Religion Dispatches
…ou’ll read an excerpt below—has surprised me, too. I wish I could find my airline companion and give him this book, to surprise him, too—in a good way. (I would accept Lakers tickets in lieu of apologies, but I think that particular era is done.) This whole book is a result of a profound evolution, and needs to be seen as such. American Muslims have gone through a lot over the last few decades. We were never the caricature Islamophobes made us ou…
Read MoreAt oral argument in Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc. and Conestoga Wood Specialties, Inc. v. Sebelius this morning, the Supreme Court justices spent a great deal of time questioning the lawyers in the case about whether corporations have a religious conscience, and whether Congress intended to protect it when enacting the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA). What was most striking, though, was how all three female justices, Sonia So…
Read More…t night while taking the trash out after work at a salon in American Fork, Utah. His assailants also yelled anti-gay slurs. Citing as many as three violent attacks on LGBT people reported in the last two weeks, faith leaders in Salt Lake City convened a candlelight vigil last Friday in the city’s historic Liberty Park. Hundreds attended the vigil and subsequent march through Salt Lake City; including representatives from American Baptist, Roman Ca…
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…he women went on to tell me and my companions that they work with Equality Utah, an organization dedicated to “[securing] equal rights and protections for LGBT Utahns and their families.” “We just hope they don’t forget us or throw us under the bus after their marriages are legal,” one of them said, laughing. “We fully expect that we will be one of the last groups in this country to achieve full civil rights,” another added. While I had no desire…
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…te segregation and economic favoritism. When I spoke with Rothstein on the phone, he underscored the long-term effects of this last policy. During the 1940s and 1950s, suburban subdivisions were built in St. Louis, and throughout the country, using federal loans stipulating that no homes be sold to African Americans. Priced at about $125,000 in today’s dollars, these were affordable—with a mortgage—to working class families, black or white. Yet bl…
Read More…ebrated billionaire philanthropist whose many named gifts to the people of Utah have included a world-class cancer research institute. In Utah, Jon Huntsman, Jr., benefitted tremendously from the family name. And as governor, he implemented a pragmatic, pro-business agenda in a Mormon culture that (despite its reputation as the reddest of the red—thank you, Cleon Skousen and Glenn Beck) tends to be pragmatic and pro-business on just about everythi…
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…ment of 50,000, as if the faithful at church. The devotion was audible, as tickets were distributed to friends of the Cuban government and not through a public sale. Here the religious nature of the Cuban sporting event is acknowledged only to be dismissed as inauthentic. The patriotic, quasi-religious crooning is suspicious because of its apparent production by the Cuban government, which distributed tickets to friends. Morosi recognizes religiou…
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…me shows), even when something unintentional happens—say you know that the airline didn’t intentionally keep you from flying—the question that humans often pose is, “Was this preventable?” “Could they have done something to prevent that?” And that’s when we wonder—well, who could have done something to prevent it? The person at the counter? The pilot? The CEO? We don’t know, and so we have, in a sense, a certain disorientation and don’t know to wh…
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…oommate over a period of months in 1970. Although I can’t find an official number, a casino employee tells us over 5,000 tickets have been sold; 5,000 pilgrims who’ve made the trek from around the country to pay their respects to Annabelle, and are willing to wait hours to do so. On the convention floor, an eclectic group of vendors hocks their wares, from Ouija boards and books about ghost hunting to bath bombs shaped like horror movie icons. The…
Read More…inues steady expansion The slow-motion marriage equality wave continues in Mexico. Federal courts have ruled in favor of marriage equality, but because of the structure of the Mexican legal system, a ruling requiring a state to grant licenses to a couple or individual couple – an amparo — does not automatically change state law for everyone, until five amparos have been issued in a state. Eighteen couples got legal clearance to marry in Mazatlan,…
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