Evolution in Progress - Eurasian Blackcap

Male Blackcap, Sylvia atricapilla

Source

It's nice to be able to report on a recently-observed example of behavioural change in one of Britain's more tuneful warblers - the Eurasian blackcap - brought about by human activity.

When I was young, a popular ornithology trivia question was, what is the only resident British warbler? 'Resident' meaning non-migratory and remaining in Britain all year round.
The answer, found after hours of searching though my bird books, was the Dartford warbler, a very pretty little warbler found in southern England and believed to then be the only warbler to over-winter here.

That's now changed. As I witnessed last winter with one regularly coming to feed in our garden, and again a few days ago when I saw and heard one singing in a tree in my sister-in-law's garden, an increasing number of Blackcaps are now resident in Britain throughout winter, at least in Oxfordshire. There have also been numerous reports from other parts of the UK. This has led scientists to speculate that this could be the beginning of a speciation as the two populations become reproductively isolated.

Catholic Abuse News - Covington Cases

Nick Sandmann and other Trump-supporting Covington Catholic High School students taunt and abuse an Elder of the Omaha Nation

The Diocese Of Covington, Kentucky Paid $120M To Settle Priest Sex Abuse Claims | The Intellectualist.

With the controversy over privileged white students from a private Catholic school in Covington, Kentucky, USA, donning MAGA hats and taunting Native Americans with racists abuse at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC, it's worth taking a look at the moral values of the Catholic Church in the Diocese of Covington that is teaching them.

Christian Subversion Update - Mississippi Missionary Baptists

State Rep. Credell Calhoun, D-Jackson, introduced House Bill 427, which would violate the Establishment Clause.

Photo credit: Mississippi House of Representatives

Mississippi May Mandate Ten Commandments and Pledges to State, U.S. Flags in Schools | Jackson Free Press | Jackson, MS

American Christian fundamentalists are continuing their campaign to subvert the US Constitution, apparently in the belief that the Establishment Clause either doesn't or shouldn't apply to them. This time a concerted effort is being made in Mississippi to make the teaching of Christian dogma compulsory in public schools, to have Mississippi taxpayers pay for it and to impose fines for complying with the Constitution and Supreme Court Rulings forbidding it.

As the Jackson Free Press reports:

Catholic Abuse News - Trust in the Clergy Hits a New Low

U.S. Catholics' Faith in Clergy Is Shaken

A recent Gallop poll has uncovered a huge decline in the perceived ethical standards of clergy in the USA, especially amongst Catholics.

In a survey conducted at the end of 2018, after the Pennsylvania Grand Jury report which found that over 300 priests had abused over 1000 children in 70 years in Pennsylvania alone, only 31% of Catholics believe the ethical standards of clergy (of all denominations) is high or very high. This compares with 49% just a year earlier. In 2008, it was more than double, at 68%.

Catholic Abuse News - The Nuns' Stories Updated

Sister Lucy Kalappura

Congregation threatens to dismiss “rebel” nun – Matters India

No sooner did I report on the promising, though uncharacteristic, response of the Catholic Church in India to the news of the arrest on rape charges of Bishop Franco Mulakkal of Jalandhar, than this update arrived in my 'to read' list. The response it seems is not quite what it first appeared to be.

The church seems now to have resorted to the time-honoured tactic of siding with the abuser, bullying the witnesses and ignoring and vilifying the victims.

Catholic Abuse News - The Nuns' Stories

Sister Josephine Villoonnickal, left, sister Alphy Pallasseril, center, and Sister Anupama Kelamangalathu, at St. Francis Mission Home, in Kuravilangad.

Credit: AP Photo/Manish Swarup

Nuns in India tell AP of enduring abuse in Catholic church

The sexual perk of choice for Catholic priests in Britain, Europe, North and South America, and Australia, is traditionally vulnerable children over whom they are able to exercise control, although nuns feature too, especially in places like Africa and Asia where many nuns come from a misogynistic, patriarchal and uneducated background.

In India, it seems, according to this AP News report, the choice for recreational sex for priests is nuns. Many Indian Catholic nuns come from a culture which reveres Catholic priests and in which a woman is expected to be servile and subservient.

