Religion Dispatches
…personal preparations. Actually the whole thing has been paid in full, the ticket has been purchased with the itinerary sent to me and now I am waiting for the visa process. The thing is, I still have the entire month of October and one week in November before I get on my way. I’ve passed more than 50 days on this blog and have exhausted the best of what I have to say. I think I’ll take a break from the daily routine, and submit one or two a week…
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…“Justice Sunday II” rally; in 2008 he not only supported the McCain/Palin ticket, but was a frequent and vocal supporter of California’s Proposition 8 and co-authored “Personal Faith Public Policy” with the Family Research Council’s Tony Perkins. In late December, after then President-elect Barack Obama chose Pastor Rick Warren to deliver the inaugural invocation, the senior pastor of the 3000-member Hope Christian Church in Prince George’s Count…
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…the creation of a more just church and society was worth the price of the ticket. Yet two of the more interesting interventions came from Jack Fitzmier, Executive Director of the American Academy of Religion, and Tony Jones, an independent author, blogger and emerging church entrepreneur. Fitzmier challenged our very raison d’etre as academic theologians. In an era marked by faltering seminaries and divinity schools, limited graduate programs in…
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…hday meal. I could find them “distasteful,” or “unappetizing,” or any of a number of options my mother would suggest. My brother could “disagree” with Nixon’s policies, but he could not profess hate for the man. “You don’t know him personally. You cannot possibly ‘hate’ him,” she would insist. “Hate” was a big-ticket word not to be squandered on annoying siblings or corrupt politicians. My mother’s semantic ethics on this point have stayed with me…
Read More…Letter to Hollywood” from “Faith-Driven Consumer,” warning that 46 million ticket-buyers could be dissuaded from seeing the film, and pressure from the National Religious Broadcasters group. Then came the $26.5 million opening weekend of the Jesus movie Son of God, an adaptation of the History Channel series that the “Open Letter” praises. Now, Paramount seems ready to try again. Grace Hill Media is back on the case, releasing a series of behind-t…
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…exercise clause into a broadly applicable special rights provision. A free ticket for the religious to exempt themselves from federal and state laws—most importantly, public health and anti-discrimination laws. JS: Do these special rights provisions apply equally? The court is on a mission to remake free-exercise law. Not too long ago, it held that religious people and organizations could not claim special exemptions to generally applicable law so…
Read More…gains. President Obama was elected just one short year ago on a prochoice ticket. If the electorate sees that a woman’s right to choose is not a core value but simply a bargaining chip to be laid on the table when the going gets tough, there will be a price to pay. We call on the Democratic leadership and all of our elected representatives to put forward healthcare reform that can be endorsed by the American people, not just the US bishops. The A…
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…Palin as his running mate, Engle ramped up his support for the Republican ticket, likening Palin to the biblical Queen Esther who saved her people from destruction. When he was in Washington, I asked Engle whether young evangelicals were looking for the kind of revival he was preaching about, in light of heightened interest in issues beyond abortion and gay marriage. “I don’t mean the old time Pentecostal [revival],” Engle replied, “but real retu…
Read More…ality is a sin and that it is one of the worst sins and will surely be our ticket to eternal flames. When that’s been your introduction to a text – you tend to be shy about giving it ultimate authority in your life. But, what has happened for most gay and lesbian Christians is that they have dedicated themselves to in-depth study of the Bible – not just a surface reading. Many books have been written about what the Bible really says about homosexu…
Read More…on Sunday mornings. She wasn’t driving a bus, but a dispute over a traffic ticket involving a veiled woman in France has intensified controversy over French anti-veil legislation. Regardless of whether or not you get the religion of soccer, seminarians in Rome are quite happy to put on a pair of cleats. Forget the U.S. tie with England, I’m more interested in the Redemptoris Mater win over the North American Martyrs. Back in Los Angeles, Cardinal…
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