Religion Dispatches
…interactive nature of communications, he says, relativizes the distinction between producer and consumer so that “communication appears not only as an exchange of data, but also as a form of sharing.” The Pope’s recent creation of a personal Twitter account in December 2012 seems to have been an attempt to engage with this interactive world without compromising papal authority (though as Elizabeth Drescher notes here on RD, this is a nearly imposs…
Read More…ose either secretly or overtly a Taliban-like, religious, strict religious code upon all Americans, which is ridiculous.” Honor killings, forced marriages, female genital mutilation, and other abuses are “un-Islamic,” he said, adding that there is “no debate among serious Muslim scholars about that.” As far as fear-mongering that that Muslims seek to supplant the Constitution with shari’ah, Khan noted, “there is room for individual religious pract…
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…that I guess? Look, it’s hard to argue that the Biden campaign didn’t do a better job of faith outreach than Clinton’s campaign did. But that also needs to be put in the context of Clinton herself: we know that Christians overall and particularly evangelicals are not as friendly to women leaders as secular folks are, and we know that Clinton has been relentlessly demonized for decades. It’s hard to say for sure, then, but it’s entirely possible th…
Read More…who has spoken at tea party rallies and who claimed at Michele Bachmann’s Code Red rally against health care reform that health care reform was “against the law of nature and nature’s God” and “against the Judeo-Christian ethic that this nation was built upon.” Broden also appears in Maafa 21, a propaganda film that claims that reproductive rights are a conspiracy to commit “black genocide.” The film has been promoted by the Frederick Douglass Fo…
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…ve resistance even if it means putting those toned, spandex-clad bodies in between Trump’s administration and the most vulnerable populations—Muslims, Mexicans, blacks, queers, disabled people and women. To be activists against poverty and hunger, they would need to embody resistance through concrete action. They would need to support the efforts of groups like the anti-war Code Pink that resorts to reason, empirical evidence and visibility to cha…
Read More…the most tolerant toward homosexuality, while a connection can be observed between societies in which religion tends to hold a central position and greater intolerance in this area. As a citizen of a democracy that is still young, allow me to show how proud I am of the level to which Spain accepts homosexuality and to recognize how valuable this acceptance is. Because I do not believe that tolerance can be divided. There is no middle ground betwee…
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…r has a long history with the Salt Shakers. In 2005, there were calls for Abetz to resign as John Howard’s special minister of state when he addressed the group’s inaugural annual dinner. Abetz will speak at the group’s “Farewell Celebration Dinner” on October 15. In a separate story at Crikey, Taylor writes about the near-collapse of the ex-gay movement in Australia, saying the movement’s promise to “pray away the gay” is being replaced by a call…
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…ldare to ER. In Chinese culture, acupuncture is similarly reinforced and encoded as effective therapy. Antibiotics, and apparently also acupuncture, work regardless of your belief system—but they work better if you believe in them. Double-Blind The history of medicine up until the last century was essentially the history of the placebo effect. Double-blind, randomized control trials are now the gold standard in medical research and have only been…
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…ustice minister has since called for a repeal of the law criminalizing sex between two men. Mohamed Salah Ben Aissa said Article 230, which provides for three years in prison for consensual sex between men, is one of several laws that are inconsistent with the country’s new, progressive Constitution… Kenya: Human rights report say mob violence meets little official response PEMA Kenya and Human Rights Watch released a report this week saying that…
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…torate, and encouraged them to download his voter mobilization app (the QR code for which was projected onto the Jumbotrons placed around the mall). This may have been the largest voter mobilization event this election season. Illustration in Mario Murillo’s essay, “The Daughter of Lies” Wallnau has been engaged in election mobilization all year, notably on The Courage Tour, which seeks to register and mobilize evangelicals in 19 key counties in n…
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