Catholic Abuse News - Covering Their Backs

Cardinal O'Malley (left) and Cardinal Dolan

O’Malley Turns in Dolan for Abuse Cover-Up

The fall-out from the Pennsylvania Grand Jury report into sexual abuse of minors by Catholic priests, and their cover-up by bishops and cardinals, continues.

As more American States launch similar investigations, cardinals like Boston's Sean O'Malley have started to distance themselves from the scandal by turning other colleagues in, according to this Spanish language report in Religión Digital.

The president of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, Archbishop of Boston, Cardinal Seán O'Malley, has denounced his counterpart, Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Archbishop of New York, in a letter to the Papal nuncio in Washington for the cover-up of the crimes of the convicted pedophile priest, Donald Timone.

Catholic Abuse News - The Missionary Position

American Roman Catholic priest Rev. Kenneth Bernard Hendricks looks at documents after being arrested in a church in Naval town in the island province of Biliran, central Philippines.

Credit: Bureau of Immigration PIO via AP

American priest facing 'horrifying' sex abuse charges during his time as a missionary in Philippines | ABC News.

An American Catholic priest, Rev. Kenneth Hendricks, has been arrested in the Philippines and charged with sexually abusing young boys. He is now facing extradition to Ohio, USA where he is also under investigation for similar crimes in the state.

The case started when two Filipino boys came forward with allegations of abuse to local authorities, prompting an investigation. More boys have subsequently come forward with very similar stories. According to Ben Glassman, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Ohio, Ben Glassman:

Each of these victims got to know Father Hendricks through the course of his official work as a priest... he befriended them, he would invite them to his residence, often to take a bath or shower. That interaction would proceed to kissing... fondle their genitals... [and] ultimately have oral or anal sex with the victims... It is horrible, horrible abusive conduct. It is grooming children, young children who are interested in being involved in church activities and taking those kids and sexually abusing them.

Catholic Abuse News - At Least 500 More in Illinois

Archbishop Blase Cupich of Chicago. "Profound regret".

Investigation identifies 500 Catholic priests and clergy accused of sex abuse in Illinois - ABC News

Contrary to Pope Francis' protestations of regret and promises to root out and put a stop to paedophile and sexually abusive priests and the church's routine cover-up and facilitation, it continues unabated it seems, at least in the six Catholic diocese in the State of Illinois, USA, if the outgoing District Attorney General, Lisa Madigan is to be believed.

An investigation into sexual abuse by Catholic priest in the state of Illinois, launched last August following the shocking Pennsylvania Grand Jury report showing that 300 paedophile Catholic priests had abused over 1000 children, has already uncovered evidence that about 500 priests have had credible accusations of sexual abuse made against them although the Illinois dioceses have only named 185.

Catholic Abuse News - Cardinal Pell "Convicted"

Cardinal Pell convicted of sexual abuse in Australia | Catholic News Agency

Despite a gagging order preventing any reporting of the trial, the Catholic News Agency (CNA) is reporting that Cardinal Pell has been convicted unanimously by an Australian court of the historical sexual abuse of two altar servers in the late 1990s when he was Archbishop of Melbourne.

This has not yet been confirmed by the Australian judiciary, which remains under the gagging order. The same source which reported this conviction the CNA is the same source which reported that a mistrial had been declared last October when the jury was deadlocked at 10-2 in Pell's favour.

The reason for the gagging order is that there is a second trial scheduled for early 2019 concerning allegations of other abuse of minors when he was a priest in Ballarat in the 1970s. The judge decided this trial might be influenced by the Melbourne trial making a fair trial impossible.

Cardinal Pell is the highest ranking Catholic cleric to stand trial on sex-abuse charges, being effectively number three in the Vatican, as prefect of the Holy See’s Secretariat for the Economy.

Christian Sexual Abuse News - Others Do It Too!

They were terrorized, trapped and even sexually abused. Now, these former members of independent fundamental Baptist churches share how their experiences will affect the rest of their lives.

Click to hear their stories.

Fundamental Baptist church pastors cover up sex abuse, rape | Fort Worth Star-Telegram

In the spirit of Christmas when Christians purport to feel goodwill to all, it seems only fair to Catholics to bring news that shows their priests, bishops and cardinals are not the only Christian clergy who take advantage of their position to sexually abuse children and vulnerable adults. As these two reports show, the clergy of other Christian churches do the same when the opportunity arises.

