Religion Dispatches
…tist Convention in 2007: “I thank the Southern Baptists who are working to promote a culture of life abroad by helping lead the fight against… HIV/AIDS. In Uganda, Southern Baptists sponsor… True Love Waits…. And now we’re building on the success by expanding this important programs to six more countries in Africa.” If Christianity has a number of mechanisms to support abstinence and the identity of the one who abstains, it does not employ similar…
Read More…Christians is not reason enough for a divorce and, more often than not, is code for “serious sin.” Pentecostals have a history of being strict about reasons to divorce, adultery being scripturally the only reason to do so. For those who divorce and who have a denominational affiliation through ministerial license, a divorce can mean, at best, additional scrutiny and at worst, stripping of ministerial credentials. Of course, that never has stopped…
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…the opportunity to walk through Black Woman is God: Reprogramming that God Code with Oakland native Seneferu and to ask her about the artwork and the movement it means to inspire. _________ Anita Little: Can you tell me more about what led you to curate this unbelievable collection? Karen Seneferu: I’ve been fortunate enough to be in gallery spaces or museums where I was able to show my own artwork, but I was either the only black artist or the on…
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…ly career-ending situation in the Marines, where failure to obtain regular promotions results in being discharged. Moreover, as a woman in the military, accustomed to proving herself to her male peers over her six-year career, Amy was wary of appearing a “weak female.” “If you get sent home for something like that, everyone will know about it,” says Amy. “That’s a really bad stigma in the military. I thought, that’s not me, I’ve worked harder and…
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…nd active commitment to “social justice,” something that Beck has said are code words for Communism and Nazism. Look, Frank Capra wasn’t exactly known for his subtle messages. Yet, somehow, Beck manages to reinterpret the movie through an unregulated free-market ideological Ayn Rand prism and message of Christian conservatism. For real? Either Beck has never watched the movie, or he’s so conservatively deluded that he thinks Mr. Potter is the hero…
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…our brains, which makes the admonition “an eye for an eye” in Hammurabi’s code sound less like savagery and more like a way to keep everybody in check. To punish more than the guilt deserves has been a legal problem, apparently, since at least 1792 B.C.E or so. The distinction between justice and vengeance matters, because vengeance costs an enormous amount to taxpayers, and, as reformers on both sides of the aisle argue, our own moral selves. Pe…
Read More…efs; and is a non-profit organization as described in the Internal Revenue Code. Religious organizations protested that this four-pronged test would only exempt houses of worship, but not, say, a church that served people of different faiths through a soup kitchen. Under the new proposed rule (which is still subject to a public comment period), an employer seeking an exemption would only have to meet the forth prong of the test, thus widely expand…
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…ustice, immigration, and the environment). Instead they support NIF, which promotes on-the-ground change. But the attack by Im Tirtzu signals an end to business as usual. Following the Money Im Tirtzu calls itself a centrist organization that wants to strengthen political Zionism. But according to an investigative report by Ha’aretz, the movement is funded by right-wing groups and individuals, including John Hagee, the controversial Texas minister…
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…? Why? In addition to Mitch Duneier’s Sidewalk, I would say Eli Anderson’s Code of the Street. It’s such a wonderful example of using the ethnographic method to dig beneath common stereotypes and reveal the social dynamics underlying a supposedly well-understood phenomenon. In his case, he’s looking at the situation of inner-city violence among young African American men. By carefully observing, listening, documenting, and then analyzing, he is ab…
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…lical fundamentalists, they wrote, is the xenophobia and Islamophobia that promotes “walls and purifying deportations.” “Triumphalist, arrogant and vindictive ethnicism is actually the opposite of Christianity,” they said. AP’s Rachel Zoll called La Civilta Cattolica Antonio Spadaro “a close confidant” of Pope Francis. Conservative Archbishop Charles Chaput responded in a commentary, calling the article “an exercise in dumbing down and inadequatel…
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