CBS, WINK
Nicholas Nuzzi says his girlfriend and a neighbor, who live across the street, saw the children cross Miramar Street, a busy two way road where cars routinely zip by at 35+ miles per hour.
DCF confirms they are investigating and adds that there have been "several" complaints of alleged child abuse and neglect against the many schools/daycares that Grace Community Schools runs.
The DCF spokesperson tells WINK News that the schools operate under a religious exemption, meaning they are not licensed or inspected by the State.
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Globe and Mail
Give this problem a shot before you keep reading, but don't feel badly if you get it wrong.
Bob is in a bar, looking at Susan. But she is looking at Pablo. Bob is married. Pablo is not.
Is a married person looking at an unmarried person? The answer could be (a) yes, (b) no or (c) cannot be determined.
Roughly 80 per cent of people choose (c), but it is not the correct answer, says Keith Stanovich, a professor of human development and applied psychology at the University of Toronto.
He studies why smart people do stupid things - or, in more scientific terms, how intelligence is distinct from rationality. His work offers insight into important cognitive abilities that are not measured by IQ tests. It also suggests that deficits in real-world reasoning can be corrected, whether in adults or in children.
He says most people get the Bob-Susan-Pablo problem wrong because they tend to be "cognitive misers" - they put as little mental effort as possible into solving a problem. In this case, they quickly jump to the conclusion that they don't have enough information rather than making the effort to see if they do.
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It says that the FBI and Virginia State Police negotiated the suspects surrender, so why thank God? What did a God have to do with anything? Which God? Why that God? And if a God had anything to do with it, how did it do it?CNN-- A daylong hostage standoff ended late Wednesday when an armed, disabled man wheeled himself out of a post office in Wytheville, Virginia, and was taken into custody, police said.
The alleged gunman, identified by police as Warren "Gator" Taylor, 53, of Sullivan County, Tennessee, surrendered in a wheelchair, said Wythe County Sherrif's Office Chief Deputy Keith Dunagan. All three hostages walked out without injury.
Wytheville Mayor Trent Crewe breathed a sigh of relief when the almost nine-hour ordeal finally ended.
"All of them are all right, thank God," Crewe said. "I am elated that it's over."
Negotiators from the FBI and the Virginia State Police negotiated the suspect's surrender and the release of the hostages, said a law enforcement source familiar with the situation.
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AFP news: PESHAWAR, Pakistan — A suicide bomber targeted a security checkpoint in Pakistan's Peshawar on Thursday, killing four people in the second such attack in as many days in the flashpoint northwestern city.
Attacks are escalating in the city of 2.5 million people on the edge of Pakistan's tribal belt on the Afghan border, an area Washington brands the most dangerous place on Earth and the chief sanctuary of Al-Qaeda.
The bomber targeted a checkpoint in the army cantonment, blowing himself up on one of Peshawar's busiest areas, outside a government office and a church, where Pakistan's Christian minority were preparing to celebrate Christmas.
...
Peshawar's is on the frontline of Pakistan's two and a half year campaign of suicide and bomb attacks waged by Islamist militants who have carved out havens in the northwest and who oppose Islamabad's alliance with the United States.
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Thanks Boz, 2001 was probably a typo meant to be 2011, since the rest of the article uses 2011 instead of 2001.
Kansas.com
The second-largest line item on Wagnon's list is the exemption for religious organizations. That amounts to $17.9 million in 2010 and $18.6 million in 2001 [2011], records show.
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ScienceDaily (Aug. 23, 2009)
The findings may illuminate reasons why some people form false beliefs about the pros and cons of health-care reform or regarding President Obama's citizenship, for example.
The study, "There Must Be a Reason: Osama, Saddam and Inferred Justification" calls such unsubstantiated beliefs "a serious challenge to democratic theory and practice" and considers how and why it was maintained by so many voters for so long in the absence of supporting evidence.
