2000+ people left the Finnish EL Church in 24 hrs

[SPMaximus]

well, we are waiting for his new show, but about a month ago subtv, the channel that has shown late night with conan obrien and the tonight show with conan obrien for like a decade, said they havent decided if they were gonna pick up his new show

his new show premieres november 8th

typo

[Ronja]

Has anyone ever heard of a comparable rush out of a religious organization?

It is now official and certain: since Tuesday evening, over 20,000 "extra" people have resigned (even when we count away max 150 people per day, which is the normal rate of resigning). When one considers that the number of resignations for the whole year 2008 was 40,410, this is staggering.

If you are interested, the people who run the web service for resigning from ELCoF (and from the Orthodox Church of Finland, the other "official" or "state" church here) have made a new special counter, which counts the resignations from Tuesday 12th October 9 PM (when the TV program that started this avalanche began) onwards: http://eroakirkosta.fi/static/ek-tilastot/ylea2.html

[Feck]

We don't have a way to resign from the church here .Nobody under 60 goes on Sundays anyway .

[Tero]

well, we are waiting for his new show, but about a month ago subtv, the channel that has shown late night with conan obrien and the tonight show with conan obrien for like a decade, said they havent decided if they were gonna pick up his new show

his new show premieres november 8th

typo

I've pretty much given up on late night TV, but I can get Daily Show updates on their website.
http://www.thedailyshow.com/
It looks like something Sub TV would carry.

[Svartalf]

Thanks for keeping us updated on this great news, Ronja!

(who pointed out that Räsänen should carry her part of the responsibility for the mass exodus from the church)

I wouldn't give her the credit for that .. clearly the people are taking responsibility for their own thinking .. and high time too.

Actually, maybe you're giving the people noo much credit and they just got chased away by too much unPC unconsensualness...

[Ronja]

To boldly go where no-one has gone before...

Sometime between 8 and 9 PM today (EEST) we passed what has thus far been The Final Frontier: the yearly record of resignations from 2008. There are now well over 50,000 Finns who have left the ELCoF this year, almost exactly half of them within one week.

For the fifth day running the number of resignations is again very likely to increase with about 1,000 per day. Nobody has any idea how long the acceleration of resignations can go on, and when it finally does slow down, what level the daily numbers might stabilize around. Today has been an unbelievable national-level media circus - the Arch Bishop alone has been on TV and on the radio at least thrice - there's no counting the "lesser" bishops and vicars, the chair of the Finnish Freethinkers has been once on the radio and twice on TV, the head of the "Equality of World Views" association - they run the resignation web service - has been twice at least on the radio, and the infamous chair of the "Christian Democratic" party was on the first page of every single newspaper's web edition (OK, so I only checked the seven biggest in circulation), and twice on TV. And these are just the ones I've happened to hear about (via Facebook, mostly).

The topic that freethinkers and many liberal xians do their best to keep in the spotlight is "Now would be a really good time to separate the church and the state" whereas many bishops focus on trying to convince people to stay as members of the church, because the liberal vote is sorely needed in the nation-wide parish elections in November.

I am both happy and a bit nervous for Finland, but also a bit worried - this example may make it more difficult to establish, in other countries, easy-to-use web services for leaving religious organizations. Heaven forbid, people might actually use such services!!!

[Ronja]

And the prime minister can't keep her yap shut, and has the audacity to criticize others for using the church/homosexuality theme for political points! At least the president had the good taste to not comment, other than "It is good that these things are discussed" (she's not a member).

[beige]

I am both happy and a bit nervous for Finland, but also a bit worried - this example may make it more difficult to establish, in other countries, easy-to-use web services for leaving religious organizations. Heaven forbid, people might actually use such services!!!

That's true, I'm amazed they actually provide that service at all.

[SPMaximus]

And the prime minister can't keep her yap shut, and has the audacity to criticize others for using the church/homosexuality theme for political points! At least the president had the good taste to not comment, other than "It is good that these things are discussed" (she's not a member).

the president is probably dancin' behind closed doors

[Svartalf]

And the prime minister can't keep her yap shut, and has the audacity to criticize others for using the church/homosexuality theme for political points! At least the president had the good taste to not comment, other than "It is good that these things are discussed" (she's not a member).

