Religion Dispatches
…s toys, without acknowledging the spiritual authority of believers as they use them in the world and bring their experience and insight into religious institutions misunderstands the radically participatory, dialogical, and collaborative nature of a contemporary Western culture informed by digital social technologies. It inadvertently reinforces a line between “faith” and “life” that believers now routinely transgress. Bible Mash-Up Where religiou…
Read More…way to protest what the Dove World Outreach Center in Gainesville, Florida, is planning is to read the Qur’an. This seems an appropriate way to not interfere with the free speech of others, and yet use our own freedom to express our dismay at those who use their freedom to express intolerance and to attempt to provoke others to violence and conflict. For those who wish to read the Qur’an online, here is a link. McGrath ends with a quote by Heinric…
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…build the center. The Evening of Hope event itself bounced back and forth between efforts to promote access to abortion alternatives in the form of charitable services and political campaigning aimed at legally prohibiting abortion—a position the Republican Party’s platform. Palin and others invoked the notion of building and affirming a “culture of life,” to give the event an apolitical patina. Crisis pregnancy centers have been controversial in…
Read More…day. Before the shaykh arrives, I continue with my Qur’an reading. I don’t use the tiny mp3 player anymore because this last juz’ includes most of the Qur’an that I have memorized myself, and this is more a review than a simple reflective read. Coming to the end of the Qur’an reading is also melancholy, and I forget why I felt I should rush just a few days ago. How will I put my friend down, except for the many occasions I use it in my work, after…
Read More…quences of one prayer’s answer are more troubles than you were facing. So, better to be prudent. I used to have a sticker in my car that I think sums it up, “Oh Allah grant me the most benevolent outcome.” This is the idea behind the special prayer worship called istikharah. Again, no details, but the word itself means asking for the best outcome, even as it is attached to an elaborate formula of ritual request. In another entry I had mentioned…
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…over the years, I continued to work out strategies for filling those gaps between written texts and lived experience. Once I discovered the synergy between my experiences as a child and the women in the study and how important talking to the dead was to us all, I realized that I had a niche for framing the disconnect that had disturbed me many years ago. In the end, what began from a dissatisfaction I experienced as a Geechee girl who wanted to s…
Read More…come.) Sacred borderlands The truly unprecedented thing was, for lack of a better term, the creation of coalition on the axes of race and sexuality. It didn’t hurt that of the fourteen students who were selected to be in the program, eight were people of color. Not surprisingly only four of the eighteen teacher/mentors were, and this generational shift bodes well for the future of Queer/LGBT religious movements. And it also didn’t hurt that the wh…
Read More…man beings are created in God’s image and they deserve to be protected because they are a human being uniquely created by God with innate dignity and worth, and not because of how they identify sexually.” Honestly, could she even hear herself? If she and FotF truly believed that, and encouraged conservative Christian parents to actually teach that to their potential bullies in training, then there would be no need for anti-bullying legislation. Bu…
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…e Care Act, to pay for the abortion coverage. Experts believe this could cause insurance companies, for economic reasons, to drop abortion coverage altogether, leaving women without a way for paying for an abortion, even in situations in which a continued pregnancy poses severe health risk. In addition, the Smith bill would prohibit women from using flexible savings or medical savings accounts — which are funded by their own money, not taxpayer mo…
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…would probably not seek to change other ex-gay ministries that continue to use “reparative therapy” or other harmful “treatments” on LGBT people. “We’re not interested in fighting anymore,” Rodgers said. We want to work on suicide prevention and anti-bullying causes. We’re more concerned with seeing human flourishing.” It’s all very promising and conciliatory talk from an outfit that has done much harm to the LGBT community in the past. But if the…
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