Co-author Steven Hoffman, Ph.D., visiting assistant professor of sociology at the University at Buffalo, says, "Our data shows substantial support for a cognitive theory known as 'motivated reasoning,' which suggests that rather than search rationally for information that either confirms or disconfirms a particular belief, people actually seek out information that confirms what they already believe.
"In fact," he says, "for the most part people completely ignore contrary information".
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The Jewish Community Online
A fragment of a manuscript measuring 6in by 5in has lifted the veil over the long-vanished world of Jewish exorcism.
The fragment, containing 150 words of a handwritten Sephardi Hebrew prayer of exorcism from the 18th century, is almost certainly unique, according to the academic who discovered it.
Dr Renate Smithuis is the official cataloguer of Manchester’s John Rylands Library Geniza, a treasure trove of 11,000 manuscript fragments rescued from a 1,000-year-old storeroom at the Ben Ezra Synagogue in Cairo, now held at the University of Manchester.
Dr Smithuis, who has collaborated with Prof Gideon Bohak of Tel Aviv University, said: “This is not an account of an exorcism or a story, it is an actual exorcism ritual prayer with the names of the three people involved, recited in a synagogue. When you read it you feel almost as though you are in the synagogue. That’s what makes it so exciting.”
A ghostly trace of the Jewish Occult
Haaretz.com
The 150-word text provides a haunting insight into the often forgotten world of the Jewish occult. While exorcisms are frequently described in Jewish texts from the Middle Ages on, this appears to be the first text that provides the prayer used in a specific exorcism.
Contributed by Gandolf
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ScienceDaily.com
The results of this study, according to the authors, advance the understanding of brain cell mechanisms that underlie decision making by coupling for the first time the mechanisms that lead to decision formation and the establishment of a degree of confidence in that decision.
"Our findings suggest that when the brain embraces truth, it does so in a graded way so that even a binary [yes/no, true/false, left/right] choice leaves in its wake a quantity that represents a degree of belief. The neural mechanism of decision making doesn't flip into a fixed point, but instead approximates a probability distribution."
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Bend Bulletin
The health of mothers and children in Deschutes County has improved in recent years, according to indicators such as immunization rates and prenatal care listed in a county report to be released in the next few weeks.
But there are also reasons for concern, according to a draft of the county public health report. These include an increase in the number of children whose parents sought religious exemptions from immunizations
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ThinkProgress.org
"The Senate is expected to vote very late tonight/early Monday morning “on the first of three motions to close off debate” on the health care bill and proceed to an expected Christmas Eve vote on final passage. Speaking against the health care bill on the Senate floor just moments ago, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) expressed his hope that a Senator of the majority caucus would not be able to make the vote:
What the American people ought to pray is that somebody can’t make the vote tonight. That’s what they ought to pray.
Just a few minutes later, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) interrupted while Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) was speaking to issue a challenge to Coburn:
I have been trying to reach Sen. Coburn. … This statement troubles me, and I’m trying to reach him come back to the floor and explain exactly what he meant about a senator being unable to make the vote tonight. … I’m reaching out to Sen. Coburn. I’ll be on the floor for the next 45 minutes, and I hope that he will join me there."
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A Religious Debate, by Doctor Sami Aldeeb Abu-Sahlieh
"Many doctors and religious men were encouraged to start talking about female circumcision; however, the circumcision of males is still an obj ectionable topic. I agree wholeheartedly with Dr. Sami Abu Sahlieh, the author of this book, that the campaign against circumcision should include both sexes, not just females. The crime is one, even if they vary in degree or form. "
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The Layalina Review
“Most Muslims accept the minaret as an architectural conduit for the call to prayer, but most do not seek political power, subscribe to the burqa, tolerate forced marriages, or accept genital mutilation of girls,” comments Ahmed Rehab at the Huffington Post.
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Guaranteed to be the craziest thing you've seen all day...
