620: Luke Who's Talking Edition

Warning, the first fucking this show is in the warning.

The last one is in the outro, and there are plenty in between.

This week's episode of The Scathing Atheist is brought to you by Mint Mobile, Factor, and by the only type of Catholic priest you can count on not to rape your kids, Papal Miche.

Papal Miche, because we've had no end of trouble out of real priests.

And now, The Scathing Atheist.

Hey, every year I raise money for the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia by doing a 24-hour long Xbox Marathon.

Please donate at extra-life.org/slash participant/slash Dan E.

And we did, in fact, evolve from Filthy Monkey Men.

It's Thursday.

It's January 16th, and it's Religious Freedom Day.

All right, still free to be stupid.

You're welcome.

I'm No Illusions.

I'm Eli Bosnick.

I'm Keith Henright.

And from Aaron Rogers', New Jersey, Anne, Michigan, and Wake Ross, Georgia, this is the Skating Atheist.

On this week's episode, the Christian God does a bunch of fire smiting.

Atheist groups finally get rid of that expired ketchup in the back of the fridge.

And the Bible will still be yammering yammering on about that Jesus guy.

The first, the diatribe.

I'm reminded of an analogy that Marsh used as his country obliviously marched its way towards Brexit.

It's like there's a bomb in the middle of our democracy counting down to January 20th, but the bomb's been there long enough that a lot of people are looking at it going, eh, hasn't done any damage yet, and it's been there for months.

Maybe it won't be that bad.

Well, if you need something to shake you out of that false sense of security, might I recommend you check out the highlights of the Pete Hegseth confirmation hearing.

The one where Trump's nominee to lead the American military refused to commit to following the Geneva Convention and refused to commit to not using the military to fire on peaceful protesters.

The one where he refused to directly answer questions about allegations of sexual assault, dismissed criticisms that he's literally no relevant leadership experience whatsoever, and dismissed myriad accusations of public drunkenness by assuring the Senate that he loves Jesus now, so his past indiscretions don't count.

Past as in, according to his former colleagues at Fox News, October or so.

Now, you might not know this because the media has mostly been focused on the fact that he's a drunken rapist who's never even run a fucking Taco Bell, but Hagseth is a Christian nationalist to a degree that's far more terrifying than America has ever seen in a a position of power remotely this high before.

Friend of the show, Jeff Charlotte, who has spent the last 20 fucking years covering religious extremism in America, described him as, quote, far to the theological right of anybody even close to national power in modern history, adding, quote, Ted Cruz is Ned Flanders next to Hegseth, end quote.

In Pete Hegseth, we're talking about a guy who thinks the crusades get a bad rap.

He recently wrote that people who enjoy the benefits of Western civilization should, quote, thank a crusader, end quote.

He has a battle cry from the Crusades tattooed on his fucking arm and a symbol from it tattooed on his fucking chest.

He wrote a goddamn book in 2020 called American Crusade, and it wasn't from the anti-perspective, like the one that Andrew Seidel wrote.

The dude is a follower of Doug Wilson, who we've talked about on the show before.

His name is so generic, you might have forgotten about him, but he is the terrifying pastor out of the Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho, who wrote a book that said that slavery, quote, produced in the South genuine affection between the races, end quote.

He's a guy that says homosexuality should be illegal and argues with a straight face against women's suffrage.

Hagsett loves this guy.

And this is all the more relevant when you see how much of this confirmation hearing was spent railing against all the wokeness and DEI in the military.

This guy should scare the fuck out of you even before he's handed the world's most powerful military.

Even before he's put in a position where, as you'll recall from Trump's first term, he may be the only thing standing between the commander in chief in an order to gun down protesters

or fucking nuke a hurricane.

And if you're holding out any hope that maybe he won't get confirmed, there was nothing in the hearing to suggest that.

It looks like for all the fucking world, he's going to sail into the position.

Not a single Republican could be bothered to give two fucks about putting an inexperienced, alcoholic, avowed Christian, nationalist, sexual predator with a crusade fetish in charge of our bombs and our tanks.

It was so bad, in fact, that if you've been holding out hope that maybe some of Trump's nominees were too extreme even for this sycophantic Senate, you can abandon those.

You can throw those out the fucking window.

The required FBI background check on Hagslet was so incomplete it would be best described as a fucking cover-up, which didn't matter, by the way, because most of the senators voting on the shit weren't allowed to see it.

Nor was the public.

We only know the extraordinary amount of detail it lacks because the ranking Democrat, the only one that was allowed to see it on the whole fucking committee, told us about all the interviews they didn't do and the allegations they didn't investigate.

On top of that, the questioning was limited in ways that were unprecedented.

I mean, just consider how much of a sham it has to be to stand out against other Senate confirmation hearings for its shamminess.

Any hope that people like Tulsi Gabbard, Cash Patel, or RFK Jr.

might be extreme enough to shake the GOP out of its toadying servility absolutely disintegrated when they lined up to suck Hagseth's dick.

Like their voters, they're going to have to see how bad they made it before they're even willing to accept that it could get that bad.

And by then, of course, it'll be too late.

They're talking about your Jesus.

Bring you a special news.

Joining me for headlines tonight are the here we and ready set to my way to Heath and Wright and Eli Boznick.

Fellas, are you ready to go?

Sorry, i'm just not used to coming second in any situation so through me you've got to play through man yeah and now that i've introduced the headlines we won't do them yet instead we're going to pause for a word from our first sponsor this week mint mobile curse us

and that's half oh come on that's not half i can get the ruler if you want me get the hey hey guys what are you doing Oh, hey, Noah, Heath and I are just making better choices in the new year.

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Nice.

But we're still doing your half-off thing, right, Eli?

Yeah, yeah, it's only fair.

What's Eli's half-off thing?

Oh, I'm making sure he stops halfway through watching certain videos on the internet.

Yeah, jokes on you.

Beginning is my favorite part.

Mine too, actually.

Right?

Love beginnings.

And now, back to the headlines.

In our lead story tonight, one of the only things worse than a tragic wildfire is the response to that wildfire from religious people who worship a God that allowed that natural disaster to happen.

