Wow! We’ve made it to 100 episodes without a single week missed. Take that all you podcasts that didn’t do that! For our 100th episode, we went to Grace Evangelical Free Church in Eden Prairie, Minnesota. We sat in the pews, watched and participated in the service, and then went back to Molly and Nick’s house to talk about the experience. It was, to say the least, eye opening. The podcast explores our responses to the service and to the people we saw there.
We’d like to thank everyone who donated to Fearless Comedy Productions so we would be forced to attend this service. We didn’t enjoy ourselves but at least Fearless made $666 off of our pain!
Pictures of the church below the fold:
Here’s a link to the sermon we saw if you want to watch it.
My favorite god is Om from Terry Pratchett’s Small Gods. I love the idea that gods have power based on the people that believe.
Based on Nick’s comment about the god of death and already thinking of Pratchett, I’m not sure that he would qualify as a god, but Death fromt he Terry Pratchett makes me happy. I can support a god that speaks in small caps.
I listened to this, expecting some kind of educated opinion. All you seem to do is use the F word in almost every sentence. You talk about Christians bad mouthing others-what are you doing? You gripe about them asking for money to do things, isn’t that how you got the $666.00? You talk about christians doing false things and their double standards and yet you three sat there pretending to be christian and criticizing and critiquing . You talk about racism by christians and yet that is exactly what you have done in this blog. You say that christians are stupid because they believe in an afterlife, but you do believe in zombies. Our world and especially the U.S.A. is so filled with lying rudeness violence, hate cruelty, wrong doing murder stealing and unspeakable evil acts to children, older people and mentally ill. If there is any organization that encourages people to do good under any name better than anything that you are doing. I thought this whole blog was very immature and totally nonsense. You all need to practice what you preach!
>You gripe about them asking for money to do things, isn’t that how you got the $666.00?
We take moral issue with what they use the money for, as is our right. It’s not the asking that’s the issue, it’s what is done with the money.
>You talk about christians doing false things and their double standards and yet you three sat there pretending to be christian and criticizing and critiquing .
We actually never pretended to be Christian. For all the criticism we have for Grace Church, they were clearly welcoming and inviting of outsiders, and that’s what we were: outsiders. We didn’t lie to anyone or misrepresent outselves in any way.
>You talk about racism by christians and yet that is exactly what you have done in this blog.
Please illustrate where or when were racist. Quote us.
>You say that christians are stupid because they believe in an afterlife, but you do believe in zombies.
Uh, what? None of us believe in zombies, Linda. There’s the difference: When we talk about people coming back to life, we know it’s fiction.
>Our world and especially the U.S.A. is so filled with lying rudeness violence, hate cruelty, wrong doing murder stealing and unspeakable evil acts to children, older people and mentally ill.
Agreed! And you don’t need a god to solve any of those problems, isn’t that great?
>If there is any organization that encourages people to do good under any name better than anything that you are doing.
We feel the harm they also do should not and cannot be ignored.
> I thought this whole blog was very immature and totally nonsense.
We never claimed to be a bastion of maturity, but I don’t think we’re total nonsense. We’re talking about serious issues with levity, but that doesn’t mean we’re not serious.
>You all need to practice what you preach!
In what way were we not? We (literally and figuratively) put our money where our mouths are. If you think we’re being hypocritical, I’d like to ask you again for a citation, and please explain what you mean. Otherwise, we don’t preach or prosthelytize, the folks at Grace sure seemed to have those talents down, however.
None of us pretended to be Christian. EVERYONE ASSUMED WE WERE. No one asked us who we were, or why we were there. They just assumed we believed what they did. We didn’t pretend anything. We attended services just as any other person who wanted to check out what Grace Church was all about would do. We took notes regarding what the Church’s mission is. We wrote down things the pastors said. We paid attention and were respectful. We didn’t pray, we didn’t sing, and we didn’t kneel. If you consider that immature, then what you have a problem with is non-conformity, not us.
I say fuck a lot. That’s my choice. You don’t have to like it, but that doesn’t mean you’re better than I because of it. I feel that you allowed yourself to be blinded by the things you didn’t like (profanity, humor, geek references) and therefore couldn’t hear the educated opinions we gave. Because if there is one thing the three of us are, it’s educated. Especially when it comes to theology, Christianity in particular. Again, just because you don’t like something doesn’t mean it’s nonsensical.
We do practice what we preach. Our donation drives have sponsored kids to attend summer camp. We’ve donated money to Doctors Without Borders. We donate food, money, clothing, housewares. We support our communities. We support local arts. We practice what we preach, which is “You can be good without god.”
I take serious issue with you calling us racists. I implore you to cite your source for such libelous claims.
If you’re going spend so much time and effort calling other people stupid and uneducated, you really should take the time to use punctuation and proper sentence structure. It has the unfortunate effect of undermining your points rather dramatically.
I’m sorry you didn’t enjoy the episode. To be fair, you probably weren’t going to enjoy it regardless. But I do appreciate you taking the time to share your opinions with us, and to listen to voices outside of your comfort zone. Thank you for that.
Thank you for your comments.
Three corrections: First, we don’t believe in zombies as real things. We were discussing a hypothetical and I think that was quite clear.
Second: We never pretended to be Christians. We simply did not advertise that we were atheists because we weren’t there to be confrontational, we were there to observe.
Finally: While we may be intolerant of FUNDAMENTALIST Christianity, that is not racism. If you are going to accuse us of being awful people, that’s totally fine. Just accuse us of being the correct kind of awful people.
I listened to this again, I didn’t catch the hypothetical part and that whatever, As far as the pretending and observing, you stated that you all went through all the motions as the rest of the people, I think that is pretending. And everyone of you commented that you didn’t want to be there but because of the $666.00 you were there, taking notes, critiquing and to find criticism with the whole experience. Never, ever did I say you were awful people, that was your choice of word. I said that this blog was very immature and total nonsense and that you needed to practice what you preach.
While we did not say “this discussion of zombies is hypothetical,” I would think the context (we were talking about the movie “Gremlins,” which is fiction) would have made that completely clear.
You are obviously welcome to your opinion but our intent was not to pretend. Our intent was to participate and observe and not be confrontational. We viewed that as being respectful. It would seem you believe it would have been more respectful if we’d showing up wearing atheist T-shirts. We don’t agree.
You did not say we were awful people but you did say we were racist and I think racism is pretty awful so when you said we were racist, I felt that I was being accused of being an awful person. And maybe I am. But I’m not racist. At least I try to combat the racist tendencies that all of us have. As Nick said, I would be interested in a citation of where, exactly, we were racist.
Thanks again for your comments.
Podcasts I like that weren’t already mentioned (and damn you Molly for addicting me to WTNV!):
Coverville – a weekly show of cover songs on various themes, usually including 5 to 7 sets. It’s up over 1,000 episodes now, so you have some catching up to do!
Skeptoid – I wish this one were longer, but it’s one guy doing a weekly show that looks skeptically at various claims. The host does occasional episodes pointing out where he screwed up, which is refreshing. There are other skeptical podcasts out there, but this is the one I’ve stuck with.
60-Second Science (and spinoffs), Stardate, and Composer’s Datebook – all brief shows talking about something cool in the world of science or art. Very nice for the short trips to the store or when a longer show runs out and I’m not quite home yet.
Hooray! Managed to download the episode over the swizzle-stick connectivity here in Reykjavik airport. Now I get to listen on the plane!
In fairness Missionaries are often targeted for kidnappings. You know the target has a reasonably well-to-do support system that will be willing to pay a ransom.