Religion Dispatches
…ers qualitatively superior to mine in nearly every respect. Since the early 1980s, this man had had season tickets to our favorite team. He’d not just lived through but witnessed firsthand the golden ages of purple reign. He’d sat through the playoffs, too. Magic, Kareem, Worthy, Shaq, Kobe. On their way to ten titles! I was ablaze with jealousy. But later in our conversation, as the topic shifted to our respective travels, he made an offhand rema…
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…shootings in 2009: that of Nidal Hasan, the US Army psychiatrist who killed 13 servicemen and women and wounded 29 at Fort Hood, Texas, and George Sodini, who killed 3 women and wounded 12 at a Pennsylvania fitness club. Both men had no friends, work issues, difficulties meeting women, and felt victimized—Sodini by women and Hasan by his fellow soldiers for being a Muslim. And both men intended to die. Sodini shot himself before he could be stoppe…
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…t difficult and dangerous prisoners to be locked in a secluded location for 10 days without speaking, meditating about 12 hours each day, guided by two teachers. There would be no guards with weapons, no prison officials allowed inside. “After it was over, we learned the prisoners had threatened to kill the teachers several times. But the teachers never told us. They just kept the session going,” she said. By day six, the turning point for most pe…
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…s of Tibetan religion. According to the most conservative estimates, before 1959 monks constituted 10-12% of the total male population in central agricultural regions (the percentage of nuns being somewhat lower). Most Tibetans had close family members—children, siblings, aunts or uncles—who were ordained. Monasteries served as a focal point for many lay religious practices, including important village or regional festivals. Because of the importa…
Read More…hority in question will cede way (in other words you block the aisles for a 10 hour flight, or you file lawsuits and cost the government time and money defending the law you tried to convince it not to pass, and then once you get an accommodation you sue to be exempted from that as well). The real difference here is that if you don’t want to deal with ultra-Orthodox men interfering in your travel, you can just take another airline. If only it were…
Read More…artners in Israel,” notes the Times. “Civil marriage does not exist in the country, where the solemnization of marriage is entirely controlled by the state rabbinate, and homosexual unions are not in themselves recognized.” Vietnam: Couple marries on airplane flight A Vietnamese lesbian couple celebrated a Valentine’s Day wedding on a Vietjet flight from Ho Chi Minh City to Bangkok. Pink News notes, “Same-sex marriage is not legally recognized in…
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…o have the highest proportion of gay men – an estimated 1.6%, compared with 1.5% for England, 1.3% for Wales and 1.1% for Scotland. But it was also the country where women were least likely to say they were lesbian – just 0.3%. However, some questioned the impact of how the data was collected. “I’m encouraged to see there’s been an increase in people in Northern Ireland identifying as LGB, but this disparity I find really challenging,” said Gavin…
Read More…e built digital models of synagogues destroyed by Nazis on Kristallnacht in 1938. Anglican vicar Alex Brown was convicted of performing 360 sham weddings for immigrants trying to stay in the UK. Vandalism against mosques and Islamic centers continues: There’s the vandalism in Madera, California and Hudson Valley, New York. Meanwhile, federal investigators have ruled that a fire at a the construction site of an Islamic center in Murfreesborough, Te…
Read More…al. Mormon Church: Mass resignations after anti-gay policy change More than 1,000 Mormons and their supports rallied in a Salt Lake City park on November 14 as part of a campaign of mass resignations following the release of new anti-gay policies that prohibit the baptism of children of gay couples. Organizers told Reuters last Sunday that about 1,500 people had resigned. Church officials urged people to think twice. A Church spokesman said: “We d…
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…there would be. Similarly, if you’re not innately inspired to want to kick China’s butt, if you ask why?, you are likely to be met with blank stares at best, and accusations of insufficient patriotism at worst. Let me tip my hand. As someone who has lived and traveled all over the world, I find jingoistic calls to defeat other countries (whether militarily or economically) to ring very hollow. My wife is Chinese; if China conquers America, w…
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