Religion Dispatches
…e last decade. The majority of Mormon converts in the US now come from Latino communities. And there are just about as many Mormons who live in Mexico and Central America as there are in the state of Utah….
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…Referring to Trump’s “plan” to build a wall between the United States and Mexico, the Pope suggested that Trump is “not Christian.” In Francis’ words, “a person who thinks only about building walls, wherever they may be, and not building bridges, is not Christian. This is not in the gospel.” Trump was quick to strike back, calling the Pope’s remarks “disgraceful,” and adding: If and when the Vatican is attacked by ISIS, which as everyone knows is…
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…statements about gender and sexuality with pastoral stories. Vatican journalists have come to expect surprise statements from the pope when he speaks off the cuff, often on airplane press conferences. His oft-quoted statement about gay priests—“Who am I to judge?”—occurred on a flight back to Italy from Brazil. Most recently in Tblisi, Georgia, the pope referred to the “theory of gender” as a “great enemy to marriage today.” He added that “there i…
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…e disaffected “confessional” Lutherans from the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Lutheran CORE will remain as a network for dissenting Lutherans not wishing to leave their current denominations. Lutheranism is at Heart a Reforming Tradition What are the issues at stake in these discussions? First, I put the term “confessional” in quotes because I consider its use in this context to be disingenuous; it implies that only those Lutherans who are op…
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…hing voice for the pre-born!” There’s even a short “ProLife Training Camp” promotional video: The Faithful Soldier School of Evangelism’s Jason Storms is married to Sara Trewhella, a longtime anti-abortion activist and the daughter of Matt Trewhella, founder and head of the militant anti-abortion group Missionaries to the Preborn. Matt Trewhella once urged anti-abortion activists to get involved in militias. On Facebook, Storms also claims to be a…
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…er Sophia runs the socialconservative group European Dignity Watch and was listed as a participant in the Political Network for Values summit in December. Conservatives use the term “gender ideology” as a rhetorical device for denying the existence of transgender people, in much the same way that many deny the existence of people with a homosexual identity. This shows up in the use of terms such as “people with same-sex attraction” by those who wa…
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…istianity (or any religion) that condone or ignore scapegoating, fundamentalist movements that become totalitarian, or apocalypticism combined with dualistic demonization. Where can we find this? I have a shelf of books published in the past 20 years in which right-wing fundamentalists warn of an impending apocalyptic battle pitting Godly Christians against sinful secular elites, those in favor of government social welfare programs, Muslims, New W…
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…ned to ramp up immigration enforcement and enable the building of the U.S.-Mexico border wall he promised during his campaign. Muslim and immigrant groups, especially youth, are mobilizing against these actions, with a major protest taking place last night in New York City’s Washington Square Park. To combat the continued vilification of Islam in the American public sphere since September 11th, American Muslim houses of worship and organizations h…
Read MoreEfforts to put the Gulf of Mexico oil spill in a theological context are all well and good but honestly, I don’t think that comparing the disaster to abortion or reminding people that “the earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it, the world” or asserting that it really is as important as abortion is going to cut it. The basic problem is that they don’t name “the real deathliness that hovers over us,” as Walter Brueggemann calls it, “the very fea…
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…othing to offer them but the condolences of a stranger. Nevertheless, as I listen to this story, I cannot help but overhear a haunting chorus of overlapping elegies. There is an elegy for Kruse’s way of life, which was robbed from him by the oil spill. There is an elegy for the Gulf of Mexico, whose plants and animals will never understand what hit them. There is an elegy for Kruse’s dead brother, a re-elegy of sorts, for a man who had his burial…
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