Religion Dispatches
…ly enterprise. On that latter point, it appears (to my delight) that I was wrong, at least in part. The tide has turned, evidently, because of a pileup of criticisms from within Barton’s own cocoon. Most recently, conservative scholars have begun to pile on. Thomas Kidd, the well-respected Baylor historian known for his excellent works in early American history as well as his contributions to conservative intellectual periodicals, reported in Wor…
Read More…ended when he “set captives free” by the founding of the country. It’s all wrong, of course, historically, constitutionally. But Bachmann found the precise sweet spot where testimony and Christian American exceptionalism mythology intersect. Bachmann took her speech even further, invoking the biblical story of Joshua and Caleb, who led a younger generation into the promised land, after the Israelites wandered 40 years in the desert. God sent Joshu…
Read More…n of science and human origins. Both players get it right, and both get it wrong. First to bat, science writer Clay Farris Naff stakes out new territory in the science-religion rumpus ring: supernatural-free intentional creation. Naff, a secular humanist, proposes a scenario in which our universe was created by a mega-species with the intention of perpetuating life. This mega-species was (is?) trapped in its own universe which, like our own, is su…
Read More…and disrespect towards women as reported in Salon and elsewhere. But it’s wrong to depict Mitt Romney as some kind of hardliner, because as far as Mormon men of his generation go, on gender, Romney is rather moderate. Given the scrutiny of Romney’s time as bishop, it also helps to understand more about the roles of bishops in LDS communities. There are about 28,000 LDS congregations worldwide, each with it’s own bishop (except for smaller congreg…
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…could be used against them. But in this instance, they tried to bully the wrong pol. In a subsequent appearance on Fox, Marty defended the integrity of his faith and his stance against the In God We Trust amendment. He insisted that posting of In God We Trust in the public schools is “offensive” to both religious believers and the non-religious. And, speaking as a Christian, he said that the “government sanctioned motto does not strengthen our re…
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…ad backed itself into a terrible corner and few of us like to admit we are wrong. This is especially true for many clergy and bishops who believe they are not only right but empowered by God in their rightness. (Ask any union organizer who has negotiated with a religious hospital.) Regardless of the particular issues of concern, the style in which they were presented or the various policies of the institution, this is essentially a labor dispute….
Read More…But as Hussein and many others have shown, years ago, Graham is just flat wrong about the business about Islamic law and Obama’s father. I’ll let Hussein’s 2008 post explain: Although he [Obama] was born to a Muslim father, his father renounced his faith. To be a Muslim is not a legal status that is transmitted by birth, like Judaism is confirmed through the mother. A child can be raised as a Muslim, but still renounce the faith when she reaches…
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…ormity of Hofmann’s crimes. How can you be sure of anything when proven so wrong on this? Near the end of the series, the anti-Mormon critic Sandra Tanner and LDS spokesperson Richard Turley offered competing theological readings of the crisis. To Tanner, Hofmann’s deception proves the fallibility of church leaders and erodes their claims to prophesy; to Turley, free will means that even God’s elect can, and will, be fooled. Debates continue to ra…
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…ters a great deal. To illustrate the current prevailing framing and what’s wrong with it, take Jennifer Rubin’s recent column in The Washington Post, “Trump Idolatry has Undermined Religious Faith” in which she laments “the damage the MAGA movement has wrought to religious values” (emphasis in original). By contrasting the two, Rubin thus relegates authoritarian attitudes and behaviors, as well as racist and anti-immigrant sentiment, to a position…
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…tions—however, wherever, and whenever they choose. But something is deeply wrong when the burden remains exclusively on the community itself to conduct all of the outreach, to articulate its values and defend its contributions to the rest of society. There is a deep isolation, not to mention exhaustion, in that “cultural tax”—especially after a tragedy. Do we as Americans simply leave the community to articulate itself to its neighbors? Do we ask…
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