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Dispatches from the Workplace: Postville: Ground Zero for the Intersection of Immigrant and Workers’ Rights

By Kim Bobo

…ondemning both the company’s treatment of the workers and the government’s commando-style terrorizing of a community. On Sunday, July 27, hundreds of concerned citizens, led primarily by Jewish social action organizations like the Chicago-based Jewish Council on Urban Affairs and the Minneapolis-St. Paul-based Jewish Community Action, joined local religious leaders for a city-wide march in Postville. Rally speakers called for an end to the workpla…

Amway, Religious Right Pyramid Scheme, Returns to the Motherland

By Bill Berkowitz

…leading brand of vitamin, mineral and dietary supplements,” is one of the company’s leading moneymakers. The company’s most important product has always been selling its version of the American Dream: the notion that any person with a fair amount of desire, spunk, and initiative with a get-up-and-go persona and a little bit of up-front money, could shape their futures. They can get rich, and their futures would include a fair amount of well-deser…

UN Human Rights Council Creates LGBT Watchdog; Orthodox Council Affirms Traditional Teaching on Family; Pope Francis Says Church Should Apologize to Gays; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…eges. With time, gay Adventists at all levels of the church will feel more comfortable with coming out of the shadows. Same-sex couples that marry outside the church will bring their children to Sabbath school and a growing number of openly gay students will attend Adventist academies and colleges. Like the SCC’s black members in the 1960s, gay Adventists will be able to hold their faith community legally accountable for any discriminatory respons…

Show Me the Way of the Hebrews: The Making of an African American Rabbi

By J. Lester Feder

…ieve a larger goal of getting a Jewish education. “Ultimately, it opened a number of doors for me,” he says. After completing his studies and receiving his ordination from Shoulson, Aronoff honored his commitment to his teacher by teaching in his grandmother’s congregation for more than 20 years, while earning his living as an accountant. Bethel member Dave McClam, whose mother was among the congregation’s founders, says that Aronoff was “on the c…

An Extravagant Welcome For All: Believe Out Loud, a Faith-Based LGBT Campaign, Launches

By Peter Laarman

…of congregations that are actively engaged in formal processes either to become officially welcoming for the first time—or to upgrade the quality of their LGBT-related ministries, in the event that they are already officially “on record” as welcoming queer people. Supercharging the Faith-Based LGBT Movement Organizers feel that the sky is the limit with respect to the campaign’s ultimate impact. They note that even before the campaign goes public,…

A Post-Christian America? Not Quite—Though Devoutly to be Wished

By Peter Laarman

…stian nation” thinking should now recede. It’s a good thing that more have come to appreciate the wisdom of separating church and state. And yet I’m not sure the road ahead is completely sunny. This morning I awoke with two thoughts in relation to Meacham’s piece: 1) There’s got to be a connection between the smaller number of people, especially young people, wishing to claim the name “Christian” and the cultural prevalence of toxic forms of Chris…

After More Mass Shootings It’s Time to Call Out White Supremacy in the Pews

By Peter Laarman

…n culture is “exceptional”—exceptional in its toxicity, that is. A growing number of truth telling historians are eager to help us discover these deeper roots if we are willing to listen. Here I’m thinking mainly of scholars like Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz and Gerald Horne who focus on the connections between settler colonialism, white supremacy, and an unparalleled level of gun violence. To me the question that grows more acute daily is how to amplify…

Life as a Game Show: Reading Slumdog Millionaire

By Paul Courtright

…hands of destiny is a broadly shared Indian cultural perspective. Further complicating the film’s swirl of ethnic, religious, and national identities, Slumdog, though officially British-made, is also a very Indian film faithful to the Bollywood aesthetic formula. It produces a number of rasa, “tastes,” in the viewer: heroism, humor, disgust, eros, fear, and tranquility. The final dance scene on the train platform pays homage to the familiar Bolly…

Catholic Leaders Offer Criticism, Support to Boxer Pacquiao After Anti-Gay Comments…

By Peter Montgomery

…s Justice Party, tweeted that the Prophet Mohammed said “Whomever you find committing the acts of the community of Lot (homosexual) should be put to death.” Sembering later deleted the tweet in response to online criticism. A few people, including religious studies scholar Akhmad Sahal, suggested Sembering was importing the rhetoric of ISIS, which has publicized the execution of many alleged gay men that it justifies with this same passage of scri…

The Abortion Debate, Texas Style

By Dhawn Martin

…at side accused the other of trading in idle speculation as to supposed outcomes of the bill, outcomes that some argue would leave only five abortion clinics in the state. Approximately 45 minutes later, the testimony started. Experts testified, and impassioned speaker after impassioned speaker stepped up to the podium. After one gentleman opened with a prayer—which to me felt a bit like pious posturing—I stepped out into the hall. On my right, th…