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Where Polls and Surveys Fall Short: A Conversation with Robert Wuthnow on “Inventing American Religion”

By Andrew Aghapour

…s pretty much it. Evangelical leaders themselves didn’t believe the Gallup numbers were right, and [they thought that] the best way to combat those Gallup numbers was to ask Gallup to do another survey. And so in 1978, Christianity Today, a leading periodical for evangelicals, paid Gallup to do a big survey and in addition to just asking the born-again question, they asked questions about belief in the Bible, belief in Jesus, and intent on convert…

End-Times Watcher Sees Satan in an Energy Drink

By William R. Black

…anyone with understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a person. Its number is six hundred and sixty-six.” The author of Revelation meant that 666 was a person’s name turned into a number via the Jewish numerological practice of gematria. Since every Hebrew letter was also a number, the letters of a name could be added up to produce that person’s number. Here’s an example of gematria using an alphabet we’re more famil…

The Landmark 85-Year-Old Report Absent From Debates Over Missionary’s Death

By Amy Fallas

…pressing issues facing their foreign missions in India, Burma, China, and Japan. Based off a two-year study in consultation with foreign mission boards and missionary leaders abroad, the commission concluded by recommending a reorientation of missionary approach emphasizing education, social services, partnership with local communities, and respect for local religious traditions. The Laymen’s Report marked a watershed moment when American mission…

“Kill the Gays” Bill May Pass Ugandan Parliament Within a Week

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

…law would be completely unfair. To them. With the world’s eyes turned upon Japan as it recovers from its natural disasters – and works to prevent an all-out nuclear disaster – the Ugandan Parliament may finally succeed in passing this draconian measure without much international notice. Many on the religious right are quick to blame human immorality for bringing on natural disasters. If this bill – supported and shepherded into being by American e…

Sacred Real Estate: What Makes Washington’s WWII Memorial So Dreadful?

By Michael A. Elliott

…wis, in Washington State—only to be interrupted by the announcement of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Years later, he would be fond of telling the story of how, in the midst of the pandemonium, he had to buttonhole a friend to ask where exactly Pearl Harbor was. “I had never heard of it before,” he would say. I have always liked that story, especially in the gentle self-deprecation of my grandfather’s telling, as a reminder of how hard it ca…

Tornado Hits the Heartland: Is God Punishing Us?

By Jay Michaelson

…VI. Even Glenn Beck (remember him?) opined that the recent catastrophes in Japan constituted “a message being sent. And that is, ‘Hey, you know that stuff we’re doing? Not really working out real well. Maybe we should stop doing some of it.’ I’m just saying.” (Read the full quote here.) Strange, then, the eerie silence that has greeted this recent string of weather emergencies in the Bible Belt. One can understand the Christian Right keeping mum—a…

You’ve Been Warned: Reading Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America in the Trump Era

By Christopher Douglas

…se: the isolationist administration signs agreements with Nazi Germany and Japan recognizing their areas of influence and conquest and pledging to stay out the war. Pearl Harbor doesn’t take place, and the allies fight on without U.S. support. Meanwhile, a newly vocal, nationwide anti-Semitism is given a boost, and the child narrator of the novel—named Philip Roth —describes the new social order as it takes its toll on his family and his Jewish ne…

Baby Dolls, Sex Dolls, and Ritual Objects

By S. Brent Rodriguez Plate

…her.” Nisan is known as a “2-D lover,” the designation given to a growing number of people, mostly men, within Japan’s anime-fan culture who have romantic attachments to representations of animated girls. Some images exist virtually on computer screens, some as figurines, and others like Nemutan, as pillowcases. This real-life story reminded me of the fictional 2007 film Lars and the Real Girl. The plot of that quiet, surprise-hit movie wouldn’t…

Countering the “Countering Violent Extremism” Program

By Elizabeth Shakman Hurd

…Su’s recent book, Exporting Freedom, examines the US-occupied Philippines, Japan and Iraq. “[N]o doctrinal position or school can be identified as causing the actions of jihadi groups.” Since 2009, US military chaplains have engaged with local religious leaders overseas to advance American strategic objectives: gathering cultural intelligence, promoting religious tolerance, and patching up relations with local citizens whose lives have been damage…

Brazilian Evangelicals Launch ‘Sin-Free’ (Read: Gay-Free) Version of Facebook

By Peter Montgomery

…they choose to love. In sports news (really), after the U.S. victory over Japan in the women’s World Cup finals before a huge television audience, US soccer legend Abby Wambach sought out and embraced and kissed her wife, earning plenty of glowing media mentions, as well as inevitable right-wing grousing that the moment had “ruined” the game. Turkey: ‘Islamic Defense’ group publicly calls for gays to be murdered A group calling itself Young Islam…