Religion Dispatches
…evolution is incompatible with the Gospel of Jesus Christ,” a significant number of evangelicals are working to convince their fellow believers of their compatibility. Their efforts are evident in the increasing number of books, conferences, and organizations—such as Francis Collins’ BioLogos—that have formed around the topic. Cracks are likewise showing in what once was understood as a unanimous and uncritical evangelical support of Israel as ep…
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…t the white nationalist ideology that inspired him is also implicated in a number of other recent attacks, including the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting in October, the killing of 49 Muslim worshippers last month in New Zealand, and the 2015 murder of nine African-American Christian worshippers in Charleston, South Carolina. In Earnest’s twisted worldview, “every Jew is responsible for the meticulously planned genocide of the European race,” and he…
Read More…sure softball questions, few dissident voices, and reverent talk about the number of ciboria necessary to serve communion in baseball stadiums. And, we are all supposed to know what ciboria are (for the record, they are the goblet-shaped metal vessels that hold the hosts—that is, the wafers—used for communion). Catholic terminology is about the only thing used liberally in these exercises. Television hosts like Tim Russert fairly swoon over their…
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…ing their children to do the same, they could win the culture wars through numbers alone. What’s the most important take-home message for readers? My main concern about these convictions is not so much the plans for Christian dominion that Quiverfull authors and homeschooling ministries discuss, but rather that in the service of these ideas, many women are subjecting themselves to an often punishing lifestyle. Quiverfull is not just about the…
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…ups, such as Toronto-based Salaam and US-based Al-Fatiha, and by a growing number of Muslim scholars in order to push back against the most conservative Islamic voices and open a space for Muslim gender and sexual minorities. The Internet also provides a vital resource for LGBT Muslims seeking to develop and put forward their own religious perspectives about same-sex desires and identities. Where Leviticus is concerned, only anal sex between men i…
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…percent of the total Russian population in 2021—according to the official numbers. When read against the dwindling numbers of some of Russia’s largest ethnic minority groups, such as Tatars, Bashkirs, Chuvash, Avars, Armenians, and Ukrainians, this data suggests that many Russian citizens do not feel safe enough to disclose their ethnic identity in the current political climate defined by the Russification of the nation. See Robert Coalson, “Russ…
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…in which abortions are necessary, the context that needs to change if the number of abortions is to be reduced. This larger context constitutes “gravely moral reasons” why a Catholic could, some might say should, vote for Obama over McCain despite their respective positions on abortion. Theologians and other Catholic scholars have led the way on this approach. Pro-choice Catholic scholars have long argued that one can favor legal abortion from a…
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…sful forger in American history, having sold dozens of fake documents to a number of institutions for a total of over a million dollars. Hofmann’s is a story that is so enthralling that it would capture the nation’s admiration were it not for the outright fraud and tragic reality that it resulted in lost lives, broken homes, and devastated communities. This Wednesday, March 3, Netflix will release Murder Among the Mormons, a three-part documentary…
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…an the tip, the system is, if not quite secure, then stable at least. When numbers of new investors decrease, as is inevitable in a finite universe, the seismic shocks ensue. What triggered this now is the overwhelming feeling of crisis on Wall Street and throughout the country. Simply put, a number of Madoff’s investors needed their money (even the very wealthy are feeling pinched in this downturn), and he was confronted with the impossibility of…
Read More…and a growing number of conservative African-American candidates. A record number of black Republicans ran in this midterm election (some had already lost their primaries), and two are heading to Congress. Tim Scott will be the first African-American Republican to represent South Carolina in Congress since Reconstruction. (He beat out Strom Thurmond’s son in the primaries.) Iraq war veteran Allen West will be headed to Congress from Florida, despi…
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