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“Pregnancy is Not a Disease”: Birth of an Anti-Contraception Rallying Cry

By Sarah Morice-Brubaker

…ement that insurance plans will be required to offer contraception without copay, unless they meet the conditions allowing for a religious exemption. The HHS guidelines follow recent recommendations issued by the Institute of Medicine. Included are contraceptive methods like IUDs and tubal ligations which have a high upfront cost but, when offered for free, may be especially effective in reducing abortions. Despite their promise for preventing uni…

Global Precap: 5 Religion and LGBT Stories to Look For in 2015

By Peter Montgomery

…gious liberty cannot co-exist. The World Congress of Families withdrew its official backing for its 2014 Summit in Moscow after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and annexation of Crimea, but the meeting went ahead and WCF officials and American Religious Right activists such as Brian Brown still attended. One of the organizers of the 2015 summit is Janice Shaw Crouse of Concerned Women for America, who has lavished praise on Putin’s Russia for resisti…

The Vatican ‘Doubts’ Same-Sex Love, But More Doubt The Vatican

By Mary E. Hunt

…asy answers” on these questions, noting that the document reflects current official teaching. True enough. What it does not reflect is current practice. In Catholicism, practice always comes first, then often a heavy-handed condemnation, then documents trickle out that confirm what is already the case. Of course this can take decades, even centuries, but that is the usual order of things. This little theological tidbit might actually foreshadow so…

From Organized Religion to Organizing Religion: Brian D. McLaren Wants Christians to Be Better

By Peter Laarman

…a friend who consults with the government of China was told by a Communist official: “We know that our current economic system isn’t working. We know we need a new one. Whatever it is, it will still be called communism because our constitution requires it to be so named.” I don’t know what a just, generous, and sustainable economic system should be called, nor do I know how to get from where we are to where we should be. So for now, I want to focu…

Why Mike Lindell and the Majority of White Evangelicals Can’t Give Up On ‘The Big Lie’

By Mark Leuchter

…ment of biblical prophecy, with Trump spreading the MAGA gospel with every official pen-stroke. And this is where the belief in biblical inerrancy intersects with Lindell’s devotion to the Big Lie. Just as someone can never question the Bible’s inerrancy, one can never question the unassailable truth of Trumpism. To do so would be no less than to question the will of the deity who, for many conservative evangelicals like Lindell, directly chose Tr…

How Mario Cuomo Made the World Safe for Pro-Choice Catholics

By Patricia Miller

…nto experience.” But he was also clear that his responsibility as a public official in a pluralistic society transcended his Catholicism: …the Catholic who holds political office in a pluralistic democracy—who is elected to serve Jews and Muslims, atheists and Protestants, as well as Catholics—bears special responsibility. He or she undertakes to help create conditions under which all can live with a maximum of dignity and with a reasonable degree…

Postcard from the Vatican

By Louis A. Ruprecht

…ritual, about the July 21st edition of L’Osservatore Romano, the Vatican’s official weekly newspaper, most of which was dedicated to the very weighty (and altogether earthly) matter of legal reforms that were approved by the Pope in late May, as a response to the current crisis. I have commented before on the curious way in which the Vatican is also a state, and as an independent state, is composed of many bureaucracies working sometimes in surrea…

Daschle Is Gone—But the Stench of Insider Corruption Lingers

By Peter Laarman

…peddling was rotten. I hope that people of faith who can still relate to good old Jeremiah (“Woe to him who builds his house by unrighteousness: your eyes and heart are only on your dishonest gain…”) will remember that official Washington’s culture—and the casual arrogance that accompanies power and privilege—is incapable of correcting itself. It’s up to us to call it out again and again—and as loudly and even rudely as we can….

Why the Women’s Ordination Question Will Shape the Future of Mormonism

By Joanna Brooks

…rum—a development some trace to the March 2013 launch of Ordain Women’s website featuring pictures and testimonials from rank-and-file Mormons who support ordination and a more equitable role for women in LDS Church leadership and service. Today, the global operations of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are governed and directed by an all-male organizational chain of command. Mormon women may participate in some decision-making at…

Country of Georgia Considers Constitutional Marriage Ban; Hindu Nationalist Leader Surprises India With Call to Decriminalize Homosexuality; No End to Anti-LGBT Propaganda Campaign in Indonesia; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…since a group of Dominican evangelicals posted it to the White House’s website last week. A group of Catholic bishops in the Dominican Republic on Monday urged the country’s government to formally complain to the U.S. about Brewster’s “conduct” that includes visiting schools and attending public events with his husband, Bob Satawake. National Security Advisor Susan Rice last week reiterated the Obama administration’s support of Brewster. A group…