The pope does not wear underwear

I was in a random disjoint discussion in Skypeland and the subject of religion came up. A long spew of insanity ensued.

*Someone mentioned that one Pope had been a woman. Someone said this is why the Pope, when he is carried in a chair after his election, does not wear underwear under his cloak. This allows people to look up under his gown and inspect his equipment (This sounds highly doubtful to me. I investigated and was unable to find anything about this on the Internet).

*An Israeli claimed that his reading of Genesis proved that air was made up of water vapor. He said that we know this is correct, so it proves Genesis is accurate (Almost nothing this man said was correct, as far as I could tell, although he talked and talked and talked. Although there is water vapor in the air, clearly the atmosphere has a lot of other gases in it besides water vapor).

*People said that the problem with Darwin's theory of "evil-ution" was the "missing link". This came up several times with different people claiming that the missing link would never be found. Someone claimed that there were millions of missing links. I tried to direct the conversation in a productive direction with a few facts, and pointed out that if you had two species and one had descended from the other, there was clearly a gap in between them. If this gap is filled with another fossil, it does not remove the gap, but creates 2 gaps in its place. If those two gaps are filled, then one is left with 4 gaps. The more fossils are found to fill the gaps, the more gaps remain after, and the doubters are never satisfied. They were furious at me for saying this, so I decided to shut up.

*Someone said that evilutionists agree that the order given in Genesis is the same order that science suggests. Someone said that this was not true. People disagreed. The person said that he had not said that evilution agrees with Genesis, but with the order. The host pointed out that it was a bit hard to imagine that the planets were formed first, and then light came next, and then stars and the sun came after that. The Israeli claimed that physicists do believe that. The host disagreed with this and people started to butt in with comments. It was pure chaos (Take it from me, no competent professional physicists believe this.).



*Someone claimed the angels who had sex with the human women to create giants in the Bible were actually visitors from other planets. He claimed he had definite proof of this, but he did not say what it was, only that he was positive it was true.

*The Israeli claimed that the order given in Genesis is incorrect, and that all the translations we have been reading are incorrect.

*The Israeli claimed that all religions on earth are monotheistic and all religions worship one god, and the same god.

*It was claimed that the Pyramids proved that ancient man knew how to do mathematics.

*The Israeli claimed that all Jews believe the earth was created 6000 years ago (This is definitely not true.).

*Someone said you need to have faith to believe in science. The Israeli said he was in love with science. He was starting on another long diatribe when the host shut his microphone off. (Science is not based on faith, but evidence. It is inaccurate to equate it to religion and demonstrates a lack of understanding of science and religion.).

*Someone told a story about hearing a friend at work tell him that he did not believe in dinosaurs since he thought the earth was 6000 years old.

*Someone said that the Bible clearly condemns homosexuality, and now we have gay priests, so clearly religion evolves, and this shows we have evolution. Someone said that Islam is supposed to be a religion of peace, but now we have suicide bombers, so this also proves that religion evolves. Then this turned into a discussion about how religion should never change.

*Someone claimed that religion is about listening to what is right and doing what is right and it has never changed since the time of the Pharaohs. Someone else said that before Christianity there was no such thing as a religion that was about doing what is right, because the religions before that were involved with human sacrifice (Of course, it is clear from history the idea of what is right has changed with time).

*Someone said that "if you talk to god, you are called devout, but if god talks to you, you are called a lunatic".

*Someone interjected that, "You need Catholicism to keep the pedophiles out of schools".

* The host said, "Most religions believe that Jesus will return."

*Someone stated that "It is healthy for young people to believe in a power greater than themselves and to get on their knees and pray to this power."

*A Muslim said that it says in Koran that "Jesus will come back and liberate Palestine and fight all the Jews there."

*Someone from Australia said "Jesus was a dude that took too many magic mushrooms". Someone from the UK said, "Last time I sat in front of a burning bush it cost me 25 pounds a quarter". Someone else said, "Last time I sat in front of a burning bush I burned my nose".

*The host asked, "Consider the likes of David Blaine. Is he the second coming?"

*Someone else stated that, "Israel will be attacked by the whole world, or what we call the Antichrist, when Jesus comes back."

* Someone with an atrocious accent said that when Jesus comes he said his arrival would "turn the daughter against his mother. It is up to us humans to use religion to make war, or use religion to make war."

*Another said, "You cannot believe in Julius Caesar if you say you cannot believe in Jesus, because there is less evidence for Julius Caesar than there is for Jesus."

*Someone said, "It is really refreshing to listen to people discussing religion intelligently without people telling each other off" They said there was only one exception, and of course that was me. But I had shut up since I realized they wanted to speak nonsense at each other instead.