AS international aid agencies rush food, water and medicine to Haiti’s earthquake victims, a US faith group is sending Bibles to Haitians in their hour of need … and Hollywood nut John Travolta has announced that he will fly “volunteer ministers” from the Church of Scientology to the devastated country.
But, first, those Bibles.
The 'Proclaimer' can even broadcast God's word on the moon
These are solar-powered contraptions that can broadcast the holy scriptures in Haitian Creole to 300 people at a time.
Called the “Proclaimer” – motto: “A Ministry Tool like No Other” – the audio Bible delivers “digital quality” and is designed for “poor and illiterate people”.
The “Proclaimer”, believe it or not, is
Self-powered and can play the Bible in the jungle, desert or … even on the moon!
The Albuquerque-based organisation behind the initiative said 600 of the devices were already on their way to Haiti.
It said it was responding to the Haitian crisis by:
Providing faith, hope and love through God’s Word in audio.
With tens of thousands of Port-au-Prince residents living outdoors because their homes have collapsed or they fear aftershocks from last week’s quake, the audio Bible can bring them:
Hope and comfort that comes from knowing God has not forgotten them through this tragedy.
Meanwhile Travolta has said that he hopes his mission will inspire others.
What can Haitians expect from Scientology “ministers”?
When the Indian Ocean tsunami struck in 2005, Scientologist Randy Myers went to India to help victims.
According to the Washington Post, he did so by:
Employing the techniques he has learned from Scientology. More precisely, he is helping them heal themselves, eradicating pain waves and allowing energy waves to flow, clearing pathways for nerves to run errands of anatomical necessity, liberating the spirit to align with the body as described in the confident prose of the late L Ron Hubbard, founder of Scientology and the applied practices known as Dianetics.
I think I’ll stick with the Paracetamol.
Hat Tip: Alan H (for the Travolta report)
The Freethinker was founded in 1881 by GW Foote, an outspoken critic of religion. After the publication of 
January 19th, 2010 at 8:40 pm
Could be worse – They could put on free showings of ‘the book of eli’
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_Eli
January 19th, 2010 at 8:40 pm
At least if they sent proper paper Bibles the Haitians could use them to keep warm. Seriously though these people really are effing insane. They really are so desperate to promote their particular brand of guff that they ignore the real needs of disaster victims and send them these useless bits of garbage instead.
January 19th, 2010 at 8:55 pm
From that audio bible website:
Join the effort to reach our troops. Give the gift of God’s Word to a military man or military woman for only $25. This includes a Military BibleStick, an MP3 disc of the entire New Testament along with response card for service members to have New Testaments and KIDZ Bibles sent to their families.
Me Thinks the charity is buying these things from their own company….
http://www.faithcomesbyhearing.....y-and-fcbh
January 19th, 2010 at 10:06 pm
You know, Judas made the most sense sometimes.
January 19th, 2010 at 10:12 pm
Religions abusing of poor people in need, that’s not news.
January 19th, 2010 at 10:29 pm
Can we have some food/shelter/water – hell no! have a bible instead!
They just cannot put aside their insane need to spead the word for one second and concentrate on actually helping people.
January 19th, 2010 at 10:41 pm
I hate the way people such as these always try to brainwash others when they’re at their lowest ebb.
January 19th, 2010 at 10:49 pm
“Self-powered and can play the Bible… even on the moon!”
Okay, if they made a bible that can produce sound in a vacuum, I will have to become a Christian.
January 19th, 2010 at 10:52 pm
How is this contraption supposed to work on the Moon in a near-vacuum atmosphere? That is, how is the sound propagated? Religious science at its best as usual…
January 19th, 2010 at 11:10 pm
You Can’t even wipe ur Arse with it. Damn!
January 20th, 2010 at 12:45 am
Parasites, pure and simple.
January 20th, 2010 at 1:17 am
Chuckle!!! All you have to do is ask his holy saint, pastor Robertson why the plagues happened in Christian Europe generation after generation. Maybe he can enlighten us to why men, women, and children died and all their possessions burned:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plague_of_Justinian
Then ask him why his loving and forgiving god killed 3000 of his chosen people for doubting Moses?:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_calf
Pat Roberson is no different from Jim Jones. A witch doctor enslaving people afraid of their own mortality, with a promise of something after putrification. I guess all murderers are innocent, they just sent their victims to a better place. Christianity is such a conflict of bullshit. Suicide is a mortal sin, yet running armed into a wall of cops with weapon raised is not a mortal sin. LOL. Confess and you shall be absolved, but you piss on your little sisters bubblegum and don’t confess it, you burn in hell. LOL. Sorry to say it, but, there seems to be a cross section of human population that is not ready to open their eyes, even in a mirror.
