Religion Dispatches
…half. There were still probably 80 empty seats, and it was clear that some number of attendees had free tickets. The largest financial supporter of the event was a local news/talk radio station and its representatives were the only media allowed in. As I arrived with my Religion Dispatches press badge they stopped me before I even got to the door. I chatted with an AP reporter and he said AP had been trying for weeks to gain media access—but that…
Read More…selves, for the most part, has proven easier. In reality, the only reason anyone is talking about “reparative therapy” is because religious beliefs have convinced far too many people that God will damn them for eternity if they pursue their natural inclinations toward the same gender. Here’s an idea: instead of fighting about how to change gay people into straight people, let’s shift the focus on how to end homophobia and religious intolerance of…
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…n our side. Number 1 could be “God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.” Number 2: “God doesn’t discriminate.” Number 3: “Sex is only for procreation.” And so on. We could get clever, of course, and assign separate groups of numbers to arguments pro and con or to thematic clusters. I can even imagine some seminary librarian proposing a sort of Dewey Decimal System to organize the arguments. This would allow long series of arguments to be cited b…
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…ept an ‘abstracted’ science? And what does abstract science do for us? The number of nuclear bombs used by the West outweighs the number used by the entire planet. Muslims did not invent nuclear weapons, nor have they used them. (Let’s pray that stands.) When Saddam Hussein was our ally, he unleashed chemical weapons on Kurds at Halabja, the only confirmed instance of a Muslim regime using chemical weapons. Even considering the possibility of Assa…
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…ght in laughing at Mormons. From personal knowledge, I can tell you that many of the play’s zingers about 19-year-old Mormon “elders” fall on target. A surprising number of these Christian soldiers haven’t in fact read the Book of Mormon (“Another Testament of Jesus Christ”). Pairs of missionaries (“companions”) do often resent each other; sexual tension, homophobia, homesickness, and boredom strain the relationships of these co-workers/roommates….
Read More…other ways to meet other LGBT people … church, for instance! Certainly, many LGBT people have suffered from sexual abuse, but so have many straight people, who continue to be straight to this day, despite the horrors they may have suffered at the hands of adults when they were children. There is no excuse for anyone, gay or straight, to abuse a powerless child. But, the experts agree, sexual abuse doesn’t affect sexual orientation. Oh, but Fisher…
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…d. And in response to the controversy and the barrage of outraged parental phone calls, many school systems decided it was safest not to air the speech at all. Others required that alternative activities be arranged for children whose parents refused to permit their kids to be subjected to an encouraging presidential pep talk. The evening after the talk, the local news station I was watching aired a report on the event, complete with footage of a…
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…s in general—aren’t “real” Christians, a framing that I’ve criticized on many occasions as upholding Christian hegemony by implicitly equating “Christian” with “good”? Asked about the relationship between Christianity and Christian nationalism, Tyler is thoughtful. “Christian nationalism is not a religion,” she says. But, she adds, “I’ve heard people say ‘[Christian nationalism] has nothing to do with Christianity,’ and you have to reject that.” N…
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…g like hotcakes. According to the Web site, complete with the iconic 1-800 number and attractive female operator with headset, the IDENTIGENE test is “Fast. Accurate. Confidential.” It’s not the speed, accuracy, nor confidentiality that worry me so much (although plenty of problems lurk therein). It’s more the information itself, its power, and in what context it is received. Personally, I’m not too interested in the test for myself. I know who my…
Read More…instatement of a compulsory draft.” However, that belief runs counter to many studies already done that show lifting Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell would not adversely affect the military in any way. In 1993 RAND Corp. concluded that openly gay people in the U.S. military do not negatively impact unit cohesion, morale, good order, or military readiness. Several other military-commissioned and GAO studies have concluded that open service does not undermine…
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