Religion Dispatches
…llgowns (or bikinis). Until then, I hope we can find happiness and our own love stories. When I finished Virgin Tales, I searched for Jordyn online. She got married this year. I was happy for her….
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…esearch and Therapy of Homosexuality board member, and purging of Exodus’s online bookstore of all materials advocating reorientation. The second was Columbia psychiatrist Robert Spitzer’s renunciation of his infamous study arguing that sexual orientation change was possible—a study based on research subjects recruited by Exodus. In the wake of these events, the “change” question is shifting from whether or not gay people can really change their s…
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…u use the tent cities that the Occupy movement set up in cities around the country as a metaphor for God’s presence in the movement. Why is the symbolism of the tent important? SBT: We didn’t get to put up any tents in Chicago [at Occupy]. Rahm Emmanuel landed on Occupy like a ton of bricks. I went to the encampment on LaSalle each morning for coffee and donuts. CTS students and I made a golden calf and carried it around at various demonstrations….
Read More…ts—which, fairness should note, get mobilized without authorization in the service of all sorts of purposes, including multilevel marketing schemes. A reader somewhere in the Beehive State sent me the following message received via congregational email list: Subject: Women for Mitt Join Together Dear fellow Utah women! During the week of our Pioneer Days celebration, I’d like to invite you to join Utah women all throughout the state in sending a…
Read MoreIn the latest episode of my Bloggingheads show, Christianity Today online editor Sarah Pulliam Bailey and I discuss whether evangelical women’s rejection of Rush Limbaugh’s misogyny will have any impact on either their position on the contraception coverage requirement or the presidential election: You can watch the entire program here; we also discussed the KONY12 controversy and Mitt Romney’s evangelical problem. (Click on the links in the prog…
Read More…Smaller religious movements such as Pagan groups are often able to thrive online despite their small size and lack of resources. Conversely, the internet has presented liabilities for well-established religious institutions, particularly organizations that feature a hierarchical structure or esoteric teachings. Today’s cyber attack confirmed these predictions. As an acephalous group with no organizational structure, Anonymous is exactly the sort…
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…Lifeway also includes a publishing group, two conference centers, and two online shopping websites. Eric Metaxas is the author of the bestselling biography Bonhoeffer: Pastor Martyr, Prophet, Spy, published by Thomas Nelson. He told me that he thinks the retailer’s decision was “a misunderstanding of God’s idea of holiness.” Metaxas says that when Hollywood makes a film that portrays evangelical Christians in a positive light, Christians should e…
Read MoreFor the last several months there has been a flurry of discussion—mostly online, of course—about the impossibility of a literal Adam & Eve (see, e.g., here and here and here). This ruling-out has been accomplished recently by the Human Genome Project, which indicates that anatomically modern humans emerged from primate ancestors about 100,000 years ago, from a population of something like 10,000. In short, science has confirmed what many of us al…
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…tance, investors might support a number of projects through MicroPlace, an online micro-financing subsidiary of PayPal, with investments of as little as 20 dollars that help low income entrepreneurs in Texas, women merchants in Azerbaijan, the rural farmers of Cambodia, and so on, earning a return of 0.5% to 4.5% over 2-3 years. Not bad. Really? As a person of faith, am I supposed to be earning even nominal interest on the efforts of a women’s bea…
Read More…groups to increase efficiency and innovation in the delivery of goods and services. But I think there is a religious-spiritual undertone to the Occupy Wall Street protests that goes back to our core sense that you shouldn’t make money if you don’t make anything. If all you’re doing is moving your corporation’s capital around, you’re getting a windfall every time someone else’s genius makes you rich. I owned Apple stock for awhile myself, and made…
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