Modern Ghana.com
Witches meet in the coven (assembly of witches) every night (12:00 midnight). They make human beings captive. If your spiritual level is very low they can arrest and take the spirit of that person captive in the night and from there affect all his or her activities and even kill him or her. In their coven, spirit of human captive looks like animals e.g. goat. Anything they do to that animal representing your spirit in their coven, it will affect you physically. Whenever they kill the animal in their coven the human captives will die later. Witches can travel (spiritually) in a split second to any part of the world to attack their victims. This is because they move through the air and there is no barrier in the air. Witches press people at night to suck their blood.
Contributed by Gandolf
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NBC Philadelphia
"Our seasonal flu vaccine policy is stronger than most hospitals in our region – and it should be, because we care for the sickest of sick children," read a statement from CHOP. "Many of the children in our care have never had a chance to have a seasonal flu vaccine themselves so we have to do it for them. Many of our patients are either too young or their immune systems are too weak."
The Cowlays said they refused to get the shot for religious reasons.
"I am a Christian, and my religion prohibits me from receiving vaccines," said Tyrika Cowlay, who was a lab technician. Gary Cowlay worked in environmental services.
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ScienceDaily (Mar. 23, 2009) — A study led by Catalan researchers has clearly shown the importance of the first developmental life stages in the development of the symptoms of psychopathological disorders. This research confirms the existence of aggression by pre-school children towards their peers, as well as differences according to age and gender. There is a widespread lack of understanding about this important stage of life, and previous data have shown that 1% of the pre-school age population in Spain already shows symptoms of major depression.
...
Contrary to belief, the majority of these symptoms start at a very early age. The problem, according to therapists, is the great lack of understanding among the general public about the importance of such symptoms in children, and the significant limitations in detecting them. “If we can do something at this age, it is possible that we could prevent the problem from becoming really established later on,” says Jané.
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OregonLive.com
Ryder Stevens is what's known in the Christian Science church as a "practitioner" of prayer-based healing.
When he speaks next week at Lake Oswego High School, perhaps he'll share the story he told me of his own miraculously fast recovery from a high school football injury just days after a doctor told him the injury would take weeks to heal.
A story he's less likely to tell is the long, painful death of 2-year-old Robyn Twitchell, whose screams of pain from a fatal bowel obstruction forced his Boston neighbors to shut their windows but never persuaded his Christian Science parents to call a doctor.
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LA Now
The spiritual leader of the global Anglican Communion issued an unusually sharp and swift rebuke to Episcopal Church leaders over the election of an openly gay bishop in the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles. In a terse statement, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams delivered a warning to bishops, clergy and lay representatives of the U.S. church about the confirmation of the Rev. Canon Mary D. Glasspool, a lesbian who has been in a partnered relationship for two decades.
"The election of Mary Glasspool by the Diocese of Los Angeles as suffragan bishop elect raises very serious questions not just for the Episcopal Church and its place in the Anglican Communion, but for the Communion as a whole," Williams said in the statement.
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Associated Baptist Press
The justices agreed to hear the Christian Legal Society’s appeal of a lower court’s decision saying the group’s student chapter at the University of California’s Hastings College of Law had to, like other school-recognized student groups, follow the university’s non-discrimination policy. The policy includes provisions prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or religion.
In 2004, the chapter asked for exemptions from those two aspects of the non-discrimination rules, saying the national Christian Legal Society’s policies prohibit non-Christians and people who engage in non-marital sex from being voting members or officers of the organization.
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Shooting yourself in the foot....
ScienceDaily (Sep. 18, 2009)
Joseph Strayhorn said: "The magnitude of the correlation between religiosity and teen birth rate astonished us. Teen birth is more highly correlated with some of the religiosity items on the Religious Landscapes Survey than some of those items are correlated with each other."
...
According to Strayhorn: "Our findings by themselves do not, of course, permit causal inferences. But, if we may speculate on the most probable explanation, we conjecture that religious communities in the US are more successful in discouraging the use of contraception among their teenagers than they are in discouraging sexual intercourse itself."
