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American Christianity Is Changing Fast: Five Stories to Watch in 2016

By Richard Flory

…ken a much more adversarial stance to LGBT acceptance. However, increasing numbers of evangelical churches are accepting LGBT individuals as members. This development is not without its opponents, however. Many evangelical organizations—most significantly colleges, universities and seminaries—are mobilizing to retain their “religious right” to discriminate against LGBT individuals. More than 30 evangelical higher education institutions have petiti…

Heaven: Our Enduring Fascination with the Afterlife

By Lisa Miller

…sus Christ” will get to heaven. (I’m not alone here, by the way; a growing number of evangelical Christians agree with me.) At the same time, the most moving and culturally important visions of heaven are those created by the conservative believers. These are the visions that move people to action: to be faithful to One God, for example, or to martyr themselves. I would like to believe in heaven as a concrete reality in the future, a place that re…

Top Five (Less Sensational, But More Dangerous) Things to Remember About Pat Robertson (1930-2023)

By Mark Hulsether

…her to acknowledge Robertson’s latest provocation. It bores me, and I feel cheapened even to think about it as I worry about one of my students who has not yet returned from a mission trip to Haiti. Still I could not resist clicking on a list of Robertson’s top ten greatest gaffes that I found in the blogosphere. It was amusing to ponder the rankings. Does Robertson’s feat of leg-pressing 2000 pounds (thanks to the diet shakes he was selling) dese…

Haiti and the Push for Theological Questions

By Paula M. Cooey

…t, between 1793 and 1801 the people we now call Haitian pulled off a successful slave revolt against nothing less than the armies of Napoleon Bonaparte. On an August evening in 1791, either before or during the revolution (depending on when you date the revolution’s beginning), slaves performed a voodoo rite, Robertson’s “pact with the devil.” That the dominant tradition existing alongside Voodoo is Catholicism implicitly buttresses Robertson’s ca…

Aasif Mandvi on Islamophobia, Acting, and the Long Shadow of Jon Stewart

By Haroon Moghul

…out? Anything to make a social impact?” I had been on the Daily Show for a number of years at this point, and spoken to a lot of Islamophobes, people who had a lot of misinformation about Islam and Muslims. It was a personal thing to me, and it was an issue I thought I could lend my voice to in a satirical space. Were there any particular misconceptions or fears you wanted to address? There was a lot of stuff about Shari’ah Law, the protests again…

Another Manufactured Outrage: Rep. Ilhan Omar Did Nothing Wrong in Listing Hamas, Israel, and U.S. Together

By Joshua Shanes

…more effective if it were honest. And perhaps that would have lessened the number of death threats and other vile correspondences she has received. Second, others have said that she deserved the criticism for its political harm, that this hurts the Democratic party. Perhaps, but that doesn’t make much sense either, because the manufactured outrage made it worse. If a Democratic leader had privately contacted her and said, “Ilhan, you have to clari…

The 17th Century Roots of Roy Moore’s Refusal to Concede the Election

By Karen E. Park

…clear violation of the establishment clause of the First Amendment and any number of Supreme Court cases. He was removed again last year for refusing to uphold federal law on same sex marriage, on the grounds that it was in violation of God’s law as found in the Old Testament. Like Winthrop, Moore believes that the Old Testament should order American society, whether Exodus or Leviticus. The ancient Israelites in these societies either adhered, or…

Diplomatic Suckerhood: Why Israel Is Fighting Toward its Own Demise

By Ira Chernus

…ous as far back as the Persian Gulf War of 1991 when Israel was hit with a number of Iraqi missiles the Israeli government, which always boasts that it will respond harshly to any attack, did nothing because Washington put up a big red light. Washington appears to be flashing the red light once again. According to the Washington Times, “a senior Israeli official said that Israel has not asked for US aid or permission [to attack Iran] because the N…

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…

The Year of the Abusive Priest

By Anthea Butler

…f a dying institution. These are people who trade in words, who argue incessantly in ecumenical dialogues about a word’s meaning. The problem is, the Vatican and its minions haven’t figured out that we are past the days of the monastic scribe, slowly chiseling out each word. The internet age has assured that their choice, ill-crafted words can be made available to everyone (assuming the church hasn’t shredded or put them under seal). No one is goi…