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On Pi Day, Puzzling Over the Most Famous Transcendental Number

By Ilana E. Strauss

…Physicsworld.com user asks, “What could be more mystical than an imaginary number interacting with real numbers to produce nothing?” Where infinity merges with the earth When you dig into pi, you encounter questions that are as much theological as mathematical: is there a pattern to the universe? Or is it fundamentally random? And how do we reckon with the infinite? Some people have always insisted that there must be a pattern behind pi. If only h…

Vatican Reverses Anti-Liberation Policies in Mexico

By Ruth Chojnacki and Jennifer Scheper Hughes

…ate, an ancient institution revived by Vatican II. In 2000, 341 of Mexico’s 800 deacons served the Diocese of San Cristobal, the largest number of deacons in any Catholic diocese in the world. Vatican suspicion of Bishop Ruiz’s liberationist pastoral strategy resulted in a failed attempt to remove him in 1993. The deacon program came under particular scrutiny after the 1994 Zapatista uprising in Chiapas, with reports that Maya catechists defied th…

Milquetoast Liberal Religion Won’t Challenge Conservative Values: A History Lesson

By Sheila D. Collins

…arge part of the Great Plains, restored wildlife and built a system of over 800 state and county parks. They electrified an entire region of the country, bringing what had been America’s “Third World” up to 20th century standards. They created works of art, gave concerts, set up theaters throughout the country, ran nursery schools, served over 1.2 billion school lunches to needy children, gave immunizations, taught illiterate adults to read and wr…

Heterosexual Martyrs and Gay Saints: Did AIDS Coverage Clear the Way for LGBT Equality?

By Diane Winston

…as a “mental illness,” the change was widely reported as were the growing number of cities that added “sexual orientation” to anti-discrimination laws. By the end of the decade, reporters were filing profiles about a “hip” community with its own bars, clubs, music, and fashion as well as a distinctively uninhibited sexual scene. Journalists also covered an emerging religious backlash, coalescing in the 1977 “Save Our Children” campaign to rescind…

Clergy May Soon Find Taxes Soaring As Result of an Under-the-Radar Ruling

By Patrick Hornbeck

…and nuns, Christian and otherwise, live in monasteries and convents; and a number of historic Protestant churches, especially those best endowed financially, provide parsonages. But over time, an increasing number of clergy have made their own living arrangements. Churches found parsonages prohibitively expensive; congregants preferred to see their donations go toward services rather than clergy housing; and new religious ventures, especially the…

Religious Exceptions Not So Exceptional According to New Study

By Patricia Miller

…most Catholic health care institutions have accepted the accommodation, a number of the nation’s 260 Catholic institutions of higher learning as well as Catholic nonprofits are seeking a broader exemption that would in effect bar their insurers from providing contraceptive coverage as specified under the accommodation designed by the Department of Health and Human Services. The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear a consolidated case challenging th…

Indonesia Hears Islamist Arguments For LGBT Criminalization; Zambian Churches Oppose Condom Distribution in Prisons; Lithuanian Conservative Manifesto Calls LGBTs Enemies of Freedom; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…orality, but it was at risk of having its core Muslim values overridden by international human rights claims that embrace LGBT rights.” One of the judges said, “Must all laws that are not in according with the morals and religious have to be synchronized with the local values so this court…[can be] an institution illuminated by the light of God.” The government is opposing the lawsuit, warning that criminalizing sex before marriage would turn crim…

Duterte Cites Catholic Heritage in Opposing Marriage Equality, and More in the Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…ans bus tour in Spain that we reported on earlier this month is part of an international strategy. The Spanish bus was sponsored by HazteOir, a Spain-based group that mobilizes Catholic conservatives and their allies in Spain and Europe. A billboard with the same visuals and messaging showed up in Guatemala, branded as a project of CitizenGo, with which HazteOir is affiliated. Then, this past week, the National Organization for Marriage brought th…

Is LGBT-Muslim Clash Aiding Rise of Right in Europe?

By Peter Montgomery

…cal religious authorities any time soon, given the results of a WIN/Gallup International poll in 2015 that found Hong Kong was rated second lowest in the world in terms of religious belief – behind only China – with 34 per cent claiming they did not believe in a deity. Other polls have put that number far higher, with as much as 80 per cent stating that they do not have any particular religious affiliation. It seems that the powers that be in Hong…

Must We Burn Something to Get Attention?: 50 Years After the Catonsville Nine

By Jason C. Bivins

…rty Law Center as a hate group) are affiliated with the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, when Robert Jeffress is the poisonous voice sanctifying the American embassy’s relocation in Israel, when the Vice President of the United States understands Christianity as a “get out of jail free” card used to freely exercise open bigotry, it can seem pretty conclusive that power has prevailed over justice. But consider some other words of…