Religion Dispatches
…room at the Hilton North Raleigh for the celebration that was part standard-issue campaign victory party and part wedding reception. There was a cash bar, and music that included love songs. The centerpiece was a seven-tier white wedding cake, capped by a plastic heterosexual couple embracing. After the Associated Press declared that the amendment would pass, Tami Fitzgerald, the Vote for Marriage chairwoman, took the stage to thank the churches,…
Read More…us states in the union. And because population turnover rates are high, one-on-one voter contact can be more challenging. Ground game (door-to-door voter identification, contact, and mobilization) may prove crucial in getting voters to the polls, and here Romney’s quasi-hometown advantage among Republican Mormons—a population with excellent door-to-door skills—could be a point of strength. New Hampshire: Can Romney convert the “nones”? Of all the…
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…l sex or inappropriate touching. But what would you call it when you have a 16-year-old girl sitting by the side of your bed as you get out of bed in the morning, powdering your feet, and pulling on your socks? There is a sexual subtext to that, so yes, he was a dirty old man to that extent. In any case, all of us—not just the Messengers—saw him as a father. He never said those words to us, but it was the role he filled. All of us just wanted his…
Read More…ies highlighting how and why Utah Mormons might make good foot soldiers in western swing states, and nothing-new polls gauging consistent levels of voter antipathy towards Mormon candidates (with zero analysis). I’m waiting for the story that transcends the flat ethnicity paradigm and gets the deeper and more persistent question of religion and moral bearings: How does the most religiously devout candidate in recent memory reconcile a life of reli…
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…when writing? To the extent that “other academics of religion, music, and American culture” and “non-academics who participate or are interested in Southern gospel” constitute specific audiences, I guess so. But that’s probably not very satisfying. For me, audience can be inferred to some extent through method: how one goes about one’s scholarship helps determine the audience(s) who can or will find the work valuable. Methodologically, the book i…
Read More…raws on several disciplines in an engaging account of Western moral philosophy. What’s your next book? Throckmorton: I am completing a book on sexual orientation and identity, hopefully by mid-August, to be published by Inter-Varsity Press. Coulter: I am working on manuscript about John Locke’s conception of citizens within a liberal political order….
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