And when they call the city where it happens hell A, they become worse than one of the only things that's worse.

And if I'm mad about your wordplay, you've done something terribly terrible.

Yeah, you're really fucked up.

Putting the LA in the lake of fire was the move, obviously.

Oh, much better.

Much better.

We got plenty of these assholes last week saying horrible, stupid things.

That includes, quote, prophet Amanda Grace from Ark of Grace Ministries, the Mysterious Ways journalism team at the New York Post, and of course, cryptometeorologist Marjorie Taylor Green, who has a secret weather weapon solution to offer.

Oh, does she, you know, I know we're all numb to this at this point, but step back for a second and consider how terrible a person you just have to be to have a bad take on a natural disaster.

Yeah.

That's hard to do.

Yeah.

Earth quaking in my boots.

Is that anything?

We're the worst kind of monsters.

Sorry.

All right.

I'll start with Amanda Grace, Grace, whose very important work was covered by Charisma News.

Breaking News Spiritual Perspective.

Their article starts by saying, this is the time to intercede for California during the devastating wildfires.

So, okay, two things.

One, fuck your face.

And two, if you think you can intercede with magical wishing, Now is way too fucking late.

Yes, so late.

But that's not how it works for liars like Amanda Grace.

They're going to have everyone intercede now with praying and when the fires eventually go out that's a win for them somehow and it proves their praying magic yep yeah it's funny how christians always talk about how helpful they are in a crisis except when there's an actual crisis right that's when we get the wishing magic yeah well look and look if prayer worked There would be one prayer that some clever lawyer came up with that managed to encompass all the good shit with none of the bad shit right now, right?

Just got up there in heaven.

whereas, god damn it, he really got me.

So for anyone who doesn't stay up to date on very important literature, Amanda Grace is the author of the Revelationary War, the epic battle against false prophecy and deception.

Turns out she's accidentally the antagonist of her own book.

Yeah, right.

Here's what she had to say last week during a live stream.

After mentioning the importance of interceding now, she pointed out the clear signs that God is punishing Democrats with hellfire in California.

She said, quote, I want you to think about this.

No, I'm not going to, but we're going to have to.

A leader of the Democratic Party, Timmy Carter,

passes toward the end of the year and has a funeral.

Talk about him all the time.

And while the funeral of Carter, one of the most recognizable icons and elders of the Democratic Party, is going on, one of the most liberal areas in the United States is burning to the ground.

End quote.

What is

if these things aren't related, why would there be yarn between these push pins?

Yeah, and I mean, as long as there's never a natural disaster in a highly religious area of this country, this take is going to serve her super well, right?

It's always going to be

great.

All right.

Next up in the line of assholes, we have an article from the New York Post entitled, Blame LA Fire Horror.

on the woke religion bringing ruin to our cities.

And it starts by saying,

The story of the Hebrew Bible is, at least in some part, the story of God punishing the wicked.

Welcome to wildfire-beset Los Angeles, or as the Post so poetically put it, hella.

I don't mean to suggest that Angelinos somehow deserve the catastrophe.

To do so would be not only misguided, but unforgivably cruel.

Don't say but, don't say but

but is the next exact word.

But as we're reeling from one of the greatest disasters ever to befall an American city we must be brutally honest I don't think we must actually no that's not not the way they're talking about it

continuing especially if we want to prevent this kind of calamity from happening again and a brutally honest assessment points to one inconvenient truth The devastation occurred largely as a result of people in power adhering blindly and madly to a very bad religion.

It was the woke religion.

Oh, you lost me.

Which judges by the color of their skin and not the content of their character that propelled Mayor Karen Bass to the highest office in town.

End quote.

Well, I mean, in their defense, the alternative to blaming a black lady is admitting that global warming is real.

So,

and can I be honest and say that it's because you had a black mayor is bad?

But based on that intro, I was actually pretty sure we were going to hear that gender-neutral bathroom started on fire.

So, I don't know how to feel that I was less woke than the New Yorker.

Not far from what we've heard this week.

So the author of this article in the Post, by the way, who quoted Martin Luther King Jr.

in order to scold a black mayor for being a DEI hire

via election, hired via election, to be clear.

It's a white guy named Lyle who wrote that.

Yep.

Lyle went on to criticize a budget cut for the LA Fire Department of about $17 million compared to the previous year.

And conservatives love government spending.

They do.

They always advocate for that.

Not clear how the religion of woke was involved in that, especially considering that never happened.

What's actually true, the initial approved budget was $17 million less than the year before.

Yes.

But that wasn't the whole thing because negotiations were still happening about certain items in that budget.

And once that negotiation was done, there was an increase of $53 million for pay raises and an increase of $58 million for supplies like fire trucks.

So overall, the budget grew.

Now, to be clear, the budget definitely needs to be bigger.

We've learned that pretty fucking hard.

But Mayor Bass's woke religion diversity index score is unrelated to that.

That was a dumb fucking lie.

And Lyle was on a roll with lying.

So he also repeated a claim from Donald Trump that woke environmental policy regarding the smelt fish was a big factor that was hampering the firefighting effort.

Yeah, no, we've literally reached a point now where the lies about what's hampering the firefighting effort are hampering the firefighting effort.

Correct.

Right.

Okay.

But at least everyone on Facebook can see those lies without censorship.

Am I right?

It's a better world.

Well, that brings us to Marjorie Taylor Greene.

The culmination of every list of idiots.

She's right there.

And she's a problem solver.

Madge tweeted: why don't they use geoengineering like cloud seeding to bring rain

on the wildfires in California?

They know how to do it.

That's her quote.

And given her past comments about, you know, Jewish space lasers, I was actually just impressed that she named a real thing, cloud seeding.

Cloud seeding is a real thing.

It involves releasing a chemical like silver iodide into an existing cloud to gather the water droplets and make it rain.

There's debate about whether it's effective enough to be worth it, but again, it is a real thing.

But that wouldn't work in Los Angeles because the area doesn't have any clouds right now.

That's the whole fuck.

That's the whole thing with it.

