Religion Dispatches
…ideo aims to help families talk about sexuality The Indian Express reports on the latest episode of a Web series designed to show people how to talk about sex and homosexuality to their children or their parents, “Sex Chat with Pappu & Papa.” …
Read More
…a terrible thing, and you know, maybe he should find a country that works better for him.” As a scholar of religion what interests me in this instance is the power of the flag as symbol—particularly in the way that people have reacted. To help understand this level of outrage, I turn to theorist of religion Émile Durkheim (1858-1917) who foretold this sort of controversy over a hundred years ago in his famous text, The Elementary Forms of Religio…
Read More
…they accounted for 14 medals (accounting for team sports such as the four out women played on the US basketball team). Notes Outsports, “Those 14 medals beat every single country that criminalizes sex between people of the same gender.” The lesson, according to Outsports, “If you want your population to thrive, including in the world of athletics, let them be free.” …
Read More
…st make some decisions about how we deal with such a heightened level of anxiety. Authoritarian forces in governments all over the world can stoke our anxiety in order to justify more control. They can fake a coup, botch the response to an attack, and push through “heightened security measures.” So much of the militarized response to terror seems to feed upon terror and feed it back into the populace. So I decided that JFK would not be a site of t…
Read More…p the Communion, in efforts to bring about the decriminalisation of same-sex sexual conduct between consenting adults. It asked a simple question: should an independent commission be set up to look at all aspects of criminalisation and seek ways in which Anglicans can come to a better understanding of these issues and how they can engage with governments, legislatures and the public in countries which criminalise? United Nations: Fallout on Human…
Read More
…e into contact with while shooting the images were all super friendly and excited about the project when I explained what I was doing. People I know who were raised in the church, but have since turned against it, were totally freaked out by it. They found it creepy. But in terms of actual religious people, I haven’t seen that much reaction yet or had those conversations. Are you religious? I’m Catholic. I don’t have a lot of experience with megac…
Read More
…that those concerns are now moot, given the time lapsed since trial, the existence of nationwide marriage equality, and the increasing scope of cultural conversation surrounding conversion therapy. “The importance and power of our lived experiences is why the stories of real-life LGBT people move hearts and have the ability to change law,” Kendall told RD. “With the power of our stories in mind, I have decided to seek the release of my sealed fed…
Read More
…st one of many who foresee violence. Last year, Prophet Amanda Grace, for example, blew a shofar to open a ReAwaken event, explaining, “When the shofar was blown, the walls of Jericho fell. When the shofar was blown, Gideon and an army of 300 men defeated over 147,000 Midianities. It’s an announcement to the enemy that his stronghold is about to fall. Demons tremble at the sound of the shofar.” She said the shofar is “a weapon of our warfare. And…
Read More
…iew, she speaks to Russell Jeung, a professor of Asian American studies at San Francisco State University and author of Sustaining Faith Traditions: Race, Ethnicity and Religion Among the Latino and Asian American Second Generation (NYU Press, 2012). Their conversation explores a few of the ways he sees Asian American Christians decolonizing their faith from white Christianity, how that shapes their approach to social justice and their impact on t…
Read More
……where do they get these notions? Communion is not a litmus test of orthodoxy nor a prize for theological correctness. It is a simple way people get together to express gratitude amidst life’s vicissitudes and to draw strength from companionship at the table and energy for justice struggles. It’s a chance to tap into the “renewable moral energy” (hat tip: Catholic moral theologian Daniel C. Maguire) of the Jesus story. To ensnare this simple act i…
Read More