Religion Dispatches
…on cult crusades of the 1980s) are increasingly willing to set aside their reservations about Mormons when it suits their pragmatic and political interests. Glenn Beck marks an unprecedented national mainstreaming of a peculiar strand of religious political conservatism rooted in, and once isolated to, the Mormon culture regions of the American West. That Mormons are capable of leveraging disproportionate political influence with decisive results…
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…the founders of the evangelical Right to neutralize previous, Bible-based reservations about Catholic pro-life activism. By 1980, Jerry Falwell was off to the races. “The Bible clearly states that life begins at conception,” he declared in his book Listen America! Abortion “is murder according to the Word of God.” Falwell’s major reference for this claim was Psalm 139:13, where the author writes that God “knit me together in my mother’s womb.” Mo…
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…s good faith to those with whom one disagrees. For example, whatever one’s reservations might be about whether the “Come Let Us Reason Together Governing Agenda” goes far enough, it is indisputable that it marks movement in key policy areas. It is the first time that mainstream evangelicals have publicly supported policies on abortion that have no bans or restrictions and that include support for prevention of unintended pregnancy, including compr…
Read More…guage does not advance our cause. It has never softened a single heart nor changed a single mind. The blessings of faith carry the responsibility of civil and respectful debate. The task before us is to focus on the conservative beliefs and the values that unite us – let no agenda, narrow our vision or drive us apart. Posner characterized this as a mild reproach, met with tepid applause from the VVS crowd. But Romney’s words actually strike me as…
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…pting of LGBT people, but still less than 24% of Koreans said they had “no reservations about homosexuality,” according to a 2014 survey conducted by the Asian Institute for Policy Studies, a think tank. Korea has a large Christian population, and vocal Protestant groups have for years blocked the inclusion of sexual minorities in a proposed anti-discrimination bill by pressuring politicians to vote against it. Jang, the army chief of staff who al…
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…n short, the standards of any maturing society may not evolve, but they do change. Yet the decision of death is unchangeable. Perhaps persons inclined to the Christian faith might join others of similar ethical interest and inclination to perform a thought experiment. What if Jesus and Socrates had not been killed? What next? What might they have said in prison? Whom might they have reached, whom convinced? When might they have been released? How…
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…ark, and exactly one day before the election.] Back in May 2008, I made my reservations for the AAR and decided I would stay over for election day. It was the best decision of my life. From the Chicago Hilton Bar and the streets of Chicago, I saw history being made. I shouted and cried not only for the burden that is beginning to lift from our country, but from the burden of teaching the history of African-American religion with a heavy heart seme…
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…aves by way of hierarchy. The U.S. government splicing up Native land into reservations: “Plus the Great Chief in Washington promises your tribe $1 million.” The losers, criminals, and out-casts have learned to survive by imitating the powers that be. Duplicity, seduction, and addiction are the American reality. “Come on boys and gamble….I’ll take your money home.” In his lyrics, Hunter alerts us, however, to the danger. Like the ancient Greek cho…
Read More…rns for the welfare of society, many conservative evangelicals harbor deep reservations about supporting any programs that seem to deprioritize evangelism or run the risk of becoming too liberal or too secular. Socially engaged evangelicals counteract those concerns by insisting that faith-based activism can ideally be a vehicle for greater evangelism, not a distraction from it. But they often face strong ideological resistance and logistical cons…
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…k teenager growing up in the 1990s my relationship to The Ten Commandments changed. In an era influenced by Afrocentricity and politically conscious hip hop, this straightforward morality tale about slavery and freedom became complicated. The Egyptians were Africans, as my deep dive into Afrocentric literature revealed. And weren’t the Hebrews just foreign invaders who sought to form alliances with the enemies of ancient Kemet (Egypt)? Couple this…
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