Apparently, MTG was like, she was clearly picturing like a seed you throw out the window of an airplane and it like sprouts into rain clouds.

Or like in Mario, you know, where the little, the, the vine would come up and there'd be a cloud at the top of it, maybe.

Yeah.

Anyway, moral of the story, if there's a terrible natural disaster and you really want to give your religious hot take about it,

shut the fuck up.

There you go.

And also, same if there's not a terrible natural disaster.

Shut the fuck up there too.

And same if you're MTG about anything ever, ever, ever.

Just

all the time.

Shut the fuck up and go away.

And in Mynantology news.

With devastation as terrible and all-consuming as what we're seeing with the fires in California this week, we knew it was only a matter of time until religion took financial advantage of it.

Now, Heath just mentioned the same awful shit requirement that has been fulfilled by religion, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that rather than the usual emergency tent that won't help gay people or bigot-sponsored supply shop, our good friends over at the cult of Scientology got in on the taking advantage of the desperate action this week.

And if Twitter and Reddit are to be believed, they helped themselves to some emergency supplies, took a bunch of pictures, and then fucked off.

Okay, to be clear, Twitter and Reddit are not to be believed.

That's a new rule of thumb, but I guess they still have some real things from time to time.

This might be one of those times.

Emphasis on the might.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So first off, I want to thank all the folks who sent us this news to scathingnews at gmail.com.

Both AOL and the New York Post had articles about this, but both have mysteriously gone missing as of the writing of this story.

Now, some people might suspect that's due to the actions of the infamously litigious Church of Scientology, but maybe they both just reported on something independently untrue and then took it down.

Well, or dependently untrue, since the AOL one was just a repost of the New York Post article.

Exactly.

Yeah, it could all be fake.

Either way, if you're a lawyer for the Church of Scientology and you're listening to this, we live in states with robust anti-slap laws, and I will turn up to court dressed as Shelly McScavage.

So, I mean, pick your battles, gents.

Eli might do that regardless of court.

It just

Not for nothing, Eli.

You don't dare the Scientologists to sue us.

It's on the whiteboard.

I'm just saying, Tom and I got along a couple of times I met him at the store.

All right.

I've got an in.

Got a n.

So here's the story.

As you know, California is on fire and they need all the help they can get right now.

Well, according to at least a few posters on Reddit, so-called volunteer ministers from the Church of Scientology have been showing up, taking a bunch of photos, taking stuff people need, and then fucking all the way off.

With one poster in our Pasadena writing, quote, beware of these people.

They came to the Santa Anita Racetrack Donation Center and helped themselves to food and goods for their, quote, low-income community.

Okay.

Wouldn't listen to us volunteers, and now half the food is gone, end quote.

All right.

I get that.

unpaid cult pirate intern that's going to be a low-income community, but the wildfire relief centers are not the solution for you.

Right.

No, no, trust us on how low income they are we're their employers yeah trust us but that's not all one of the replies on that same thread said quote i saw some similar looking dudes near the lake ab donation center in pasadena they were about a block away collecting donations people were ostensibly donating to the official donation center loading them into a large van like the one in the picture but gray they appeared to drive away later end quote hard to say what's happening maybe they were helping but one guy like dove into the van at the end and yelled, go, go, go.

So

just urgent charity, maybe.

I just thought maybe it was worth mentioning.

You guys remember when Reddit solved the Boston marathon bombing and it was just some dude that they found.

I just feel it that there are better sourced stories about how shitty Scientologists are than this one.

There would have to be.

Skeptics.

Now, look, these are obviously posts on Reddit.

And as Noah said, these people could be lying or just trying to make the church look bad.

Scientology has its share of enemies.

and maybe they were, or maybe the cult is doing bad stuff.

Legally, we're not making a claim either way.

What's important for you to remember, podcast listener, is that everything I just said is parody, and no reasonable person who didn't kill Shelly Miscavige would take it any other way.

Also, reasonable people who did that.

Yeah, uh-huh.

I don't think there are reasonable people who did that.

Shelly Miscavige.

Probably not.

He hates Shelly Miscavige, everybody.

Not a fan.

All right.

I didn't do it.

And in What Are You Thinkin' news tonight?

Way back in the infancy of this show, we covered a story about a study that showed a disturbingly high level of fecal matter in the stoops and baptismal fonts of Catholic churches.

I mean, it was as high as you'd imagine a pool of still water would be when you just leave it there and encourage everybody to dip their fingers into it as they walk in the door, but that's still pretty disturbingly high.

Point is, Catholics are terrible at water management, which makes it all the weirder that West Virginia's Water Development Authority gave a Catholic school in Ohio a $5 million grant.

Hard to imagine how that's going to improve the water quality in West Virginia.

All right, no, let's brainstorm.

No bad ideas, right?

What if Catholic kids, they're going to clean the runoff from the West Virginia coal mines as like a field trip from the

college?

Okay, that's good because I was picturing just like a straight-up bribe to stop dumping babies in their septic tanks the the way they get caught doing in Ireland and Canada.

And so yours is

a lot nicer.

No bad ideas.

Thank you.

So, yeah, so this sorted tale begins when a quarter of a billion dollars in COVID relief money falls into the hands of the West Virginia Water Development Authority, or WDA, and they set out to distribute it to nonprofits and government agencies to build things like, quote, a water system, a wastewater sewer system, stormwater system, or an economic development type project, end quote.

And if they were arguing here that Catholic colleges are a sewage system, I guess you could defend it, right?

You'd have us there.

You'd have us.

Yeah.

But the argument they're making in granting $5 million to this school in Ohio is, as best as I can tell, that the school might educate some people in nearby West Virginia who might come back and work on like pipes and shit in their state.

Okay.

Sounds unrealistic.

Like once you experience the splendor of eastern Ohio, especially Steubenville, where the college is

that shining city on a hill, Steubenville, Ohio.

You're not moving to West Virginia to do work at that point.

It would literally be a better argument that they were going to burn the money because carbon returning to the earth is part of the water supply.

Yeah, right, right.

Now, as bad as this sounds on the surface, it's actually much worse.

