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Goat Head Found in Brooklyn. Who Cares?

By Joseph Laycock

…press their displeasure. In 1991, while the Church of Lukumi Babalu Aye v. City of Hilaleah case was making its way to the Supreme Court, a muzzled goat head was found in the police parking lot. The head was part of a campaign of harassment aimed at mayor Julio Martinez, who was attempting to clean up the city after the previous mayor was suspended for corruption. Martinez’s supporters also received cow tongues and dead fish in their mailboxes. Th…

Jesus Comes Out for Christmas

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

…Cardy has guts, I’ll give him that. Cardy is pastor of St. Matthew in the City in Auckland, New Zealand. You may remember this church for their controversial billboards. In 2009, they put up a billboard depicting Mary and Joseph in bed with Joseph wondering how he could ever measure up to God. Last year’s Christmas billboard showed Mary holding a holding a pregnancy test. Both of those billboards were vandalized—torn down by sensitive religious t…

Syria and the American Apocalyptic Imagination: Isaiah 17:1 as “Evidence” of the End

By Jason C. Bivins

…eventual return just east of Damascus. As other observers have noted, the city itself fares differently in each vision: its physical condition, the sequence of its destruction, the particular plot in which it figures. But the co-resonance of violence and religious teleology is unavoidable from a certain perspective, one conditioned to gather together the fragmentary world in a meaning where violence is no counter-sign to redemption but evidence o…

Obama and the Louie Giglio Controversy

By Sarah Posner

…here. President Obama has tapped Louie Giglio, pastor of Atlanta’s Passion City Church, to deliver the benediction at his inauguration. Think Progress has found, not terribly shockingly, that the 54-year-old Giglio delivered an anti-gay sermon in the 1990s. You can read all the ugly details here. I say not terribly shockingly because even today Passion City describes itself as “conservative and evangelical,” and in the 1990s, this was certainly no…

Catholic Church Campaigns Against Gay US Ambassador; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…support Brewster, using the hashtage #ImWithWally. Brewster told the Windy City Times last week that he has never questioned the support of the Obama administration, saying that “the President of the United States has our back and so does the administration. So we’re going to keep doing our job.” Malawi: Pastors Threaten to Sue if Govt Does Not Arrest Gays The Young Pastors Coalition of Malawi is threatening to sue the government if it does not ar…

What Jerusalem Will Obama See?

By Sarah Posner

…porting, about the myth and reality of Jerusalem. The mantra that the holy city is the “undivided capital of Israel” is a political flashpoint in the US, capable of upending almost any political gathering. Recall the brouhaha during the Democratic National Convention last year over the change in platform language, after which Israeli activist Daniel Seidemann (who Wildman and I discuss in this segment) noted, “the only place that Jerusalem remains…

Francis Now and Then: The Ecological Politics of Saints

By Beatrice Marovich

…There’s a wolf on the outskirts of the city who has been sneaking into the city limits at night and stealing livestock—and has begun to prey on people. The locals are terrified and go after the wolf with the meager weapons they have, but the animal attacks and devours anyone who comes after him. This wolf is a force of nature, beyond human control. This is where Francis comes in. He goes out and meets the wolf, face to face. Francis preaches a lit…

I’m Too Sexy for My Church: Will a Thriving Singles Scene Renew American Catholicism?

By Megan Sweas

…here they “get fed” St. Monica, which is located in the cosmopolitan beach city of Santa Monica, is diverse by national standards, though the 5:30 p.m. service is filled mostly with young, white professionals, who arrive smartly dressed whether mass is followed by a workout or a night on the town. Dating through a religious community isn’t new or unique to Catholicism, of course. JDate turns twenty next year, and evangelicals (for whom “young adul…

Why We’ve Opened Our Doors for Polygamy USA

By Claude Cawley

…es available to those who need them, and second, the debacle that Colorado City and the FLDS have become in the public eye. We do not wish to be portrayed with the broad-brush picture taken from coverage of the FLDS. [See RD’s coverage of the FLDS here –Eds.] We realize that, to overcome stereotypes associated with the activities in Colorado City and general attitudes toward practicing plural marriage, something must be done to portray the people…

Is “Racist” Jesus Lawsuit Against The Met Already a Success?

By Andre E. Johnson

…ber a lawsuit was filed against the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City claiming that the artwork of Jesus hanging on the museum’s walls is “racist propaganda” because the pieces depict Jesus as white. Noting that the Met receives “millions in taxpayer funds,” Justin Joseph, the New York City resident who filed the federal lawsuit, argues that this makes it “government speech” and that the government should not support speech that is racis…