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For Better or Worse: The Rise of the Professional Wedding Celebrant

By Carlos Wilton

…ominational exams. For aspiring celebrants there’s a much easier route: an online ordination from the Universal Life Church or one of its imitators. The Universal Life Church has been around for longer than there’s been an Internet: since 1959, to be exact. In the early years, it was an open secret that many customers tried to use their mail-order ordinations as a tax dodge. The organization presents itself as an international community of free-th…

Meeting on the Bridge: Fr. James Martin’s Ministry to LGBT Catholics Becomes a Book

By Kaya Oakes

…rough social media might be LGBT. It’s grown since I started to write more online and in America magazine and be quoted about these issues. People may feel more comfortable knowing I’ll be more welcoming. In the process, I’ve gotten to know a lot more about that kind of ministry, even though it’s not a formal ministry. For example, I’ve never worked in an LGBT outreach program in a parish, or done seminars, or anything like that. But I feel like I…

When a Pride March Means Owning the Shame of Racial and Economic Injustice

By Peter Laarman

…who may not be inclined to seek, or interested to receive, needed support services north of the 10 freeway (traditionally demarcating the boundary between White LA to the north and Black/Brown LA to the south). I suggested to my friend that we query the powerful and well-funded LGBT Center to see whether they might be receptive to some kind of partnering with the church. Without even asking the right kind of due diligence questions, however, Cent…

A Note to Megyn Kelly & NBC: How to Talk About Conspiracy Theories

By Julie Ingersoll

…re social networks in which his view of the world is shared. These include online groups, but I’ve also seen his website promoted at Tea Party events and other political gatherings, and even among church groups. Conspiracy theories rely on what historian Richard Hofstadter called “political paranoia.” They are intensely rationalistic and appear compelling as they operate in opposition to prevailing views. They are hostile to authority and expertis…

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin’s Legacy of Eugenics and Racism Can’t Be Ignored

By John P. Slattery

…ia Eucharista: Because even when it is celebrated on the humble altar of a country church, the Eucharist is always in some way celebrated on the altar of the world. It unites heaven and earth. It embraces and permeates all creation. John Paul’s understanding of Teilhard was shared by then Cardinal Ratzinger, as found in The Spirit of the Liturgy, when he uses a favorite concept of Teilhard—divinization—to argue that the goals of worship and the wh…

A President “Anointed By God”: POTUS Shield and Religious Right’s Affair with Trump

By Sunnivie Brydum

…ayer warriors” still stand shoulder to shoulder with this president. _____ Sunnivie Brydum: My first question after reading your report is relatively simple: Is POTUS Shield unique? Have we seen anything similar, in terms of an organized Pentecostal prayer shield for a sitting president before? Peter Montgomery: I don’t think we’ve seen this before. Certainly, a lot of Christians of all stripes feel obligated to pray for national leaders, and that…

Why I Give Zero F*cks What Anti-Gay Christians Think

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

…lly condemn homosexuality. I cared so much that I created an Whosoever, an online magazine – back in 1996 with the mission of arguing against anti-gay Christians and equipping my fellow LGBT Christians to do the same. I even wrote a book, Bulletproof Faith: A Spiritual Survival Guide for Gay and Lesbian Christians, to help others who deeply cared about what anti-gay Christians believed and said cope with the ongoing battle for our right as LGBT Ch…

I Created the Hashtag #EmptythePews Because It’s Time for Evangelicals To Walk Out of Toxic Churches

By Chrissy Stroop

…he church we’d been attending didn’t bother mentioning #Charlottesville on Sunday. As if I needed more reason to not return. #EmptyThePews — Gov. Pappy 🕷 (@GovPappy) August 17, 2017 The trauma of the church accepting his sexual immorality was worse than my sexual assault. I’m in mourning. #emptythepews — Ms Cat. (@catherinemom23) August 17, 2017 Can Heaven be #WhiteSupremacist ?#WhiteChurchQuiet #EmptyThePews https://t.co/1RtKPdC8Lk — Dae Shik Kim…

Buddhism And Politics in Myanmar: An Author Interview

By Matthew Walton

…commonplace for many people to say that Buddhism influences politics in a country like Myanmar, but actual attempts to describe that influence usually end up being superficial or over-generalised. I’m describing a “moral universe” of modern Theravada Buddhist thinking that provides key ideas and understandings that Buddhists have used to make sense of the political world they inhabit. If we don’t know the outlines of this worldview (and the varia…

Rev. Rob Lee Lost Congregation For His Anti-Racism Speech: Here’s Why He Should Have Packed His Bags First

By Daniel Schultz

…d to why I wasn’t exactly surprised to hear that Rev. Lee had been canned. Sunny Hostin of The View asked Lee about a sermon he gave after the recent attack on Charlottesville by white supremacists. Quoting from the sermon, she read: If you are silent at a moment like this, if you do not condemn the racism through what channels and avenues you have, you can leave church now, because you’re doing church wrong. “Are you saying that those who want to…