I hope he’s also calling on us to question how much Obama buys into the doctrines of Jeremiah Wright and the Trinity United Church of Christ.

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Yes, Mormonism is patently silly, but so are most other organized religions. For example, one of the central beliefs of Christianity is that an all powerful deity was so offended by actions of humans that the deity required the blood sacrifice of a person to placate the deity’s feelings. Isn’t this story straight out of human tribalism of 5,000 and 10,000 years ago? Christianity, Judaism and Islam, too, are as silly as Mormonism.

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Yeah, all religions are wacky to all other religions, but no one sees their own wackiness. And they’re all wacky to us.

Krauss is basically encouraging people to indulge in religious bigotry - just against the Republican, of course. Wouldn’t that also make the atheism of a candidate a legitimate point of discussion?

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@Buy.  Is pointing out irrational/contradictory thought bigotry?  Do we have to ‘tolerate’ the label bigot for pointing out the obvious?

It’s a clash of worldviews and right now the bigots against a rational worldview are winning.

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@Patrick, Krauss is being rather *selective* about the irrationality he is drawing attention to. “Look a those weirdo Mormons” is a transparent appeal to religious bigotry against a candidate he disapproves of.

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@buy, help me understand.  Is pointing out the absurdities of a/any religion bigotry?  Or is it only bigoted because he’s picking on one.  BTW, one is obviously more absurd than the other as there’s far more evidence to disprove the claims of Mormons.

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@Buy: While all religions are wacky and dangerous to some degree, some are more dangerous than others (Islam) and some are wackier than others (Mormonism, Scientology).  The degree of wackiness does imply a higher degree of credibility on the part of the adherent, and thus it is more appropriate to enquire after Romney’s sanity than Obama’s.  Krauss’s point is legitimate and not necessarily partisan.

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@Patrick: great minds think alike, we left almost identical comments that crossed each other….

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Mormons more wacky than Catholics?

As far as I know, Mormons don’t turn cannibalism into a sacred rite. Ritual cannibalism wacky enough for you?

The more detailed, the more wacky. Just get them to talk.

And please share your comprehensive comparative wacky analysis of the beliefs of Obama and Romney, if you want to make claims about who is wackier than who. Krauss should share as well.

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@buy, Obama isn’t Catholic so your point it moot.  As far as I can tell he’s some sort of moderate/liberal Protestant and repudiated Wright a long time ago.  Romney may not believe the wacky tenets, but we wouldn’t know.

BTW, you didn’t answer my first question, is pointing out absurd beliefs bigotry?

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All brands of christianity are foolishly stupid, but between protestantism and mormonism, the latter takes the prize for ridiculousness.  While anyone deserves ridicule for being willing to believe in silly superstitions, those who are willing to believe in the most absurd and silly of them deserve more ardent ridicule.

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@patrick, yes, selectively pointing out absurd beliefs can be bigotry.

You say we wouldn’t know about whether Romney believe in wacky beliefs. We wouldn’t know whether Obama does either. Let’s line them both up, and interrogate both.

And Obama repudiated his pastor of more than a decade after it became politically inconvenient not to. That would hardly imply any actual change in beliefs.

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@buy, naw, you’re just bigoted against people who selectively point out absurd beliefs.  Who chooses which beliefs can’t be criticized?  Or maybe all beliefs are equally valid and above criticism.  Oh except those that are bigoted.  ::eyeroll::

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Bigotry is the state of mind of a bigot, defined by Merriam-Webster as “a person obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices; especially: one who regards or treats the members of a group (as a racial or ethnic group) with hatred and intolerance”

i thought we left this in the past with the 4 wheel drives and hunting helpless animals…

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@Patrick, your inane posturing on this issue is your problem, not mine.

Two presidential candidates claiming to believe in the supernatural, and both have a history of belonging to churches outside of main stream Christianity in the US.

Krauss selectively comments on the weirdness of the church of the candidate he disagrees with. What a strange coincidence.

A child can understand this. Apparently you cannot.

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@Buy, you still didn’t answer my question.  Please help me understand what constitutes bigotry as you claimed Krauss’ post was bigoted.  Where and how is pointing out absurd beliefs bigoted?  Where am I supposed to tip-toe around criticism of someone’s beliefs?  Can I criticize anyone’s beliefs?  I really need to know this so I can sleep at night for fear of you calling me a bigot.  Stand up to your statement and stop dancing around it like a coward.

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Laurence picked up one only one of the odd beliefs of this strange group of human’s that live in dual worlds. They preach that the faithful will be resurrected with a physical body in “its” prime of life in a joyous extended family. The story in the BOM records thriving groups of waring peoples with large cities and their god destroys all of the cities and all of the inhabitants for various reasons. No one was spared!  Where are the ruins?  Where are the remains?  When TV became available so the Mormon conference could join all members via CATV, it was fulfillment of a prophecy that they could now speak as god, to everyone at the same time. Now science is providing knowledge about new planets, revealing that indeed each of the faithful will get their own world to be the god of. Mormons really do live in another world believing as they do. At its best it makes money best!

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