Religion Dispatches
…ike the Internet. And like the Internet, the unseen world doesn’t necessarily imply the existence of a singular God, or even make death any less final. My favorite recent incarnation of the real-magic-vs-fake-magic story takes a similar attitude. Deadbeat, a Hulu TV series, doesn’t have the pomp and Provence of Magic in the Moonlight. Instead it’s a sly spiritualist sleeper hit for the Internet age, sort of a combination of Medium’s workaday quali…
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…ng, all of which describe the elephant by its tail and trunk but never really name the animal. Remarkably, there is still no general agreement as to whether conscience is given or constructed, essential or accidental, something real or simply a placeholder we insert when needed for a reasonable explanation of behavior. Conscience frequently functions as a moral proxy in the toughest equations of human life. Recourse to conscience is a common strat…
Read More…: Appellants have asserted an undisputed sincere religious objection not only to signing and submitting the self-certification [i.e., Form 700], but also to offering health plans through an insurance company or third-party administrator authorized to provide contraceptive coverage to students and employees who are “are enrolled in [those] plan[s].” 29 C.F.R. § 2590.715-2713A(d); 45 C.F.R. § 147.131(c)(2)(i)(B); Appellants’ Br. at 26-27. The Govern…
Read More…lican is the majority identity; for each younger generation it’s increasingly a minority identity. Only about five percent of young people now call themselves Anglican. Whatever their personal views, church leaders have stalled on the ordination of women because of their deference to two small but vocal minority parties within the CofE. There are many reasons for this, but one is a church hierarchy which has fallen out of step with the moral convi…
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…. Despite their diligence, when they tested the cards with friends and family last July, it flopped. “We initially did not censor ourselves,” confessed Thomas after describing how players balked at their liberal use of four-letter words. This prompted the pair to create what they call a “theology of swearing.” “If something was a direct translation of something in the Hebrew or the Greek where the modern corollary would be a swear, we kept it,” ex…
Read More…s are innocuous, specifying length and urging proper decorum (“Keep it family friendly, and not gross”), but included in the guidelines is the following statement: “You can’t thank God. I’m sorry about this—and I don’t want to have to outline the reasons why.” It’s that statement, of course, that has garnered attention and criticism, catapulting the story to the national news, while in the process painting Hvastkovs as an anti-religious pariah ben…
Read More…than any recent prime minister in talking about his Christian faith publicly.” Cameron subsequently penned an opinion piece for Church Times, in which he elaborated: Some people feel that in this ever more secular age we shouldn’t talk about these things. I completely disagree. I believe we should be more confident about our status as a Christian country, more ambitious about expanding the role of faith-based organisations, and, frankly, more eva…
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…83 establishment of the Presbyterian Church (USA), but I was there.I was only a few months old when my family traveled to Atlanta for what many called the “reunification” of the southern-based Presbyterian Church in the United States with the United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. There’s a great family photo with my grandfather, great-uncle, father—all pastors—and me sleeping in my stroller in the foreground. Reunification brought my family’s p…
Read More…excitement over the new pope? Are people just driving to mass really, really slowly? Or, as I suggest, are they waiting to see if anything is really going to change? That seems to be at the heart of Gallicho’s complaints; that I’m suggesting that Catholics need to see some doctrinal change before they get invested in their religion again. He sees the fix as stronger parishes, ie., better priests and a more exciting liturgy, which could come from…
Read More…with a red ‘X’ for the past five years owner Vasily Boyko-Veliky has finally explained why: Supermarket barcodes are the mark of the Anti-Christ described in Revelation and the ‘X’ is a actually cross. As critics have pointed out, the cross makes no sense as a literal strategy for mitigating an end-times scenario since the dairy has still submitted to the Mark of the Beast. But it does make sense in the context of an ongoing struggle for legitima…
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