First of all, the grant to this out-of-state school was by far the largest grant they gave to any single entity by a factor of four damn near.

Secondly, there are legal requirements that three specific cabinet officials need to sign off on every grant approved through this program, and they don't seem to have all those signatures in this case, so it may have been illegal.

But third, and most importantly, within the grant application, they straight up say that the money isn't going to anything remotely relevant to water infrastructure.

The grant application includes, for example, $750,000 to build a facility called the Center for the Common Good, which would be focused on, quote, supporting broadly life-affirming policies in West Virginia, end quote.

In other words, an anti-abortion think tank that the West Virginia taxpayer is apparently going to fund.

Disappointing.

This is the state of Joseph Mansion.

I am shocked.

Yes.

That liberal bastion.

You know who we really need not to be a theocratic idiot redirecting funds to his personal politics.

The guys in charge of keeping poison out of the water.

Yeah, I can't emphasize that.

That's the thing is that there's some shit the government does that's really important.

You know, it'd be really bad if RFK Jr.

was in charge of that.

Yeah, no fucking kidding.

And of course, it should come as a surprise to precisely nobody that they're now getting sued over this shit.

The American Humanist Association, in conjunction with the ACLU, are suing on behalf of the West Virginia taxpayer.

According to AHA president and my second favorite leader of a secular watchdog group named Fish Stark, quote, we're proud to take a stand on behalf of our members in West Virginia because no one should have to pay to fund someone else's religion.

End quote.

And while there's been no official response from the state thus far, you can expect some variation of nu-uh in the near future.

Yeah, but at the end of the movie, he's going to kick that bad guy in charge of the project off the top of a dam or something and be like, go fish.

I'm just saying it right,

right?

All right.

Well, clearly we've got some storyboarding to do.

So we're going to take a quick break for a word from our other sponsor this week.

Factor.

I want to do it again.

Sleeping with the fishes.

Oh, that was good.

That was good too.

Nice.

That was good too.

We'll work topics more.

None of those were very good.

You should say that to the love interest, though.

You're at the bottom of a damn.

He's gone.

And you're funny, and it really seems like you've adjusted well as it kind of sort of stepped down.

And time.

Okay, how'd I do?

Meh.

Seriously?

Just meh?

Just meh.

Hey, guys.

What's with the stopwatch?

Oh, hey, Noah.

Heath and I are trying to keep up with Maslow's hierarchy of needs in under two minutes.

Yeah, and factor, they make it look so easy.

They really do.

What's factor?

Oh, seriously, Heath?

You paused too long.

I never get a point.

You guys always get the points.

That's because you don't shenanigan.

I can shenanigan.

You can?

Cool.

So, yeah, shenanigan right now.

That's a dance.

You're just dancing.

You're dancing right now.

Well, I can't do it on demand, but I can shenanigan.

Anyway, what's Factor?

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All right, guys, thanks.

Hope that they take payment in juggling balls.

Trying to do a shenanigan.

Feels forced.

Yeah, no, I felt it.

A man wrote the Bible?

A whores, what's your mind?

If it's a legitimate random

slut, right?

Cooking can be fun.

Hey, I'm proud of my man.

This weekend.

Do you remember when Trump promised to protect women whether they wanted it or not?

Our first story reminds me of that.

It's a story about a bill that just passed through the House of Representatives called the Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act, or Hawagisa, I guess.

And if you guessed that what they're protecting women from is trans equality, give yourself a gold star.

Now, I want to remind everybody that women's sports has never been about protecting women.

You hear a lot about the sanctity of women's sports now from transphobes who suddenly give a passionate fuck about women's individual medleys or whatever.

So it's worth remembering that the whole reason women's sports exists as a thing is because men were scared to let women participate in their sports.

Just look up the photos of Bobby Gibb, the first woman to run the Boston Marathon.

Just look at how concerned all the men around her are with gender equality in sports.

But now, all of a sudden, women's sports are so important that we have to pass laws to protect their sanctity.

And for those of you who are still in the Trans Issues Aren't Atheist Issues camp, I should point out that when House Speaker Mike Johnson set out to justify his bullshit law, the first thing he cited was the Bible.

Quote, we know from scripture and from nature that men are men and women are women, and men cannot become women, end quote.

Adding that the Bible was pretty clear on the subject of transgender women in sports.

Forgive me for saying, I don't remember that part of the Bible.

Now, that's not to say that it actually being in the Bible would make it okay.

And to underscore that point, we'll head over to Virginia where we'll find our second story.

And this one is pretty fucked up as well.

It comes from a church service video that went viral over the weekend in which a young girl is forced to stand before the congregation and the live stream and apologize for being pregnant out of wedlock.

And if that kind of public shaming isn't enough to piss you off, the pastor then went on to further shame her about how she didn't deserve a baby shower or any of the joy of pregnancy.

Quote, we ain't going to condone your sin now.

We ain't going to do that.

Ain't no baby showers going on.

That's what you lose out on when you have a baby out of wedlock.

Can't have no baby shower.

You lose all the prize and glory.

You lose all of that, end quote.

And by the way, once this video spread around and the internet got as outraged as it rightfully should have, the church made no effort to take down the video, apologize for torturing that young girl, or otherwise show any contrition whatsoever.

Hell, the girl's mom posted about how okay it is anyhow.

Everybody needs to leave her church alone.

Because get this, suddenly she's worried about shit being publicly shamed.

This is what the patriarchy brings.

This has nothing to do with that girl's well-being, just like Mike Johnson's bill has nothing to do with protecting women's sports.

It's about protecting the patriarchy.

It's about reminding everybody about the supremacy of masculinity.

Notice that no boy had to come before the congregation and apologize for impregnating someone out of wedlock.

And with that reminder of what we're up against every fucking day, I'll wrap things up and hand you back over to Noah, Heath, and Eli.

Thank you, Lucinda.

Next up in headlines in Old Men Yell at Cloud News.

I wish Joe Biden and Pope Francis had yelled at a cloud last week.

That would have been more useful.

Maybe help out Los Angeles by yelling at the cloud.

I don't know, seed something.

