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55% of Utah Mormons Believe LGBT People can “Change”

By Joanna Brooks

…e of us who live within the culture know: many, many LDS people live in a parallel universe when it comes to the reality of LGBT experience. Just a few weeks ago, I was visiting with a friend who has a gay adult child. We discussed the nuances of the recent events surrounding Elder Boyd K. Packer’s abrasive and controversial October conference talk which asserted that God would never have people be born with “tendencies” to same-sex attraction, an…

The Devil is in the Details

By Amina Wadud

…my last official day for completing local business before departure. I’ve balanced my checkbook and paid all of my bills except the ones that are automatically paid (which is about the same as being paid, when the checking account from which they are drawn has been balanced). I’ve taken out cash for travel with the knowledge that using ATMs abroad is always a great way to get the best rates. Yep that’s right. The U.S. always considers its own curr…

What Pence and Kaine Reveal About Divides in Catholicism

By Patricia Miller

…Catholics switched alliances to the Republican Party, voting for Ronald Reagan in 1984. The Jesuit-educated Kaine, meanwhile, was attracted to Liberation Theology’s “blending of Catholicism and socialism,” influenced by his time volunteering in Honduras when US-backed right-wing dictators were engaged in vicious internecine conflicts with Communist-backed forces. It’s no coincidence that Catholic defection to the Republican Party during the Reaga…

Do Space Aliens Need Baptism? The View From Gliese 581g

By Paul Wallace

…ew planet—Gliese 581g—was discovered orbiting a star a mere 20 light years away in the constellation Libra. This in itself is not too big a deal, because the discovery of planets orbiting other stars (termed “exoplanets”) has become a weekly occurrence. But this planet is special because (1) it’s massive enough to retain an atmosphere, and (2) it resides squarely in the center of the so-called habitable zone of its parent star, red dwarf Gliese 58…

Commies, Blacks, Jews, the UCC and Other Threats to America

By Daniel Schultz

…n this past weekend’s One Nation Working Together rally, you’ll find this paragraph: On Thursday [Glenn] Beck warned that the march included Marxist, Communist and revolutionary groups. Among the organizations endorsing the march were the Communist Party USA, the United Church of Christ, Jewish Funds for Justice, the National Urban League, the National Baptist Convention, People for the American Way and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. My…

Halloween, Evangelicals, and the Macabre

By John W. Morehead

…ess positive note, evangelicals intensifying their critique of all things macabre and “occultic.” American evangelicalism has always had a strong sense of evil which it battles in various manifestations—frequently in the form of popular culture. This sense of the presence of and confrontation with evil, however, ramps up during the Halloween season whether the focus is the holiday itself or those minority religions associated with it. In regards t…

We Were Here Before September 11th

By Amina Wadud

…ot just condemn terrorism done by fellow Muslims; I condemn terrorism done against fellow Muslim—whether as a civil act of disobedience, or as a collective act of a powerful government. And because my condemnation of terrorism sits right there beside my condemnation of violence, oppression and coercion, it was not born out of September 11th. I condemned violence, terrorism, oppression, weapons, and war long from before I became a Muslim. Nothing h…

Why Anti-Gay Bullying is a Theological Issue

By Cody J. Sanders

…en a young person completes suicide in the aftermath of daily torment and harassment. After this, I sat in stunned silence in front of my computer screen as news stories continued to appear about the suicides of 13-year-old Asher Brown, 18-year-old Tyler Clementi, 13-year-old Seth Walsh, and 19-year-old Raymond Chase. Today, it is very clear to me that profound sadness and stunned silence is no longer a suitable, appropriate, or adequate response….

The American Media’s Longterm Ambivalence About the Papacy

By Peter Manseau

…nder the wire for Holy Week, the traditional season of religiously-themed magazine covers, the new pontiff is sure to be seen in a gleaming soutane, his arms outstretched, suitable for framing within the red border that once announced a moment the world would stop to notice. In their former ubiquity, their former authority, the former certainty of the futures of their respective empires, the pope and Time seem made for each other. The first time T…

This Year in Satanism

By Joseph Laycock

2014 was the year of the Satanist. In December 2013, The Satanic Temple announced plans to erect a statue of Baphomet on the grounds of the capital in Oklahoma City. This Baphomet statue was intended to challenge the constitutionality of a Ten Commandments monument erected on the capital grounds in 2012. That story has continued to develop all year. Meanwhile, members of The Satanic Temple, led by spokesperson Lucien Greaves, have been working li…