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Church Attendance is (Once Again) Correlated with Authoritarianism — So Why Do We Refuse to Acknowledge It?

Since 2016, I have been arguing here at RD that former president Donald Trump’s politics, and his appeal to White evangelical Christians, are best explained through the lens of authoritarianism. Pundits initially scratched their heads for entirely too long over how evangelicals could purport to follow Jesus and support Trump. The answer was always easy; he promised to do, and then did, what they wanted, which any disaffiliated former Christian sc…

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The Supreme Court Cleared the Way for the ‘President-King’—The Right’s Prize for 50 Years of Planning

…conservative president. While they were initially very skeptical of Nixon, today he is hailed as a hero in the conservative movement, and Watergate waved off as a conspiracy by a “Deep State,” as right-wing operative Christopher Rufo claims in a video lauding Nixon’s presidency as the “blueprint for the counter-revolution.” It’s part of a broader effort by conservatives to rehabilitate the former president in order to normalize Trump—to paint the…

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Election Reporters: Here’s Why Simply Descriptors Like ‘Christians’ Can Have Enormous Consequences

…lot of reasons, conservative Christians tend to own the cultural megaphone today. (Most important among them: conservative judges endorsing extremist conservative Christian arguments.) So I don’t expect the average person to understand all the nuances. But journalists covering national politics, especially those on the Trump beat, need to do better. Here’s why. First of all, it’s a matter of accuracy. As Sarah Posner points out on Bluesky, the bes…

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Loyalty and Chaos Play a Role in Trump’s Nominations, But This Schoolyard Tactic May Provide a Better Explanation

Thus far much of the commentary about Trump’s cabinet and staff picks alternates between “He values loyalty above all else” and “He wants to generate chaos and break the federal government.” There’s significant truth in both statements. However, a more fundamental psycho-social program appears to be at work in Trump’s nomination of people like Matt Gaetz for Attorney General and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for Secretary of Health and Human Services—as…

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Editor’s Picks: Remembering the Broken Promises — and the Possibilities — on Independence Day

Independence Day doesn’t tend to cause as much dissonance as Thanksgiving, as much confusion as Juneteenth, and isn’t as widely reviled as Columbus Day (aka Indigenous People’s Day). Yet, while it “is not America’s birthday,” as Peter Laarman argued nearly a decade ago, Independence Day is every bit as apt as the holidays above to initiate—for better and certainly for worse—a discussion about what the American project actually is, what it was mea…

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Attacks on Tim Walz’s Lutheran Denomination are Undermined by Reality — I Mean, Is ELCA Even Exciting Enough for Controversy?

…erica (ELCA) started to roll in. Harris herself is a Baptist. Christianity Today played things safe, noting that Walz had upset conservative Christian leaders during his time in office in Minnesota and carefully explaining the difference between the ELCA and the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, the United States’s next largest (and far more conservative) Lutheran body. The Christian Post took things further, declaring the ELCA “notoriously progress…

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Op-Ed: Bishops vs. Catholic Politicians

…c Church and nothing in his subsequent writings refutes these basic and broadly accepted assertions. During the Vietnam war, the United States bishops issued instructions to “the faithful.” The bishops said that they thought that war to be just…a judgment very few support today. However, they said that the war was a complicated matter and they urged Catholic to pray and consult and decide for themselves. That’s the kind of good sense and humility…

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Christian Media Battle Over Controversial Figure

…nd exaggerations; one of his sources, Hokuto Ide, a reporter for Christian Today—a Jang-affiliated publication in Japan not to be confused with Christianity Today—describes CT’s articles as “predatory efforts by those with commercial interests,” and suggests they’re motivated by “trying to break Olivet’s deal to purchase [the] Glorieta [Conference Center].” I asked Jonathan Park via email why he thought Christianity Today put so much time and effo…

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As Transition Looms, Jewish Studies is Mired in Controversy

…h wedding.” Greenberg and Jick may have been willing to pay that price. In today’s world, much of Jewish Studies takes place in secular university campuses across the country, and professors of Jewish Studies are evaluated for promotion or merit on the same grounds as their colleagues. Such parochialism can put those scholars at a disadvantage. In addition, it locks Jewish Studies into an identitarian model where courses would be taught by Jews, a…

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Today’s Inauguration Was a Reconsecration of Sacred Space

…d dead had an eloquence all its own. Altogether a fitting beginning. The Latin root of “inauguration” harks back to Roman times and means “to consecrate by augury.” I’d say that today’s event augurs well for a new birth of decency. What we need is revolution, of course. But today I will settle for decency….

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