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#TeachAcceptance and the Fight for the Soul of SF’s Catholic Schools

By Patricia Miller

…behavior outside of the classroom.” For Allen and other who object to the new rules—which, he notes, include school administrators and some of the religious orders that sponsor the schools—the sticking point is the harsh anti-gay language in a community that prides itself on acceptance and diversity. “We perceive the archbishop’s language to be a real threat to our status and history as ‘an inclusive community of faith’,” he said. “For many of us…

Why Republicans Don’t Think Obama Is Christian

By Sarah Posner

…-secret-Muslim theme have suggested various sources for it: ignorance, Fox News, racism, too much World Net Daily in your diet. Theodoridis’ post was inspired by Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker’s remarks that he didn’t know whether Obama is a Christian. But do other elected Republicans suggest that Obama is not only not a Christian, but a Muslim? I ran a search in the Congressional Record for recent floor speeches in which the word Islam or Islami…

Rand Paul, Religious Skeptic?

By Sarah Posner

…but added that he doesn’t want to hear partisan messages at church. Not a word about the religious freedom of pastors to endorse candidates! Not a word about how the Christian nation needs a revival! No diatribe against the horrors wrought by secularism! In a way, it was refreshing to see a candidate be frank about his doubts about his faith. (As Ed Kilgore has pointed out, doubt as an element of religious belief is not favored by conservatives.)…

Fellow Mainline Christians: Are We Completely Useless?

By Sarah Morice-Brubaker

…ternet access for the duration of the study because the whole town was overrun by zombies, and they couldn’t get word out because there was a quarantine, OK, fine. But this is a statistically significant pattern. This is something we mainliners tend, as a group, to do. “This” being “act in a white supremacist way.” Yes, white supremacist. That phrase accurately describes the actions of a group that treats emails from white-sounding names as worthi…

Millennials Put Off By Rigid, Judgmental Religion Offered … More Orthodoxy

By Daniel Schultz

…morality afloat than actually helping anyone in need. You’ll notice that Shrum never says a word about service or ministry. It’s all holiness all the time. Unfortunately for churches like Shrum’s, holiness just isn’t very popular in our culture these days. What people want in spirituality is egalitarianism, an emphasis on the ways in which God welcomes, rather than rejects. It’s okay that Shrum or other conservative pastors might say “Sorry, we ca…

Netanyahu’s Speech, Lane’s Trip, and the Impossibility of Boycotts

By Sarah Posner

…Here at home, there are noises that House Democrats might (emphasis on the word might) boycott Netanyahu’s speech. Politico reported this morning that Democrats have privately (emphasis on the word privately) hinted that they might skip the speech. Politico also reported that Israel’s Ambassador to the U.S., Ron Dermer, had a “spirited” meeting with seven pro-Israel House Democrats. The AP reports that Rep. Steve Israel, the Democrat who arranged…

Focus on the Family Goes to Bat for Bullies

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

…y focusing on the bully, Wiseman said, it becomes a matter of the victim’s word against the word of the bully, and if FotF gets its way and strips specific categories from anti-bullying laws, the victim won’t even be able to use the words necessary to describe what they were being bullied about. “If you take out the language of naming the behavior, then it becomes so amorphous that there’s no place for that kid to define what is happening to them….

Santorum and Huckabee Question Authority

By Sarah Posner

…Supreme Court’s authority impinges on what they see as religious truths about homosexuality, abortion, and birth control. But what are religious truths when even Rick Santorum says he can’t listen to the Pope? …

Remembering Gil Scott-Heron

By Mark Hulsether

…of social justice; and they pioneered some of the forms of blending spoken word, rhythm, and music that later took the world by storm as hip-hop music. Later, during an era of music videos and mainstream commercial rap, less and less that Scott-Heron produced made the transition to a mainstream lingua franca or commercial success. For a long stretch between the mid 1980s and 2010 he released only one record, and he battled drug problems. In 2005,…

On National Coming Out Day, Many Still Can’t Afford the Luxury

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

…gia towns that I knew would not embrace me—and might even fire me—if they knew the truth. I fled to the relative safety of Atlanta and found jobs where my sexual orientation made no difference, and since then have been up-front, even in interviews, choosing to pass up jobs where I would not be both welcomed and affirmed. Again, many of us do not have that luxury. As Preston Mitchum writes in the Atlantic, the closet is often still the safest plac…