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2011’s Best Books—
Or Just a Great Reading List

By Haroon Moghul

…a profoundly influential poet, philosopher, and political thinker in South Asia and the Muslim-majority world, but he is largely unknown outside Muslim conversations. Second caveat: This is not a book that will be easily accessible for those to whom contemporary Islamic thought, or South Asian philosophy, are familiar subjects. Nevertheless, the subject of this work, since Muhammad Iqbal has had a profound impact on contemporary Islam, far out of…

Tony Perkins Will Fit Right in at Religious Freedom Commission

By Caroline Matas

…mad filed suit against the USCIRF, claiming that they hired her as a South Asia policy analyst but quickly reneged on the offer on the grounds of her Muslim faith. Ghori-Ahmad’s suit quoted Nina Shea, a founding USCIRF commissioner, as saying in an email that hiring Ghori-Ahmad to analyze religious freedom in Pakistan would be the equivalent of “hiring an IRA activist to research the UK twenty years ago.” Ghori-Ahmad claimed that her treatment by…

Is Tarot Just a Cool Self-Help Deck of Cards?

By Daniel Wise

…, and even earlier, to late-19th century European colonization of Buddhist Asia. Scholars of religion now recognize a widespread attempt by Western colonial thinkers (often with cooperation from reform-minded Asian Buddhists) to depict Buddhism as something like an enlightened philosophy rather than a “mere religion.” These Western colonial thinkers created the image of a pure Buddhism that fit the standards of Western Protestant liberal thought,…

Gandhi, his Grandson, Israel, and the Jews

By Shalom Goldman

…appened to millions of my fellow-Jews in Europe, North Africa and parts of Asia.” Aware that Gandhi is engaged in a struggle which has no connection to the fate of the Jews, Greenberg makes the case for Zionism as the “cure for Jewish rootlessness—and for the need to educate Indian’s Muslims as to what the aims of the Zionist are.” He implies that if Gandhi is really concerned about India’s Muslims, he should counter anti-Zionist propaganda: We Je…

Religious Conservatives Mobilize Internationally Against Spanish Nondiscrimination Bill; And More in Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…nment would investigate reports of a Canadian underground railroad. India: Asian feminists denounce murder of journalist Feminists who gathered in Thailand last week for the Asia Pacific Feminist Forum denounced the murder of Indian journalist Gauri Lankesh as “an emblematic example of the attacks our governments have enabled through their support to right wing vigilante groups and their own attacks on civil society feminism and human rights”: A f…

We’ve Finally Begun to Confront White Christian Nationalism; But What About Its Source Text?

By Dianne M. Stewart

…the United States’ racist, nativist and imperialist acts against African, Asian and Indigenous peoples domestically and internationally. The optics were bad, but America’s perception was based on short cherry-picked video clips from two of Wright’s sermons. Both Democratic and Republican opponents seized upon a felicitous opportunity to characterize Barack Obama as un-American and unpresidential, since he followed a pastor whose vision could not…

Seventh-Day Adventists & Gay ‘Cures’; Legal Victory for Kenyan LGBTs; Political, Religious Leaders Spar on LGBT Issues in UK; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…ased, openly gay Muslim,” secretly videotaped his journey to Mecca on his iPhone and other small phones. “I was terrified because they reserve the death penalty for people like me,” Sharma said. Several times he had his equipment seized and video files deleted by authorities. But he persevered with both his spiritual journey and his film. “I was there making this pilgrimage for the thousands of gay Muslims who were too scared to go to Saudi Arabia…

Catholic Archbishop Takes On Jesuit Magazine’s Slam on “Ecumenism of Hate”; and More in Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…on their hands.” East Timor: First Pride celebration held in capital city Asian Correspondent reports on the country’s first Pride parade, reporting a celebratory, “carnival-like” atmosphere: Marching through the streets of East Timor’s capital Dili with a rainbow flag in his hand, Natalino Guterres was overwhelmed with emotion, reminding him of how he felt 15 years ago when he saw the Timorese flag raised for the first time. “It was an emotional…

LGBTs in Philippines Reflect on Papal Visit; Francis Meets Trans Man Shunned by Parish; French Group Turns ‘Bar of Sodom’ into ‘Pub of Mercy’; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…he Philippines. This week Ging Cristobal, IGLHRC’s project coordinator for Asia and Pacific Islands, published a reflection on the papal visit. An excerpt: The visit was an inspiring moment to the majority of Filipinos where almost 80% are Catholics, while at the same time offered crucial insight into the limitations to Pope Francis’ apparent openness about welcoming lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) individuals of faith to the church….

‘How Pentecostal Christianity Is Taking Over the World’: An Interview with Author Elle Hardy

By Katherine Stewart

…with evangelicalism. This is particularly prevalent in sub-Saharan Africa, Asia and Latin America, but also in the West too. Spiritual Warfare isn’t simply about the salvation of individuals; there’s a belief that evil spirits operate ‘strategically,’ i.e. in geographical areas and institutions. So people who advocate these types of ideas might say that the Las Vegas strip or the Democratic Party or their local school board has been taken over by…