I’m not very comfortable with placing labels on children that may change as they become older. Race, nationality, sexual orientation, gender (sometimes), biological vs. adopted (or placed/surrendered) – those are things that cannot change. Gender…well, maybe. But things like a religion, social class (and for the most part I’m talking about the US here) – those can and sometimes do change as a child grows up and becomes more independent.

We have always tried to expose School Girl to different religions as she’s been growing up. Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism, Wicca, Islam, and Christianity so far. Right now, we’re working on talking to her about her friends’ religions and that we aren’t religious at all; which is perfectly appropriate for a 7-year-old. Of course, her “God” is a giant elephant with a lollipop in his mouth…

I should say that I couldn’t see all the fuss about the “Don’t Believe in God? You are not alone” that was displayed not far from us last November and December. So perhaps I’m not as sensitive as some.

Stephen Fry is a kick-ass speaker. This is a part of the Intelligence Squared debate series in London; it was broadcast by BBC News on the weekend of 11-7-09. His part of the debate happens at the 2:40 mark. Unfortunately, the last few seconds of his speech were cut off and aren’t available (AFAIK) on the next YouTube excerpt. Mr. Fry is passionate, funny and thoughtful. I especially liked what he has to say about distinguishing between religious people and religion. Enjoy.

ETA: He also celebrated getting his millionth follower on Twitter with this video (NSFW or kids).

Take a look at the date on the article: That’s right – it’s from the TIME dated Dec. 7, 1970. Not exactly news.

It does make me wonder how much things have changed in the adoption world, if at all. When we were beginning our “adoption journey” 9 years ago, infant adoptions in our state were almost always handled by Christian agencies. Those agencies that weren’t specifically Christian did have an indefinable but definite preference for Christian adoptive parents.

For example, the “Dear Birthparent” letters that we were given as samples were all written by Christians. Not a difficult task to suss that out once you got beyond the first paragraph. One that I recall was specifically “pro-life”, praising the potential birthparents of their child for choosing adoption over abortion.

Another example was the adoptive parent questionnaire. Several questions related both to the prospective parents’ religious beliefs and what sort of “values” (religious values) they wanted to give their child. Evil Dad and I both wrote down “we are spiritual but not religious”. We also mentioned that we had planned to take our child to the Unitarian Universalist church nearby (we still are talking about that, as I feel that she’s old enough to get something out of comparative religious education now). We were fortunate in that School Girl’s birthfamily aren’t especially religious, although many of them are deists. Still, sometimes I wonder if our 2 year wait would have been less if I had outright lied about our religious inclinations.

Since then I’ve met 2 other adoptive families who identify as either atheist or agnostic, and 1 family who’s currently going through the infant adoption process. I wish we could be here longer, as I’d love to talk to them about how they dealt with that process and if there were difficulties along the way.

Here’s what the doctor had to say about her continuing the pregnancy:

Fatima Maia, director of the public university hospital where the abortion was performed, said the pregnancy, which was in its 15th week, posed a serious risk to the girl, who weighs 80 pounds.

And here’s what the archdiocese of two regions in northeastern Brazil had to say:

But Marcio Miranda, a lawyer for the Archdiocese of Olinda and Recife in northeastern Brazil, said the girl should have carried the twins to term and had a Caesarean section. “It’s the law of God: Do not kill,” he said in comments reported by the newspaper O Globo.

The rape victim and her doctor have both been formally excommunicated by the church.

I should say that there are many people whom I love dearly who are religious. I have enormous respect for them, which they have earned from me over the years. I have no respect for a religion that places more value on a group of cells that cannot survive outside their human host than that of a 9 year old rape victim whose life would really be endangered by continuing a pregnancy that resulted from her rape. None. At all. I also have no respect for anyone who would condone the statement and actions of the Church in this instance – or in any instance where they have caused irreparable harm to a child. I would also prefer not to get into a discussion about one needing religion to be a moral human being. Not today, thank you.

I’m not sure if thanks is the right word, but thanks anyway to Pharyngula for the story yesterday. I was too pissed off to write about it immediately.

UPDATE: Apparently everyone involved (except the child and apparently the rapist) have been formally excommunicated by the Brazilian Catholic Church. Very classy.

Back then, Susie Bright started a little game/charity event that she called “Bet on Ted”. Basically, it was a betting pool for the date when Ted Haggard would come out of his tightly-closed hypocrite’s closet once and for all. The money was to go to the winner; if nobody won, the money would go to Ms. Bright’s charity of choice, LYRIC in San Francisco. LYRIC is a support organization for LGBTQQ youth, and it’s by all accounts a great one.

This past week, amid the media circus over the HBO documentary about Haggard (deliberately not linking – he needs no more publicity than he’s already gotten here) another person came forward to talk about his relationship with Haggard. At the time, the young man in question was a minor, so this one is a little more…problematic. Oh, and there’s the little question of the hush money paid out by New Life Church to keep this person quiet.

Haggard now says that his sexuality is “complex”. Well, good for you, Mr. Haggard. Lots of people’s sexuality is complex. Even the people who you condemned at your pulpit, over and over again, without the slightest bit of shame. But I’m digressing.

A couple of days ago, Susie declared an end to the pool. Since nobody picked a date so far out in space, those of us who participated are sending out $5USD to her on LYRIC’s behalf (she’s sending out one huge check). I’m sending a check when Evil Dad gets paid this week, in fact. If you’d like to join me, I’m sure they would appreciate it deeply.