Religion Dispatches
…sk: “which way’s north?” Or south, or east, or west. I’d smile, and turn south, and point out the World Trade Center. I’d tell them: Just keep an eye on that, and you’ll always know where to go. But there was just smoke, and it stole more and more of the sky, overcoming that beautiful September morning with a sick smell. If Eid ul-Fitr falls on the anniversary of that day, it will be an especially difficult task for a Muslim in New York. Many of o…
Read More…ing on an intensifying anti-gay crackdown in Egypt following social media outrage about a rainbow flag being waved at a rock concert by a Lebanese band whose lead singer is openly gay. Alexandra Zavis at the Los Angeles Times reports that the brutal crackdown “has gay and transgender Egyptians asking: Is it time to leave?” “The problem is that no one can tell the limit of this crackdown and how far it might go,” said Mostafa, a community activist…
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…nse. That is all well and good, though I hope the show may ultimately be used not simply for a more sophisticated form of a myth of religious innocence, but to scrutinize the assumptions and elisions that lay behind that national story….
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…dium on November 1 as a ‘blitzkrieg moment.’” The PfAW report also points out that “while complaining about opponents of the proposition ‘raising millions of dollars from wealthy gay Americans,’ campaign organizers said they have already raised $15 million of their minimum $23 million [including a reported $500,000 gift from Wildmon’s American family Association and $400,000 from James Dobson’s Focus on the Family] budget and have plans for specia…
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…l and unnatural forms of contraception. Catholicism most famously talks about this, but I was surprised to discover that it wasn’t just religions—even people who are anti-religion have also embraced the idea that natural contraception (however defined) is good, and unnatural birth control (again, however understood) is bad. And what ends up happening is that people try to shoehorn whatever it is that they want to believe is good into an understand…
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…o-life, conservative state. Senator Crain’s office did not return repeated phone calls, but according to The Daily Beast, he “said the bill is simply a statement that Oklahoma is ‘pro-life.’” Senate Pro Tem Brian Bingman said much the same thing, according to Reuters, offering that “Oklahoma is a conservative pro-life state—we are proud to stand up for what we know is right.” Well, yes, it feels very good to be proud of things, doesn’t it? Might I…
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…And commenter Karen West writes: “Lila has the beauty and brains to do any number of things, but instead, she is laying down her life for those most innocent of all.” But not everyone on the religious right believes that Lila Rose is acting out God’s will, let alone laying down her life. After all, Lila Rose lies in order to get the footage she seeks. She and her colleagues pose as underage pregnant teens, as sex traffickers, as statutory rapists….
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…. Schneiderman’s article “Flock Is Now a Fight Team in Some Ministries” about the “growing number of evangelical churches that have embraced mixed martial arts—a sport with a reputation for violence and blood that combines kickboxing, wrestling, and other fighting styles—to reach and convert young men, whose church attendance has been persistently low.” Jesus Didn’t Tap offers the newly converted Christian-inspired threads that won’t clash with th…
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…Muslim, Pakistani-Americans? This isn’t really a question the essay sets out to answer, but it’s revealing, isn’t it? American Islam is tremendously variegated, as indeed is the conservative movement, as the essay itself reveals. But do all American Muslims cluster together, culturally and politically, because they are Muslim? Is their (our/my) Islam more important than anything else? The point comes out more forcefully here: Read this again. “Cu…
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…opting this new technology. Although Altman is happy to state his fears about AI out loud, for most of us it’s hard to do so without sounding hyperbolic. The Talmud has no such qualms. Regarding the technology of the written word, theologically, the Talmud contends, what was at stake was no less than the opportunity for a relationship with the Divine. When thoughts are written down, they lose their flavor, their spirit, their intentionality. Stren…
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