John Lennon said that life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans. Those plans might include New Year’s resolutions. I never make any, knowing from experience that things will happen regardless. Not that I don’t intend to make an effort to sort out the more disorganised parts of my life – that’s work in progress – but there’s no reason why I should be any more successful if I start a list of things to do on 1st January than at any other time of the year.

SEVERAL POLLS indicate that the term “atheism” has acquired such an extraordinary stigma in the United States that being an atheist is now a perfect impediment to a career in politics (in a way that being black, Muslim or homosexual is not). According to a recent Newsweek poll, only 37% of Americans would vote for an otherwise qualified atheist for president. Link: 10 myths — and 10 truths — about atheism – Los Angeles Times

One of the greatest mysteries of the universe is about to be unravelled with the first detailed, three-dimensional map of dark matter – the invisible material that makes up most of the cosmos. Astronomers announced yesterday that they have achieved the apparently impossible task of creating a picture of something that has defied every attempt to detect it since its existence was first postulated in 1933. The Universe gives up its deepest secret: The Independent

There’s an online poll on the Channel 4 website, asking “Is atheism a meaningful alternative to religion?” So far, the religionists are winning. Go and vote now! Tags: Poll, Channel+4, TV, Atheism

For a long time, Christians have been dominating American politics and public life even more than they do here. It’s been hard to find any American atheists willing to come out of the closet, but things are changing. Richard Dawkins’ book ‘The God Delusion’ has had record sales and his promotional lecture tour has drawn large audiences, many of them sympathetic. In The State News, John Bice writes about the ‘growing popularity of atheism’…

E-mail: mail@suffolkhumanists.org.uk Event description: T4TD by Margaret Nelson during Mark Murphy’s programme on BBC Radio Suffolk (95.5, 95.9, 103.9 & 104.6 fm). Listen online or listen again via the Radio Suffolk website.

Cabinet rejects exemption on gay adoptions | Special reports | Guardian Unlimited The Catholic church is almost certain to lose its battle for special treatment over gay adoption rules under a deal agreed by the cabinet to heal damaging divisions between senior ministers. Cabinet sources said the new proposals would require Catholic adoption agencies to consider gay couples – or close down – after a reasonable delay that would allow them to ensure that the children in their care are properly dealt with.

Please help to prevent Islamic Sharia law being implemented in the Kurdistan region. Please sign the petition to remove Article No 7 from the proposed Kurdish constitution. Article 7 clearly states that Islam is the main official religion, and that laws should be based on it. If this happens, it will lead to the violation of the most fundamental and basic liberties of the people of Kurdistan, and most of all undermine the rights and freedoms of women.

Since the story about the alleged kidnap plot by “terrorists” broke today, BBC news has been dominated by it. Reporters have been interviewing people in the Alum Rock and Sparkbrook areas of Birmingham where the arrests were made. The “Muslim community” is in the news again, with indignant young men protesting that the “community” ought to have been consulted before any arrests were made. Of course! That’s what the police ought to do – ‘consult’ people about whether or not to arrest anyone.