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More Than Big Hair and Money: Jim, Tammy Faye and the Media “Holy Wars” of the 80s

By John Wigger

…some of Jim and Tammy’s appeal. PTL was all about images so there were any number of options. Too bad books can’t come with a dozen different covers to choose from. Is there a book out there you wish you had written? Which one? Why? I love the writing style of Lawrence Wright and Hampton Sides. They are both masters at weaving nonfiction into a page-turner. Anything half as good would be fine with me. What’s your next book? I’m not sure yet. Hopef…

The Only Common Denominator of American Conservatism is Anti-Blackness

By Yannick Marshall

…ople. It’s not natural to assume that advocates for liberty and small government would be championing the expansion of police power and be the chief defenders of Terry stops (aka ‘stop and frisk’) and lengthy sentences. The precepts of evangelicalism (if seen as a religious and not a racist movement) don’t immediately suggest Donald Trump as a natural figurehead. Indeed, most of the stated values of conservatism would not seem to correspond to con…

How the Study of Evangelicalism Has Blinded Us to the Problems in Evangelical Culture

By Christopher D. Cantwell

…hat that term means to them. There’s a certain irony here, in that an Anglophone movement that once saw itself as uniquely positioned to save the world is now looking to the globe to salvage its reputation. ‘Evangelical’ as metaphor Noll, Marsden, and Bebbington have each retired in recent years, making Evangelicals something of a testament to their centrality to the field. The text concludes with a new essay from each editor that seeks to steward…

Modern Vampires: Your Neighbors and Spouses

By Joseph Laycock

…infringes on that comfort. By the end of this study, I was shocked at the number of educated people I met who dismissed my work as a book on “freaks.” Ideally, I would like readers who dismiss this community to stop laughing, and readers who fear this community to perhaps smile. What alternative title would you give the book? So many books have been written about vampires that almost every clever title has been taken. Our Vampires, Ourselves was…

Welcome to the Shari’ah Conspiracy Theory Industry

By Sarah Posner

…litical groups to claim they are not being represented, or that their government is not representative of the people. So it’s more about representation and identity than it is about specific codes or laws.” Even though some political activists in Middle Eastern and North African countries promote “Islamic law” in reaction to the imposition of European-style government and legal systems on them, there is no single school of thought on what shari’ah…

UPDATED: Religion Has Been Framed; Covering the Aga Khan’s Visit

By Hussein Rashid

…off from the main Shiite branch of Islam.” The fact that there is a larger number of non-Isma’ili Shi’ah does not make them the main branch. If the central belief of Shi’ism is the belief of Imamah, then the only group with a present, living Imam are the Isma’ilis, making them the main group. The point is that there are many ways to claim superiority, but the reality is most Muslims have lived with various other communities of interpretation. The…

New Reports Reveal Global Persecution of Nonbelievers

By Austin Dacey

…igious criticism; • compulsory religious registration, usually with a government proscribed list of permitted religions; • religious requirements or restrictions on government ID cards and passports; • religious tests for citizenship or participation in civic life; • religious control of family law; • and religious control of public education. Almost half of the countries of the world have laws or policies that penalize blasphemy, apostasy, contem…

Americans Say Religion is “Losing Influence”

By Diane Winston

…big tent approach to coverage of American ir/a/religion. But do the Gallup numbers point to new ways we might be thinking about business as usual? Two findings are striking. First: Gallup reported that although Americans felt religion’s influence was declining, many—75 percent—agreed that more religion would be positive for the country. Not surprisingly, churchgoers were most gung-ho about religion’s beneficial impact. But “over half of those who…

Sacred&Profane: The Living Dead

By Gary Laderman

…oked. There are ghosts and graves in the yards of my neighborhood, and the number of skeletons—reclining on lawn chairs, sprouting up from the ground, beckoning from the shadows—has transformed the suburban landscape into a set for a George Romero film. In addition, and beyond bland suburbia, monsters, ghosts, skeletons, vampires, and other playful dead inhabit stores and sell products, entertain across the television dial, and instill a dreadfull…

The Real Goal of Pro-Life Movement Support for Scott Brown: Kill Health Care Reform

By Sarah Posner

…lieve we need to reduce the number of abortions in America. I believe government has the responsibility to regulate in this area and I support parental consent and notification requirements and I oppose partial birth abortion. I also believe there are people of good will on both sides of the issue and we ought to work together to support and promote adoption as an alternative to abortion. Apart from the parental notification requirements, Brown so…