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‘Rising Global Tide’ Of Anti-Gay Crackdowns; More in Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…ip. This is a particularly sensitive time for that relationship. Political commentator and religious history scholar Altay Goyushov notes that the LGBT raids come during Muharram, one of the holiest times in the Islamic calendar, which may be an effort to appease religious groups. Nils Muižnieks, Commissioner for Human Rights of the Council of Europe, sent a letter to the Azeri government asking for information about recent arrests and detentions…

U.S. Religious Right Groups Support Move Toward ‘Illiberalism’ of Hungary and Poland; and More in Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…Montreal in August. A new international coalition, the Global LGBTQI Francophone Initiative” is in the process of coming together and working together “to end governmental and societal repression of sexual and gender minorities.” A U.S. vote against a United Nations resolution condemning the death penalty for “same-sex relations” and other acts provoked widespread outrage, leading U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley to tweet, “Fact: There was…

Eclipseville, USA: The Birthplace of ‘Little Green Men’ Proudly Hosts The Point of Greatest Eclipse

By Matthew Bowman

…le’s boosters promise that the town has enough bed-and-breakfasts and cell phone towers to transform the eclipse into a comfortable tourist experience, there is a fundamental strangeness to the whole affair that no amount of merchandizing can fully defang. That it’s hard to reduce the weirdness of things like the eclipse hasn’t stopped Hopkinsville from trying. More than a half-century ago, on Monday, August 22, 1955, news media around the country…

Southern Baptist Convention Kicks Out Gay Attendees, Waffles on White Supremacists

By Sunnivie Brydum

…as Robertson wrote on his Huffington Post blog about the incident, he was coming off a first day of the conference that was “filled with wonderful conversations with pastors of churches, large and small, which were eager to hear my story and I, theirs.” Robertson told RD that everyone affiliated with FIA had gone to great lengths to maintain warm, welcoming postures, and were not looking to be confrontational. Robertson says that he, Mitchell and…

Maybe The Question Is: Should Shabbat Be The New Yoga?

By Michael Schulson

…ces will be framed: as communal or theological obligations? As sometimes-uncomfortable challenges to the status quo? Or as comforting practices that serve personal well-being? Shabbat can be all of these things at once, of course. But I do suspect that companies like Arq, the Brooklyn Jewish lifestyle startup, offer a kind of warning. On a day that is traditionally set aside from consumption, Arq’s guide to observing Shabbat offers, essentially, s…

Duterte Cites Catholic Heritage in Opposing Marriage Equality, and More in the Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…t announces congressional run LGBT activist Luis Larraín announced a bid for a seat in the Chilean House of Deputies; national elections will be held on November 19. Cambodia: Report on growing visibility of LGBT community “Cambodia’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community is coming out with an assertion of unprecedented pride,” reports Voice of America, “in stark contrast to just five years ago when discrimination and bullying we…

Anti-LGBT Culture Warriors On The March; More in Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…dance between the west and the rest. … One could well ask whether the LGBT community have any friends in Azerbaijani politics whatsoever. When approached for comment, several of Azerbaijan’s opposition politicians did not seem willing to engage with the topic. Isa Gambar, former leader of Müsavat, the country’s largest opposition party, said that he remained sceptical of both the interior ministry’s statements on the detention and the accounts of…

Why Notre Dame’s Contraception Flip-Flop Undercuts Bishops’ Religious Freedom Claims

By Patricia Miller

…therefore much more supportive of it. When Notre Dame was finally able to come down off its culture-war high horse and look at the facts, they realized that there was a perfectly acceptable compromise that would, in its words, recognize “the plurality of religious and other convictions among its employees” while allowing the university to officially state that it’s not providing contraceptives. Notre Dame and other Catholic organizations were her…

William Barber And The Religious Left Join Forces. Will It Work?

By Daniel Schultz

…be I’m wrong, and this strategy call has some kind of secret weapon to overcome those divisions. Prayer and appeals to common values won’t do it, and unless they have something that will, the project is going exactly nowhere. Problem two is this: American self-segregation and gerrymandering are irreducibly a matter of race. It’s not a coincidence that the strongest and most firmly gerrymandered Republican seats are also overwhelmingly white. Add t…

Does It Matter If Islam Is A Religion? An American Ahmadi Explains The Effects Of Religious Discrimination

By Daniel Schultz

…sign it, you’re ultimately considered to be a non-Muslim. That is how they come up with a gauge. It starts to creep into everything. So now if I’m trying to open up a bank account, I’m doing a cell phone application, or anything, that statement is there, it has just gone into everything, every aspect of one’s life, it’s there. It’s ridiculous to have that, but nonetheless it’s real. The problems are not just administrative: Ahmadis have a “glass c…