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From the - Island online, Sierra Leone, Liberia and Ivory Coast have all lived through nightmarish civil wars after long-ruling dictators died or were killed and junior officers seized power. Gambia has been ruled for the past fifteen years by a former army lieutenant who now imports witch doctors from Guinea to hunt down the witches who he believes are trying to kill him. And now Guinea has fallen into the hands of the junior officers.
Contributed by Gandolf.
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Pewforum.org. With their distinctive appearance and religious practices, Sikh-Americans often find themselves at the center of workplace discrimination cases and other controversies involving their religious rights.
...
In California, for example, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger recently vetoed a bill that would have required police in the state to receive training about the Sikh religion - including the faith's requirement that believers carry a small sword known as a kirpan.
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One 1984 case involved a Sikh whose job potentially exposed him to toxic gases. The employer required all employees in this position to be clean shaven because facial hair interferes with the use of a gas mask, and employees might need to use a gas mask in an emergency. The Sikh employee asked for an exemption, but the employer refused. Instead, the employer offered him a lower-paying position that did not involve potential exposure to toxic gases. The employee filed a discrimination lawsuit, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit sided with the employer, ruling that the employer's concern about workplace safety justified the decision not to exempt the Sikh employee from the ban on facial hair.
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NYDailyNews.com
Jewish leaders expressed disgust Saturday when Pope Benedict XVI pushed a controversial predecessor one step closer to sainthood.
The pontiff declared Pius XII "venerable" even though he's been criticized for not doing enough to help Jews during the Holocaust.
Elan Steinberg, vice president of the American Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors and their Descendants, called Benedict's decision "profoundly insensitive and thoughtless."
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ScienceDaily (Feb. 20, 2009) — In a new study in Psychological Science, psychologists Jeremy Ginges and Ian Hansen from the New School for Social Research along with psychologist Ara Norenzayan from the University of British Columbia conducted a series of experiments investigating the relationship between religion and support for acts of parochial altruism, including suicide attacks.
...This study indicates that religious devotion does not cause support for suicide attacks or other forms of parochial altruism. However, the findings suggest that regularly attending religious services may make individuals more prone to supporting acts of parochial altruism (suicide attacks). The researchers theorize that collective religious rituals and services create a sense of community among participants and enhance positive attitudes towards parochially altruistic acts such as suicide attacks. Although, the researchers note, the greater sense of community, developed via religious services, may have many positive consequences. They observe, "Only in particular geopolitical contexts is the parochial altruism associated with such commitments translated into something like suicide attacks."
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Los Angeles Times
Reporting from Los Angeles and Riverside - The Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles on Saturday elected the first openly gay bishop since the national church lifted a ban that kept gays out of its highest ordained ministry, a move that deepened divisions between liberals and conservatives in the faith.
Clergy and lay leaders, meeting in Riverside for their annual convention, chose the Rev. Canon Mary D. Glasspool, 55, who has been in a committed relationship with another woman since 1988, from a field of six candidates. She is a canon, or senior assistant, to the Diocese of Maryland bishops.
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Belief reduces the ability to self-correct. What good is believing in a God that wants you to be moral when belief in a God disrupts the mechanism needed to know when to change behavior?
ScienceDaily (Mar. 5, 2009) — Believing in God can help block anxiety and minimize stress, according to new University of Toronto research that shows distinct brain differences between believers and non-believers.
Their findings show religious belief has a calming effect on its devotees, which makes them less likely to feel anxious about making errors or facing the unknown. But Inzlicht cautions that anxiety is a "double-edged sword" which is at times necessary and helpful.
"Obviously, anxiety can be negative because if you have too much, you're paralyzed with fear," he says. "However, it also serves a very useful function in that it alerts us when we're making mistakes. If you don't experience anxiety when you make an error, what impetus do you have to change or improve your behaviour so you don't make the same mistakes again and again?"
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OttawaCitizen.com
Doctors told him they could operate, but they would not be able to heal him entirely, and he would need to use a colostomy bag.
...