First, a report in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram revealing how the practice of sexually abusing vulnerable people by pastors in Independent Baptist churches is commonplace, as is the practice of cover-up and moving priests to other locations where they can continue abusing an unsuspecting congregation, just like the Catholic Church does:

Earliest Primates Were From North America

The unusual tooth sockets in UF specimen 333700 upended the hypothesis that Teilhardina brandti was a younger species in the genus. The sockets closely resemble those in Teilhardina asiatica, thought to be the most primitive Teilhardina species.

Credit: Florida Museum image by Paul Morse

Oldest-known ancestor of modern primates may have come from North America, not Asia – #FloridaMuseumScience

The earliest known primate may have come from North America!

But! Creationists should calm down! This is not another opportunity for a 'Nebraska Man'-style hoax*. It is from a time when Eurasia and North America were part of the same landmass about 56 million years ago. At that time, Earth was warm enough for palm trees to grow around the Arctic Circle.

This discovery by scientists from Florida University suggests the earliest known example of basal primates, a genus named Teilhardina did not come from Asia as was once thought. A detailed analysis of 163 teeth and jaw fragments recovered from Wyoming’s Bighorn Basin, showed that specimens found in North America which had been classified as Teilhardina asiatica were more primitive and were those of an earlier species, now named T. brandti.

Malevolent Designer News - Getting Ready to Hit Back

Staphylococcus epidermidis

Source

The potentially deadly bacterium that’s on everyone’s skin.

You may not have heard of Staphylococcus epidermidis but you have almost certainly heard of its close cousin, S. aureus, that in its antibiotic resistant form (MRSA) has become such a problem in hospitals, causing life-threatening infections in wound sites. Now, scientists have warned that S. epidermidis, an abundant, commensal bacterium on human skin, has the potential to become a serious health risk.

If you subscribe to the intelligent design notion, the only possible interpretation of this news is that a designer with malevolent intent has prepared for the eventuality of human medical science overcoming its current favourite harmful pathogens, like MRSA and Escherichia coli.

S. epidermidis is a close relative of S. aureus, the antibiotic-resistant form of which (MRSA) is a major health risk, especially in hospitals, following surgery. S. epidermidis is a normal, commensal bacterial species found on the skin of every human being. Normally, it is harmless but, in the right circumstances, it is also a serious health risk following surgery when it infects operation sites.

Catholic Abuse News - Bash the Gays

Cardinal Müller. Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (2012-2017)
"Nobody told me!"

Catholic Cardinal: LGBTQ People Are to Blame for Sex Abuse Scandal

The latest senior Catholic cleric to jump on the bandwagon and join the growing tendency to externalise the child sex abuse scandal by blaming it all on others, is Cardinal Gerhard Müller.

Cardinal Müller is the former Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. In other words, the Pope's enforcer who job it is to make sure the church's dogma and Papal diktats are complied with. He joins a growing list of senior Catholics and Catholic apologists who have formed an alliance with the extreme right and are taking the opportunity to simultaneously try to dissociate the Catholic Church from culpability in the world-wide clerical sex abuse scandals and victimise and stigmatise the LGBT community.

Christianity News - Abusing the Gullible in South Korea

Lee Jae-rock. 15 years for "habitually" raping his followers.

South Korean Church Leader Sentenced to Prison in #MeToo Case - The New York Times

Continuing the tradition of Christian cult leaders exploiting the gullibility of their followers for sexual gratification, one such leader of a Christian cult in South Korea has been convicted of "habitually" raping his female followers and sentenced to 15 years in prison.

75 year-old Lee Jae-rock, who founded the mega-church, Manmin Central Church in Seoul, South Korea, has been the subject of allegations of corruption such as extortion, faud and sexal abuse for several years but it was only when the #MeToo movement caught on in South Korea that eight former members of his cult came forward with specific allegations. Some of them alleged that he had lured them to his apartment and ordered them to strip off "as Adam and Eve did in the Garden of Eden", then he raped them.

Malevolent Designer News - Sleeping Sickness

The parasite that causes African sleeping sickness can cause death in humans if not treated.