That'd be great.

Instead, we got to see Biden bestow the head of the international cabal of pedophilia, bigotry, and tax evasion with the presidential medal of freedom.

Well,

I agree that the Pope and Rush Limbaugh deserve to be equally honored for whatever that's worth.

Yeah, so in fairness to Biden, he was scheduled to meet with the Pope in person at the Vatican to give the medal, but Biden canceled the trip in order to help coordinate the emergency response to the wildfires.

And fairness over, because the trip to Italy and the medal were fucking stupid in the first place.

And so was the statement from Biden.

He tweeted, Pope Francis, your humility and your grace are beyond words, and your love for all is unparalleled.

You are a light of faith.

hope and love that shines brightly across the world.

And of course, listeners, you can't see this, but there's an asterisk after love for all that specifically excludes gay people, trans people, women, and child victims of sexual assault.

Yeah, you gotta have that.

And nuns with resting bitch faces.

Well, also, yes,

vinegar, gross.

And just a quick reminder, the guy whose humility and grace are beyond words, same guy who recently said there's too much F sluritude in the Catholic Church.

And after being told by HR, to be clear, the HR at the Vatican, that he was being a little too homophobic for them,

and that maybe he should keep the slurs out of his public speech pattern at work, he said it again.

Less than a year later, he was awarded the highest civilian honor given by the U.S.

government.

And he got it with distinction.

Apparently, that's a thing.

The president can add that if it's like extra distinct, whatever the fuck that means.

Oh, nice.

Well, I'm actually now no illusions esquire with distinction, Nephilim expert.

It's fun.

Okay, so for Pope Frankie's part, it's not even clear that he knows what happened.

He was on a Zoom call with Joe Biden at some point.

There's no way those two people did it,

even with plenty of help from I.T.

Regardless, the Pope is now part of an elite club that includes important intellectual luminaries like Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan, Nancy Reagan, Antonine Scalia, Bill Cosby, and Dave Thomas.

Yes, that Dave Thomas, the founder of Wendy's, also got

the Frosty added way more to the world than anything those other motherfuckers did.

Yeah, I was going to say, I don't know why you're coming for Dave like that.

He is

too far.

Too far.

I hope at the ceremony somebody was like, sir, this is not a Wendy's.

And Dan Wylette Facts getting the prey of of a good time news.

Okay.

As he accepted his post of re-elected Speaker of the House, Congressman and man who elected to be his own son's porn snitch, Mike Johnson, recited a prayer that he informed us was written by Thomas Jefferson and recited by the nation's third president every single morning.

And like all things, Mike Johnson believes, that's a lie he's wrong about.

So we're going to talk about it.

Okay, and even if Mike Johnson was right, he's not.

It doesn't matter what Thomas Jefferson fucking prayed about.

He probably prayed for the well-being of his children who were enslaved by him.

Yes.

Write some new material.

Right.

Yeah.

His lie made things worse, unless you're a big fan of fucking slaveholders, which as a nation, we are.

Yeah.

So first off, big thanks to Carl for sending us this story and that amazing opening pun to scathingnews at gmail.com.

If you send us atheist news to scathing news at gmail.com, we'll award you with plaudits.

I don't know what plaudits are, but you can have a

bucket of them.

Scathingnews at gmail.com.

I am not, I'm not kicking in a third of a bucket of plaudits for that pun.

I'm sorry, Carl.

It was just fun.

Eli, you're using your own plaudits for this one.

Same, you're using a full bucket of yours.

All right.

Well, when I find them, you can have them, Carl.

Right.

Fuck you, Carl.

Piece of shit.

I like this.

This is a fresh take.

Put some risk in it.

Put a little heat on the ball.

Put a little spice in the experience.

Oh, you can send us some news, but maybe, maybe we hate you.

We might roast you.

We might hate you.

Maybe that's the last mistake you ever make, Carl.

Carl with the K?

That's how Nazis spell it, Carl.

Yeah.

And Marxists.

We have your IP address, Carl.

We're going to find you.

We're going to fucking kill you.

It's a rough week, everybody.

I'm sorry.

We promise not to threaten to kill you.

Unless you're Carl.

carl

carl is a crisis actor

get him yeah okay so barely had the dear jesus it's me tea dog left his lips when journalists noted that the website of monticello jefferson's historic home in virginia currently operating under the thomas jefferson foundation has a dedicated page declaring that the so-called national prayer of peace is not, according to researchers, something Jefferson is known to have ever recited publicly or privately, let alone daily.

Cool.

Well, hopefully the house floor has a community note section where you can put a little sales.

Yeah, take care of it.

Yeah.

No, but so that's that's the thing.

It's not just that they lie, it's that their lies are so old and so stale that the official website thing has bothered to refute it, right?

It's the kind of wrong that autocompletes four words into Googling, did Thomas Jefferson ever with the word no?

The amount of wrong they're capable of is staggering.

It's true.

It's true.

And of course, it wasn't just the Jewish media that noticed Johnson's ahistorical bit of assholery.

Democratic representative, co-founder of the Congressional Free Thought Caucus, and man whose gen bills have been described as, quote, as close to God's existence as I'm willing to admit, Jared Hoffman chimed in on Twitter saying, quote, the prayer that you read in the House chamber today was not written by Thomas Jefferson and your claim that he recited it every day is false, end quote.

You're lying.

Yes.

And co-founder of the Congressional Free Thought Caucus, U.S.

Rep Jamie Raskin of Maryland, who actually taught constitutional law before coming to Congress, told the religious news service, quote, Our colleagues are constantly trying to enlist Thomas Jefferson to the party of theocracy.

He, of course, was a champion of the Enlightenment who insisted upon the separation of church and state.

End quote.

Yeah, the one good thing about him.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And hey, just apropos of absolutely nothing.

Here's something Jefferson did say.

He said, the tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.

I don't know.

I'm just naming things that are true.

He did say that.

Jamie?

You've got access, Jamie.

Carl.

Carl.

And look, I know in the era of Trump, it's easy to dismiss a misattribution of a Christian prayer to a founding father as relatively minor in comparison, and it is.

