Search for "cheap airline tickets asia phone number 1-800-299-7264"

Will the Taliban Actually Remain Somewhat Moderate This Time?

By Mark Juergensmeyer

…freedom-loving urban constituency. Throughout Afghanistan people have cell phones and access to the internet. It’ll be difficult to have the same kind of social control two decades later. Another factor is the way the Taliban came to power in recent months. In February 2020, then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo represented President Donald Trump in meetings with Taliban representatives in Qatar. Trump essentially surrendered to the Taliban in excha…

President Joe Biden at a podium with a microphone in hand.

Biden’s Embrace of ‘Victory Culture’ is a Victory for Toxic White Christianity

By Peter Laarman

…eaths. I’m not here to trash Biden but to probe the psychology of the vast numbers of White Americans whose peace of mind appears to rest on the consoling idea of American global dominance, who glory in the extravaganza that is our trillion-dollar military budget, and who are only too willing to think of this deeply troubled country as “the indispensable nation.” These are not people whose sleep is troubled by the deaths of faraway children. None…

Undercover-ed Religion: 13 Stories That Went Missing in 2012

By Peter Laarman

…e pro-queer side. Pollster/strategy consultant Amy Simon went before large numbers of liberal Christian leaders in battleground states to say, in effect, “Please don’t duck what your own religion has to say about this. Try behaving like Jesus for once.” And Simon was only one of many out there, working hard and bringing in sheaves of religious voters for equal rights. It seems to have worked. 8. Body of this Death It wasn’t just gay bodies that go…

Global LGBT Recap: Homogeopolitics; Dalai Lama Says Gay is OK; Pope Says Civil Unions May Be

By Peter Montgomery

…s worldwide still criminalize homosexuality, and it seems likely that this number will grow. There already are efforts to duplicate Russia’s anti-LGBT “propaganda” laws in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, and there are attempts to emulate Nigeria and Uganda’s new laws in other African countries. With a single decision by the Indian Supreme Court in December, homosexuality was recriminalized in a nation home to 1.23 billion people. Dominoes are goi…

Could Orthodoxy Be Having its Vatican II Moment?

By Chrissy Stroop

…parts of the globe not usually associated with Orthodox Christianity, from Asia, Africa, Western Europe, and from North America. In and of itself, such a universal gathering represents a singular and significant event in the life of the Church demonstrating the new global reach of Orthodox Christianity. The council should focus the attention of the Churches away from solely parochial and local concerns to a broader perspective on Church life. None…

What Can Ancient India Tell Us About Our World?

By Bruce Rich

…, political science, ancient history, religion, Buddhism, India, and South Asia. Are you hoping to just inform readers? Give them pleasure? Piss them off? I found the stories and the [philosophies] of Ashoka and Kautilya fascinating and thought-provoking, and I tried to communicate this to readers. Most of all, I hope that it helps people think a bit more deeply and broadly about where our world is going and how the approach of two of the greatest…

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…

Studying Religion is Suddenly Popular

By Mark Hulsether

…diversity,” deserving about the same amount of resources as Ancient South Asia or Chinese Religion in the Twelfth Century? Far from being embarrassed that Religious Studies is a good place to study how the history and current practice of Christianity shapes everyday American life, I maintain that this is a major reason the discipline has thrived—both in the past and present. In fact, the relatively “esoteric” parts of religious studies are more l…

How to Meet Muslims: A (Cinematic) Primer

By Haroon Moghul

…the steamy plains of the Punjab but raised in gelid New England. And South Asia’s a part of the world we never stop hearing about. Of course, most of this attention is directed to Pakistan, so let’s start there. In Silent Waters, we follow a young man from a small village impressed by the Islamist message coming from more urban types. But his falling for the forces of extremism doesn’t come without a price, not least for the secrets buried in the…

Boy Gets Boy, Saves Earth: A Gay Christian Writer’s Plan to Change the World

By Nick Street

…e Milk and Brokeback that straight people get behind,” Moore said in a telephone interview from his home in New York City. “The heroes die terrible deaths or endure terrible tragedies. And the characters like us that we see on TV are often the gay version of the Stepin Fetchit stereotype. Mine will be the first show where the gay character is a true hero and he isn’t doomed.” Moore’s novel, a “Best of 2008” selection by the young-adult division of…