Credit: College of Science

Researchers reveal secrets of parasite that causes African sleeping sickness

The intelligent designer hates Africans. This is obvious from the way it has designed a nasty little parasite and a clever delivery system, that is designed not only to make Africans sick and die but also prevents them using the same domestic animals that allowed Eurasians to develop agriculture. The nasty little parasite is a trypanosome that causes sleeping sickness.

This parasitic trypanosome and its tsetse fly vector have huge economic importance to Africa because while the African native megafauna are all unsuitable for domestication, the Eurasian animals that were used as transport and to pull ploughs in agricultural cultures are all susceptible to it and so agriculture could never spread south of the Sahara to any significant extent, nor could food sources such as sheep and pigs, save in the highlands of Ethiopia, where the tsetse fly is absent.

Catholic Morality News - Fleecing the Flock

Fr. Lenin Vargas-Gutierrez

Court docs allege priest lied about cancer diagnosis, sex addiction therapy and charity projects | Starkville Daily News

According to a report by Ryan Phillips in Starkville Daily News, Father Lenin Vargas-Gutierrez, a pastor at St. Joseph Catholic Church in Starkville, MS, USA, in the Diocese of Jackson, is alleged to have hit on a novel solution to two problems: how to cover up the fact that he is HIV positive, and how to supplement his income and provide a living to which he feels entitled.

The report says:

According to a 37-page affidavit filed Friday by Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Special Agent William G. Childers in U.S. District Court in Jackson, an ongoing investigation into Father Lenin Vargas-Gutierrez, a pastor at St. Joseph Catholic Church in Starkville, shows the priest is accused of lying about being diagnosed with cancer and soliciting money from parishioners for treatment and other pet projects.

Catholic Abuse News - Vatican Blocks Child Protection Plan

Cardinal Daniel DiNardo.
President of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops

Vatican tells U.S. bishops not to vote on proposals to tackle sexual abuse, spurns outside investigations - The Washington Post

In a quite extraordinary intervention, the Vatican has ordered the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to drop plans to debate and adopt a code of conduct that would strengthen measure to protect children and prevent their abuse by Catholic clerics.

This proposal was to be debated today at the Conference AGM, but on Monday the Conference president, Cardinal Daniel DiNardo, told them that the Vatican’s Congregation for Bishops, acting on instructions from the Holy See, had blocked it pending a meeting of world-wide Catholic leaders next February.

Hypocrisy News - Kim Davis

Kim Davis - Rejected

Apparently, Jesus has decided on a change of career for Christian arch-bigot, Kim Davis, now she has been rejected in favour of a Democrat by Kentucky voters in the midterm elections.

Readers will remember how the (now former) Rowan County clerk gained notoriety and became the poster-girl for white right Christian extremism when she decided her religious prejudices entitled her to victimise homosexuals by denying them marriage licences for same sex marriage, while being paid by Kentucky taxpayers for doing a job she was refusing to do. She even achieved glorious martyrdom by being sent to prison by a court for refusing to do the job she was taking money for doing.

She acquired even more notoriety and the adoration of the extreme Christian right, when she helped Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò embarrass Pope Francis and give hope to the extreme right that his reforms were mere PR and not to be taken seriously. Viganò , then Papal legate to Washington and bearing a grudge, arranged a clandestine meeting between Davis and Pope Francis at the end of his visit to the USA, in which Francis appeared to encourage Davis to continue breaking the law in his host country. Details of the meeting were immediately released to the press by a triumphant Viganò.

Intelligent Designer News - E. Coli Success

Transmission of Antibiotic Resistant E. coli Mapped in Wild Giraffe Social Networks

A progress update on the Intelligent Designer's campaign to make human and other animals get sick and die, using the bacterium Escherichia coli.

The story so far:

E. coli is the name of a highly diverse group of bacteria which displays far more genetic diversity than entire families of multicellular organisms with only about 20 percent of genes being common to all strains. Some authorities believe the taxon is overdue for revision and that some bacteria classified as Shigella should be reclassified as strains of E. coli while some E. coli, for example, the K-12 strain, should occupy a different taxon. Some strains have no flagellum, so lack motility.