Wait... what kind of country are you? is the president a real political personality, or is he there only for decoration?

[Ronja]

And the prime minister can't keep her yap shut, and has the audacity to criticize others for using the church/homosexuality theme for political points! At least the president had the good taste to not comment, other than "It is good that these things are discussed" (she's not a member).

the president is probably dancin' behind closed doors

If I had to bet, I would bet for that and not against. Once upon a time she was the chair of our national Sexual Equality Association (SETA), and despite having a biological daughter and having been with the same man for ages (they married only after she was elected, to make travel and protocol abroad easier) has been repeatedly accused by various bigots for being a lesbian.

Her/their cats (and other pets) are adorable: http://www.tpk.fi/public/default.aspx?n ... ture=en-US

[Ronja]

And the prime minister can't keep her yap shut, and has the audacity to criticize others for using the church/homosexuality theme for political points! At least the president had the good taste to not comment, other than "It is good that these things are discussed" (she's not a member).

Wait... what kind of country are you? is the president a real political personality, or is he there only for decoration?

She, Svartalf. She.

To put it very briefly, the president has these main duties (below), so the office is not purely decorative, though the prime minister has more power, if she chooses to pull rank:

Under the Constitution of Finland executive power is vested in the President of the Republic and the Government.

The President of the Republic conducts Finland’s foreign policy in co-operation with the Government and decides upon her relations with other states and her actions in international organisations or negotiations.

The President of the Republic is the Commander-in-Chief of the Defence Forces.

Source: http://www.tpk.fi/public/default.aspx?n ... ture=en-US

[Ronja]

I am both happy and a bit nervous for Finland, but also a bit worried - this example may make it more difficult to establish, in other countries, easy-to-use web services for leaving religious organizations. Heaven forbid, people might actually use such services!!!

That's true, I'm amazed they actually provide that service at all.

Well, AFAIK the whole thing started in 2003, first as a charity-funded snail-mailing service, organized by a few active free-thinkers: fill in a form on the web and the association printed and posted it for you. In 2005, when email was legalized as a form of contact with government authorities and civil servants - that they have to accept email in most cases and cannot demand paper letters unless there is a real reason - the service started to email the population magistrates. At first the magistrates did not want to accept email, despite of the new legislation, and the association had to take them to court. The magistrates lost the case. Two magistrates (one of them the largest, Helsinki) still demand that people send the resignation from their own email address, so for such resigners an email attachment file is produced.

Simple, really. And before you say that that can't be done in your country, remember that that was what many people said about the Finnish service also - that nobody would donate enough money, that they would make mistakes and get the wrong people resigned, that email at least won't be acceptable and/or work... the dogs have barked, but the caravan has kept going.

If you start thinking of doing this, I can put you in touch with the people who have the most experience about how to do it, and can give both valuable tips and working software, if you ask them nicely.

[Svartalf]

It's still Tarja Halonen? wow, I thought her retired for some time (then again, I'd never have believed how long Vigdis Finnbogadottir lasted in Iceland until I saw it)

I just looked at wikipedia about the government of Finland, and the parliament... It's weird... the center party is represented as the rightmost political formation in parliament... is that just a relativistic effect because they are less to the left than the others, or are they really to the right, with laissez faire economics, small state and the bells and whistles?

I don't think that a party that was really fascist hard to the right could get that many seats in Finland... then again, just how bad are they? Do you have fascists of any significance?

BTW, you speak of this whole business of quitting the church like it was a matter of administrative importance? Is there a matter of church tax involved?

[SPMaximus]

church taxes its members some 1-2%

my brother has to pay like 500 euros/year to the blood suckers, his motivation for staying a member seemed to be getting married in a church (i think its free?), at least thats the only reason i got from him when i told him that i had left
ive since come to the conclusion that hes a little thick