Search for "CNN International cleantalkorg2.ru Headlines Videos Stories and Videos on News breaking newstoday bbc news news word BBC News World"

Burning Man: Religious Event or Sheer Hedonism?

By Lee Gilmore

…For one week in late August and early September, an elaborate civic infrastructure called “Black Rock City” is constructed, featuring a carefully laid out grid of streets in which participants set up hundreds of different “theme camps.” Organizers provide some basic services (camp placement, public information, and porta-potties being just a few), but participants must still supply all of their own gear, food, and water; sufficient to survive for…

After Early Christian Opposition, Iceland Gets First Pagan Temple in Nearly 1000 Years

By Joseph Laycock

…en Iceland fell under control of Denmark from the thirteenth century until World War II, stories of the old gods became linked to ideas of independence and nationalism. In 1972 the Ásatrúarfélag was formed by a group of artists and intellectuals led by Sveinbjörn Beinteinsson, a farmer and poet. The early movement drew from many of the same Romantic currents of the 1960s that in the United States led to the cult of Tolkien and the founding of the…

Tim Tebow, Protestant Saint

By Sean S. O'Neil

…I might add) a “miracle” included two Tebow tosses for touchdowns, a Tebow run for a two-point conversion, a successful onside kick (that almost never happens in the NFL), and a Dolphin’s sack-fumble. Overtime included a 52-yard field goal, which brought the Broncos their 18-15 win. Tebow seemed to have an uncanny sense that the camera had caught him when he ceremonially genuflected. The difference between his gesture and other athletic signals to…

Hookers for Jesus: Sex and Salvation on the Strip

By Nicole Greenfield

…rk Investigation Discovery, profiled Lobért and Hookers for Jesus and, in true reality docudrama fashion, the personal stories of three women who have been “saved.” In a segment she calls “Saturday Night Love,” Lobért brings her “takes one to know one” attitude to the Strip, boasting that she can spot a working girl anywhere. Equipped with gift bags full of beauty products and Bibles, she offers support and encouragement, and an invitation to chur…

Meet Arizona’s Even More Anti-Immigrant Bill

By Lauri Lebo

…ry illegally, I found a community overwhelmed by fear. While there I heard stories of parents afraid to send their children to school for fear that police would pick them up and send them to Mexico. Many refused to talk to me at all, fearing something they said could get someone they know deported. A pastor kicked me off the grounds of a church that ran a day labor site, saying that lawyers prohibited anyone there speaking to the press. What made…

The Democratic Party is Not a Religion

By Gary Laderman

…side but keep getting stuck on Michael Dukakis, Al Gore, and John Kerry. Truth is, there’s simply been no one on the Democratic side like the glorified icon Ronald Reagan, whose life and presidency is held up more than ever as a sacred source of myths, rituals, ethics, and theology for the faithful. Finally, another more obvious religious element in the Democratic Party is the presence of moral values, though these do not serve quite the same fun…

Poll: Negative Church Messages Contribute to Gay and Lesbian Suicides

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

…ut how their childhood churches treated them. One woman in particular told stories of her fundamentalist upbringing and how the church made sure that she knew she would go to hell if she “chose” to be a lesbian. “I won’t ever set foot in church again,” she vowed. So much for recruiting her musical skills into my budding new church, I thought. She took my card at the end of the night, so who knows — perhaps the lure of playing her guitar in front o…

Gay Lawmakers Paving the Way for Equality

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

…of Colonial Baptist Church in Randallstown, Md., told Baptist Press — the news service of the Southern Baptist Convention — that he resents the fight for marriage equality being compared with the civil rights movement and instead calls it an attempt “to create a system and special laws for a group of citizens that are living in immorality and wanting to force all of us to embrace that as if it is morally equivalent, that is wrong.” A recent Pew P…

Does One Have to be an Ex-Muslim to be a Good Christian?

By Hussein Rashid

…gh both Caner and Saleem told tales that could not reasonably be taken as true, they were elevated within their respective organizations. Their fictional vision of Islam gave them credibility as Christians within these organizations. These evangelical organizations seem to be saying that belief in Christ is not a reward in and of itself, but the denigration and belittling of another tradition is what makes a good Christian. Even if one fabricates…

“Ex-Gay” Therapy Revealed in Prop. 8 Trial

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

…“ex-gay ministries” have been around, they have but a handful of “success” stories to share with the world. (Usually, those “success” stories go on to be paid, professional ex-gays, giving speeches and trading on their “cure.”) Their “therapy” is based on outdated or repudiated studies, and often consists of enforcing strict gender roles by teaching men to be more masculine and women to be more feminine. NARTH, in particular, continues to use the …