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

…? 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…

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How Many Ways to be Mormon and Gay?

…individuals, while conference co-organizer Julia Hunter will film “It Gets Better” videos by and for Mormons. “That this conference is even happening is hard evidence that things are getting better,” says Hunter. “I hope that the energy generated here this weekend will continue to ripple outward into our community with love and understanding; that the conversation will continue—on the web, in our chapels, with our visiting teachers, between brothe…

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Breivik’s Emasculation Paranoia Fueled Vision for Patriarchal “Reforms”

…e multipliers. Conservatives are strenuously trying to challenge parallels between the Norway shooter and the positions they themselves have been advocating. But Breivik’s call for a return to patriarchy, driven by a fear of emasculation by powerful women, is also a feature of American religious right rhetoric. Florida Congressman and Tea Party favorite Allen West, speaking last spring at a “Women Impacting the Nation” meeting, declared: “We need…

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Democrats Have Seized the Narrative Frame From the GOP, But Can They Find a Better Story to Tell About an Inclusive, Pluralist US?

…nalism. If Democrats wish to embody their espoused values of inclusion and freedom for all Americans, they ought to ignore the Republican framing of the question entirely and instead find a better story to tell. Christianity remains hegemonic in American discourse, and that’s a key reason Democrats display such a lack of imagination in this area. At best, they give a nod to other religions while leaving Christianity front and center. The Christian…

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We Would Be Wise to Pay Attention to Trump’s Apocalyptic QAnon Posting Spree

…ind him. He holds in his right hand a ghostly “Q+” (according to some, the code name Trump himself uses when he posts on Q message boards) and the text reads “The World Will Soon Understand/Nothing Can Stop What is Coming,” a direct reference to “The Storm.” As I wrote back in 2020: The QAnoners’ apocalypse, unsurprisingly, is one of political partisan violence, culminating in “The Storm,” when all of the so-called “deep state leaders” will be arr…

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Mississippi’s Personhood Bill Makes God Look Bad

…oing to voters on November 8 has a good chance of passing and it should be coded as ED, E for embarrassing and D for disgraceful. Both Republican and Democratic candidates for governor of that great state have endorsed the measure. It proposes to redefine the basic word “person,” applying it to fertilized eggs. The goal of this mischief, as many have noted, is to outlaw all abortions with no exceptions—even for rape or incest, or when a woman’s li…

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#Occupy: A Deeper Form of Protest?

…sly is. If we still had a Democratic Congress, we’d have a much fairer tax code (plus better health care, plus a thousand other things). But okay, that’s me. When I look at vast movements in history—fascism, socialism, American capitalism—they arise out of contexts that were, themselves, created by lots of large-scale circular movements which are impossible to trace precisely. Who knows, perhaps the collective weight of Occupy-style consciousness-…

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Queer Repentance: On Not Surrendering to a Text, to Guilt, or to Habit

…lifetime of repression and sublimation. And for those who refuse to choose between God and gay, it means having to do just what Huck Finn did: transcend religion in order to save it. Of course, this is an essential step for all religious people—but it’s one LGBT religious people cannot avoid. Queer spiritual consciousness is inherently distrustful because it has seen how rules, codes, and even the operation of conscience itself can be tools of opp…

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Perry Thinks Palestinians Should Be Shafted, No Surprise

…ikened President Obama to Pharaoh, appeared via videotape at the inaugural Freedom Federation conference last year at Liberty University, saying, “we know you love us and want to commend you for unconditional support for state of Israel,” adding that “Christians and Jews share the same future.” That’s code not only for no state for the Palestinians, but a perpetuation of illegal settlements and purging of Palestinians from occupied land. For Danon…

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Spiritual But Not Religious? Come Talk to Me

…butter; it is the very thing that drives many people into my classes. For better or worse, it is often the conventionally religious students who seem satisfied (sometimes smugly so) with shallow understandings of their own traditions—to say nothing of anyone else’s religion. Meanwhile, some of the spiritual students (though certainly not all) are those who work the hardest to figure out what they can believe in or sign on for, while still maintai…

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