Rapid Evolution of Barn Swallows

Barn swallow, Hirundo rustica

Barn swallows may indeed have evolved alongside humans

Barn swallows (Hirundo rustica) are one of only a handful of species that have co-evolved with humans but are not parasitic on us. This commensal evolution depended on the ecological niches we have provided during our own evolution and, in this case, as with House sparrows, particularly the social evolution of agriculture and settled dwellings on and in which to live. Barn swallows nest almost exclusively in man-made structures, hence their popular name.

Now researchers have tentatively establish when the species took up residence with humans and when they radiated relatively rapidly into the six regional subspecies now recognised.

Dinosaur Eggs Confirm Bird Evolution

A selection of bird eggs and a fossil theropod egg (on the right).

Image credit: Jasmina Wiemann/Yale University

Dinosaurs put all colored bird eggs in one basket, evolutionarily speaking | YaleNews

More evidence today, if any more were needed, of the dinosarian origin of modern birds. This time it is evidence that the pigments birds use to colour their eggs evolved in dinosaurs who needed to camouflage their eggs in open or partially open nests on the ground.

The study also changes our thinking on how and when bird egg colour evolved.

It had been believed that birds evolved egg colours multiple times according to environmental pressures, however, all bird use the same two pigments, red and blue, in various combinations and patterns to achieve the different markings. This study challenges that view by showing that dinosaurs also had pigmented shells.

Catholic Abuse News - The Pope's Attack Dog Is Snarling Again

Bill Donohue, Catholic League President
The Pope's Pit Bull

Let Activists Dig Ireland's “Mass Grave” – Catholic League

The self-appointed Pope's pit bull, president of the American Catholic League, Bill Donohue is snarling and yapping again. This time, it is to mock and denigrate those trying to uncover the full horror of exactly what happened at the Bon Secours Mother and Baby Home in Tuam, Galway, Ireland at the hands of sisters of the Catholic Bon Secours order, and give their victims a decent burial.

ECHR Ruling on 'Paedophile Prophet'

Conviction for calling Muhammad a paedophile is not in breach of Article 10 | ECHR^PDF

On the face of it, the ruling yesterday by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) that the conviction of 'E.S.' by an Austrian court for 'disparaging religion' by suggesting that Muhammad had paedophile tendencies, should be upheld, is disturbing to say the least. However, it needs very careful scrutiny.

It does not, for example, as some are claiming, make it illegal to call Muhammad a paedophile. Nor does it give any special protection to Islam not available to other religions.

Ireland - Another Rejection of Religious Bigotry

RTÉ exit poll suggests blasphemy referendum will pass

In another stunning rebuff to basic Christian teaching and to religious privilege in general in the Republic of Ireland, this once staunchly Catholic country appears to have voted overwhelmingly to remove the offence of blasphemy from the Constitution, if exit polls are to be believed.

In the last few years, increasingly secular Ireland has voted by very large majorities to legalise same-sex marriages and to decriminalise abortion, both in the face of vigorous campaigns by the Catholic Church and against fundamental church teaching.

Another Failed Attempt at Christian Political Subversion

Diane Douglas, Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction.

Credit: David Wallace/The Republic

Arizona superintendent fails in last attempt to limit evolution teaching | Ars Technica

Yet another attempt by entitled Christian fundamentalists to subvert the US Constitution and foist their superstition on vulnerable children at public expense, contrary to the Establishment Clause, has failed, just as it has failed in every attempt when brought before the US courts.

This latest attack on the Constitution was by Christian fundamentalist, Diane Douglas, Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction (an elected position) who abused her position by instructing her staff to edit a set of educational standards to remove any mention of 'evolution'. She later also ordered them to remove any reference to 'climate change'. When these changes were rejected by the Arizona school board she tried another tack and attempted to have the entire educational guidelines for Arizona replaced by those developed by Hillsdale College.

Catholic Abuse News - What Pope Francis Knows

Nicola Corradi and fellow priest Horacio Corbacho, left, are escorted to a courtroom in Mendoza, Argentina, Thursday, Dec. 22, 2016.