He started a course of tea made by his wife and a First Nations herbalist, and injections from a faith healer.
The turning point came early one morning. “I heard this bird singing outside.” After he opened the drapes to see it, he fell to his knees by the sofa, engulfed in pain.
“I knew that bird was not just a bird. He was more than that. I asked that bird to save me.”
...
He stopped drinking, and got over his constant anger. He forgave everyone who had made life so difficult for his people. His wife was baffled. “You’re not the same person anymore, what did you do to yourself?”
His temper subsided because, “My life does not belong to me, it’s not mine. It’s borrowed time. It belongs to my Creator.”
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ScienceDaily.com
The researchers noted that people often set their moral compasses according to what they presume to be God's standards. "The central feature of a compass, however, is that it points north no matter what direction a person is facing," they conclude. "This research suggests that, unlike an actual compass, inferences about God's beliefs may instead point people further in whatever direction they are already facing."
But the research in no way denies the possibility that God's presumed beliefs also may provide guidance in situations where people are uncertain of their own beliefs, the co-authors noted.
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Star-Telegram
The seven-member court, which handles civil and criminal nondeath penalty appeals from 12 counties, has ruled on a range of issues, from child custody to investment fraud, from whether Arlington had to refund street maintenance fee collections to whether a church could be held liable for a teenager’s injuries during an exorcism.
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If prayer really worked, you could do it from where you're at couldn't you? But God should already know right? And doesn't he have a plan? Is God going to change his mind? Why would he need to unless he hadn't considered something? What the heck do these people think they're doing?
ChristianNewsWire.com
"Sen. Casey has refused to meet with any representatives of state pro-life organizations on this issue, either in Pennsylvania or in his D.C. office. So, we are traveling to his D.C. office to pray that he votes in accordance with his stated pro-life beliefs."
Pray-In Event Details---
When: Tuesday, December 15, 2009; 1 PM
Where: The Office of Sen. Robert Casey, Jr., 325 Russell Senate Office Building, Washington, DC
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CNN.COM
Life was good for Kenny Sparks. ... At 49 he had it all. But then he began to change....Kenny has a condition known as frontotemporal dementia, or FTD.
"Many patients will lose their inhibitions; they'll act totally inappropriately, leaving their families to wonder what is wrong," said Dr. Murray Grossman, a neurologist with the University of Pennsylvania. "Some patients will have no problem spending the family fortune, taking all their money and putting it into scams, get-rich-quick schemes, or going off and buying an expensive car or boat the family doesn't need. The patients lose their reasoning."
"What's particularly frustrating for family members is, the patients don't seem to have much insight into the difficulties they are having or causing for others," Grossman said.
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Legitimizing violence and politics with supernaturalism.
Peace FM Online
Fear is said to have gripped residents of Hyiawu-Besease in the Bosomtwe Kwanwoma District of the Ashanti Region following media reports that this year’s annual general conference of the Association of Witches in West Africa (AWWA), is scheduled to be staged in the town.
The residents’ fear, has been aggravated following some weird happenings in the town since the news broke somewhere last week. Three people including a middle-aged woman, according to sources, have died under hard-to-believe circumstances in the town in the last four days.
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The letter, which was leaked by an aggrieved witch, noted that Ghana’s share of the blood-letting exercise has been targeted mainly on the Offinso-Techiman and Obuasi-Kumasi roads.
According to the disillusioned witch, she decided to divulge the information because she hails from Ofiinso-Namong and also has relatives at Anwian-Nkwanta on the Obuasi-Kumasi road, which forms part of the designated roads for the blood theatre. Meanwhile, the local branch of the Ghana Christian Council at Hyiawu-Besease has vowed to stop the intended witches’ conference scheduled to be staged in the town.
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HuffingtonPost.com
Let me begin by saying that I have no intention to ridicule the Christian Science religion to the extent it relies upon prayer in the face of illness. It is a religious belief and practice to be respected. On the other hand, the thought of insurance coverage for such prayer sessions is ludicrous. Will we next be covering the cost of chickens killed in animal sacrifice!