NeoWolfe
January 20th, 2010 at 11:10 am
Rog, is Book of Eli not a good film then? I thought the trailer looked quite appealing.
January 20th, 2010 at 11:20 am
Send them all to the moon. Do it now!
January 20th, 2010 at 3:17 pm
@heng After being tricked into watching the film ‘knowing’ thinking it was SiFi I thought that I’d check out the plot of the book of eli, because of the title
That wiki link has an explanation of the plot – it seems rather bible-orientated for my liking, I must confess I’ve not seen it, but thankfully now I’m not going to waste two hours of my life.
January 20th, 2010 at 3:55 pm
Quote from the trailer
“This is not a book this is a WEAPON!”
Think I’ll give it a miss.
January 21st, 2010 at 6:27 am
People in Haiti are back to praying and praising, as priests are telling them god is still around, I guess enjoying the devastation. Which makes me wonder: why should people be helped who believe this swill? Maybe their god wants them to suffer a bit more.
January 22nd, 2010 at 12:09 am
What a bunch of armchair, whining, back-seat driving critical arseholes! All of you can be bothered to sit and throw abuse at others out there giving a hand so long as it doesn’t endanger your ‘right’ to sit back and throw remarks as to how this or that aint the way it is or shouldn’t be this or that way. Get off your dumb arses and lend a fucking hand and maybe your criticisms would mean something!
January 22nd, 2010 at 3:12 am
@kiwibro so, in your opinion, exactly how is the ‘aid’ mentioned in the original article going to help the people of Haiti? I would be interested read your explanation as I am sure it will explain your motives for that comment.
January 23rd, 2010 at 6:57 pm
Hello all-
First of all, thank you for helping us spread the word. Second of all, I wanted to let you know that in times of crisis, people greatly benefit from spiritual guidance. It is comforting to many and we see this all the time (for instance, the increase in church attendance after 9/11). So when the Haitian people requested the solar powered audio Bible, we wanted to do our best to fulfill that. Thirdly, we agree that their emergent needs are top priority and although we cannot use our funding for that (our donors provide funds to make and distribute audio Bibles only), we have partnered with other organizations to help meet those other needs. Fourthly, please, please, please consider the children. My family personally has been hit with a lot of tough times and during those times, it has been helpful to my children to try and maintain normalcy, as well as have an opportunity for fun. In Haiti, the children enjoy gathering around for story time, find comfort in connecting with their friends in group settings and therefore will benefit from hearing the stories in the audio Bible. This tragedy will forever have an effect on these little ones and however we can help, we will.
January 25th, 2010 at 7:55 am
Hitler just found out about this solar powered bible nonsense. He is pretty pissed:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdPNT5he1rs
January 26th, 2010 at 3:05 am
Am I understanding this correctly?
For the past few years atheists worldwide have literally wasted enormous amounts of money during times of recession, war and poverty not in helping anyone in any material need but in order to purchase bus ads and billboards attempting to demonstrated just how clever they consider themselves to be; and now they want to become the charity police—please!
Futher dissection of this particular atheist hypocrisy here.
January 29th, 2010 at 5:45 pm
I guess we’ll never know how many people died because these 600 talking bibles took the place of a consignment of MREs, drinking water or plasma.
Here’s an idea…. Why not just get the Pope or some other shaman to bless a nuke, then just turn the place into a sea of glass? This seems to me to be a far more efficient means of sending them wholesale to a “better place” than just allowing a handful of them to starve or bleed to death.
January 29th, 2010 at 6:26 pm
Good question. Let’s see now….
Would the recession have ended any faster had these advertisements not appeared on buses?
Doubtful. Indeed I was always led to believe that you spend your way out of a recession.
Would the non-appearance of the advertisements have ushered in an era of world peace?
Scratch one “war” argument.
What kind of impact on poverty would there have been had the same advertising budget been allocated to a series of faith-based announcements, or if the panels had just been left blank?
Marvel at the brass neck of adherents to a faith whose teachings on AIDS and birth control condemn millions to a life of disease and penury, lecturing us on poverty!
No, I don’t think you are.