{"id":1876,"date":"2006-06-06T12:12:13","date_gmt":"2006-06-06T18:12:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/the-atheists-pulpit\/have-a-damn-fine-day\/"},"modified":"2006-06-06T13:39:09","modified_gmt":"2006-06-06T19:39:09","slug":"have-a-damn-fine-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/the-atheists-pulpit\/have-a-damn-fine-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Have A Damn Fine Day!"},"content":{"rendered":"<blockquote class=\"mine\"><p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/mjhinton\/15816310\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/static.flickr.com\/14\/15816310_52edb7ed83_m.jpg\" width=\"180\" height=\"240\" alt=\"photo by MRudd\" class=\"right\" \/><\/a>It must be the End-Times: the devil is stomping around Artesia this very moment.<\/p>\n<p>New Mexicans will recall we used to have a state highway numbered &#8216;666&#8217;. Ah, but primitive superstition was too much for some. So, we spent public money changing the number to appease them. Church trumps State again, as ignorance does reason. <span class=\"sig\">mjh<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><span class=\"mine\">[mjh: the following is a good in-depth article on the history of this lunacy.]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.latimes.com\/news\/printedition\/california\/la-me-apocalypse6jun06,1,4596015.story?coll=la-headlines-pe-california\">A Date With Destiny or Just Another Day?<\/a> By K. Connie Kang, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer<\/p>\n<p>As for associating Satan with 666 and the antichrist, that&#8217;s the result of Christian authors writing about Satan so much, said J. Gordon Melton, a Methodist minister based in Santa Barbara and author of the &#8220;Encyclopedia of American Religions.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><strong class=\"highlight\">&#8220;Satanism is itself largely a product of Christian <em>paranoia<\/em>,&#8221;<\/strong> Melton said.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/news.bbc.co.uk\/2\/hi\/uk_news\/magazine\/5051540.stm\">BBC NEWS | UK | Magazine | The Nick of time<\/a>  By Stephen Tomkins<\/p>\n<p>Vexen Crabtree, the Minister of the London Church of Satan, plans to go to one of the alternative clubs that are celebrating 06\/06\/06. &#8220;My official take on it is that 666 is really only a Christian number,&#8221; he explains. &#8220;But <strong>any excuse for a party<\/strong> is a good one.&#8221; &#8230;<\/p>\n<p>The book <strong class=\"highlight\">&#8220;Is George Bush The Antichrist?&#8221;<\/strong> was published in 2004 in the US. The answer was yes, showing all kinds of ways of doing the maths to get the president to equal 666.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It must be the End-Times: the devil is stomping around Artesia this very moment. New Mexicans will recall we used to have a state highway numbered &#8216;666&#8217;. Ah, but primitive superstition was too much for some. So, we spent public money changing the number to appease them. Church trumps State again, as ignorance does reason. &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/the-atheists-pulpit\/have-a-damn-fine-day\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Have A Damn Fine Day!<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1876","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-atheists-pulpit"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1876","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1876"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1876\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}