Religion Dispatches
…gicians have clientele rather than a church. The Anba Dlo festival is an index that Vodou has begun to enter the American mainstream. With resources not available to many Vodou practitioners, advocates like Glassman can demonstrate that Vodou is not merely a collection of magical practices, but a religious tradition complete with its own values and worldview….
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…urity in the culture. You have a lot of historical information and theological background in this book that religion students would already know. So was this for a more mainstream audience? I wrote it because I was annoyed with some writers because I knew they knew better. I said, “There’s bad faith here.” These people are supplying the data but they go along with the lie. But I was also writing it for a number of people having these doubts who ne…
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…t because, according to journalist Maury Terry, Lueken also made anonymous phone calls to reporters investigating the Son of Sam murders. She offered information connecting David Berkowitz to a Satanic cult. I’m very interested in Satanic Panic and it seems that the Baysiders had a major role in disseminating urban legends that serial killers are part of an organized network of murderous cultists. 4. What are some of the biggest misconceptions abo…
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…nzalez de la Vega, the Supreme Court clerk who helped Méndez bring the Oaxaca case, said. But now, with scores of amparos pending, “they are not saying anything.” Gonzalez attributes this in part to the fact that there isn’t much history of using the courts to force widespread change in Mexico, and so neither activists nor the media fully understand the scale of the change that’s underway. Méndez thinks this will change as the litigation moves fro…
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…cted against substance abuse. There’s nothing like this in the epidemiological or clinical research. It’s jaw dropping. And it drove me nuts, as a parent, that I didn’t see other parents benefiting from this. I could see it clear as day every day in my lab, and it wasn’t crossing the barrier of the lab. I grew up in the Bible Belt. There were lots of opportunities to cultivate “transcendent spiritual relationships,” and I think we probably didn’t…
Read More…eer put his hand on Monk’s shoulder and praised him, saying, “We’ve gotten phone calls from military members who are undergoing discrimination…and with the exception of him, those folks that have called us have all wanted to remain anonymous. Sergeant Monk, to his credit, is willing to stand up.” Let’s read between the lines here: Monk is, quite literally, the best example of discrimination against Christians in the military that the Liberty Inst…
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…k of him as a genie inside a lamp. Plus, that’s not racist, or anthropological. It’s xenobiological.) In hard times of my life, the Qur’an has always been there for me, a source of support and comfort, and Lord knows we all need our inspiration and sustenance. Your journey is your own. It’s a terrible thing to have to have one’s life scrutinized, pored over, mocked, insulted, and constantly found wanting, when all you did in the first place was ma…
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…numerous car chases we bring to their urban cores? ECB policy! Most heretically: Can you be friends with our nemeses? Uh-oh. Spy is much more than irreverent slapstick flick; it’s edgy in its honesty, valuing sororal loyalty to the point of political infidelity. In an age when there is no higher value than being open-minded, comedy might be the most politically subversive means to any end. Cartoons are blasphemy, comics are pundits. And don’t let…
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…y, “more than a church.” It is “a place of worship that was founded by African Americans seeking liberty” and “a sacred place in the history of Charleston and in the history of America.” Yet, as Obama noted, Emanuel, like other black churches, has been the target of violence, not just last night, but throughout its history. In an excellent essay at TPM, Benjamin Park writes about how black churches have long “served as a flashpoint for hatred from…
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…scopalian I was participating in the liturgy. I was living into the liturgical calendar. I was in Sunday School, with certain stories about Jesus and about Scripture. The discussions about what it means to be a Christian or about what it means to be a follower of Jesus, which are common in certain traditions, and where that engagement with Christian identity is so much on the surface and so central to the practices of worship—I don’t think I exper…
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