Credit: AP Photo/Emmanuel Rodriguez Villegas

Argentine abuse investigation involves priest previously reported to Pope Francis

In addition to the unanswered accusations by Archbishop Carlo Viganò concerning Pope Francis's knowledge of Cardinal McCarrick's sexually predatory habits, there are persistent accusations that, as Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio, he was informed of the predatory activities of Fr. Nicola Corradi at a Catholic-run school for deaf children in Argentina but did nothing to protect his victims or bring Corradi to justice.

This sorry story starts in Italy where Corradi, a member of the Company of Mary, an Italian religious community which operates schools for deaf children in several countries, including Argentina and Italy, is reported to have sexually abused several deaf children at the Antonio Provolo Institute for deaf and mute children. This allegation came from “Giuseppe” who was born near Verona with a congenital defect that left him deaf and mute. He was eventually enrolled in an Antonio Provolo Institute.

Bringing Christianity Into Disrepute - Really?

Pastor Penuel Mnguni of the End Times Disciples Ministries

'Snake Pastor' feeds dog meat to congregants for communion | News24.

In a slight variation on the Catholic tradition of feeding congregants on pieces of wafer and telling them it's really a piece of real Jesus, a South African pastor has come up with a slightly more nutritious alternative. He feeds them pieces of dog. Admittedly dog meat he has turned into a tasty stew.

In fact, it's so tasty so he says, that it simply must be Jesus.

He has also been known to feed them snake, hair, cockroaches and rat.

Pastor Penuel Mnguni of the End Times Disciples Ministries explained:

[I]t is not what goes through the mouth that disqualifies us and defile us but what comes out of the mouth – The heart matters most than what decomposes (Food we eat) (sic). Christianity has shifted so much from time to time, however at End Times Disciples Ministries the move of God has been seen as many peoples faiths has also been challenged. From changing a snake to chocolate – to partaking octopus and frogs – a dog stew was prepared for the Church to partake as Holy Communion.

Evolution News - Giant Mice Threaten Rare Seabirds

Tristan albatross Diomedea dabbenena

Gough Island restoration programme | RSPB

A very nice, even if worrying, example of evolution in progress was illustrated in a report by the RSPB on one of their programmes to protect the seabird population on remote South Atlantic Gough Island. The giant descendants of the house mice that were introduced accidentally to the island in the 19th century, have become predatory on the estimated more than eight million seabirds of twenty-three different species that nest there.

Gough Island is part of the UK Overseas Territory of Tristan da Cunha, and is the nest site of the critically endangered Tristan albatross, Diomedea dabbenena.

Fake Dead Sea Scrolls an Intelligently Designed Hoax

'Dead Sea Scroll' display, Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C.

Credit: Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images

Dead Sea Scrolls exhibit at least partly fake, museum admits | CBC News

In the search for certainty, concern for truth takes a low priority.

The dangers of being over-eager for confirmation of bias were highlighted yesterday when a fundamentalist Bible museum was forced to admit that at least five of its sixteen claimed Dead Sea Scroll fragments were forgeries.

Despite highly dubious provenance, the museum had purchased the fragments which began mysteriously appearing on the international market in about 2002, despite the actual scroll fragments being tightly controlled by the Israeli Government's Antiquities Authority. Bible scholars had warned that these fragments appeared to be intelligently designed to target American evangelical Christians. A Baptist seminary in Texas and a evangelical college in California reportedly paid out millions of dollars for some of them.

Creationism Sent Spinning Over Wheels

Wheels are everywhere these days. Almost every intelligently designed machine needs wheels somewhere, either inside it, like a clockwork clock or outside it like a motor car or a bicycle. Even modern, solid-state electrical machines will probably have wheels somewhere. Even all but the most primitive ploughs have wheels.

Yet wheels are virtually unknown in natural organisms. The only thing approaching a wheel in nature is the tiny molecular rotary proton motor driving the flagellum. Why is this?

The reason wheels, and in that description I include rollers, pulleys and rotating shafts - in fact any rotary component - are used

Catholic Abuse News - Paranoid Pope Again Blames Satan

That Satan! He's out there I tell you!

Pope blames devil for Church divisions, scandals, seeks angel's help | Reuters

Is Pope Francis losing his marbles?

Fleshing out his claim last month, that Satan is behind all the revelations of the activities of his paedophile priests, an increasingly paranoid-sounding Pope Francis has now ordered Catholics to say special magic spells to enlist the help of angels and frighten Satan off.

