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A Tale of Religious Tolerance… On Reddit

By Joanna Piacenza

…anyone else who might have taken offense to his posting. Reddit in search of mindless memes beware: between the cat videos and bizarre news stories you might just find some religious tolerance….

Will Catholic Voters Support LGBT Rights in Washington State?

By Joanna Brooks

…have people around the state working in their parishes—most of it on the west side of the state, where the decision will be made. We are participating in a Catholic-to-Catholic phone bank that Washington United for Marriage has set up on Wednesday nights and we assist with the larger phone bank at the Jewish synagogue downtown. A great deal of our work is communicating with Catholics on our email list and Facebook. As a Catholic, how does your fai…

Cloverfield: Sin & Redemption, with Monsters

By Gabriel Mckee

…’t attack California if greedy capitalists didn’t kidnap his miniature priestesses. The monsters symbolically destroy our human world, and we cheer because we think it’s all our fault. We deserve it, this says—a theology of sin and divine retribution. The kaiju-as-divine-wrath theme is nowhere as clear as in Gamera 3: Awakening of Irys, possibly the genre’s best film since the original Godzilla. Early in this film Gamera, the giant fire-breathing…

Godly Game or Godless Satire? Countering Biblical Ignorance with Heretical Humor

By Betsy Shirley

…me for Good Christians, released earlier this year, offers a scriptural twist: most of the material from its 300-card deck has been lifted directly from the Bible, with chapter and verse to prove it. The results fall somewhere between playful irreverence and flat-out blasphemy. For example, if the card “A woman must quietly receive ________ with full submission” is played, it could be paired with response cards that include “Crotch-less pants (2 S…

Vatican Considers ‘Disordered’ Language; HBO Doc on LGBT Persecution in Russia; Nigerian Bishop Shifts on Anti-Gay Law; Arson at ‘Open Mosque’ in South Africa; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…nesian gay rights activist interviewed by the Jakarta Globe. Another activist insisted the punishment belongs in the Middle Ages. “Gays and lesbians are human beings also,” said a female Indonesian lecturer from Aceh in an interview with GlobalPost. “Who are we to go against God’s creations?” Africa: ‘Conversion Therapy’ as Political Weapon Political Research Associates’ Kapya Kaoma reports on conversion therapy in Africa, and the ways American re…

Is It OK To Use a Cellphone in Church? Pew Surveys the New Etiquette

By Michael Schulson

…phone use in church (cf. Matthew 7:5). But it’s also possible that the question was just confusing. The problem here is that when Pew asks questions about how people use their cellphones, they’re entering vague territory, because there’s no agreed-upon definition of “use.” I’d wager hard cash that if you asked the exact same question about churches after priming people to think of Bible apps, those opinions would be very different. “Oh, that kind…

Lying About Our Religion, And Other Problems With Polling

By Michael Schulson

…ants. It’s disappointing, then, that Wuthnow does not venture a more activist stance. After laying out an extended case that pollsters are marketing misleading results—a process called, in less polite company, “deception”—Wuthnow ends with a mild call for “closer and more critical scrutiny” of polls. Hasn’t he just written an entire book doing exactly that? The final line of Inventing American Religion—“much more about religion remains to be under…

The Problem with Pew’s Science & Religion Poll

By Andrew Aghapour and Michael Schulson

…fuel internet hot-takes rather than productive public discourse. This is just one study, of course, but it matters for two reasons. First, Pew’s study manufactures and reinforces a narrow view of religion and science, while claiming to objectively measure public opinion; and second, the study’s extensive and largely uncritical media coverage is emblematic of the dysfunctional relationship between pollsters and reporters. The basics Pew surveyed 2,…

How To Talk To “Nones” and Influence People: Rob Bell’s Transrational Experience

By Brook Wilensky-Lanford

…nt regional manager of an insurance company—he actually says this—be the best assistant regional manager of an insurance company you can be. Work on something called your “craft.” (Even the insurance agent has a craft.) Also, pay attention to the details of life. Use the fine china. Unplug and play with your kids. Take a “Sabbath” from email. And you, too, will learn how to be here. Rob Bell, for most of us, will be best known as the guy who decla…

Should NASA Have Given $1.1 Million to a Theology Institute?

By Michael Schulson

…pirical claims? Seidel stuck to his main point. “At its most basic, you’re still stuck with the problem that the government is funding theological inquiry,” he said. “That just can’t happen.” In some ways, the question here boils down to something like: What the heck is theology? Is it a specifically Christian pursuit? Does it only have applications for religious people? In its narrowest definition, theology is the study of God. Unlike the field o…