The possible inclusion of such coverage is wrong for a number of reasons. First, there is no proven medical benefit to such prayer. It may work and it may not. However, there are a number of reported cases in which the reliance upon prayer in the stead of recognized medical treatment has resulted in disastrous consequences. Second, among the goals of health care reform is the reduction of costs. To add unproven spiritual remedies to the ever increasing expenses, runs contrary to that goal. and it may open the door to many other unproven remedies.
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Associated Press
Roberts' message was one of healing the whole person — body, mind and spirit. The philosophy led many to call Roberts a "faith healer," a label he rejected with the comment: "God heals — I don't."
Before Roberts came on the scene, "the idea of healing within a religious service was left to Christian Scientists or people who went to Lourdes," Cox said. "Now, it's fairly common in churches across the board. In his own way, he made that happen."
Synan, who ranks Roberts among the three or four most important Christian leaders of the last half of the 20th century, said Roberts was widely loved for bringing Pentecostals, derided as "holy rollers" for their spirit-filled worship and speaking in tongues, into the mainstream.
Just decades later, more than 1 in 4 Christians in the world today are Pentecostal, said Cox. Roberts "was onto some of this stuff intuitively long before it became as big as it has."
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A new University of Pittsburgh study reveals that craving a cigarette
while performing a cognitive task not only increases the chances of a
person's mind wandering, but also makes that person less likely to
notice when his or her mind has wandered.
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citizen.com
On 11/27, we were blessed with another sermon from Bishop Paul Blake, PRECIOUS BLOOD. It took me back to the days of my early teenagerdumb when the cruci-fiction of the Bible god, Jesus, began to gross me out. I felt somewhat ashamed and weak because everyone else seemed to enjoy it so much.
As the Bishop put it, "The concept of the shed Blood of Christ offered in substitutionary sacrifice for guilty and condemned sinners is profoundly offensive to the modern mind." Yes, I admit it, the alleged brutal, barbaric, and bloody murder of an innocent man/god to somehow pay for my sins is not only offensive, but stupid and certainly unjust. Even if I was a sinner, (there is no such thing as sin) killing an innocent being for my sin takes us back to those thrilling days of yesteryear when animal sacrifice and human sacrifice were socially acceptable.
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Well, would you make up your mind? Bless gays or not to bless gays, aren't you getting your prayers answered?
MetroWest Daily News
At St. Paul's Church in Natick, the Rev. John Strand also hailed the move.
"I'm very grateful for the decision," said Strand, who oversees a congregation that includes married same-sex couples, including some with children. "It allows the church to bless and fully support the rights the state has given."
The change, however, only applies to Shaw's diocese. At churches in Westborough, Shrewsbury, Northborough, Milford and the rest of the Diocese of Western Massachusetts, priests are barred from even giving blessings at same-sex weddings.
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MyRepublica.com
Notwithstanding the brilliance of individual Nepalis, the general enterprising and hardworking and positive spirit that all Nepalis possess, we somehow remain frozen in time with barbaric, uncivilized and primitive rituals pervading every pore of our society, more suitable to the medieval ages. While such rituals eventually became extinct in other parts of the world, in Nepal just the opposite happened, it flourished.
If we ponder over our barbaric belief and practices we will realize that these rituals are not rituals of the common people; they are in fact the rituals of our erstwhile rulers and the rich and powerful feudal class. The Shah and the Rana rulers upheld the importance of animal sacrifice as the cornerstone of Hindu religion and culture, and actively promoted it during their reign. This ensured that they would continue to become lords and the people would remain as ignorant as ever.
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ScienceDaily (Dec. 13, 2009) — A study carried out in Ivory Coast has shown that monkeys of a certain forest-dwelling species called Campbell's monkeys emit six types of alert calls. The primates combine these calls into long vocal sequences which allow them to convey messages about social cohesion or various dangers, including predation.
