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Glenn Beck Hijacks It’s a Wonderful Life

By Lauri Lebo

…d pray for God’s intervention, “Lord, help us fill these shelves.” And because of that, he says the people are trying to be like Bedford Falls. Did he and I watch the same movie? Because I don’t recall the government being the villain in the movie. No, as a matter of fact, it seemed pretty clear that the villain was Mr. Potter, a greedy and corrupt banker who referred to the working class as “a discontented lazy rabble.” (Wow. Sound familiar to an…

What’s the Problem With a Good Placebo?

By William Grassie

…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…

Lost and Found: Despite the Hope, Morality, and Meaning Inspired by Deconversion, Why is Respect Only For Those Who Find God?

By Robert Repino

…? Both conversion and deconversion have led people to do good things, lead better lives, and work for a better world. Why is that so difficult to say without caveats? But if that isn’t possible for some people, if their version of Christianity won’t allow it, then it’s fair to call out their bigotry for what it is. Empathy must be a two-way street. If the tables were turned—if we claimed that conversion is dangerous and disingenuous, and that it n…

The Secret History of Easter

By Joseph Laycock

…rd “Easter” takes its name from a Germanic goddess. (The Romance languages use some form of the Latin “Pascha,” which is derived from the Hebrew “Pesach” meaning “Passover.”) It’s also true that Pagan fertility customs used in vernal equinox celebrations (eggs and rabbits) were incorporated into Easter festivities. But Christians are hardly ignorant of this history. As early as the Protestant Reformation there were debates about purging Pagan ele…

What the Lost Finale is Really About

By S. Brent Rodriguez Plate

…idst of the hullabaloo? Why write before it is over? Why write at all? Because the ultimate response to the show’s questions have already been answered. The ending of the finale is (spoiler alert) not important. There are no answers that can be given that will leave anyone feeling satisfied. It’ll be like a Thanksgiving feeding frenzy: gobble it up and think we are satiated, but an hour later we’ll be wanting more: “But, but, wait a minute, what a…

Russian Multimillionaire Makes Peace with Anti-Christ Milk

By Joseph Laycock

…ndoff with Russian authorities, barricading themselves within a bunker because they believed that barcodes on food packaging are Satanic. In a statement, Christian dairy tycoon Boyko-Veliky explained the crosses: Russian Milk is forced to place bar codes on its packaging, as without this, we will only be able to sell our goods at farms, not in stores. . . . By placing the cross on the bar code, we want to demonstrate our stance: We are with our Lo…

The Blockbuster Spirituality of John Green’s “The Fault In Our Stars”

By Jodi Eichler-Levine

…ably biased toward consciousness, that it rewards intelligence in part because the universe enjoys its elegance being observed. And who am I, living in the middle of history, to tell the universe that it—or my observation of it—is temporary? Here it is, a cosmology for our times: a passive yet hopeful plea to a vast, personified universe. In the book, Hazel’s father credits this inspiration to a college professor. In interviews, Green credits it t…

Religious Discrimination and the Violence Against Women Act

By Sarah Posner

…tatutory protections against religious discrimination or to create a broad free exercise right to receive government grants without complying with applicable regulations that protect taxpayers.” Last year, civil liberties groups lobbied hard to have a non-discrimination provision included in VAWA. The resulting statutory language reads: No person in the United States shall, on the basis of actual or perceived race, color, religion, national origin…

Brits Get A Dose of Christian Nation Politicking

By Sarah Posner

…other religious faiths, too.” (Like the Prime Minister using his office to promote his Christian faith.) But then Cameron reveals his politician’s circumspection, arguing on the one hand that advocates of “secular neutrality fail to grasp the consequences of that neutrality, or the role that faith can play in helping people to have a moral code.” That accusation is abruptly followed by the disclaimer that “[o]f course, faith is neither necessary n…

Is Army’s New “Humanist” Designation Just Semantic Hooey?

By Elizabeth Drescher

…ather than “Agnostic,” “Atheist,” “no religious preference,” or “none”—the codes previously approved by the Army Chaplaincy for service members with non-religious beliefs and practices. The new faith code is significant in a number of ways. First, for Bradley and Humanist service members, it means that their existential disposition and associated practices are designated in their military records with language not shaped primarily in opposition to…