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Euthanasia Billboards, Post-Rapture Pet Care, Can You Tell a Burqa from a Hijab?

By Michael J. Altman

…cals think about it, at the time? NPR offers a view into religious life in China. So far, the series has profiled women imams, Protestants, and Catholics. Sufis from Pakistan brought ancient devotional music to modern New York City. The Umayyad Mosque in Damascus stands at the crossroads of Christianity, Islam, and Roman paganism. In Italy, the Catholic Church is advocating for the rights of immigrants—Muslim immigrants at that. Do Rastafarians an…

Pope Backs Anti-Gay Referendum; Islamic State Executions Include Gay Syrian; ‘Conscience Clause’ Debated in Northern Ireland; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…en a problem for him or Uganda. African Union: Anti-Gay Mugabe Appointed Chair Robert Mugabe, the president of Zimbabwe, became chairman of the African Union, a position he will hold for the coming year, Pink News reports: In his speech, which drew applause, he said African countries should value relationships with “friends”, but that “colonialists and imperialists” were not welcome on the continent. Ahead of his re-election campaign last year he…

Australians Vote Overwhelmingly For Marriage Equality; and More in Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…r 19 had eight presidential candidates to choose from. Conservative billionaire Sebastián Piñera and Alejandro Guillier have apparently advanced to a runoff election. Before the election, DW examined the possibility that the outcome could jeopardize the GLBT community’s recent progress. Outgoing president Michelle Bachelet had introduced marriage equality legislation. Out of the eight candidates running, Piñera was one of only two candidates in th…

Clashing human rights visions for LGBTs at United Nations; More Mixed Messages from the Vatican as Family Synod Begins; Timeline of Worsening Homophobia by Turkey’s AKP Party; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…country. Our commitment to providing justice to those whose rights are unfairly violated is unwavering. The Year of Mercy declared by Pope Francis calls us even now to do more.” It is therefore important to place on record that no amount of calumny, intimidation, lies and name-calling will make the Bishops to change their stand on marriage and family life or abdicate their moral responsibility in speaking out clearly against the same-sex issue. F…

Global LGBT Recap: Mandela and Equality; Elton John Defies Russian Ban; Fake-Healing of AIDS

By Peter Montgomery

…The next day, The Washington Post ran a Religion News Service story from Nairobi reporting on a disturbing trend in Kenya, Uganda, and other countries in the region: “At prayer healing services in some Pentecostal churches, pastors invite people infected with HIV to come forward for a public healing, after which they burn the person’s anti-retroviral medications and declare the person cured.” According to the story by Fredrick Nzwili, patients ar…

Olympics 2008: Ignoring History

By Louis A. Ruprecht

…t”: that was the ritual key in Seoul. The Koreans boldly choreographed any number of events that lent themselves to Orientalizing stereotypes, but then, as I say, doubled back on themselves to show how very fluent they were in western forms of ritual representation as well. These Opening ceremonies have been clearly invoked many times since — in Barcelona, in Atlanta, and even in Sydney, where gestures to indigenous ritual form took center stage….

Catholic Bishops End Family Synod With Little To Say To Gays; World Congress of Families Has Plenty To Say, None of it Good; How Same-Sex Marriage Came to a Buddhist Temple in Japan; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…an certainly is one of the more progressive in Asia,” said Ashley Wu, co-chair of this year’s conference which attracted about 400 activists from countries including China, Thailand, Cambodia, and Nepal. “But there is still strong opposing voices such as Christian groups. Their numbers aren’t big but their political influence is significant,” Wu said. While marriage is not yet an option, some are encouraged by recent developments in gay rights. Ka…

Marriage Vote ‘Transforms’ Not-So-Catholic Ireland; Activist to Malaysian PM – ‘Love Is Not Terrorism’; LGBTs Find Growing Acceptance in Colombia, Not At World Meeting of Families; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…hom are disappointed that its bid to host the 2022 Winter Olympics lost to China. LGBTs had hoped that hosting the Olympics would also bring greater international pressure on the government to respect the human rights of LGBT people. The country’s constitutional court rejected a Russian-like ban on pro-gay “propaganda” earlier this year, but activists worry that conservative lawmakers will push another version of the law in the near future. United…

International reax to US Marriage Ruling; Official violence at Turkey’s Pride; Marriage Advances in Mexico Over Church Objections; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…dicted that 30,000 people would participate in the service, but the actual number appeared to number around 2,000. “Our prayers will open the sky and the homosexuals will fall, we will be blessed with victory,” said Lee Young-hoon, head of the leading organization in the anti-LGBT coalition. Mexico: Supreme Court embraces marriage, Church and some political officials resist As we have been reporting, the marriage equality movement has been movemen…

Why Belief in the Primacy of Language Leads to a Misunderstanding of Richard Dawkins, Islamophobia, and Politics

By Andrew Aghapour and Michael Schulson

…mething more fundamental and more powerful going on there. So would it be fair to say that the religious practitioner who goes and debates Richard Dawkins in a linguistic mode is already set to lose that debate? To me, neither side wins or loses in that situation. It turns into a stalemate. It turns, in a sense, into a perpetual aggression machine where they can constantly tussle with each other. It’s just a sort of ongoing boxing match, but it’s…