According to a Freedom from Religion Foundation news release (awareness of which came my way via Daylight Atheism), the FFRF “filed a lawsuit yesterday in federal court, challenging the pervasive integration of ‘spirituality’ into health care by the Department of Veteran Affairs.” The complaint cites a number of practices at certain VA Health Centers, practices … FFRF sues over integration of spirituality into VA health care

Janet Reitman has written an excellent article for Rolling Stone magazine called “Inside Scientology.” She began with no cooperation from the Church of Scientology (not an unusual state of affairs), but then was given access to Scientology leadership, tours of facilities, and was able to interview current Scientologists. My first reaction on hearing about this … Inside Scientology

Antony Flew was supposed to have received the “Phillip E. Johnson Award for Liberty and Truth” from Biola University yesterday. Presumably it went as planned, though I can only find the “Former Atheist to Receive Award at Biola” announcement on Biola’s web site. Flew was a well-known philosophical atheist (and complete political Neanderthal) of the … Antony Flew receives award from Biola

Reported by the NCSE: the Playboy Foundation has just awarded Case Western Reserve University’s Patricia Princehouse one of eight 2006 Hugh M. Hefner First Amendment Awards for her role in some of the recent defeats of the intelligent design movement, especially in Ohio. I am glad for Princehouse, but I am also guessing this will … Patricia Princehouse receives Hugh M. Hefner First Amendment Award

It’s finals week, and I’m trying to postpone grading exams and papers until I can’t avoid it. So, trying to waste half an hour on something not involving physics, I stumbled on the web site for Physicians and Surgeons for Scientific Integrity. This, evidently, is a new organization of MD-types who think there’s something wrong … Belief among applied scientists

Jack Chick just put a new tract out — you know, those asinine and bigoted gospel tracts that are some of the best entertainment for skeptics. Go enjoy it…

I apologize if this is old news to others here, but I just noticed this: as of 26 Apr, there are 10,348 clergy signatories to An Open Letter Concerning Religion and Science. Among other things, the letter states: We believe that the theory of evolution is a foundational scientific truth, one that has stood up … Reason for hope

Ilya Somin is a law professor at George Mason University who recently wrote several blog entries on prejudice against atheists, especially in the law: Somin later massaged these posts into a more formal article, “The Final Prejudice,” that was published in The Legal Times, but that article is not available online. Thanks to Eddie Tabash … Hostility to Atheists

A Christianity Today article describes, in part, how seven-year old Becky’s mother helped her to overcome her uncertainty about the existence of God: An idea I’d heard several months earlier came to mind. “Let’s make construction paper flowers and write a prayer request on each one. We’ll pray every day for the requests. When God … Sometimes (unless you ask for something trivial) the answer is “No.”

In light of Rabbi Gellman’s recent editorial about “angry atheists,” here’s a piece of good news. The LA Times recently reported on a high-profile counter-example: Julia Sweeney, a “smiling atheist.” (Thanks to Eddie Tabash for pointing out this article to me.) For more information, see Julia’s blog.