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What Pence and Kaine Reveal About Divides in Catholicism

By Patricia Miller

…Progress: …if this sort of dissenting spirit was unique among modern American Catholics, one could plausibly argue that the United States has created an environment that bifurcates Catholics in unusual ways. But it’s not: In 2014, a global survey conducted by Univision found that most of the planet’s Catholics disagree with the church on birth control, abortion rights, divorce, and priestly celibacy. But of course what really divides the left and…

Welcome to the Shari’ah Conspiracy Theory Industry

By Sarah Posner

…S., replace our Constitution with Shari’ah law, and establish a North American Caliphate here. That was the entire point of the presentation, to make people aware of the Muslim Brotherhood’s (and all the little ikhwans, CAIR, MSA, ISNA, ICNA, etc.) activities and objectives. Anyone who wanted to turn my information into a broad-brush indictment of all American Muslims in the U.S. have their own agenda. O’Brien is a Texas Republican Party delegate…

Holey Holey Holey: The Problem with a New Study Valuing Religion at $1.2 Trillion Per Year

By Michael Schulson

…ut the future. Plenty of commentators have fretted over the rise of the so-called Nones—Americans who decline to affiliate with a particular religious group—but few have speculated that religious disaffiliation could make ripples in the economy. “Is this economy endangered with people being less religiously affiliated, given that religion is such a positive contributor to overall social and economic well-being?” asked Grim during our conversation,…

Does Record Number of Religious “Nones” Mean Decline of Religiosity?

By Elizabeth Drescher

…oing or how high over a rushing river we seemed to be slung, I counted red cars, blue cars, white cars; trucks, station wagons, sedans; light posts, fence posts, sign posts; and so on. So it is that I learned this at an early age: numbers make us comfortable. They create the illusion that we understand something meaningful about the reality through which we are moving even as they distract us from the mysterious, often hidden, mechanisms propelli…

Who Is “Sam Bacile?”

By Sarah Posner

…d that the film was intended to be a provocative political statement assailing the religion. He denied being Sam Bacile, the pseudonym for the video’s purportedly Israeli Jewish writer and director, but AP said the cellphone number it called for a telephone interview with Bacile on Tuesday matched Nakoula’s address. —- For more RD coverage of the events in Libya see “Tragic Violence in Libya: No Excuses,” by Haroon Moghul — ed….

South Asian Religious Leaders Challenged to Take on Stigma and Discrimination: Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…uador will allow same-sex civil unions to be displayed on national identification cards, which El Diario calls “an important step forward in supporting the rights of its LGBT citizens.” Under the country’s 2008 Constitution, Ecuadorans have the right to “personal integrity, which includes physical, psychological, moral and sexual integrity.” The country does not permit same-sex couples to marry. Although President Rafael Correa, described by El Di…

How to Choose a Tour Company for Your Hajj

By Amina Wadud

…ld not be anything more sadistic. Actually, I became excited after I got a phone call from the agency that I chose. Turns out, this first full business day after Ramadan was also the day that they clarified for me all the upcoming deadlines. In the next week (that is, by or before September 20), all my pre-travel preparations need to be complete. It all feels rather last-minute to me. But then, maybe that’s the way it goes. No, if I had my way I w…

Five Flood Stories You Didn’t Know About

By Ingrid Lilly

…rals who have no use for the Bible really care about these questions? America, we can ask a better question, a more crucial and more meaningful question, “Why does The Flood continue to work as a powerful cultural story?” Indeed, The Flood is one of the most ancient and oft recycled stories in world cultures. In looking at The Flood today, we participate in thousands of years of meaning-making. We connect ourselves to world literature, to ancient…

Forget Debates and Dialogue about LGBT Justice, the Religious Right isn’t Listening

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

…vel, really believe that granting LGBT people equal rights would ruin America not just economically, but in a real, moral sense. And a theological sense, so the church can’t support us. The Southern Baptists have to keep denying our rights because they don’t want to be part of the collapse of the country and get God’s displeasure—which is God being a terrorist. They don’t use bombs and bullets to enforce their views, but they use this fear of God….

7 Religion Stories to Watch in the 2012 Battleground States

By Joanna Brooks

…them will actually vote remains to be seen. And will anyone in the Republican camp bring ultra-conservative Christian opinion-makers like Iowa radio jock Steve Deace, an avowed Romney foe, into line by November? Wisconsin: Catholics and collective bargaining. Obama now leads by 12 points: that’s a comfortable margin. If he hopes to maintain it, religion watchers say he’ll need Wisconsin’s Catholic voters, who make up 29% of the population. (Evang…