But as I'm sure I will remind you many times over the next four years, we're not doing comparison.

Yes.

And theocratic lies are bad, even when they're compared to fucking treason.

Yeah.

And finally, tonight.

Thanks to a kerfuffle instigated by a bunch of transphobic atheist dinosaurs that wrote popular books about 20 years ago or 15 years ago, respectively, the commitment of the atheist community to LGBTQ rights has rightly been called into question.

Well, that question has been answered by no lesser authority than the atheist movement itself.

Seriously.

Oh, did the dinosaurs die of morbid self-satisfaction?

That's so sad.

Satisfaction about getting one easy question right?

That's tragic.

Right?

Tragic.

Yeah.

No, a joint statement was released on Tuesday reaffirming that commitment, and its signatories included, but were not limited to, American Atheists, the American Humanist Association, Black Non-Believers, Camp Quest, the Clergy Project, the Freedom from Religion Foundation, the Military Association of Atheists and Free Thinkers, Recovering from Religion, the Secular Student Alliance, and the Secular Coalition for America, which are, correct me if I'm wrong, all the atheist organizations we've ever cited on this show.

Yeah, well, except maybe the Republican atheists.

Well, yeah,

we didn't cite them for information.

We just cited how they somehow exist.

And I think we cited their angry email that said, there are dozens of us.

And they were furious about it.

Also, fun fact, just out of curiosity, I Googled the exact name of their group, Republican Atheists, and their website was eight results down.

Oh, you hate to see it.

Their Instagram was actually seventh.

And they move way down from seven and eight if you count the sublinks from Reddit and Cora.

The gods they don't believe in have way better SEO is what I'm saying.

Yeah, they haven't quite risen to the level of graphs about religion.com.

Anyway, no, you were talking about the much better atheists who realize you're supposed to be fucking humanist too.

They released a statement.

Yep, yep.

But, but hey, hey, hey, Republican atheists, if you want to release your own statement about your commitment to, I don't know, bigotry, we are willing to put it right where we think your other correspondent should go.

So give us a, give us a call.

So the statement itself is only about a page long, and we'll have it linked in the show notes.

But I want to share a few highlights here because while they don't call out Richard Dawkins and Jerry Coyne directly, they also make it clear who they're talking to.

Quote: As organizations committed to protecting the separation of government and religion, as well as universal human and civil rights threatened by the white Christian nationalist ideology, the undersigned organizations reaffirm our commitment to forcefully advocate for the rights of LGBTQ plus Americans, create inclusive and welcoming communities, present the interests of our diverse constituents, and act in accordance with our values.

No, that's beautiful.

But while you were talking, I went to the Republican Atheists' Leadership page, and it looks like WordPress vomited.

I'm so sorry.

I'm so sorry.

We have to talk about it.

No, no, we don't.

More of the quote here.

We will not permit religious extremists to foment a moral panic, encourage harassment or violence, and enact dangerous policies that seek to force LGBTQ plus Americans generally and trans Americans in particular out of public life and out of existence.

Nor will we sit silently or ignore when the talking points, misinformation, and outright fabrications of the anti-LGBTQ plus extremists are laundered and given a veneer of legitimacy or acceptability by those who would hold themselves out as voices of reason or science.

End quote.

Also, I'd like to call out Richard Dawkins and Jerry Coyne directly.

Fuck your face, Richard and Jerry.

Yeah, no.

I've actually released my own version of the statement that just adds comma Jerry or comma Richard after every sentence.

Oh, there you go.

There you go.

So, yeah.

So kudos to those groups for saying the right things.

Obviously, that's a lot easier than doing the right things.

And we're going to continue to look to our LGBTQ listeners, members, and ex-members to see how we're doing with that.

But it's nice to at least see them put the standards that we should hold them to in writing.

And now it's just kind of on us to hold them to it, I guess.

And with that reminder that when our community gets it wrong, it at least recognizes that and tries to fix it.

We're going to close the headlines for the night heath eli thanks as always crogano and when we come back oh nice one we're going to figure out which kidnapped transdimensional time travel permutation at don ford eli brought for us this time

right just because the facility and baby corp both involve suits doesn't make them the same company

look at the wall of boss babies that's very clearly sigourney weaver i i don't think it is.

You won't even look at the poster.

Hey, hey, Don.

When did you get here?

Future Eli sent me back in time and killed this timeline's me because he was busy.

Oh, so like the prestige?

The prestige doesn't own killing time clones, Noah.

Feels like they kind of do.

Are you guys ready for Bible Peace Theater?

You mean the part of the show where we act out the Bible so our listeners don't have to read it?

We sure are.

Where are we?

Luke.

Okay.

And is Luke 99%

stories we've heard so so far?

No, it's closer to like 64, 65%.

Yeah, I'll take it.

So where do we start with the differences and stuff?

Actually, at the beginning, with a letter to Theophilus.

Who's Theophilus?

Well, it depends on who you believe.

Another one of these, huh?

I mean, it's the Bible, man.

No, that's fair.

Right, right.

So who Theophilus is depends on who you believe Luke is.

So the dominant narrative is that Luke is Luke from the Bible.

Wait, I thought these were were just names.

Well, they are.

And the argument that Luke is Luke boils down to he talks smart, and Luke was a doctor, therefore, this guy is Luke.

Okay, but there were smart people after Luke.

There were, yes, but most of them didn't write parts of the Bible.

Yeah, that tracks.

So, yeah.

So, if you think Luke is Luke, there's lots of theories about who Theophilus is.

He could be a Roman general, a famous Jewish guy in Alexandria, a voice of fantasy and adventure, perhaps.

Sorry, it had been a while since since I spoke.

I just was finding people here.

So it could be specifically a guy, but most biblical scholars think it's an honorific that means something like, my brother in Christ.

Oh, so what's he say to Theophilus?

The birth of an important holy man.

Jesus?

Nope.

John the Baptist.

What?

Why?

Because Luke was written about 80 years after Jesus died.

Allegedly.

Allegedly.

And John the Baptist was still a big deal.

Like, as big a deal as Jesus?