This study shows the capacity of this monkey species for very complex vocal communication, both in the range of transmitted messages and in the techniques used to encode these messages.
...
In this new study, the ethologists explain some of the rules that govern the semantic combinations of calls. For example, Campbell's monkeys can add a particular type of call to an existing sequence in order to make the message more precise or to alter it. They can also combine sequences relaying different messages in order to convey a third message.
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ScienceDaily (Dec. 13, 2009) — Scientists studying how bacteria under stress collectively weigh and initiate different survival strategies say they have gained new insights into how humans make strategic decisions that affect their health, wealth and the fate of others in society.
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Each bacterium in the colony communicates via chemical messages and performs a sophisticated decision making process using a specialized network of genes and proteins. Modeling this complex interplay of genes and proteins by the bacteria enabled the scientists to assess the pros and cons of different choices in game theory, a branch of mathematics that attempts to model decision making by humans, in which an individual's success in making choices depends on the choices of others.
...
This has applications to human society because many people encounter similar dilemmas during their own lives. For example, should people ignore side effects and vaccinate against a new potentially lethal virus or should they not vaccinate and take the risk of being infected with the possible consequences?
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Houston Chronicle
The endorsement of a local anti-gay crusader put mayoral contender Gene Locke on the spot Monday as he considered whether social conservatives' support was worth the risk of appearing to embrace views some voters may find intolerant.
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Examiner.com
It isn't easy to be a humanist in Nigeria these days. In July, when Leo Igwe, Executive Secretary of the Nigerian Humanist Movement, held a symposium on witchcraft and children's rights, not only was it disrupted by 150 followers of Helen Ukpabio's Liberty Gospel Church, but he was attacked, had his glasses destroyed and his bag, camera and mobile phone taken from him.
And now Helen Ukpabio is suing him. For religious discrimination.
The religious belief Igwe is accused of discriminating against is her church's assertion that many of Nigeria's children are witches.
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ScienceDaily (Dec. 10, 2009) — Scientists from the University of Zurich have discovered the physiological mechanisms in the brain that underlie broken promises. Patterns of brain activity even enable predicting whether someone will break a promise.
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(CNN) -- As many as 10,000 albinos are in hiding in east Africa over fears that they will be dismembered and their body parts sold to witchdoctors, the Red Cross said in a recent report.
The killings of albinos in Burundi and Tanzania, who are targeted because their body parts are believed to have special powers, have sparked fears among the population in the two countries, the report said.
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letstalkmore.co.uk
Of course, who could forget Glenn Hoddle’s granny, the faith healer, Eileen Drewery? She was employed by disabled bashing Hoddle to exorcise the demons within the England team leading up to the 1998 World Cup. Most of the players took this incredibly seriously including ex-Arsenal midfielder Ray Parlour who when touched on the shoulders by the faith healing loony asked for a ’short back and sides, please!’
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Former England footballer, turned illiterate pundit eye candy, Jamie Redknapp, was once ironically instructed by an osteopath to have his wisdom teeth removed in order to cure… you guessed it (or not) a knee injury?! Redknapp was forced to retire from football, aged 32.
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St. Pauls Disease from
© German Epilepsymuseum Kork - Museum for epilepsy and the history of epilepsy.
In old Ireland, epilepsy was known as 'Saint Paul's
disease'. The name points to the centuries-old assumption that the
apostle suffered from epilepsy.
To support this view, people usually point to Saint Paul's experience on the road to Damascus, reported in the Acts of the Apostles
in the New Testament (Acts 9, 3-9), in which Paul, or Saul as he was
known before his conversion to Christianity, is reported to have a fit
similar to an epileptic seizure: '...suddenly a light from the sky
flashed around him. He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to
him: ''Saul, Saul! Why do you persecute me?''...Saul got up from the
ground and opened his eyes, but he could not see a thing... For three
days he was not able to see, and during that time he did not eat or
drink anything.'
Click "Read more >>" for access.
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