Religion Dispatches
…chool boards “to create and foster an environment” in public schools that “promotes critical thinking skills, logical analysis, and open and objective discussion of scientific theories being studied including, but not limited to, evolution, the origins of life, global warming, and human cloning.” In addition to state-approved textbooks, teachers “may use supplemental textbooks and other instructional materials to help students understand, analyze,…
Read More…of U.S. Freedom to Discriminate Debate While Americans debated “religious freedom” or “freedom to discriminate” laws, a British politician, Lewes councilor Donna Edmunds, got into hot water suggesting that business owners should be free to refuse to provide services to women and gays. After an outcry, she said she regretted her comments: “I in no way endorse any form of discrimination. I believe in cutting red tape for business and I also strongl…
Read More…f states, regardless of their political, economic and cultural systems, to promote and protect all human rights and fundamental freedoms,” it said. You can download the text of the resolution. Free and Equal, the UN Campaign for LGBT Equality, released a video made during the September opening of the UN General Assembly. The UN Human Rights Office and members of the Core Group on LGBT Rights at the UN set up a photo booth and invited visitors – in…
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…me-sex marriage, vote no,” said Abbott. “If you’re worried about religious freedom and freedom of speech, vote no, and if you don’t like political correctness, vote no because voting no will help to stop political correctness in its tracks.” Later that day the director of the Australian Christian Lobby, Lyle Shelton, wrote that “the marriage plebiscite is a referendum on freedom of speech and ‘safe schools’”. He has lamented the “stolen generation…
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…ubt that homosexuality is seen as a crime. Article 427 of the Afghan penal code refers only to “pederasty” – a sexual act between males, one of them understood to be a youth or a boy. The act is punishable with “long imprisonment”. However Dr Niaz Shah of Hull University in the UK, an expert in Afghan and Islamic law, says that the penal code reflects the underlying Islamic principle that homosexuality is banned. “Islamic law allows only one form…
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…cil and other Muslim leaders urged the government “to make gay sex and the promotion of LGBT activities illegal,” reports Associated Press. “The council’s statement said the clerics and other Muslim leaders supported the government’s rejection of foreign funding of LGBT causes and they called for bans on promoting and funding LGBT activities in Indonesia.” The government has also moved to ban Tumblr unless it blocks LGBT content, and the Indonesia…
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…the way the world itself was made.” While the ritual aspects of the Mosaic code aimed at guiding the Israelites, the theological, ontological, and ethical principles, continued into the Second Testament, aim at guiding all. The human task is to grapple with those principles—to discern how they promote our flourishing—and to further them secondarily, as co-creators. Why is such attention given to the stranger and what good could come from offering…
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…with the rethinking of American history (and imagery) spurred by the black freedom struggle. And yet it cannot be reduced simply to a code for broader sets of values for particular groups, because the use of Jesus—even a Jesus envisioned as white—destabilized white supremacy. When asked a question about Jesus’ race, Martin Luther King responded that Jesus was “no less significant because he was white,” suggesting both how his own unspoken and even…
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…lection. Then point out the evidence—that’s piling up already—suggesting they’ve been duped by a con-man who just last week admitted that he didn’t think anyone would take his pledge to “keep jobs in America” seriously. Call 1-844-USA-0234 and enter your zip code to be connected with your representatives in Washington. Tell them why you oppose each nominee, and keep calling. Ask your friends and neighbors to do the same. Use the liberal bubble so…
Read More…ntended she violated school policy and the American Counseling Association code of ethics. That code, by the way, is clear about what is expected from counselors: Counselors do not condone or engage in discrimination based on age, culture, disability, ethnicity, race, religion/spirituality, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, marital status/partnership, language preference, socioeconomic status, or any basis proscribed by law. Counselors…
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