Religion Dispatches
…ams has uploaded an undated video of Pinckney giving a floor speech in the South Carolina legislature about the murder of Walter Scott, who was gunned down by a police officer in North Charleston on April 4, just one day after the suspected Emanuel shooter, Dylann Roof, reportedly received a gun as a 21st birthday gift from his father. Pinckney was speaking in support of body cameras for police officers, as the only reason we know what happened to…
Read More…ll, of the religious right leaders endorsed Santorum. What does Gingrich’s South Carolina win say about that? It says, for one thing, something I’ve been arguing since 2007: that grassroots activists don’t care about those leadership endorsements. But it also says that the “one of us” formulation is off the table. (Recall, if you can, Rick Perry and Michele Bachmann, the quintessential “one of us” candidates.) That “character” doesn’t really count…
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…Protestant families for decades, the agency came under the scrutiny of the South Carolina Department of Social Services (DSS) in early 2018, when it turned away a Jewish parent from serving as a foster mentor. South Carolina law prohibits discrimination in the provision of child welfare services on the basis of religion. Miracle Hill is arguing that this state law violates the federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA). This is the same law…
Read More…een set up by a network of Sikhs and was programmed to run for governor of South Carolina by outside influences in foreign countries. He claims she is hiding her religion and he wants the voters to know about it. Just this past week I had remarked to a friend of mine that I found it remarkable that Haley had the lead in the four-way Republican race for governor since, one: she’s a woman, and two: she’s an ethnic woman at that. If she were a Democr…
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…owan County officials were favoring Christianity. In response, these North Carolina lawmakers proclaimed that the first amendment did not apply to North Carolina. The wildly overshooting lawmakers garnered immediate media attention (“North Carolina May Declare Official State Religion Under New Bill,” reported The Huffington Post) and alarmed those who felt that Christian theocrats had gained a foothold in the Tarheel state. Mary Elizabeth Williams…
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…going so far as to declare Obergefell “null and void in the state of North Carolina”), observers are left wondering as to the true intent of filing this dead-in-the-water bill. At best, the bill is a cynical attempt to appeal to the (presumably) far-right base of the Republican representatives who filed it. At worst, it’s the clearest sign yet that North Carolina lawmakers never intended to allow LGBT people to “live and let live.” Enter to win a…
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…Against Amendment One, Knight points out that conservative churches far outnumber progressive ones in North Carolina. “They’re encouraging their folks to vote as much as we are,” he said. “It remains to be seen who’s going to be motivated and mobilized to get out there and do it.” As far as media coverage is concerned, Bakker laments that the same-old anti-gay Christian perspective is still the easy go-to. “It’s a strange phenomenon,” he told me:…
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…way from the hard work of repentance, who tickle our ears with promises of cheap grace, and offer a vision of the cross of Jesus that has nothing to say to the crosses, and lynching trees, of history. But, if we do, we will be settling for the gospel of Caesar, not the good news of Jesus Christ. Perhaps it is time to put down the chalk, stop drawing pyrotechnical conspiracy theories that play into our worst fears and listen, instead, for the diffi…
Read More…for Obama in the last election. But, overcoming any sort of bigotry in the South is hard work. As a born and bred Southerner I can assure you that our region will always be the taillights, and never the headlights, in the march for anyone’s equality. While the religious right will crow over this victory and shout how it again shows that people will stand up for “traditional families” — what it really reveals is that they will stop at nothing to ut…
Read More…ore refused to discontinue a promotion which offers its customers discount tickets to a Christian magic show produced by Lawrence Khong, the anti-gay pastor of Faith Community Baptist Church: Mr Khong has claimed that gay people have “a shorter lifespan, more sexually transmitted infections and more health problems than the general population” and has warned of a “looming threat” of “homosexual activists” trying to repeal sodomy laws. Many custome…
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