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Trump’s “Muslim Ban” A Gift to Terrorists

By Ali Olomi

…s essential to provoke America into a civilizational conflict. ISIS is, at best, a regional threat, but it has global aspirations. Through the use of terrorism, it can extend its reach and provoke fear and hatred in far more powerful countries. Terrorism is a political strategy. Our fixation on religion blinds us to its strategic use. Banning Muslims is exactly what ISIS has hoped to achieve for many years. Propaganda from ISIS regularly decries t…

Trump is a Nightmare, Sure, But Can He Actually Do Anything?

By Sunnivie Brydum

…olina’s House Bill 2, Indiana’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act, and any number of ill-fated attempts to block the forward march of marriage equality. But my professional pedigree also breeds skepticism. And although it’s long been clear that the current administration is hell-bent on turning back the clock on basic civil rights for anyone who’s not a straight white evangelical Christian man, I often wonder whether the near-constant panic that c…

Will the Pope’s Woman Problem Alienate Young Catholics?

By Patricia Miller

…has called women theologians “the strawberries on the cake,” along with a number of other comments insulting to women more broadly, which hasn’t helped minimize doubts on the part of many women about Francis’ ability to see them as full persons. Gina Messina-Dysert, author of the forthcoming Faithfully Feminist, noted that: Francis has made some important, positive comments about women and said it is time to reexamine the role of women in the chu…

Census Reveals Gay People are Shockingly… Normal

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

According to new census figures, the number of people reporting that they are living with a same-sex partner has risen 52 percent in the last decade. That’s almost 902,000 people who are living all across the United States. Even here in my own incredibly conservative state of South Carolina, the number of same-sex couples increased and a quarter of them are raising children. It’s those kinds of facts that have right-wing media like the Christian…

Why Even Progressive Christianity Must Own Its Complicity in Anti-LGBT Violence

By Layton E. Williams

…, self-harm, and suicide among LGBT youth and adults. Of course, a growing number of churches and denominations today have rejected such a destructive understanding of human sexuality. Religion Dispatches recently compiled a list of the official positions on LGBT issues currently taught by various Christian denominations. According to this list, mainline Protestant denominations such as the United Church of Christ and the Episcopal Church claim th…

How a Ruling for Masterpiece Cakeshop Could Embolden White Nationalists

By Sunnivie Brydum

…ling in favor of Masterpiece Cakeshop could open the floodgates for groups looking to carve out their own faith-based hate bubbles. The fact that Masterpiece Cakeshop is challenging a longstanding Colorado non-discrimination law amplifies the possibility that, if successful, the tactic could be employed to undermine state—or even federal—protections aimed at combatting discrimination against any number of marginalized populations. “The cultural an…

The Suppression of Sin in Evangelical Abolitionism: The Wilberforce Problem

By Jonathan D. Fitzgerald

…us feminist groups to lobby for the bill. In 2005, The Nation took a close look at the TVPA and referred to it as having a “split personality,” which Debbie Nathan, the author of the piece, attributed to “the split group that created it.” More recently, old-guard culture warrior Focus on the Family joined the effort. Under new president Jim Daly, they recently launched a website called “Rising Voice,” aimed at attracting young evangelicals to soci…

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

By Peter Montgomery

…s and we cannot be open in public anymore.” The proposed bill emboldened a number of radical nationalist movements and, according to activists at Labrys, a gay activism group in Kyrgyzstan, led to a near 300 percent increase in attacks against the community. Activists fear things will get worse once a Russian-style anti-gay “propaganda” bill gets its final reading in parliament and becomes law; a restrictive definition of marriage was placed into…

A Twisted Love Story: How American Evangelicals Helped Make Putin’s Russia and How Russia Became the Darling of the American Right

By Katherine Kelaidis

…ese Americans with no historical ties to Orthodoxy, became a majority in a number of Orthodox jurisdictions in the United States and brought with them their cultural baggage—most importantly the Culture Wars. The changes were obvious and immediate, both in traditional Orthodox countries and in the diaspora. Of course, Orthodoxy has never been gay-affirming (despite John Boswell’s eloquent but unsubstantiated claims) and abortion had been cause for…

Was Ghana Anti-Gay Scare Just Politics?

By Warren Throckmorton

…ins.” Unsure of the prevalence, Aidoo told Joy FM that there are landlords looking for gays among their tenants in order to report them to the police. If they are arrested, he said, then the courts can test the strength of the law. According to the Joy FM report, Aidoo hoped “to get rid of these people in the society.” Some observers believe the number of sexual minorities may have been inflated in order to whip up opposition to homosexuality whic…