Well, not quite that big, but big.

And he would remain like central to Jesus' narrative pretty much till the Council of Nicaea.

Ah, that's where Santa punched the guy.

Different conference, same name, but yes.

All right, let's hear it.

Lulu Lou, doing incense stuff.

Incense in the holy temple is my favorite stuff.

Zechariah.

Oh,

my goodness, an angel.

For shizzle.

Look, I know you and your wife Elizabeth have been bombed out about being old and not having kids and stuff.

Well, good news.

Elizabeth is gonna get pregnant.

Just make sure you call the baby John, because he's gonna be awesome.

Oh, how so?

Big time, awesome.

He's not gonna drink alcohol.

Okay, that doesn't sound awesome.

And and he's gonna be filled with the Holy Ghost before he's even born.

What is the Holy Ghost?

What are you talking about?

It's a theological concept.

it'll be invented in like a thousand years oh got it

okay

you kind of seem skeptical okay yes but like i'm really old and so is my wife so you understand you don't believe me i'm gabe

i mean i i figured i mean you have very broad shoulders for a woman no gabe what no gabe gabriel the angel and you know what Just for that, you're gonna be mute until your son's born.

okay you guys can't see it but he's totally freaking out right now from the muteness

oh this is kind of bad radio i'm gonna head out

oh hey happy birthday to luke from sarah by the way sarah what are you doing he paypaled me don't do paid shout outs fine i'm going i'm going

so sure enough elizabeth gets pregnant

All right, honey, I'm off to hide myself away for five months.

Right, forgot you still can't speak.

Well, I'm going, because if I don't, men will laugh at me.

Well, because you have an old dick, and nobody's going to believe it.

Put a baby in me, that's why.

But that's what I thought.

Yes, I'll see you.

Also, happy anniversary to Kit and Helen.

What the fuck is going on this week?

Well, he's got to do one.

Right, so now it's time for Mary to get her visit with a few key differences.

Lulu Lou, doing Mary stuff.

Mary stuff is definitionally 13-year-old stuff.

So I like Minecraft or something.

Lulu Lou.

Yo, yo, Mary, what up?

I'm Gabe.

I assumed you have a very broad jaws.

No, I gotta start saying my full name.

No, I'm Gabriel.

Like Gabriel the angel.

Anyway, good news.

You're gonna have God's baby.

But how is that possible?

I'm a virgin.

Oh, yeah.

Don't worry.

The Holy Spirit is gonna come over you.

not great phrasing with a 13 year old that some books say you could be like 15.

yeah i heard plus your cousin elizabeth got pregnant uh when she was old so you know through god all things are possible did i seem like the part i was worried about was the possibility

yes you know it's it's fine noise

Lulu Lou, doing pregnant stuff.

Pregnant stuff is my favorite stuff.

Hey, cousin Elizabeth.

Wow, cousin Mary, my baby just jumped.

You must be pregnant with God's baby.

Really?

All based on your baby's jumping.

Well, that and I'm filled with the Holy Spirit.

Oh, fantastic.

All right, shall I sing a long, boring song about what a vessel of God I am?

Only if every Catholic mass can repeat it in a monotone for the next 3,000 years.

You said it, sister.

So Mary stays with Elizabeth three months till it's time for John the Baptist to be born.

Three months?

It's that or hang out with a guy who married a 13-year-old.

Fair point.

Sorry, it's just usually someone points out that in some books she's 15.

Feels like we're kind of missing opportunity for a three-beat that the first one in Matthew, second one just now.

Fine, fine.

Some books say she's 15.

Wow, Keith, what's the matter?

Oh, come on.

Gross dude, why would that matter?

No, he tricked me with the thing.

God damn it.

My son is born.

And we shall name him Zachariah, like his father.

No, no, the Lord spoke to me, and he shall be named John.

But there's nobody in your family named John.

Donya, ask my husband.

What do you think?

Right, right, no talking thing.

It's terrible radio this part of the.

Here, here, take a pen.

What do you want to name the kid?

John.

All right.

The kid's name is John.

Oh, I can speak again.

Oh,

and I shall deliver my son, my prayer.

Don't bother, honey.

They're gonna do a swoosh.

Oh, come on.

Hey, Mary, how's the baby?

He'll be here soon, Joseph.

I can feel it.

All right.

Now, who could that be?

Excuse me, I'm here to inform you that Caesar Augustus has called for all the world to be taxed, and we must do a census.

Oh.

Um

okay.

Right.

So, you have to go home to uh Nazareth

and be counted.

Wait, why would we go home for a census?

That's not what a census like is.

Well,

it is for this one, and also because the Bible says that Jesus was born in Nazareth.

Feels like you could just lie about that rather than lying about the census.

No, no,

it is not a lie.

Feels like the census thing is the census, like some of the best preserved records in history.

Okay, no, it's an off-year census, and you guys have to go home and have your baby.

Okay,

all right, thank you.

Now, can I use your bathroom?

I've got like 11 more houses that I have to make it to for this proclamation.

It's actually pretty late.

Am I shaving stuff in there?

Okay, wow, cool.

Thanks, guys.

Thanks.

Really appreciate it.

Look like a number two guy.

Really look like a number two guy.

Excuse me?

Um, excuse me?

Yeah.

Yeah, um, do you have a room for the night?

Uh, sorry, pal, all filled up.

Please, just, you know, see if you can help us out.

My wife just gave birth and we have nowhere to stay.

Fine, fine.

You can stay in the barn.

Like, with your animals?

No, I know.

I felt.

No need to thank me.

What can I say?

I'm a big slough-type.

Right, right.

Barn.

Thanks.

I guess.

Hey, just out of curiosity, where are you sleeping tonight?

Oh, here in my room at the inn.

Is your last name Hyatt by any chance?

It is.

That is my name.

Yeah, that tracks.

I'll head to the barn.

Thanks again.

You guys can come by for breakfast in the morning if you want.

What time's the breakfast?

7 to 9 a.m.

You.

Yep, that's right.

So now it's time for some shepherds.

Oh, nice.

Luke has the shepherds.

