Did Doomsday Predictions Give Rise to Christianity?

Richard Carrier’s speech from Rapture Day in Witchita .

God of the Week: Themis

07/02/2012: Themis

Themis is an ancient Greek god, one of the titans and the personification of law and order. 

The second wife of Zeus, according to the account in the Theogony of Hesiod, was Themis (“Justice”), and, as we have pointed out elsewhere, she is a form of the great earth goddess. Her primary role apparently was that of controlling the cycle of the seasons, and so regularly did she bring about the periods of productiveness that men came to look upon her as a power to whom they could appeal for the elucidation of matters in which human arbiters failed. In brief, she became an oracular goddess, and the righteousness of her deliverances established her as the personification of justice and equity

–Mythology of All Races, Vol 1, Greek and Roman

God of the Week: Hyperion

06/18/2012: Hyperion

Hyperion was a Greek Titan, one of the children of Gaia and Uranus. 

God of the Week: Minos

06/11/2012: Minos

Ah, good ol’ King Minos. In his life … a bit of a bastard; sending 7 male and 7 female Greeks to their death every year just to satisfy the blood lust of a bull/man too stupid to find it’s way out of a cave. Yet, for all this cowardice, it was believed that after his death, Minos was elected to became a judge of the dead. 

God of the Week: Priapus

05/28/2012: Priapus

Priapus was a Greek god of fertility. He was normally depicted with an exceptionally large phallus. 

Priapus, the son of Dionysus and Aphrodite, was regarded as the god of fruitfulness, the protector of flocks, sheep, goats, bees, the fruit of the vine, and all garden produce.

His statues, which were set up in gardens and vineyards, acted not only as objects of worship, but also as scarecrows, the appearance of this god being especially repulsive and unsightly.

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This divinity was chiefly worshipped at Lampsacus, his birthplace. Asses were sacrificed to him, and he received the first-fruits of the fields and gardens, with a libation of milk and honey.

-Myths and Legends of Ancient Greece and Rome

Bigfoot DNA to be Tested

Well, alleged Bigfoot DNA.

“I’m challenging and inviting the cryptozoologists to come up with the evidence instead of complaining that science is rejecting what they have to say,” [Geneticist Bryan] Sykes told Discovery News.

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People with evidence of Bigfoot, including hair, skin, or teeth samples, are urged to send a description of their items and photos to the researchers.Sykes and his team will then ask to sample the most promising evidence, and compile a full DNA profile for each of the samples.

And, of course, we all know that this will settle the case once and for all. No more claims that Bigfoot is from another dimension or lives in a UFO. Or … is bionic.

Don’t Forget: End of the World This Sunday!

Don’t  let the Memorial Day weekend make you forget, the world is coming to and end (again) this Sunday (5/27/2012).

Here we go again, folks. On May 27, 2012 the world is fated to end in flames, but it’s not the Mayan calendar that’s predicting it, nor has last year’s failed prophet Harold Camping redone his calculations. No, this time the prediction comes from the divinely-inspired revelations of Ronald Weinland, prophet and leader of the Church of God-PKG(Preparing for the Kingdom of God).

Weinland, who is predicting that “the United States will collapse” and that there will be a nuclear war before May 27th, claims he “is the pastor of God’s Church on earth, has also been appointed by the God of Abraham to be His end-time prophet and one of the two end-time witnesses (and spokesman of both), preceding the return of Jesus Christ on May 27, 2012.”

So, add it to your calendar. There may be no need to make any more potato salad than you can eat before then.

Vatican Creates Rules for Virgin Mary Sightings

According to Religions News Service, the Vatican has all it can take with all the “bogus” Virgin Mary sightings, and is creating a set of rules and guild-lines to authenticate future visions.

The Vatican has published rules to evaluate the authenticity of the dozens of apparitions of the Virgin Mary reported each year.

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The rules also require an evaluation of the “personal qualities” of the alleged seer, including his or her “psychological equilibrium,” “rectitude of moral life” and “docility towards Ecclesiastical Authority.” The contents of the “revelation” must be “immune” from theological error, and the apparition must bear “abundant… spiritual fruit,” such as conversions.

The authenticity of the vision should be rejected if, among other factors, the alleged seer shows “psychological disorder” or “evidence of a search for profit.”

Ah, come on. If you’re going to rule out people with psychological disorders and those seeking profit, who’s going to be left? That’ll wipe out  pretty much all of them.

God of the Week: Toutatis

05/21/2012: Toutatis

Toutatis was a Celtic god worshiped throughout ancient Gaul. Victims were sacrificed to him by being plunged head first into a vat of liquid. He was associated with the gods Mars and Mercury by the Romans.

God of the Week: Chaos

04/30/2012: Chaos

Oceanus was an ancient Greek god, a formless void that preceded the creation of the universe. 

The Hesiodic story is different in many points and is much less satisfactory as a philosophical explanation of beginnings. First there was Chaos,

“… the vast immeasurable abyss, Outrageous as a sea, dark, wasteful, wild.” 1

Then came Gaia, gloomy Tartaros (the dark “Underworld”), and Eros as the moving force within and about all things. Chaos brought into being Erebos (“Lower Darkness”) and Nyx, and these in their turn begat Aither (“Heavenly Light”) and Hemera (“Earthly Light,” i. e. “Day”). Mother Earth bore Ouranos (star-sown “Heaven”) to be a helpmeet to herself and at the same time a secure dwelling-place for the blessed gods. Now appeared the rugged mountains and the wild stretches of the sea. In their relation of husband and wife Ouranos and Gaia became the founders of what one might call the first royal house of the gods.

-Mythology of All Races, Vol 1, Greek and Roman