Editor's note: Zack reached out to me in response to a piece I published on Jerry Falwell Jr. and what I perceived to be the commercial rot of American Evangelical Christianity. He thanked me for my words and for, as he put it, "exposing our hypocrisy". I was struck by his ...read more
The Banter Long Read: As a militant atheist, I generally don't keep my rock bottom opinion of religion to myself. I do, however, reserve most of my criticism for the religious right because they're not just everything wrong with religion, they dial it up to 11. They're so ...read more
In today's show, Ben and Michael discuss how to choose a religion. Are you interested in Buddhism? Does Christianity make sense to you? Do you even need a religion in the first place, and why isn't atheism enough? We grapple with the deep questions and help you figure out which ...read more
Remember Paul Nehlen, the Republican candidate looking to unseat Paul Ryan? He's the nice businessman from Wisconsin who recently decided to come out of the Nazi closet and tell Trump's voters that he thinks Jews are a dangerous threat to the vaunted white race. But Nehlen is ...read more
If you're not already aware of it, on Tuesday Trump announced that he's going to move the United Stated embassy to Jerusalem and officially recognize the city as the capital of Israel. This is the diplomatic and religious equivalent of a nuclear first strike, intended to incite ...read more
After a two week break, Ben and Michael are back with a brand new episode of the Bantercast. In today's show, Michael discusses his experience meeting a Mongolian Shaman and Ben talks about his crazy trip to the Amazon Jungle. It's a thought provoking show with insight into the ...read more
There's an entire cottage industry of conservative pundits who are shocked, shocked, I tell you!, that America's right wing is full of racists, hypocrites and all around horrible people. One of these newly woke pundits is Jennifer Rubin of The Washington Post whose entire job ...read more
The Banter Long Read: Half a century ago, conservative Christian Republicans were aghast at the idea of a Catholic, John F. Kennedy, being elected president because they were worried that he would put his religion before the Constitution. But that was before the American right ...read more
Televangelist Paula White is apparently Donald Trump's closest spiritual advisor and a staunch defender of the president who believes that Trump genuinely "is a Christian," who "accepts Jesus as his Lord and savior.” Which makes all the sense in the world when you take 30 ...read more
In today's episode of the Bantercast, Ben and Michael talk to Noor Tagouri, a Muslim American woman who made history by becoming the first woman to wear hijab in Playboy magazine. Noor Tagouri is a journalist at Newsy and has been on the road documenting heroin addiction and sex ...read more
Stop me if you've heard this before: A deeply religious man, beloved by his church/community, targets and grooms a young child for sexual abuse. The child tells an adult and they report it to the elders of the church. The church investigates the abuse and then sweeps it all ...read more
On Sunday, Donald Trump gave a speech written by a non-crazy person and managed to stay on topic. He almost sounded like a liberal so don't expect it to last: The relatively even keel stayed on target as the president read carefully from his teleprompter and avoided off-the-cuff ...read more
One question I always ask my Christian Evangelical Republican friends is if Jesus Christ were alive today, would he vote for someone like Donald Trump? The answer is almost always "no, but he'll get the things I like done". And invariably, those things are the least Christian ...read more
This week, Us Weekly reported that Trump's most recent marriage is in shambles: Multiple sources claim that the former fashion model — who’s currently living 200 miles away from Washington, D.C., in NYC’s Trump Tower while Barron finishes the school year — refuses to share a bed ...read more
I have some experience of American evangelical fundamentalism. Years ago, I spent a year at Oregon State University in Corvallis, and became close to a number of people who were practicing evangelicals (and without going into too much detail, dated one for a significant period ...read more
