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Obama Shifts US Narrative Away from “Christian Nation”

By Michael J. Altman

…ralized nationally because they are our shared national story. Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, Wicca, or whichever belief system or world view one chooses certainly can endorse liberty but it cannot corner the market on it. But Obama’s statement also fits into another sacred narrative of American culture: the story of American pluralism. In the colonial period there were a variety of Christianities throughout America—Presbyterians in New J…

Argue-by-Number: A Suggestion for the Church

By Mark D. Jordan

…they are not easily cast out—in ourselves or in others. All the more reason, then, to put away the joke book. Repeating the clichéd arguments doesn’t begin to touch these deeper motives—doesn’t address the impulse to quarrel about something, anything, rather than listen again to the demands of the book we keep quoting. It is not a joke book, and it is not meant to be cut up into proof texts for smug citation. If we contenders want to number things…

Francis Visits the Church that John Paul Broke

By Patricia Miller

…The number of baptisms has declined from nearly 1 million to just over 700,000, and the number of marriages within the church has declined by nearly half. Only the number of Catholic funerals has held steady. And while the number of Catholics overall has remained level, that’s largely due to Hispanic migration to the US; some 40 percent of those born Catholic have left the church. But numbers don’t tell the whole story. The church Francis will en…

Conservative Black Preacher Leads Crusade Against Hate Crimes Legislation

By Bill Berkowitz

…identity. Attacks upon individuals because of a difference in how they look, pray, or behave have long been a part of human history. It is only recently, however, that our society has given it a name and decided to monitor it, study it, and legislate against it. The FBI defines a hate crime (a.k.a. bias crime) to be: “a criminal offense committed against a person, property or society which is motivated, in whole or in part, by the offender’s bias…

Turning Point Efforts to Export Drag Queen Attacks and ‘Take Back Universities’ Marred by Fringe Associations and Farcical Missteps

By Matthew Boedy

…ist”: “If Hitler just wanted to make Germany great and have things run well, OK, fine,” Owens continued, while standing next to Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk. “The problem is he wanted, he had dreams outside of Germany. He wanted to globalize, he wanted everybody to be German, everybody to be speaking German, everybody to look a different way.” TPUK’s rollout of its social media accounts three months later—complete with a grim video—“desc…

Vatican Enlists Allies Against Gay Marriage; Iranian Gays Pushed to Change Gender; And More in This Week’s Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…forming a positive attitude to untraditional sexual relations” among minors, is, like Russia’s anti-gay propaganda law, a major step backward: Consensual sex between men was a crime in Soviet times but Kyrgyzstan, an impoverished country of 5.5 million, adopted a new criminal code in 1998 that made it legal. Kazakhstan and Tajikistan have also taken similar steps but the two other ex-Soviet republics in Central Asia, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, h…

Democrats Have Seized the Narrative Frame From the GOP, But Can They Find a Better Story to Tell About an Inclusive, Pluralist US?

By Chrissy Stroop

…does it say about the broader vision that it was accompanied by chants of “USA! USA!” and a “tough on crime” stance embodied by a sheriff who once worked with right-wing wackos on their (at best) morally dubious anti-trafficking missions? Once again, Democrats cede moral ground by uncritically adopting GOP framing instead of trying to shift the conversation to something that represents the party’s inclusive and progressive vision. That brings us t…

The Southern Baptists Dumped a Predator or Two, but Let’s Hold Off on the F-word

By Anne Linstatter

…compelled to build an organization defending the patriarchal view of church, family, and society. Its leaders defended their view that only men belong in church leadership and that defining roles by gender is the only truly biblical stance. Women need to be “in submission” to their husbands and their pastors. In an era when men with these views were being called male chauvinists, these guys invented—or perhaps co-opted—a kinder, gentler identity f…

Wild Goose Festival’s (Mostly) Welcoming Spirit for LGBT Christians

By Kristin Rawls

…med and accepted, “because I felt the center of gravity of the mostly young, cool, hipster social justice-supporting attendees was overwhelmingly pro-queer. I thought Campolo and his cohorts were on a bit of an intellectual island… Pro-queer statements got cheered at panels; antigay statements were generally met with silence.” But not every emergent-church hipster uniform suggested progressive politics, as attested by the presence of Devin Murphy,…

Religious Freedom Manifesto Calls for Compromise and Civility—What’s So Wrong With That?

By Frederick Clarkson

…ommunions. These denominations, the Episcopal Church, Presbyterian Church (USA), United Methodist Church, and United Church of Christ, have been leading members of the 38 member communions of the National Council of Churches. Mainline leaders recognize that Religious Freedom Institute leaders, Executive Director Kent Hill, Chairman Thomas F. Farr, and signatory neoconservative Catholic Robert P. George have all played leadership roles in the neoco…