Religion Dispatches
…s and Our Lives.” The most pronounced finding across all social networking sites (SNS) was that active social networking participation does not, as is commonly opined, result in social isolation or a lack of relational intimacy. Further, SNS participation tends to enrich rather than diminish participation in face-to-face relationships. Key findings of the report focused on the dominant site, Facebook, where some 92% of social network users have a…
Read More…opposition to the proposed Islamic center to be built near the Ground Zero site in New York City: An influential Jewish organization on Friday announced its opposition to a proposed Islamic center and mosque two blocks north of ground zero in Lower Manhattan, intensifying a fierce national debate about the limits of religious freedom and the meaning of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. The decision by the group, the Anti-Defamation League, touched o…
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…ish to eliminate Jews and other perceived enemies. In particular, the same site hosts numerous posts voicing ideas that the Earnest family would find all too familiar. Populating these sites is a supersessionist or “replacement” theology native to the Earnest family’s Orthodox Presbyterian creed. Some of these posts make portentous apocalyptic anti-Semitic threats. These, tellingly, articulate the same “replacement” ideology/theology made notoriou…
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…d Christians might agree. “We love the Bible,” they claim on the game’s website, “we just have a funny way of showing it.” THE NAMES of the game’s creators are not listed on its website, Twitter, Tumblr, or Facebook. The only name affiliated with A Game for Good Christians is a pseudonym—“Ben Christian”—which a June 6 Tumblr post explains is a pun on the Latin word bene: “good. As it turns out, the game’s creators are two guys in their early thi…
Read More…gious right aimed to kill it in the court of public opinion. In July, Life Site News claimed the amendment would subsidize Planned Parenthood (which, in the eyes of the religious right, only performs abortions when in fact well over 90% of its work goes to other reproductive health services). Calling the amendment the “silent FOCA” (Freedom of Choice Act), Life Site News was able to invoke two religious right bogeymen simultaneously: the evil “abo…
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…ut Palin and the NAR was reposted in its entirety on the Free Republic Web site, then a fight broke out between pro and anti-NAR site members. It was astounding! You produced over twenty stories and several videos on Palin. What are your plans for the future? The short answer is: books, longer and more ambitious articles, and even a full length video documentary or two. The New Apostolic movement relies heavily on visual media and pop music (much…
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…ace is primarily a construction of culture, then the original construction site was on the page, in particular, as I mentioned before, on the pages of our religious writings. And I’m not just talking about sacred scriptures. I’m talking about all the writings that America’s religious people produce in relationship (intertextually) with their religious scriptures. From public writings like sermons and legal codes, to private writings like journals…
Read More…aven. Might some evangelicals feel outrage on visiting Daniel Radosh’s Web site? As online testimony for his new book Rapture Ready! the site is a miracle of kitsch, commercialism, and great links. We learn that the book, a self-proclaimed “perfect blend of amusement and respect” for the “often hidden world of Christian pop culture” reveals the artists, artifacts, and experiences that propel the $7 billion faith-based industry. Be sure to check ou…
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…phobic, racist language on online forums such as the Leadership Network website or his Mars Hill blog. Hansen’s CT profile was published after two well-publicized controversies over Driscoll posts in 2006 that go unmentioned or are breezed over in the Rise and Fall podcast but that are covered at length in my book. First, Driscoll wrote a rebuttal in Christianity Today’s now defunct sister publication, Leadership Journal, to an article on the “hom…
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…mitted to Mpofu “as a mentor in prayer.” As she recounts it on the WWW Web site: [God] revealed to me that if I would submit myself and these women under the spiritual leadership of Pastor Vicky that He would raise up an international army of mighty warriors, and together we would enter into a realm of intercession that would change nations. The following year, seeking to assist the family of Rami Ayyad, a Christian bookstore owner who was killed…
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