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The Battle for the Meaning of Religious Freedom Day

By Frederick Clarkson

…om may very well determine the future of democracy in our time, just as it did in the 18th century. As historian John Ragosta told RD last year: A republic could not work if government and church officials… were trying to control what we think or prescribe what was the ‘best’ religion or which people were the ‘best’ citizens based upon their religious beliefs. If people were to make informed political choices themselves, they had to be free to thi…

What Fundamentalist Christian Fiction Can Teach Us About Our American Crisis

By Christopher Douglas

…eed to the literary arm of this new social movement: The [New York] Times ‘best-seller’ list was misleading. Evangelical books were often outselling the Times’ best-sellers. But the paper did not bother to count sales in religious bookstores. The people hurt most weren’t evangelical authors (our books sold anyway); rather, the losers were Democratic Party leaders and other liberal readers of the ‘paper of record’ who were blindsided by subsequent…

Religion, Morality, and the Death of the American Soap Opera

By Katy E. Shrout

…in the context of reaffirming that bad situations will be resolved for the best. Characters who claim not to believe in God are aberrations, usually identified as gravely troubled—perhaps grieving a deceased loved one—and will often be depicted as recovering their faith in the end. Clergy make appearances as minor characters, but sometimes, as was the case with an Episcopal priest on One Life to Live in the 1990s, have been major players, too. It’…

A Report from America’s “Sacrifice Zones”

By Chris Hedges

…ho would buy it or if it would sell. We focused only on producing the very best work we could, a work we were proud of, a work that spoke to us and hopefully would speak to others. Are you hoping to just inform readers? Give them pleasure? Piss them off? I am hoping they will wake up to the corporate forces arrayed against them, forces that if left unchecked will doom the future of their children. You cannot, as Joe and I were, be around so much…

Irony Thick in Bush Interview with Focus on the Family

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

…ng the hypocrisy of his words. Daly, similarly, did what he and Focus does best—not getting that the message they’re putting out starkly reveals their own hypocrisy. For example, Bush tells Daly: “I don’t believe you can lead by demonizing somebody. I believe you lead by convincing somebody,” he says. “And in my case, I was unable to convince (some people) on different issues. I understood that.” Here’s where tears of frustration begin. While Daly…

NYPD Lied About Islamophobic Third Jihad

By Hussein Rashid

…ime for the Mayor to show he’s still a man of the people. He is by far the best Mayor we’ve had on transportation because he takes the subway. Now it’s time for him to show he can be the best Mayor we’ve had for law enforcement, and recognize the daily ways in which communities are victimized by the police. Instead of letting the NYPD take advice from unnamed, unaccountable DHS contractors, partner with experts. NYC has no shortage of top-notch un…

Op-Ed: Liberal Hatred

By Laurie Patton

…American psyche can in some small way be healed, and that we should refuse to give up on the notion that American culture is at its most vibrant in those rare moments when the best of the liberal and the best of the conservative traditions converge. I had forgotten just how perilous those ideas can be….

RDEpistle: Open Letter to Sean Hannity

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

…more wisely. I hope, in choosing future words, you’ll consider not what’s best for the Hannity bank account, but what’s best for humanity. I long for the day when profitable words are words that uplift, encourage, and inspire people. The strength of this nation has always been our unity in diversity and our unity in the face of adversity. By using your words to create a world of “us” and “them” you only perpetuate violence and discord in our soci…

Hajj Journal:
This Cultural Hajj

By Amina Wadud

…cided on the next best thing from then on: I would do what I thought would best enhance my experience of the hajj and I would stay away from the rest, opting for silence if somebody else’s culture got too close. The variance of different cultural Islams prevented the women in our tent from creating an immediate community for the days ahead. At one point, the group leader wanted to inform the men and women together about the rites of Mina, Arafat,…

Ensign’s Sin, Power, and No Consequences

By Sarah Posner

…or his efforts to pay off and arrange a lobbying job for Doug Hampton, his best friend and aide whose wife he’d had an affair with — said “there are consequences to sin.” He’s nonetheless confident that “God has forgiven me, and so has my wife.” The announcement comes as the Senate Ethics Committee ramps up its investigation, even though the Justice Department concluded its probe without pressing charges. Sin: Ensign had an affair with his best fr…