Weekly Roundup (The Best of the Internet).

Occasionally, I like to do link roundups, either of great websites/blog posts I encounter, or sometimes, YouTube channels. I always like to share great material I encounter with my blog audience, especially great post for fellow bloggers. You never truly appreciate how much work goes into a great blog post until you become a blogger, and so it’s always good to lend a hand to a great blogger, and send some people their way.

Here’s my favorites for this week:

Are ministers more depressed than the general population?

A recent post by The Friendly Atheist talks about a recent study of Methodist pastors by Duke Divinity school. They surveyed and interviewed over 1,700 pastors from the United Methodist denomination in the US, and found that of the pastors they contacted, 8.7% had depression to some extent, compared to 5.5 % of the general US population.

I wonder if the same holds true for other denominations, and I have a feeling that it’s probably worse in fundamentalist denominations. My feeling is probably that it’s due to the fact that many congregations have a tendency to run their minister ragged, expect too much from him (or her), and don’t give them a break when they really need it.

Congregations can be very demanding on pastors, people get too emotionally connected to their minister, look to them to provide for their feeling of spiritual and emotional well being, and put them on a pedestal. Then there’s the constant stress, long hours, and middle of the night phone calls telling them about some disaster or another that has come upon a member of the congregation, or a friend/family member of a church member.

The last full time pastor at the church I am undercover in had his share of this. He would often visit members and their relatives in nursing homes and hospitals, many younger ministers today don’t do that (he was the son of a pastor, and his father taught him to do that). Then, on top of being a pastor of a church that averaged about 350 people each Sunday at the time, he was also one of my town’s 3 volunteer police chaplains.

Exposing the IFB: Pastor Steven Anderson

Pastor Steven Anderson of Faithful Word Baptist Church in Phoenix is no stranger to controversy or militant rhetoric.

He is a pastor in the loosely organized Indepdent Fundamental Baptist network, and his teachings and public statements are the most extreme and bizarre I have ever seen from any leader in the IFB cult.

In 2009 he said that he prays for the death of President Obama:

"I hope that God strikes Barack Obama with brain cancer so he can die like Ted Kennedy and I hope it happens today,"

He is militantly homophobic, saying that not only should homosexuality be illegal, but that gays should be executed, and that gays supposedly "recruit" children into homosexuality through rampant sexual abuse:

A few good pages and articles I have stumbled across lately.

I always like to share good blog articles, and great things that I find on the internet, and here's today's list.

I'm happy to find out that The Onion is on Google +. If you are not familiar with the Onion, they are a news parody website, poking fun at the news and political stories of the day, as well as making up their own bogus news stories. They have been laughing at the news since 1988, when they started as a print publication, and the website started in 1996, according to Wikipedia, 7.5 million people view the site each month.

I stumbled across the Google + page for tech blogger "Nixie Pixel" recently, I had never heard of her before. She works in the IT industry for Revision3 Corporation, is a avid Linux fan, and has a bit of a sense of humor about technology, for example, see this post . Visit her page, and make sure to take a look through the profile's photo albums, you won't be disappointed ;)

The Friendly Atheist:

I've been a fan of Patheos atheism blogger Hemant Metha aka The Friendly Atheist for a while now, I enjoy the direct, yet classy posting style that he has in his posts. Besides being a blogger, he is a Chicago area math teacher, and chairman of the atheist charity Foundation Beyond Belief.

Here's two great posts he has written lately.

The Man Who Could Have Become the Pope

Italian Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini died several days ago, he was considered a serious contender to become pope after John Paul II died. His liberal views often put him at odds with other clergyman. He openly criticized everything everything from clergy clothing and rituals ( he called them "pompous"), to the worldwide pedophilia scandals and attempted cover up, "The church must admit its mistakes and begin a radical change, starting from the pope and the bishops”. He also took far more liberal views on social issues than most of the clergy.

Why can't this atheist accept her husband's loss of faith?

Hemant Metha responds to a New York Times article. The woman in the article claims to be an atheist, married a Christian man, and responds in a rather unusual way when her husband gives up her faith. She's very confused and conflicted in her beliefs despite her professed atheism, and seems somewhat self-loathing as well. I can't get over laughing at his line in the article: "Ugh… an atheist who accepts Pascal’s Wager. That’s gotta be just one level above S.E. Cupp."