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Mexico moves toward national marriage equality; Greek govt announces civil partnership legislation; Pope warns against ‘secularism and relativism’; Global LGBT recap

By Peter Montgomery

…year, the Greek office of the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights (GHM) submitted an action to the European Court of Human Rights because of the exclusion of civil partnerships. In a statement to VICE, their Department of Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity said: “A civil partnership plan that makes no distinction between heterosexual and same-sex couples is obviously a positive development. It means that Greece will be in compl…

Are We Entering the End Times for Mainline Seminaries?

By Elesha Coffman

…s in both the number of churches that could support such positions and the number of people eager to take the more challenging, but lower paying, church jobs that remained. Some seminaries shifted their missions to serve the academy or society more broadly, while others trained more part-time, second-career and lay pastors. These shifts were less abrupt than decisions to close or merge a seminary, but they were often quite jarring for faculty and…

‘Murder Among the Mormons,’ Latest True Crime Doc From Netflix, Highlights Issues of Faith, Skepticism, and Authenticity

By Benjamin E. Park

…sis. Though inextricably linked to Hofmann through his role facilitating a number of document purchases, he also had an eye to the future, envisioning a church that was much more media-savvy and tethered to the modern age. His quick work helped dissipate attention and avoid long-lasting repercussions. A decade after the bombing, in 1995, Hinckley became the church’s fifteenth president. His thirteen years at the head of the faith are now remembere…

Pastor Convicted in Lisa Miller Child Kidnapping Case

By Peter Montgomery

…d that as he drove home from the border, Mr. Zodhiates tried to call a cellphone number registered to Liberty Counsel, an evangelical legal group. That cellphone number has sometimes been used by Mathew D. Staver, the founder of Liberty Counsel, dean of the Liberty University Law School in Lynchburg, Va., and a leader of Ms. Miller’s defense team. The RICO filed by Jenkins includes information that RD readers learned last year from Sarah Posner’s…

The Quixotic Task of Debunking David Barton

By Paul Harvey

…s presidency) that rates “true,” or even “mostly true.” Getting Jefferson Right is an excellent example of the art of historical contextualization, of trying to tell the whole story, not just part of it. For those reasons, the work should become a standard reference. And for that reason, most historians will assume this settles the matter. But they would be wrong, just as they were wrong when a previous generation of Christian historians (Mark N…

Black Churches are Burning: Is It the 1990s All Over Again?

By Katie Day

…nantly African American churches in the south. They were able to get civil rights convictions for racial hate crimes in 60 percent of the cases in five Southern states and Nevada. In subsequent years, the numbers fell: there were 209 church arsons in 1997 and 166 the following year, according to their annual reports. The last report was issued in 2001. Altogether there were almost 900 reported cases of church arson in the late 1990s—a huge number…

The Gospel of Contradiction: An Interview with Mary Gordon

By Nathan Schneider

…er of the Gospel narratives is that they resist selective reading, though, right? They draw us out of complacency and demand that we read everything and follow everything. Exactly. On the other hand, giving everything makes you crazy. I guess that’s why the story of the washing of Jesus’ feet is so important to me. He says, “I want that perfume. I want it right now, and if it means the poor aren’t going to get to eat, they’re just going to have to…

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

By Anthea Butler

…y, as many of the dioceses in the United States become uninsurable and the number of Catholic churches dwindles. As membership shrinks, the number of ordinations decreases, and the coffers dry up, perhaps the Vatican and its leadership will be forced to look at its decrepit, hierarchical structure, and fix it. I doubt it, however. Like the spider who crawled across Pope Benedict’s robes this weekend in Prague, everyone except the Pope can see the…

A Secret History of Satan

By W. Scott Poole

…n, in some cases public policy. The book makes the case that a significant number of Americans believe in the same Devil believed in by Puritan preachers and 19th-century evangelists. This cannot be dismissed. Its essential to understand why this is so, what historical conditions gave rise to this phenomenon and what does it tell us about the United States. Did you have a specific audience in mind when writing? I had several groups in mind, all of…

Debunking the Myth That Democracy Is “Incompatible” With Islam

By Asma Afsaruddin

…g no disjunction between religious beliefs and democratic principles. In a number of Muslim-majority countries, the preference was even stronger. In Jordan, for example, 54% of men and 55% of women want Sharia to be the only source of legislation. Interestingly, from a comparative perspective, a 2006 Gallup poll indicated that 46% of Americans say that they want the Bible to be a source of legislation. These findings corroborate earlier studies co…