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Debunking the Myth That Democracy Is “Incompatible” With Islam

By Asma Afsaruddin

…with democracy” or lack thereof was relentlessly discussed in scholarly fora and the popular media. The religious resurgence evident in many parts of the traditional Islamic world in the wake of the Islamic revolution in Iran in 1979 tended to confirm for many in the West that Islam and democracy were destined to part ways forever. The predominant conception of democracy in the West has been (and remains) that it is ineluctably predicated on secul…

Exclusion is Causing Great Harm: A Conversation With Suspended UMC Pastor Rev. Cynthia Meyer

By Joel Pitney

…hurch leadership with open arms. In fact, within days charges were brought against her for violating the UMC’s official policy against openly gay individuals practicing as clergy. Despite the fact that her own congregation accepted her choices, the Bishop of The Great Plains Conference where she serves ruled to suspend her for a minimum of two years. As a result she is now faced with a difficult decision: wait out the suspension in hopes of being…

The Religious Case Against Religious Discrimination in Cakeshop Case

By Patrick Hornbeck

…ke a custom cake for a same-sex wedding reception—pits religious believers against the nonreligious. After all, Jack Phillips, the baker at the heart of the case, has cited his Christian faith and his attorneys have argued that Phillips “seeks to live his life, pursue his profession, and craft his art consistently with his religious identity.” But with more than 90 amicus briefs having been filed in the case—more than a dozen of them having been w…

Obama’s Gay Marriage Support Shocks Black Church

By Anthea Butler

…ommunity opposed it. Take Rev. William Barber, head of the North Carolina NAACP, who preached a powerful message against Amendment 1, equating Americans’ use of the Bible to oppose same-sex marriage today with the defense of slavery and militarism in the past eras. Kristin Rawls, a writer and activist, notes that the efforts against Amendment 1 in North Carolina crossed racial and religious lines, with organizations coming together under an umbrel…

Along Came a Spider: What the Pope Doesn’t See

By Anthea Butler

…ck dropped a nice spoken word ditty called No Sex in the Champagne Room. I am 100% sure Father David Dueppen, a priest in Miami, Florida, has never heard it. Why? Because not only did he spend $1800 dollars in the champagne room of a club called Porky’s, but he also had a sexual relationship with the stripper he spent the money on, Beatrice Hernandez. And if that weren’t fascinating enough, she claims that he promised her she would be cured of dem…

Religious Leaders On Anti-Muslim Frenzy: “Silence Is Not An Option”

By Sarah Posner

…anxious and fearful that their classmates “will look at them like aliens.” A number of religious leaders, including Mattson, spoke at the press briefing, which was one of the most highly attended press events relating to religion that I’ve seen — except for events hosted by religious right groups. Richard Cizik, president of the New Evangelical Partnership for the Common Good, speaking to evangelical Christians engaging in or promoting anti-Muslim…

Elaine Howard Ecklund Wants to Dispel Myths Surrounding Religious Resistance to Science

By Sammy Feldblum

…y called “non-overlapping magisteria”—come into contact. As useful as the data can often be, Ecklund’s interpretations and prescriptions often strain to “depoliticize” the sites of conflict, as if it’s even possible to depoliticize an issue like climate science in the United States. Her reasons are numerous, no doubt, but the factors that distort public discussion, money and power, are the kinds of forces that can warp research of this kind. If on…

Conservative Hardliners at Synod Prompt Question: “What Are We Doing Here?”

By Patricia Miller

…ed as having “positive values”: “There is no basis for comparing or making analogies, even remotely, between homosexual unions and God’s plan for matrimony and the family.” As John Allen reports in Crux, Erdő’s remarks prompted Italian Archbishop Claudio Maria Celli to ask “what are we doing here?” if any changes in even pastoral practice were off the table. What are the bishops doing there indeed? As Ross Douthat observed in the New York Times, t…

Islamic Intellectual Leadership at a Crossroads

By Amina Wadud

…es of operation, and even the projects they put their energies into. In US academia recently, women scholars had a list discussion about the merits of activism vis-à-vis the promotion process for most US academies. If you play too much of a role in the day-to-day lives of Muslims at every level—but especially where the majority abide, which is rank and file—then your credentials as an intellectual are questionable. For women, that is. For men ther…

The Catholic Apocalypse Cometh

By Patricia Miller

…nald Trump won the Catholic vote by seven points on Tuesday, a group that Barack Obama won by two points in 2012 and nine points in 2008. The loss of the Catholic vote—which usually determines which way the election will go—was especially striking because most polls until just before the election found Catholics more reluctant than evangelicals to support Trump. The loss of the Catholic vote is also somewhat disruptive to the narrative that Trump…