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Indonesia: As Volcano Erupts, a Spiritual Loss

By Mark Woodward

…ed with the extravagance, corruption, and single-minded dedication to self-promotion of political and business elites. Even Islamist groups who normally denounce beliefs like Mbah Marijan’s as “unbelief” rushed to embrace his memory. This is a face of Islam that people in the United States and other Western countries too rarely see. News of Islam too often repeats stereotypes of violence and extremism, projecting the views and acts of a tiny minor…

Bishop Among Those “Outed” by Ugandan Tabloid

By Jocelyn Edwards

…ent the death penalty for “aggravated homosexuality.” After an outcry from Western donors, the Ugandan president backed away from the bill and it stalled in committee. In the year since the bill was introduced, however, gays and lesbians have still faced violence, eviction, and job loss. Though he is heterosexual and married with children, the 78-year-old wasn’t surprised by his inclusion in the tabloid. Senyonjo, who has a kind, grandfatherly man…

The Tea Party are Sodomites

By Jay Michaelson

…essed in numerous condemnations far out of proportion to any antecedent in Western religious history. And as Christianity moved from the Near East into Roman contexts where homosexuality and pederasty were widespread, it makes sense that Church authorities would become increasingly concerned by it. By the 11th century, Jordan shows, the unclassified sin of sex with men became merged with luxuria (luxury, decadence, oversensuality) and deliberately…

What’s the Problem With a Good Placebo?

By William Grassie

…CAM therapies work, just as some of what is practiced under the rubric of Western, physicalist medicine is not really evidence-based, but an ongoing experiment with only probabilistic results and unknown longterm consequences. There may be some important discoveries for science to sift out from the enormous diversity of traditional medications and procedures. Hot baths, extra sleep, and chicken soup all turn out to have explainable benefits for m…

2012 Film Heralds Progressive Utopia, No Effort Required

By Jessica Weisberg

…hbeck describes the medical benefits of his favorite drugs—for example, he promotes iboga, an African root bark with hallucinogenic properties, as a cure for drug and alcohol addiction. Such theories might be convincing if they came from someone other than Pinchbeck, who borrows haphazardly from Western science when it validates his claims, but seems to distrust it as an all-encompassing worldview. The film’s subtitles proudly announce the PhDs ea…

Should Faith Healing ‘Do Business’ with Modern Medicine?

By Beatrice Marovich

…ding or eviscerate physical illness—appears in some of the oldest texts of Western culture. The gospel accounts attributed to Matthew, for instance, tell the story of a woman who’s been bleeding (presumably an intrauterine problem) for twelve years. She sneaks up behind Jesus, thinking that if she’s able to touch even the hem of his robe, she might be riddled with the miraculous—that her body might be healed. He senses her presence and turns aroun…

Does The White House Get It?

By Sarah Posner

…ll policy. In a week during which a federal judge launched the downfall of Western civilization issued a nationwide injunction against enforcement of the military’s DADT rule, the Obama administration looks drastically out of step with the American public by signaling that it may very well appeal the ruling. While there are obviously several political calculations at work there, what might be more telling is an off-the-cuff remark by Obama adviser…

Taking the Christ Back Out of Christmas: Secularizing the Season

By C. Joshua Villines

…t Jesus has nothing to do with it. When Christianity rose to prominence in Western Europe, people took their existing festal activities and whitewashed them with a veneer of the gospel. The origins of those traditions, however, are no more Christian than those of Easter eggs or the Easter Bunny. This was a time of goodwill and generosity long before anyone heard of a baby born in a stable. In fact, the most familiar and heartwarming stories we ass…

Christmas Candy Jesus, Black Magi, Jewish Xmas

By Michael J. Altman

…gathered these images together as part of their “The Image of the Black in Western Art.” The Fed has reversed its ban on religious displays prompted by one bank in Oklahoma. Payne County Bank in Perkins, Oklahoma ran afoul a Kansas City Fed examiner who said the bank’s Christmas displays and Christian symbols could be regarded as discriminatory. A county in Indiana is fighting to keep its nativity scene up: “If we let them do this, let them take C…

Pope Warns of “Christianophobia”

By Louis A. Ruprecht

…mbattled victim, worldwide. Thus the times are analogous to the end of the western Roman empire, a time when Christians were similarly besieged.. But from which they emerged triumphant. Clearly, this Pope sees a battle in the offing, and he is reminding the faithful of the divine power enlisted on her behalf. Excita, Domine, potentiam tuam… It is a deeply worrisome message couched in the apparently benign language of liturgy. And it betrays a refu…