Religulous documentary, by Bill Maher

I just watched the Religulous documentary directed by Larry Charles (who directed Borat, Seinfeld and Curbb Your Enthusiasm) and starring stand-up comedian Bill Maher (who is in the Comedy Central Top100 best comedy moments, hosted Politically Incorrect and currently hosts HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher).

The documentary bills itself as an "uproarious nonfiction film about the greatest fiction ever told."

In a statement about the film, Maher explained his rationale for making it:

It has been my pleasure over the last decade and a half to make organized religion one of my favorite targets. I often explained to people, "I don't need to make fun of religion, it makes fun of itself." And, then I go ahead and make fun of it too, just for laughs.

With religious fanatics like George Bush and Osama bin Laden now taking over the world, it seemed to me in recent years that this issue -- this cause of debunking the man behind the curtain -- needed to have a larger, more insistent and focused forum than late night television. I wanted to make a documentary, and I wanted it to be funny. In fact, since there is nothing more ridiculous than the ancient mythological stories that live on as today's religions, this movie would try to be a real knee slapper. Unless, of course, you're religious, then you might not like it.

As part of the film, Maher has also created a website, Disbeliefnet, as a parody of Beliefnet, the popular spiritual website.

I love the movie banner on that site:

About Bill Maher (Wikipedia)

Maher was born in New York City, the son of Julie (née Berman), a nurse, and William Maher, Sr., a network news editor and radio announcer. Maher was raised in his Irish American father's Catholic religion, and did not find out that his mother was Jewish until his teenage years; Maher's family stopped attending church when Maher was thirteen, because of Maher's father's disagreement with the Pope's position on birth control. Maher grew up in River Vale, New Jersey and graduated from Pascack Hills High School in Montvale, New Jersey. He received his Bachelor of Arts in English and History from Cornell University in 1978.

Maher favors a partial privatization of social security, ending corporate welfare, and legalization of gambling, prostitution, and marijuana. Maher is a member of NORML's Advisory Board, an organization which supports the decriminalization of marijuana, and is an open marijuana user. Additionally, Maher describes himself as an environmentalist, and he frequently alludes to the topic of global warming on his show Real Time. Moreover, he is highly suspicious of corporations and often criticizes figures with close ties to industry.

Maher is a board member of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and has expressed his distaste for the pharmaceutical and health care industries in general, on the grounds that they make their money out of curing people who are made sick by consuming unhealthy food that society urges upon the public. He also maintains that mass consumption of high fructose corn syrup is a contributor to the American obesity epidemic. On the August 11, 2005, episode of Larry King Live, Maher said he was not a vegetarian, adding "...but I don't eat a lot of meat."[12] Maher has stated that he has a "very eccentric diet."

Maher is highly critical of religion, which he once described as a neurological disorder that justifies crazies and stops people from thinking.[23] In two separate appearances on Real Time, comedian George Carlin and Maher alleged that religion is a cause of many of society's problems and that the practices of religion are mired in hypocrisy. Maher credited Carlin's views as inspiration for him to speak out against religion.

Maher has said many times that religion works under the guise of morality but that its tenets generally have nothing to do with morality, that religious prohibitions are being confused with moral law. In Maher's view, just because a religion prohibits abortion or decries homosexuality, that does not mean that having an abortion or being homosexual are immoral acts. Instead, Maher argues that an immoral person is one who harms others through activities such as murder or rape.

Maher opposes religious monuments, such as The Ten Commandments, being placed in or near court houses, pointing out that this would violate the separation of church and state. He has countered the assertion of conservative Christians who claim that American law is based on the Ten Commandments by saying that of the ten, only two (the prohibitions on murder and theft) apply to American law. The other commandments, he argues, such as honoring no god before the Judeo-Christian God, keeping the Sabbath holy, or honoring thy mother and thy father, are not American laws at all. In answer to the suggestion that a divine moral authority is necessary, he suggests "Couldn't we just get together and agree on the few basic Commandments that are laws? Like 'I won't slaughter you, and don't take my shit.'". Maher has stated on both Politically Incorrect and Real Time, and in several appearances on Larry King Live, viewpoints that reference a kind of deism, although Maher has never declared himself a deist. He has stated that he does indeed believe in a god, but that religion is nothing more than tradition and superstition. In 2002 he told the Onion AV Club, "I'm not an atheist. There's a really big difference between an atheist and someone who just doesn't believe in religion. Religion to me is a bureaucracy between man and God that I don't need. But I'm not an atheist, no. I believe there's some force. If you want to call it God... I don't believe God is a single parent who writes books".He asserts that religion provides answers to questions that "cannot possibly be answered." Questions such as "Where do I go when I die?" or "Is there a heaven?", he says, are impossible to answer. By claiming to have the answers, Maher argues, religion is dishonest and it "stops people from thinking."

During Maher's appearance on Larry King Live on August 11, 2005, he said he was an agnostic who nevertheless is still quite open to the idea that God exists. The following exchange also occurred on that program:

CALLER: "Hi. Well, my question is, the Lord spoke to me approximately three years ago, and if the Lord spoke to you [Maher], I was wondering if you'd become a believer."

MAHER: "No, I'd check into Bellevue, which is what you should do..."