Religion Dispatches
…rt of secret handshake among the most discerning and dedicated geeks. When BBC Wales resurrected the show after a 16-year hiatus in 2005, word began to spread that the new Who was something incredible. Under the guidance of producer Russell T. Davies (creator of Queer as Folk), Doctor Who quickly transformed from “acquired taste” into “essential viewing.” The new show is sophisticated, witty, and (most importantly) fun. It’s been showered with acc…
Read More…tus as one of America’s most successful visionaries and entrepreneurs.” The speech itself? Kyle Mantyla at Right Wing Watch calls it a “typically self-aggrandizing and buffoonish message” that included Trump’s admonition to “get even” with people who do you wrong. The mutual admiration society between Falwell and Trump may reveal something about the values that are driving Liberty’s leaders: money, celebrity, and sticking it to your opponents. [Fu…
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…Middle East and Muslim politics, or that their involvement of America and Russia, respectively, in their clash of religious authoritarianisms, might contain the ingredients for the next World War. Certainly all of us should be paying close attention. But there’s no reason to become hyperbolic. This feud has lasted 38 years now, which is significantly less than 1,000 years. For one thing, the modern Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, ruled, as its name shou…
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…with each other in ways that are transformative, and symbolic of this new world of social media. They are all Jewish and I am Muslim, and we are breaking down barriers. Our backgrounds and religions are relegated to the background as we share ideas, hopes, worries, and more. These friendships forged online are not tainted by stereotypes and prejudice, but are stronger because we respect one another’s differences. Maybe people who reach out on soc…
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…adox led me to think that what we’re asking of DNA is more than just the “truth” of it (and truth in quotes because there are lots of things that are provisional about the technology). What does DNA add? I think it can add a deeper sense of history. If you’re doing genetic ancestry testing—bracketing for a moment the veracity of the test—what these inferences provide can often be long histories. For people that have no information at all, some Afr…
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…tory he wishes to tell is unapologetically Protestant and unapologetically English, but the crux of the liberating and radical impact of the Protestant Reformation and its vernacular translation of the scriptures is a new spirit unleashed by both. The spirit of these two movements—Reformation and translation—was radically egalitarian and individualistic. The contention was that all people were capable of close reading, and the commitment was to in…
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…f the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for the Family, Cardinal Alfonso Lopez Trujillo, who told the program: The AIDS virus is roughly 450 times smaller than the spermatozoan. The spermatozoan can easily pass through the ‘net’ that is formed by the condom. These margins of uncertainty… should represent an obligation on the part of the health ministries and all these campaigns to act in the same way as they do with regard to cigarettes, which they sta…
Read More…it, the transgender community and allies may have to gear up for a long struggle.” In other news, the Central Board of Film Certification “has refused to certify for public exhibition” a film about the lives of two gay men and a woman in Kerala. More from The News Minute: The board has stated that the film is “ridiculing, insulting and humiliating Hindu religion, in particular portraying Hindu Gods in poor light”. Prathibha A, the regional office…
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…RD Senior Correspondent Haroon Moghul on CNN yesterday discussing GOP candidate Donald Trump’s disparaging comments about the parents of slain U.S. Army captain Humayun S. M. Khan, who accused Trump of sacrificing “nothing” in their speech at last week’s DNC….
Read More…RD senior correspondent Haroon Moghul on CNN talks Trump, Ben Carson, Ahmed Mohamed, and why American Muslims just can’t be who they are. Read Haroon’s latest, Protocols of the Elders of Mecca: Hints of Anti-Semitic Playbook in Glenn Beck’s Islamophobia….
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