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New Ex-Offender Program Puts Church Ahead Of State

By Mark Bergen

…of the First Amendment. Alex Luchenitser, the lead litigator for Americans United in the case, wrote in a legal journal, “Inmates who did not subscribe to the program’s religious teachings faced discrimination and pressure to convert.” Despite legal challenges, PFM continued to minister in prisons and two years ago decided to direct a bulk of its considerable resources toward cutting recidivism, the rate of repeat offenses and incarceration, throu…

Raelians’ “Clitoraid” Met With Suspicion in Burkina Faso

By Joseph Laycock

…rci Bowers has worked with the program extensively. Clitoraid engaged in a number of fund raising projects, including an “Adopt a Clitoris” campaign and a number of partnerships with companies that make vibrators. This funding was used to recruit and fund a team of surgeons (who are not Raelians) and to establish a “pleasure hospital” in Burkina Faso. There is some controversy as to what percentage of women who undergo the surgery will be able to…

Anti-Gay Violence Rages in Gambia; Conservative ‘Complementarity’ Confab; Coming Out in Iraq Can Be Death Sentence; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…rs reported from Gabarone that the Botswana judge, Terrence Rannoane, said freedom of expression and association were protected by the country’s constitution, even though engaging in homosexual acts was still a crime. Also this week, LGBT Weekly published a wrap-up of the state of LGBT equality in Africa. Vatican: Conference on ‘Complementarity’ Draws Raves from Anti-Gay Religious Right The Vatican-hosted interfaith conference on the “complementar…

Debunking the Myth That Democracy Is “Incompatible” With Islam

By Asma Afsaruddin

…g no disjunction between religious beliefs and democratic principles. In a number of Muslim-majority countries, the preference was even stronger. In Jordan, for example, 54% of men and 55% of women want Sharia to be the only source of legislation. Interestingly, from a comparative perspective, a 2006 Gallup poll indicated that 46% of Americans say that they want the Bible to be a source of legislation. These findings corroborate earlier studies co…

Black Churches are Burning: Is It the 1990s All Over Again?

By Katie Day

…or the Rev. Clementa Pinckney, President Obama called us back to being the United States. Hate crimes against black churches (and other religious groups as well) continue to occur. Many of the burned churches in the 1990s were surprised by all the media attention and that white Americans were just becoming aware of what had been part of the African American experience for generations. (A number of the sites, in fact, had been victims of arson in t…

A Secret History of Satan

By W. Scott Poole

…conditions gave rise to this phenomenon and what does it tell us about the United States. Did you have a specific audience in mind when writing? I had several groups in mind, all of which I think will be interested and challenged by the book. For example, I am fascinated by the growing number of pop culture addicts who want to examine how their interest in fantasy, science fiction, horror, and the fantastic in general connects to theology, popular…

Are Evangelical Films Destined to Leave Secular Audiences Behind?

By Daniel Silliman

…he movie-making ministry of a Baptist church in Albany, Georgia, has had a number of commercial triumphs. Facing the Giants was made for about $10,000 and grossed $10 million. Fireproof was made for $500,000 and was the highest grossing independent film of 2008, with more than $33 million in ticket sales. The studio’s latest effort, Courageous, released in 2011, is the success people dream about. It was made for $2 million. It brought in $9.1 mill…

The Gospel of Contradiction: An Interview with Mary Gordon

By Nathan Schneider

…mmunity that I can lead them to more familiarity with a very great text. A number of times you bring up Thomas Jefferson’s abridgement of the Gospels. He seems to be someone who, in some ways, you’re identifying with but also making very different choices from. I don’t have the luxury of just snipping out the parts of the Bible I don’t like. Whereas I greatly admire Jefferson and the Enlightenment figures for their courage in blasting through so m…

Along Came a Spider: What the Pope Doesn’t See

By Anthea Butler

…onal wrongdoing and shame will come surely, as many of the dioceses in the United States become uninsurable and the number of Catholic churches dwindles. As membership shrinks, the number of ordinations decreases, and the coffers dry up, perhaps the Vatican and its leadership will be forced to look at its decrepit, hierarchical structure, and fix it. I doubt it, however. Like the spider who crawled across Pope Benedict’s robes this weekend in Prag…

Turkish Police Move Against Activists Who Defied Pride Ban; And More in Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…event on Saturday, June 24, “under heavy police protection,” reports Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, which reported no serious incidents in spite of “a small number of counterdemonstrators from the Serbian Orthodox Church holding a sign reading ‘No to Sodomic Revolution.’” But bigger news may be just ahead: Meanwhile, the Serbian parliament convened to launch proceedings needed for the election of Ana Brnabic as the new premier. If elected, the 4…