Presumably, that hadn't occurred to God as he sits watching his favourite church implode and disintegrate into mutually blaming factions while none of them take any responsibility for the scandals.

Catholic Abuse News - "Contraception Turned Priests Into Paedophiles"

Thomas Paprocki, Bishop Springfield, Illinois

Catholic Bishop: Secularism And Birth Control Is To Blame For Pedophile Priests - The Intellectualist

Having faced a sharp rebuke for attempts to wash their hands of the Catholic clerical child abuse scandals by blaming it on the LGBT community, some Catholic clergy have now settled on washing their hands of it by blaming secularism and contraception!

Somehow, it's always something outside the Church, either in the laity or the public at large - the very people whose children were abused - who are to blame. It's never the fault of the predatory priests themselves. They, poor things, are merely victims themselves - sometime even of the children they couldn't help abusing.

The latest bishop to try to deflect blame away from the paedophile priests and the culture of the church which facilitated and covered up their predation on vulnerable children, is Bishop Thomas Paprocki of Springfield, Illinois. Responding to the Pennsylvania Grand Jury report into child abuse by Catholic priests with an eight-minute video entitled "Sexual Misconduct: Pruning and purification continues within the church", he said:

Christian Abuse News - When Rape is not Rape

Dr. Don Boys. "It's only rape if they scream."

Rapacious Rape Requires Resistance! | Dr. Don Boys

Dr. Don Boys is a respected (in conservative Christian circles) writer on religious matter, and, as a former GOP member of the Indiana House of Representatives, a leading defender of Judge Kavanagh. He has concluded that Kavanagh cannot be guilty of rape because his victim, Christine Blasey Ford, did not scream.

He reasons that for rape to be rape, the woman has to scream. It matters not that she may be unable to through disability, incapacity or threat to her life, or even if the rapist has his hand over her mouth (like Kavanagh's victim alleged). Why? Because the Bible says so of course. The Christian book of excuses makes it all clear. It's only rape if she is screaming during it.

In an earlier BarbedWire piece, now mysteriously taken down but archived here, Boys wrote:

Catholic Abuse News - The Bloodletting Continues

Pope Francis and President Sebastian Piñera in the Vatican

Pope defrocks two Chilean bishops over child abuse claims | BBC.

Yesterday, Pope Francis, in an attempt to be seen to be doing something about the new explosion of sexual abuse scandals to hit the Catholic Church, summarily sacked or 'defrocked' two Chilean bishops without the right of appeal.

They are Francisco José Cox Huneeus, archbishop emeritus of La Serena, Chile, member of the Institute of Schoenstatt Fathers, and Marco Antonio Órdenes Fernández, bishop emeritus of Iquique, Chile. According to the Vatican press release, the defrockings were "as a consequence of manifest abuse of minors". The announcement came after Pope Francis met Chilean president Sebastian Piñera in the Vatican.

Another Catholic Cardinal - Another Catholic Abuse Scandal

Cardinal Donald Wuerl.

Donald Wuerl, DC archbishop, resigns over clerical sex abuse crisis - Vox

In what must be one of the slowest resignations on record, Pope Francis has belatedly accepted the resignation of the most senior American Catholic cleric to be embroiled in sexual abuse and cover-up scandals, Cardinal Wuerl, former Bishop then Archbishop of Pittsburgh, PA and later Archbishop of Washington DC.

Wuerl was accused in the Pennsylvania Grand Jury report into Catholic clerical sexual abuse in the state of being complicit in allowing sexual abuse of young seminarians and minors by Cardinal McCarrick to continue and of simply reshuffling priests accused of abuses to other parishes, where they could continue to abuse children and have access to vulnerable people in a congregation unaware of their predilections and past activities.

Lessons From Catalonia - Miraculous Lies

The Virgin of Montserrat (Mare de Déu de Montserrat)

The Virgin of Montserrat (Catalan: Mare de Déu de Montserrat), or the Black Madonna of Montserrat, is co-patron saint of Catalonia with St. George.

She is also an example of how legends are created out of whole cloth and then transmuted into sacred truths by the church and fed to the people to keep them in awe and in thrall to the church, its wondrous powers and its oneness with God.

