Search for "cheap airline tickets from kingston jamaica to fort lauderdale phone number 1-800-299-7264"

Animal Sacrifice and Sexuality in Santería

By Nick Street

…s for the Fifth Circuit ruled that Merced, a Santería priest in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, was acting within his Constitutional rights when he sacrificed goats and other animals as part of the ritual home-practice that accompanied him from Puerto Rico. In fact, the court suggested that such Constitutional protections are especially important for “non-traditional” religions like Merced’s. “There are more than 250,000 practitioners of Santería in t…

Atheist Rock Fest, Buddhist Geeks, Megachurch For Sale, Church Bans Fried Chicken

By Michael J. Altman

…te-run cultural center decided that Christian symbols and phallic objects don’t mix and shut down a controversial art exhibit. A Mississippi pastor decided church and trans-fats don’t mix. He banned fried chicken from the fellowship hall. Atheists at Fort Bragg will get their own “Rock Beyond Belief” concert in the wake of last September’s Christian-themed concert staged by the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. Finally, some evangelical Chris…

Words Matter: The Linguistic Damage of “Going Muslim”

By Daniel Martin Varisco

If the media frenzy over the Fort Hood killings is any gauge, the ugly specter of 9/11 has again taken its psychological toll. This time, instead of the “bad Muslim” being a bearded terrorist called bin Laden, there is a US Army psychologist who was trained to be a healer of military personnel. He happens to have an Arabic ancestry and is Muslim. Prominent American Muslim organizations issued statements right away condemning the murders. Debate i…

Are Muslims Really Given a Pass By “Elite Opinion Makers”?

By Dan Mathewson

…. Like many people, I have been following with interest the fallout of the Fort Hood shootings, and particularly the ways that media figures (journalists, television personalities, etc.) have linked—or refused to link—Nidal Hasan’s actions with his Muslim faith. It is for this reason that I read with interest your recent post in the Atlantic, “When Muslims Commit Violence,” where you argue that we should not ignore an alleged criminal’s potential…

Muslim Students Shocked By Professor’s Column

By Haroon Moghul

…—a friendly donut vendor in New York, say, or an officer in the US Army at Fort Hood—discards his apparent integration into American society and elects to vindicate his religion in an act of messianic violence.” Friendly Muslims! Seemingly integrated! Beware, America. Freedom of religion might doom you: Must we continue to be neutral in handling all people from different groups even though we know that there are differential risks posed by people…

Talking Religion in the Military

By Hussein Rashid

…religion is not only irrelevant; injecting it into the conversation about Fort Hood is counterproductive. As Middle East expert Marc Lynch argues, the way we frame our discussions can help Al Qaeda; to make everything the fault of Muslims risks radicalizing a population. While Major Hasan’s religion seems important to some commentators, there’s a real problem with religion in the military that continues to receive scant attention. As reported by…

A Whiter Shade of Faith: Saturday’s Tax Protests and the Religion of Whiteness

By Peter Laarman

…984 run for the House in a district representing a wealthy slice of Dallas-Fort Worth. This followed a stint teaching free-market economics at North Texas State University. Dick Armey definitely meant it when, while serving as majority leader, he called Hillary Clinton “a Marxist.” And no one believed that his “Barney Fag” crack in relation to the Massachusetts legislator was any slip of the tongue. Armey apparently does believe that socialism is…

Rick Perry’s Jesus Imperative: A Report from Saturday’s Mega-Rally

By Sarah Posner

…t a glow around him. Rachel Robbins, who had traveled with her family from Fort Worth, told me she didn’t know much about Perry, but that she decided to make the trip because “the government tries to do all these things. It doesn’t have all the answers. Only the Lord does.” Joyce Thompson, who came to Houston from San Antonio with a friend, echoed a persistent theme to me over breakfast at our hotel: that Christianity is somehow under siege from e…

Untethering Conscience From Religion: An Interview with Louisa Thomas

By Jeremy Kessler

…mself and his sincerity. When Evan was manacled to the bars of his cell in Fort Leavenworth because of his absolute refusal to serve the army, his friend (and President Wilson’s son-in-law’s brother) John Nevin Sayre went to Wilson on his behalf and repeatedly described Evan to Wilson as Christ-like. Evan would have hated that description, but clearly part of him wanted that and needed that kind of commitment. So, the more radically Christ-like a…

In Vitro v. Dignitas Personae: Teacher Fired for Fertility Treatment Sues Diocese

By Sarah Morice-Brubaker

…ns are a bit different for self-funded plans, which is what the diocese of Fort Wayne has. The Vatican Time Machine Finally, although this may veer into chin-stroking territory, intellectual honesty demands that one look at the actual teachings of the Roman Catholic Church laid out in Donum Vitae and Dignitas Personae, well-summarized by Rev. Richard Sparks in an interview with The Atlantic. As Rev. Sparks explains, Catholic moral theology has a l…