Religion Dispatches
When I taught English at the American Home in Vladimir, Russia during the 2003-2004 academic year, I unabashedly brought up the issue of gay marriage in an advanced English class. In fact, I had my students read a news article on the debate surrounding the issue in the US that had been sparked by the ruling of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court that the denial to same-sex couples of the right to marry was unconstitutional. Part of what I wa…
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Pastor Ted stands astride two hay bales triumphant and seemingly oblivious to the frigid night air inside the Haggard family barn, where 75 people have gathered for a prayer service. Dressed in jeans and a favorite gray NYC sweatshirt, Haggard launches into a Borscht Belt routine for evangelicals that plays to raucous laughter. He wisecracks that God’s preoccupation with keeping tabs on Barack Obama may delay immediate answers to their prayers. A…
Read More…nd: Queen reportedly sees marriage equality as ‘wonderful’ Queen Elizabeth II signed the country’s marriage equality law in 2013 but has avoided making public comments on the matter, which is reportedly “in line with Royal Protocol.” But comedian Stephen Fry said in an appearance on The Jonathan Ross Show last Saturday that he had a “well founded” source for a story about Elizabeth: “It was only last summer that Her Majesty The Queen gave the Roya…
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…Ingersoll and Arlene’s Flowers v. State of Washington, are substantially similar to another ADF case to which the Supreme Court just granted a writ of certiorari, Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission. In fact, ADF attorneys have asked the Supreme Court to consolidate the cases out of Washington and Colorado, according to the legal group’s press release about its latest filing. (ADF did not respond to several inquiries from RD…
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…anyone trying to live in a cramped New York apartment. There’s something spiritually satisfying about the act of pruning. Who hasn’t dreamed of simplifying their life, committing to minimalism, and limiting their possessions to the bare necessities? Many religious and philosophical traditions contain strains of such asceticism. From Epictetus to the Buddha, from Christian monasticism to Thoreau, there’s a long tradition of trying to make do with w…
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Israel is not only engaged in a fierce battle with the Palestinians over questions of territory and sovereignty, it is also engaged in a critical struggle over its own identity: what kind of society does it want to be? In the course of this struggle, odd alliances have been forged; one of the most unlikely being the one between the Haredim, or Ultra Orthodox, and the Settler movement. To understand what makes this alliance so unexpected, and what…
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Mark C. Taylor is a scholar of religion who has been accused of not studying religion. Early on, he made his reputation with works on Kierkegaard and Hegel, and during the 1980s he helped to bring the ideas of Jacques Derrida into American theology and religious studies. Starting in the late 90s, though, Taylor ventured far afield with books on architecture, computer networks, economic markets, and even Las Vegas. In 2006, he released a book of p…
Read More…Dolan praised the plaintiffs in the Hobby Lobby Supreme Court case as inspiring examples of American religious conviction and told guest host Norah O’Donnell that cutting contraception out of insurance policies wasn’t a problem: Is the ability to buy contraceptives, that are now widely available—my Lord, all you have to do is walk into a 7-11 or any shop on any street in America and have access to them—is that right to access those and have them…
Read More…, Dolan praised the plaintiffs in the Hobby LobbySupreme Court case as inspiring examples of American religious conviction and told guest host Norah O’Donnell that cutting contraception out of insurance policies wasn’t a problem: Is the ability to buy contraceptives, that are now widely available—my Lord, all you have to do is walk into a 7-11 or any shop on any street in America and have access to them—is that right to access those and have them…
Read More…thing. WOW! The way the city has built up around the Ka’abah, which was originally constructed in a valley between surrounding hills, there is no way to get a view by accident. Furthermore, the mosque is now built around it and so you have to make your way through this mammoth elaborate and beautiful structure to get your glimpse. You might see that mosque, Masjid al-Haram, but only after you have approached it by some distance. Especially the mi…
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