Religion Dispatches
…Christians is not reason enough for a divorce and, more often than not, is code for “serious sin.” Pentecostals have a history of being strict about reasons to divorce, adultery being scripturally the only reason to do so. For those who divorce and who have a denominational affiliation through ministerial license, a divorce can mean, at best, additional scrutiny and at worst, stripping of ministerial credentials. Of course, that never has stopped…
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…ly career-ending situation in the Marines, where failure to obtain regular promotions results in being discharged. Moreover, as a woman in the military, accustomed to proving herself to her male peers over her six-year career, Amy was wary of appearing a “weak female.” “If you get sent home for something like that, everyone will know about it,” says Amy. “That’s a really bad stigma in the military. I thought, that’s not me, I’ve worked harder and…
Read More…tist Convention in 2007: “I thank the Southern Baptists who are working to promote a culture of life abroad by helping lead the fight against… HIV/AIDS. In Uganda, Southern Baptists sponsor… True Love Waits…. And now we’re building on the success by expanding this important programs to six more countries in Africa.” If Christianity has a number of mechanisms to support abstinence and the identity of the one who abstains, it does not employ similar…
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…ntracts to family friends; and how he ordered his staff to violate IRS tax code. Falwell’s been able to get away with such behavior partly because he doesn’t fear his board of trustees, which is essentially just a collection of close friends of the family. As noted above, Mark DeMoss, the one trustee who did speak up in disagreement of Falwell’s endorsement of Trump, was immediately removed from the board—a testament to Falwell’s Trumpian fragilit…
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…or his efforts in defending Christianity in Hungary and throughout Europe, promoting Christian values, as well as because of his personal contribution to the friendship between the Hungarian and Serbian peoples.” In the past, the idea that the Orthodox Patriarch of Belgrade would, without even a nod toward sectarian differences, honor Orbán for “defending Christianity,” would have struck many as odd. You see, Viktor Orbán is nominally a Protestant…
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…traditional marriage. It was only in 2000 that the discriminatory ban on ‘promoting’ homosexuality was lifted. Since 2004, Cyprus has implemented an anti-discrimination law (Equal Treatment in Employment and Occupation Law 2004) that explicitly forbids discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation in employment. In 2013, the penal code was amended to include sexual orientation and gender identity thus criminalising all discrimination against…
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…eal of trust exists between us. Just as we do not plagiarize, we honor the code of privacy and do not make public that which was meant to remain private. For me, that trust was broken in the midst of this passionate debate in a way that tells me we have crossed a line. Writing a Facebook wall comment in response to a May 3rd debate between Gordis and Peter Beinart at Columbia University, I referred to Rabbi Gordis as a “tribal fascist.” The tribal…
Read More…from Wikipedia). New Testament scholars have noted that since The DaVinci Code became a cultural phenomenon, there’s been a surge of conspiratorial claims about Jesus, the early church, and the influence of Pagan mystery religions. Authors such as Craig Evans and Bart Ehrman have written with bewilderment at the revival of “mythicist” theories of Jesus and “nineteenth-century philosophical hokum” that was long ago dismissed by serious scholars wh…
Read More…ent Kate Michelman and our own Frances Kissling have an excellent op-ed in today’s New York Times, arguing that the setback for womens’ reproductive freedom in the Stupak amendment is a result of the Democratic Party’s pandering to religion as much as it is a product of religious right lobbying. In its quest to “get religion” and build a larger majority in Congress by recruiting anti-choice candidates to run in conservative districts, the party ha…
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…ce arrested him last month, saying that his novel insults Islam. The penal code provides for fines and prison terms of three to five years for “offending the Prophet” and “denigrating the dogma or precepts of Islam.” More from HRW: Rahmani told Human Rights Watch that he received a police summons on February 27, 2017 at his house. When he went to the Tipaza police station the following morning, seven policemen interrogated him about his novel. In…
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