removed from the premises. Although, the allegations seemed weak.

A group of scientists, students and secularists -- 304 in all -- visited Petersburg, Kentucky on Friday to tour exhibits on display at the Creation Museum.
The visitors are in town attending a conference of the Secular Student Alliance, a group formed "to organize, unite, educate and serve students and student communities that promote the ideals of scientific and critical inquiry, democracy, secularism, and human based ethics."

Exhibits in the Creation Museum, which cost $27 million to build and opened in May, 2007, present a history of the world based on literal interpretations of the Book of Genesis. Adam and Eve share the Garden of Eden with dinosaurs; the beaks of Darwin's finches are explained by God's will, not evolution; and mankind spread from continent to continent by walking across the floating trunks of trees knocked down during the Biblical Flood. The museum has made a specific effort to reach out to students and families.

William Watkin, a chemist living in Indiana, challenged one exhibit's suggestion that the Grand Canyon could have been carved in hours by a process similar to how volcanic mudslides can rapidly create canyons in softer rocks. "Everything they said about sediment deposition, about Mount St. Helens … anyone in first year geology would say 'wrong from top to bottom,'" said Watkin.

Anybody with even a basic understanding of science will understand these people are wrong from the top to the bottom. The problem is, these people aren't as interested in having their science correct as much as they are interested in spreading their gospel message. Here is a snapshot of their mission statement.

In the singular moment of noticeable conflict, Derek Rogers, a computer science major at Dalhouise University in Nova Scotia, Canada, was detained by guards for wearing a shirt with a slogan recently plastered on buses by activist groups that read "there's probably no God, so get over it." He was escorted to the bathroom and ordered to flip the shirt inside-out.
"One family of religious people told me that I had ruined their trip, and they drove all the way from Virginia," said Rogers.

A museum that orders somebody with a shirt that isn't very offensive (though this is my opinion, it did not have any explicit language or imagery) surely is not open to the exchange of ideas. This is truly disheartening, we'd expect a place that sets forth to "educate" to tolerate an opposing view. PZ Myers, famed biologist blogger, wrote about it on his blog (there is even video footage of the conversation between Derek, Myers, and a couple of other atheists). What I found amusing was that a family from Virginia stated this ruined their trip. I'm sure their trip would have been worse were they to have been thrown out. What these people should be worried about is the distasteful attitude this museum has towards any form of minor criticism.

But at least one conversation between religious believers and members of the group found common ground. Beneath a poster that presented the creationist interpretation of fossils, two students from North Carolina and a man who became religious after being diagnosed with cancer engaged in a polite dialogue about helping others and tolerating differences that drew a crowd.

"Regardless of religion, we both live our lives for the same reasons," said one of the students. "The big thing we have a problem with here is the faulty science."

This is the ending paragraph in the article. And I agree that my first quirk against these fundamentalist types isn't their religiosity, it's their misunderstanding of basic science (and promotion of pseudoscience).

Doing a search for the book, The Christian Culture Survival Guide, I find myself a few web pages from the bottom. Either way, this is the first page. Does anybody else seem to get this result?