Luke has the shepherds.

But I keep falling asleep.

Well, see, that's why you got to count them in the morning.

Yeah, this is shepherding 101.

What up, Rose?

Oh.

Be not afraid in junk.

I feel like I'd be less afraid if you weren't holding whatever it is you're eating.

I agree.

Rotisserie chicken.

But you know, I get that a lot.

Anyway, good news.

I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.

For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord.

And this shall be a sign unto you.

You shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

Hallelujah!

Jesus, what the heck was that?

Is it a heavenly host?

Kind of my backup dancers, I guess.

Why was so many of them eating?

Think we caught him on lunch.

Is that why you have the chicken?

Yes.

Feels like it's not.

You guys want to go see the kid and then, I don't know,

tell everybody about it?

I mean, I would like to leave.

Yeah, let's get out of here.

Whatever, fine.

More chicken for me.

So, Jesus is circumcised.

For more on that, check out Citation Needed, episode 402.

Seriously, Tom?

What?

Heath and Ron said you're doing plugs this week.

It's Don.

No?

No, I'm pretty sure it's Ron.

It too, Tom?

Bless you.

Anyway, Mary purifies herself, and then they take Jesus to the temple, which is where two other stories meet up with ours.

Like a podcast of verse?

Just like a podcast of yes.

So we're going to start with Simeon.

Lou, Lulu, doing just stuff by

which I mean justice and fair.

It's my favorite kind of stuff.

Lulu Lou.

Simeon.

Holy smackerdoodles!

A ghost!

Not just any ghost.

I am the holy ghost, and I have come upon you.

What do you think I am?

A 13-year-old girl?

Some say she was 15.

Oh, so it wasn't even for the 3v then.

Anyways, you will not die till you see God's Christ.

Oh, nice.

So, like, do you need me to, I don't know, fight crime or something cool, you know?

Like, no, no.

I can't die.

Nope, no, no, nope.

Just hang around the temple till you see like a sweet baby oh sure can do i think it's bad either way

you're holding him wrong i've got him mom she's got it quiet joseph you're just still hoping she'll shtup you um excuse me uh ma'ams yes

oh sorry to bother you but that is a beautiful baby oh thank you so much Oh, in fact, I dare say that baby will be the savior of humanity.

Yeah, yeah, we get that a lot.

Oh, sure, the light of the world.

Many will rise and fall by his name, and I can die now that I've seen him.

Oh,

um,

thanks.

No problem.

Wow, isn't that something, Mom?

I mean, I'm a Jewish grandmother, so I already thought that stuff.

Speaking of which, it's time to learn about the prophet Anna.

Hey, everybody, I'm an old lady, and I pray that one day

Jesus will come.

Here, my baby.

Oh, well, would you look at that?

Okay, bye.

So now it's time for Jesus to get home alone toed.

Sorry, home alone tood?

Home alone toot.

That's right, yeah.

That was a pretty good feast, right?

I liked it, yeah.

I wish they'd get a new wine guy.

What?

Come on, Morty's been my family's wine guy forever.

He's good.

Oh, yeah, I can tell.

Hey, where's Jesus?

Oh, I thought he was with you.

Jesus?

So, we're just not telling anyone about germs at all then, huh?

No, I don't think we're gonna know.

Jesus, there you are.

Your mother and I have been worried sick about you.

Why were you looking for me?

Didn't you know I would be doing my father's business?

I thought your dad was a carpenter.

Just aren't you?

Yep, no, I am.

Probably just checking out the chairs in here, right?

Okay, my real dad is God.

Okay, we should get going, kiddo.

Okay, of the universe.

Huh?

Look at the altar.

Wow, beautiful.

He's got.

And with Tween Jesus already causing a heap of trouble, we're going to stop there, but we'll be back in a month with even more Bible peace together.

Before we tighten the lug nuts on this episode, I want to let our listeners in LA know that we're thinking about them and hoping for the best, which is, I guess, basically like offering thoughts and prayers, but at least I'm admitting that I'm not actually helping.

Anyway, that's all the blasphemy we've got for you tonight.

We'll be back in 10,022 minutes with more.

If you can't wait that long, be on the lookout for a brand new episode of our Sister Show's Hot Friend God Awful Movies Day being at 7 a.m.

Eastern on Tuesday, and an even newer episode of our Half Sister Show's Citation Needed Day being at noon Eastern on Wednesday.

Obviously, we can't expect this show to be race ready if I don't thank Heath Enright for all the stuff he does, Eli Bosnick for all the stuff he agrees not to do, Lucinda Lusions for all the stuff she is, and Don Ford for all that jazz.

I also want want to thank Carl for sending us the story and for hopefully not minding that we got way carried away in the headlines.

We love you, Carl.

Also, want to thank Dan for providing this week's Farnsworth quote.

If you want to donate to his fundraiser, be sure to check the link on the show notes for this episode.

But most of all, of course, I want to thank this week's most intelligent individuals, TJ Austin, Flickolis Cage, Brad, B-knop, and Destructo Boy.

TJ and Austin, who are so badass heights, you're scared of them.

Flickolis and Brad, who are hot enough to count as honorary wildfires, and B knop and destructo boy, whose IQs are higher than their zip codes.

Together, these six sexy seculars secured our sacrileges again this week by giving us money.

Not everybody has the money it takes to do that, but if you do, you can make a per-episode donation at patreon.com slash scathing atheist, whereby you'll earn early access to an extended ad-free version of every episode, or you can make a one-time donation by clicking on the donate button on the right side of the homepage at scathingadiest.com.

And if you'd like to help, you're sending all your donatable money to the folks in LA.

You can also help a ton by leaving a five-star review, telling a friend about the show, and following us on social media.

And speaking of social media, Tim Rupsten handles all of that for us, and our audio engineer, Morgan Clark, who also wrote all the music that was used in this episode, episode, which was used with permission.

If you have questions, comments, or death threats, you'll find all the contact info on the contact page at scathingatheist.com.

Also, so as to not make a liar out of Lucinda in the warning, fuck.

For more on that, check out Citation Agenda, episode 40.

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