Prolific author and journalist Christopher Hitchens on how his struggle with cancer has affected his personal views on the question of an afterlife. Hitchens is a lifelong atheist and his views on religion are further discussed in his bestselling book God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything.

I wonder how many politicians and world leaders have balls to be openly atheist and run for public office, like the new Australian PM Julia Gillard:

New Prime Minister Julia Gillard assured Australia’s Christian majority on Thursday that her atheism would not affect government funding to church-run schools if she is re-elected. Gillard, who was sworn in last month and promptly called elections, was the first prime minister in the federation’s 109-year history to take an affirmation of office instead of swearing on a Bible.

I believe that in politics, religion shouldn’t matter at all because the work of public officials should never be influenced by personal beliefs or religious affiliations. Unfortunately, we live in an era when religious groups and leaders are openly saying that the idea of separating your personal life or beliefs from your professional conduct should not apply to government.

Australian PM says her atheism no threat to church schools, welfare [USAToday]

Written and directed by Stephen Marshall, Holy Wars goes behind the scenes of the 1400 year old conflict between Islam and Christianity.

Shot over a four year period in America, Britain, Lebanon, and Pakistan, Holy Wars follows a danger-seeking Christian missionary and a radical Irish Muslim convert, both of whom believe in an apocalyptic battle, after which their religion will ultimately rule the world. Tracking their lives from the onset of the “War on Terror” through the election of Barack Obama, HolyWars shows that even the most radical of believers can be transformed by our changing world.

The movie opens July 30 in Los Angeles and August 6 in NYC. Official website here.

If Jesus could heal a blind person he happened to meet, then why not heal blindness? What was so wonderful about his casting out devils, so that the devils would enter a herd of pigs instead? That seemed sinister: more like black magic. With all this continual prayer, why no result? Why did I have to keep saying, in public, that I was a miserable sinner? Why was the subject of sex considered so toxic? These faltering and childish objections are, I have since discovered, extremely common-place, partly because no religion can meet them with any satisfactory answer.

—Christopher Hitchens in God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything.

The predisposition to religious belief is the most complex and powerful force in the human mind and in all probability an ineradicable part of human nature.

—Edward O. Wilson, renowned American biologist, researcher, theorist and author of On Human Nature.