Search for "cheap airline tickets to dominican republic from pittsburgh pa phone number 1-800-299-7264"

Book Bannings Are Bad Enough, But Where Those Involved Are Considered Demonic, the Stakes Could Get Much Higher

By Frederick Clarkson

…one recent example, Patriot Mobile—a NAR 7 Mountains Dominionism-inspired phone company in Texas—bankrolled the campaigns of 11 candidates for school board in the suburbs of Ft. Worth in May 2022. They all won, and they subsequently took control of four school boards. In one school district (but probably not the last) 40 books were soon pulled from the shelves for “review.” It remains to be seen whether book burnings will become more a part of th…

Duterte Cites Catholic Heritage in Opposing Marriage Equality, and More in the Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…the Status of Women. Also last week, the Trump administration dropped U.S. participation in hearings being held by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. Philippines: President cites Catholic heritage in backtracking on marriage equality President Rodrigo Duterte, who has become infamous for a wave of extra-judicial killings carried out with his approval, said during his 2016 presidential campaign that he would consider signing legislation…

Spiritual Mapping Evangelicals Battle Vodou in Haiti

By Reza Aslan

…day. Its infant-mortality rate is 2.5 times higher than its neighbor, the Dominican Republic. The devastating earthquake of 2010 not only shattered much of the country’s infrastructure, it left as many as 300,000 dead. According to the Spiritual Mappers, these conditions are not the result of socio-economic instability. They are not the legacy of what is widely regarded as history’s most brutal example of the slave trade. Rather, every single one…

Global LGBT Recap: Homogeopolitics; Dalai Lama Says Gay is OK; Pope Says Civil Unions May Be

By Peter Montgomery

…r 2009 ruling by Judge Mounir Suleiman that consensual homosexual relations were not against nature and could therefore not be prosecuted under Article 534. Spain: Court Recognizes Parental Right of Same-Sex Partner Spain’s Supreme Court ruled that the a woman whose partner had given birth to a child as a “joint project” should be considered one of the child’s parents after the couple broke up….

Russian Attack on LGBTs at UN Rejected; Gay Cake Controversy Rages in N. Ireland; Bishop Calls for Marriage Referendum in Puerto Rico; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…t to abandon plans to execute a young Kurdish Iranian to “prove that their participation at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva is more than a mere PR exercise.” Puerto Rico: Religious, political leaders slam government for ending defense of marriage ban Last Friday, Justice Secretary Cesar Miranda announced that the Puerto Rican government would no longer defend a ban on marriage by same sex couples against federal court challenges of the law’s…

Saving Teens from Obama: When Bible Study Goes Wrong

By Vyckie Garrison

…vantaged, mostly Hispanic kids between the ages of 10 and 19—to see such a partisan film as part of their Bible study discussion on “justice.” When Chassé had first seen it, she had returned home from Teen Night with a barrage of accusations against President Obama, the candidate she had been planning to vote for this November. “Is it true that Obama’s trying to get rid of all of America’s nuclear weapons so that we are defenseless against Islamic…

Burning Man: Religious Event or Sheer Hedonism?

By Lee Gilmore

…lly grew into an internationally renowned event that draws close to 50,000 participants annually. For one week in late August and early September, an elaborate civic infrastructure called “Black Rock City” is constructed, featuring a carefully laid out grid of streets in which participants set up hundreds of different “theme camps.” Organizers provide some basic services (camp placement, public information, and porta-potties being just a few), bu…

Exclusive: Columnist Jonathan Merritt on his Sudden Departure From Religion News Service

By Kaya Oakes

…couldn’t have been further from the truth.” “I was happy to let the story pass under the radar and to move on, but I felt, as a journalist, I needed to set the record straight.” Reached on the phone on July 2nd, Merritt described a slowly degrading relationship with RNS, where he began blogging in 2013. Merritt was hired by former editor Kevin Eckstrom, who assured Merritt the blog would be fully under Merritt’s control. “Within six months,” Merr…

Behind a Recent Stunt in Idaho Lies a Dangerous Theocratic Movement

By Chrissy Stroop

…ors involved in the June 23 stunt managed to pull it off. “I feel that the Republican Party in my state right now has been taken over by anti-government libertarians, and it is very split,” explains local political organizer Alicia Abbott, who works with an initiative called Reclaim Idaho, in a phone interview with RD. An entrepreneurial professional home builder and remodeler, Abbott focuses her advocacy on issues like Medicaid expansion and impr…

Retribution v. Reform in American Justice

By Jennifer Graber

…ous tradition actively engaged in prison visitation. When I was 10, I accompanied my mother and my Sunday School class to the Indiana State Prison at Michigan City. I had a pen pal who was incarcerated there. I sent him letters and sticks of gum. I visited him in prison several times. I thought all Christians did that sort of thing. Finding out that I was wrong about that, including the fact that there were Christians who supported capital punishm…