Having just spent a few days in the beautiful city of Barcelona, in my humble opinion, one of the loveliest places in Europe, we decided to spend €35 each on a train ride to the sacred mountain of Montserrat for the pleasure of the ride up a steep mountain railway, the spectacle of the views and the interest of the geology - of which more later in another post. What we were least interested in was the monastery itself, which was fortunate because we arrived hungry and thirsty at about 3.45 pm with everything closing at 4 o'clock, with barely time for a snack and a drink at the cafe.

The story of how carved effigy came to be in the monastery atop Montserrat, north-west of Barcelona is interesting. According to legend, she was carved in Jerusalem by St Luke, who gave it to St. Peter to bring to Catalonia. In 718 she was moved to the site of an old Roman temple to Venus on Montserrat to be hidden from the invading 'Saracens' who were moving north from their stronghold in Andalucia up into south-west France.

Why Did God Wait?

Imagine, you're an omniscient, omnipotent deity and you've created humans who are going to behave badly and disobey you, but you love them and want to save them from the terrible punishment you've prepared for them for behaving the way you designed them.

Because you're omniscient, you know exactly what will save these creations and you desperately want to save them because you love them. You have always known this because you know all things.

The only thing that will save them is to have yourself manifest in human form and have yourself sacrificed as the ultimate blood sacrifice because everyone knows that blood sacrifices impress and satiate gods. It's the only thing that will work; there is no alternative. And you have always know this would be needed.

You even inspire the authorship of a book and in that book, according to some people, you include lots of hints and 'prophecies' about a 'Messiah' coming as a saviour. You even tell 'Isaiah' although you get the name of the 'Messiah' wrong.

But you still don't do anything even though you know what's needed and you've decided to do it. Instead, you wait about another 1000 years, allowing millions of people that you love above all else, to not be 'saved', and keeping them in complete darkness about the solution.

Then about 2020 years ago, for no apparent reason it should be at that precise moment, you decide to act and impregnate a virgin so you can be born and grow up as a human, then you get yourself 'executed' and pretend to be dead for 3 days.

And that does the trick. You can now 'save' people from yourself.

Some people apparently find this story convincing but they never think to ask why God waited so long. Why didn't God do this right away when it saw Adam and Eve begin to go wrong? Why didn't it do it after Noah and the animals got off the Ark?

And why did it tell humans that they needed to be saved and that it had provided this vital way, in a manner which took the best part of another 1800 years before everyone got to know about it, so allowing even more millions to not be 'saved'?

It's all rather odd. It really doesn't sound as though this god was really that bothered.

Can a Christian explain this apparent tardiness?

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Baby Beetles Evolve in 13 Generations

Sexton beetles, Nicrophorus vespilloides and larva

Credit: tomhouslay.com

Neglected baby beetles evolve greater self-reliance | Cambridge University Research News

How do you make your offspring grow big and strong?

If you are a sexton beetle, you feed them on dead mice, neglect them and let them fend for themselves. Well, not exactly their immediate offspring but the offspring of your 11 time great grandchildren who will evolve to be better at fending for themselves than those who are cared for, as this observed example of evolution in a laboratory shows.

Sexton beetles, Nicrophorus vespilloides, provide a useful service in the British countryside by burying the dead bodies of mice and other small vertebrates to create food for their offspring. They represent an intermediate level of parental care, between providing for all their needs and providing no care at all. Normally, the females remove the hair from the corpse and make cuts into the skin so their larvae can get into the body more easily. They will also bite off pieces of flesh and feed it to their larvae.

Fruitloops For Jesus

Pastor Paul Begley.
"They're out there you know! Coming to get us! Only Brett Kavanagh can save us!"

Paul Begley: Kavanaugh Allegations Represent 'The Darkest Hour in the Last 150 Years' | Right Wing Watch

A measure of their values and of their desperation to take over the American judiciary can be got from the hysterical response of fruitloop American Christians to the revelations about the character of their nominee for the vacant SCOTUS seat, the religious fundamentalist and right-wing political extremist, Brett Kavanaugh.

For example, here is fellow fruitloop, Pastor Paul Begley's hysterical outburst. Bear in mind that this is an adult speaking: