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Orthodox Jews Begin to Reckon with Sexual Abuse

By Paul Berger

…s unsurprisingly, beth din rabbis are often reluctant to speak about their work. Rabbi Tzvi Hersh Weinreb, executive vice president emeritus of the Orthodox Union, says that a beth din that investigates sexual abuse is usually comprised of rabbis with some knowledge or experience of abuse cases. They may also enlist the services of a consultant, such as a mental health professional or an attorney. Says Rabbi Weinreb. “It’s very difficult to asse…

New Reports Reveal Global Persecution of Nonbelievers

By Austin Dacey

…o “blasphemous content.” The IHEU reports being contacted by an increasing number of secularist groups organizing on Facebook, including groups in Afghanistan, Algeria, Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Malaysia, Pakistan, Tunisia, Turkey, and Sudan. In all of this, the United States is an anomaly since it rejects even laws against religious hate speech, which were found in 36 of 45 European states in 2011. It’s the best place in the wo…

My Business, Myself: Piercing the Corporate Veil

By Howard M. Friedman

…ct, or “Obamacare,” does not require it to provide health insurance to its workers at all. (Only businesses with 50 or more employees are required by the new law to provide insurance.) However, if Annex chooses to offer its employees insurance, its plan—like those of larger companies—must comply with the minimum requirements for preventive health care services, including contraceptive services. In keeping with emphasis of the Affordable Care Act (…

Dear White Evangelicals: A Black Square Ain’t Gonna Cut It

By Jhas Williams

…ated? Appreciated? Probably not. Until white evangelicals are willing to rework the entire framework of their teachings, they can ‘Blackout Day’ till they’re blue in the face, but their overall message will remain loud and clear: Black people are a stain. A moment, only to be tolerated but never fully accepted. And the only square that will prove to matter will be the one at which we started: Square one, where the little Black girl in a Christian…

Jesus Christ and Super Stars: How The Holy Rolled Mainstream in Pop Music

By Alana Massey

…r prayers. But these ultra-devout performers share a peculiar space with a number of other artists whose personal faiths are inconsequential to their public personae but whose fluency in the holy plays out in, well, mysterious ways. Lana Del Rey’s catalogue runs deep with both religious imagery and sentiment; waves of apostasy crash over moments of divine revelation and then reverse course back into faith again. She may have claimed “God’s dead…[a…

Debate Heats Up Over “Francis Effect”

By Patricia Miller

…one to measure the pontiff’s influence” than, say, actual metrics like the number of people going to mass or returning to the church. According to Burke, you just have to “ask around” Boston to find folks who know someone who’s thinking about returning to the church or who feels less horrible about the church than in the darkest days of the U.S. clerical sex abuse scandal, which had Boston at its epicenter. That’s a pretty low bar, but of course n…

Americans Say Religion is “Losing Influence”

By Diane Winston

…big tent approach to coverage of American ir/a/religion. But do the Gallup numbers point to new ways we might be thinking about business as usual? Two findings are striking. First: Gallup reported that although Americans felt religion’s influence was declining, many—75 percent—agreed that more religion would be positive for the country. Not surprisingly, churchgoers were most gung-ho about religion’s beneficial impact. But “over half of those who…

What Do ‘The Christians’ Believe? Easter Reflections from a Non-Christian

By Gary Laderman

…progressive Christians who believe President Obama should do even more to work for social justice and the betterment of humanity through governmental action. Yet both sides look to Jesus Christ for guidance about health in American society. What do the Christians believe? For many, rap and hip hop are the devil’s music with no redeeming features. But the growing number of artists and outlets for Christian rap (like the Web site Holy Culture) are…

Neuroscience Says Evil is “Over”: Not So Fast…

By Paul Wallace

…y. The reason creationists are so upset about evolution is because science works and they know it. They’re awed by it, over-awed perhaps, and they feel the heat. They feel it because they, like the neuroscientists of Rosenbaum’s article, over-interpret the rather narrow (if true) statements that science makes. Which brings me to my point. The question before us is not “What does science say?” If this were the question, we’d be in for a workout. Be…