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Debunking the Myth That Democracy Is “Incompatible” With Islam

By Asma Afsaruddin

…, 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 conducted by Robert Inglehart and Pippa Norris which allowed them to conclude that Muslim populations in general tended to be more supportive of democracy than non-Muslim populations world-wide, providing important ballast against the “clash of civilizations” hyp…

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

By Katie Day

…te Americans were just becoming aware of what had been part of the African American experience for generations. (A number of the sites, in fact, had been victims of arson in the past.) Perhaps going forward after Charleston, we no longer will be able to plead ignorance of the unacceptable targeting of faith communities by those filled with racial hatred. There are certainly preventative measures that churches can take. But the deeper work of preve…

Religious Exceptions Not So Exceptional According to New Study

By Patricia Miller

…most Catholic health care institutions have accepted the accommodation, a number of the nation’s 260 Catholic institutions of higher learning as well as Catholic nonprofits are seeking a broader exemption that would in effect bar their insurers from providing contraceptive coverage as specified under the accommodation designed by the Department of Health and Human Services. The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear a consolidated case challenging th…

Are Evangelical Films Destined to Leave Secular Audiences Behind?

By Daniel Silliman

…g weekend saw sales of more than $6 million in tickets. That’s the kind of number that will inspire others to try and figure out the formula for the faith-and-family blockbuster. Yet, with the cost of the film reportedly exceeding $30 million, it’s an open question whether or not the Left Behind reboot will get a second installment. The marketing problem of evangelical movies is still, stubbornly, a problem. The general audience doesn’t seem inter…

The Gospel of Contradiction: An Interview with Mary Gordon

By Nathan Schneider

…the packaged certainties of radio preachers and the theocratic elements of American politics. But why, she wonders, do people so consistently read them that way? I spoke with Mary Gordon at the dining room table of her New York City apartment, across the street from Barnard College, where she now teaches English. What caused you to write a book about Jesus? What readers did you have in mind? When I started, I was concerned with the prevalence of…

No Conspiracy Theories Needed: Abortion Foes Cry Racism

By Kathryn Joyce

…ion Research Institute (PRI), claimed that the proposed law represented “a new front in the abortion wars”—one that they hope could associate the pro-life movement with anti-racism and attract a different demographic of supporters. The argument wasn’t new, conceded PRI head Steve Mosher. Anti-abortion intellectuals have long proposed that linking female infanticide and sex-selective abortion with all abortion might persuade reluctant supporters of…

Restoring Dignity: The Employee Free Choice Act

By Peter Laarman

…llenge and FDR’s challenge, we would do well to recall that what drove the New Deal and significantly remade American politics during the Roosevelt years was the tripling of US union membership that took place over the ten years following 1935—the year that workers first got real bargaining rights under the Wagner Act. Led by the United Steelworkers, United Auto Workers, United Mine Workers, United Rubber Workers, and United Electrical Workers, th…

The Quixotic Task of Debunking David Barton

By Paul Harvey

…futations of Barton’s bogus empiricism. I’ve considered these questions a number of times recently in observing historians struggling to deal with the popularity of figures such as David Barton, who bowdlerize history but get the kind of attention few actual historians receive for their work. To What Effect? These debates go back a long way. When I was in college at a Baptist denominational school in Oklahoma, the biology professor, a man about…

Response to Daniel Philpott: the Politics of Religious Freedom

By Elizabeth Shakman Hurd

…lligible or incoherent? My forthcoming book, Beyond Religious Freedom: The New Global Politics of Religion, also opens onto a broader set of questions involving the politics of religion in international relations. The book is a study of recent state-sponsored efforts to promote religious freedom, religious engagement, and the rights of religious minorities. It brings together the study of contemporary religion and global politics in a new way, cha…

Resurrection of ‘Comstock Laws’ Would Threaten Access to Abortifacients — But Even That Fear Misses Bigger Picture

By Gillian Frank

…ncy. As historian Andrea Tone has shown in detail, Lysol was just one of a number of unregulated contraceptive products advertised in women’s magazines and in newspapers. Comstockery, in other words, endangered women by creating an environment where quackery and scammers could thrive. Unsurprisingly, a harsh cleaning product had adverse effects. A 1936 book by Rachel Lynn Palmer and Sarah K. Greenberg, M.D. called Facts and Frauds in Feminine Hygi…